Ms. Dwyer states that her class has two main aims: (1) to introduce some central concepts in ethical theory and moral reasoning; and (2) to help begin to develop views that can be articulated and defended about the aforementioned topics.
I don't need to defend my "no" answer to the harm of pornography. My answer is no one's business to debate.
The second question, "Should the state censor or restrict the publication of pornography?", is a proper question of ethics as an answer to "Does man need values at all--and why?" Dwyer's first question assumes there are questions of value/harm in the use of pornography and leaves no opening to disagree.
The question about "should the state..." opens the real door to an ethical debate.
Dwyer writes in the Outline: "Here are two of my guiding assumptions in teaching this class. First, controversial and emotional topics admit of systematic scrutiny. Second, careful attention to these issues will help us see what particular views are defensible. We ought to be able both to explain why we hold the moral views we do and to justify the views we hold to others. I do not believe that all possible views about these matters are defensible; some positions are just mistaken or stupid. Nonetheless, there is a range of defensible views."
So, in Dwyer's class, I would be expected to admit that the question of whether pornography is harmful contains elements that not only can be systematically scrutinized, but contains things I must defend. And I will admit such elements exist--in psychology. In ethics, they are no one's business but of the man or woman who uses the porn.
The next question about the right to determine the manner and time of our own deaths would be better stated something like this: "In a society based on individual sovereignty, what philosophical position would be required by the government for said government to think it has the right to prevent one's personal choice of the manner and time of his/her own death?"
That puts an entirely different spin on the epistemology of the question by putting it right where it belongs. But asking whether or not we have the right, skips over the question of how we get from the state-of-nature where as an individual no one could prevent us, to the state of a nation of laws that would think it had the ethical right to do such a thing.
But stating her questions as she does, Dwyer gives no leeway for a dissent that such a question--as asked--is appropriate. As Dwyer states, each question holds controversial and emotional content. The content is often not, however, ethical but psychological; or it skips right over what ought to be Ethics 101, namely, "What is Are Proper Subjects of Ethics in a Free Society?"
As I regularly make the point of repeating once or twice a week under various subject headings, "Individual sovereignty was not a peculiar conceit of Thomas Jefferson: It was the common assumption of the day..." Kelley L. Ross, Ph.D. "American Sphinx, The Character of Thomas Jefferson"; http://www.friesian.com/ellis.htm I am able to repeat it as often as I do because "individual sovereignty" begins as an epistemological and metaphysical position, becomes ethical, and then as you can see moves on to becoming political. As such, it covers almost every human activity, from 1) those which ought to be kept behind closed doors; to 2) those about which no one has the right to inquire of others; to 3) those which have no business being discussed as something law may intrude into, ("those powers not delegated"); to 4) those subjects about which civilization and law have legitimate interests in discussing and perhaps intruding into (powers delegated.)
Whether or not pornography, for example, is "harmful," fits into 3), except that "feminist theorists" such as Dwyer examine it outside its ethical concepts as a right.
"The suggestion that pornography
has a "'cathartic" effect on its consumers often figures in arguments against
the restriction or prohibition of pornography, whereas anti -pornography
theorists tend to focus on the claim that pornography has significant negative
effects. In other words, empirical considerations play a role in arguments both
for and against pornography. So the success of these arguments partly depends on
what can be established about the connection between pornography and various
types of behavior and attitudes." The Problem of Pornography
Other feminist authors lay claim that it is harmful to the family; that it makes "objects" of women; that it lowers men's respect for women; and that it sometimes "causes" men to rape.
"[I]n my theoretical model, pornography can induce a desire to rape women in males who previously had no such desire, and it can increase or intensify the desire to rape in males who already have felt this desire. [I] will provide the evidence for the four different ways in which pornography can induce this predisposition." Diana E.H. Russell, PhD. "Against Pornography: The Evidence of Harm"
As to Dwyer's remark about the empirical nature of the "considerations," I would submit that there are no empirical considerations about the role of government in regulating an activity, per se. The argument needs to begin with, "No matter the empirical data, is the government the Constitutionally authorized regulator?"
As for Russell's argument, I would argue that pornography cannot suddenly anesthetize a male against the ethics which previously left him with no desire or prevented a desire to rape, that such an immediate desire could be induced by reading about a rape in the newspaper if that male was so inclined to ignore ethics, and that if he can be anesthetized against his own morals, or be so easily persuaded to become passive of them from the hormonal or psychological changes within him that were caused by a newspaper story or a photo or a movie then: A) he has either acted criminally, or B) he can validly mount an insanity defence at his trial.
But this Academy article is not about pornography. It is not about feminist ideals of an engineered society. It is not about Dwyer, Dworkin, or Russell's ideas about porn and feminism and supposed harm.
This article is
about the epistemic basis for the questions posed in ethics; for the syntax of the questions (and answers); and about ignoring whether it is the right question to ask when teaching students to ask questions."How is punishment justified?"
Ask first how its absence can go unjustified? Are the victims not to be thought of? Is the initiator of violence or coercion not to be automatically considered the object of jurisprudence? How is a civilization to survive if punishment upon judgment of guilt is not administered?"Is it permissible for a doctor to kill a patient at that patient’s request?"
In a state of nature where only two people existed, (think Promethius and The Golden One in Ayn Rand's "Anthem," where they abandonded "civiliation" for the rationality of living alone as a couple,) who would prevent one person from taking the life of another rather than leave the other to suffer beyond what the other desired to suffer? The healthy person who had to make the choice could certainly make an ethical and moral decision not to commit euthanasia. But no third party ought to be able to prevent it when the third party is aware of the patient's desire. No doctor can be forced to commit euthanasia; but no doctor should be prevented from it, in a just society that recognizes one's sovereign right to his own life--and to relinquish it when he wishes."What is the right to life?"
If the right to life is not defined as "sovereign ownership of one's body and mind", then rational civilization as understood in the revolutionary ideas of the Constitution will be forever lost, never to be touched again by objective jurisprudence. So long as one sovereign does not impose unlawfully on the sovereignty of another to the degree that the law demands he forfeit his life, then he has a right to his life."Is the human fetus a person?"
This is actually and unquestionably one of the right questions to ask. The problem is in the prevention of theistic (theological) concepts being introduced and accepted as valid. There is no science to back up the claim that soul is anything more than consciousness of one's conscience. Therefore, a fetus, having no conscience, has no soul, and it is the transcendentalism of the soul that theists argue for when they argue against abortion. To take the high road and say we cannot prove that transcendentalism of the soul is not real and so abortion must be prevented, is to take the low road in the definition of a woman's sovereign ownership of her own body. It may be more than a parasite in her body; but it is not a fully-realized human in the sense of having been endowed with its own sovereignty. Until it has been born or is viable, it ought have no sovereignty (except, I would argue, when it has been harmed, such as when its mother is murdered.)"What is the relation between morality and the law?"
This is as valid as the question can be made. This relationship is the first question of jurisprudence and jurisprudence is derived directly from ethics.When a question of ethics is posed without context, or with a political spin built in, or with syntax that would make it a "leading" question in a court of law, it has no business being posed in a freshman class.
Those freshmen have not even learned yet to ask the most important question of ethics:
"What give you the right to suggest remedies
to questions which, if implemented in the positive, would limit my
unalienable sovereignty and increase your tyranny?"
But how many graduate students are aware that they are sovereign individuals, if they handle their legal affairs correctly? How many are aware that they are not sovereign individuals if they accept the "citizens of the United States" clause of the Fourteenth Amendment?
How many professors bother teaching any of that information?
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