AGAINST DR PETER KREEFT REGARDING ANTI-CHOICE ARGUMENT
(Utilitarianism)
RESPONSE #1 (Utilitarianism)
Dr. Kreeft begins his pro-life / anti-choice
argument with three presuppositions: things he will presume REASONABLE
pro-choicers and pro-lifers would accept.
Presupposition One: Ethics is not about
feelings. Moral reality is objectively real, otherwise no argument regarding
morality would be possible as everything would be about personal, subjective
feelings.
Presupposition Two: Because the distinction
between fact and value is not absolute, total moral relativism is impossible.
While some degree of moral relativism may apply in certain situations, morality
is largely grounded in metaphysics. What is REAL is a major determinant
regarding what is RIGHT. And to claim that something is RIGHT is to imply that
it is also REAL.
Presupposition Three: The value of something (in
this case, a person) is different from its function. Utilitarianism /
pragmatism are rejected as grounds for a pro-choice / pro-life argument.
My first counter-argument deals with
Presupposition Three.
I believe it is fatally flawed.
PRESUPPOSITION THREE
Here is Dr. Kreeft at about 7:07 into his
argument.
(Link to outline and video at the end for context.)
*****
7:07: There may even be a third hidden
presupposition in my argument and we may want to argue about that. And that is
that a certain theory in morality has to be implicitly rejected in order in
order to make sense of the pro-life argument and that is pragmatism or
utilitarianism. Let's define pragmatism and utilitarianism. They are different
philosophies in a sense but they both agree that, something like, the end
justifies the means.That if you can benefit some people by harming other people,
that that might be okay. That you calculate goodness or happiness or pleasure
quantitatively. And also that people are to be judged by function. That there's
no final end: everything is a means or instrument or function for something
else. So if you are not functioning in a complete way, a human way, a rational
way, an adult way, a useful way, a social way, a good way, that's terribly
important. It's the only thing that's important. What you are is not distinct
from what you do. And if you don't do good stuff than you aren't good stuff. In
other words the pragmatist or the utilitarian would not understand or would not
agree with the old adage that you must love the sinner even though you hate the
sin. 8:00
*****
So, you cannot calculate “goodness or happiness
or pleasure quantitatively” and you can’t judge the value of a person by their
function or utility.
QUADRILEMMA POSSIBILITY #2
About a half hour later, around 37:05, Dr.
Kreeft makes the following counter-argument against the pro-choice argument
that a fetus is human, but it is not yet a person.
This corresponds to the second possibility in
his Quadrilemma Argument: IF a fetus is not a person AND you know it,
then you are ethically off the hook.
He says that such an argument - that not all
humans are persons - has a dark history involving the Dred Scott decision,
forced sterilization, and Nazi eugenics.
Dr. Kreeft’s counter-argument is that
QuadrIIemma Option 2 is dependent on the category of “person” being smaller
than the category of human.
He believes that the category of “person” is
actually LARGER than the category of human and gives tenets of his Catholic
faith (the Trinity, angels) as examples of non-human entities who are
nonetheless persons.
He goes on to a SECULAR example.
*****
37:05 So either all humans are persons or some
humans are persons. I believe that all humans are persons. I believe the
category of person is larger, not smaller, than the category humans. As a
Christian I believe God is three Persons. I also believe angels are persons:
persons without bodies. I also believe it's possible that there are
extra-terrestrial persons of other species, biological species. But they are
rational, they have self-consciousness, they have free choice and therefore
moral responsibility. So ET is a person. 37:39
*****
The problem is that, in Presupposition #3, Dr.
Kreeft presupposes that it is unethical to judge the value of a person by the
function they perform or the utility or benefit they provide to society.
Yet, focusing JUST on his “alien” persons (we’ll
leave divine and angelic persons to some later time :-)) he says he would
consider them persons if they were “rational, they have self-consciousness,
they have free choice and therefore moral responsibility.”
BUT THAT IS EXACTLY WHAT HE SAID WE *CANNOT*
ETHICALLY DO: ASCRIBE PERSONHOOD ON SOME INDETERMINATE BEING ONLY IF THEY
FUNCTION LIKE A HUMAN BEING.
Presumably, were Dr. Kreeft to encounter an
alien entity that DID NOT perform those qualifying functions (rationality,
self-consciousness, free choice, moral responsibility), he would DENY that they
are persons: alien entities, maybe, even animalistic entities with primitive
thoughts and feelings, like farm animals, BUT NOT PERSONS ENTITLED TO THE LEGAL
PROTECTION DUE PERSONS.
CONCLUSION
Dr. Kreeft’s argument succumbs to the special
pleading logical fallacy by first saying that you cannot judge personhood based
on function or utility and then saying that, in an encounter with an alien
entity, he would do EXACTLY that: judging their personhood on their evidencing
rationality, self-consciousness, free choice, and moral responsibility.
In other words Dr. Kreeft reserves to himself
the right to determine that an entity that does not look like a human and does
not function as a human is not a person when dealing with extraterrestrials
that may or may not exist BUT WOULD DENY THAT RIGHT to a woman who must decide
whether to abort a pregnancy under ALL circumstances whether it be an early
term abortion based on being unready to care for the baby that will later result,
or whether the pregnancy was the result of incest or rape, and despite the fact
that having a baby under ANY circumstances will put her OWN life at risk.
Ethically serious people WHO ARE REASONABLE will
reject his argument.
Link to an outline of and the video of Dr. Peter Kreeft’s Pro-Life Argument at
The Inclusive Christian Blog
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