Journal Club: The Moral Obligation to Create Children with the Best Chance of the Best Life

This month the Philosopher’s Eye is inviting discussion on the free article ‘The Moral Obligation to Create Children with the Best Chance of the Best Life’ written by Julian Savulescu and Guy Kahane, and the most cited article of 2010 published in the journal Bioethics.

What are your thoughts on the controversial topic discussed in this article? We invite your comments below…

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Abstract:
According to what we call the Principle of Procreative Beneficence (PB), couples who decide to have a child have a significant moral reason to select the child who, given his or her genetic endowment, can be expected to enjoy the most well-being. In the first part of this paper, we introduce PB, explain its content, grounds, and implications, and defend it against various objections. In the second part, we argue that PB is superior to competing principles of procreative selection such as that of procreative autonomy. In the third part of the paper, we consider the relation between PB and disability. We develop a revisionary account of disability, in which disability is a species of instrumental badness that is context- and person-relative. Although PB instructs us to aim to reduce disability in future children whenever possible, it does not privilege the normal. What matters is not whether future children meet certain biological or statistical norms, but what level of well-being they can be expected to have.

The Philosophy of Father’s Day

William Tell

Have you remembered Father’s Day? Father’s Day is a celebration honoring fathers and celebrating fatherhood, paternal bonds, and the influence of fathers in society. It is celebrated on the third Sunday of June in many countries and on other days elsewhere.

Check out this free article from The Philosophical Quarterly about things that we ought to do for our parents – do any of these theories apply to you?

FOUR THEORIES OF FILIAL DUTY by Simon Keller