X-Message-Number: 15171
Date: Sun, 24 Dec 2000 09:49:37 -0800
From: Lee Corbin <>
Subject: To be or Not to be

Dani Kollin wrote in Message #15150
>...The question behind it all is what determines what is an
>ethical act?  Is female castration "ethical"?  To those that
>do it the answer is an unequivicable "yes".

>The Romans used to throw girl babies down the toilet upon
>birth with nary a thought. Perhaps they even thought it was
>the "right" thing to do.  Was it?

I was originally speaking of individual psychology and of
one's genetic predisposition (or lack thereof) to have innate
sympathy for others, or to be disposed to follow moral and
ethical teachings of one's community.

But you bring up very nice, and more important, questions.
Now, far be it from me to decry traditional teachings.
Mostly, these are very costly lessons painfully learned
over generations, and imbue societies with proven methods
of survival.  Still, each such teaching should be open to
criticism, especially if we restrict ourselves to criticizing
only one at a time, and avoid the urge to replace traditions
wholesale (as 20th century socialist experimenters were wont
to do).  All this is best explained in the writings of Hayek.

As for throwing babies down toilets, what do we know that
the Romans didn't know?  Perhaps indeed it wasn't really
wrong for them in their time; after all, they were very
successful.  (And by "wrong" here, I really can't mean
anything more than "I disapprove", since there isn't any
"good book" for me to consult.)

How different is it really from an abortion?  As for me, the
baby died rather quickly, and there are evolutionary reasons
to believe that it didn't suffer much.

What is different today is our incredible wealth!  We can 
afford to support undesired children (whereas perhaps the
Romans could not).  I submit that we should regard each human
life as quite valuable, and praise those (who we call parents)
who rescue people from non-existence.  In other words, abortion
is bad because someone doesn't get to live---but it's not quite
as bad as failing to conceive in the first place, for which a
lot of us are guilty.

My mother was the last of ten children, and my father was the
fifth-born in his family.  Thank goodness that no one ever
thought of planned parenthood back then!

Lee Corbin

Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=15171