On Falibility of Human Conscience
And interesting comment from Rosalynde,
Setting aside the particular issue of abortion, I find the notion that technology informs our moral intuition fascinating and a little frightening. For one thing, it casts serious doubt on the moral legitimacy of private conscience; if the conscience is basically an internalized enforcer of social convention—shaped, of course, by technology and culture—then it doesn’t have any special authority against external claims.
And while this case breaks in a way that matches my own views, there is lots of biotechnology promoting an instrumental view of human identity that I find abhorrent. I’m not thrilled about the possibility that future generations’ conscience will reflect the assumptions of the next gadget coming out of the laboratory.
I saw Adam’s response to it, but I’m not sure I understood his point. Adam, care to enlighten us more on your thoughts?
Filed under: We transcend your bourgeois categories | No Tag
Adam Greenwood
February 4, 2010
BN,
my nightmare fodder post, immediately below this one, is the response you have in mind.
My idea is that if technological evidence shows that people who are in persistent vegetative states are sometimes actually conscious, then that will certainly change what our consciences tell us about what counts as being alive and when its appropriate to pull the plug.