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Mark Coeckelbergh: Growing moral relations: critique of moral status ascription
| Content Provider | Semantic Scholar |
|---|---|
| Author | Gunkel, David J. |
| Copyright Year | 2012 |
| Abstract | In the Structure of Scientific Revolutions, Thomas Kuhn (1962) famously distinguished between what he called ‘‘normal science’’ and those rare but necessary instances of paradigm shift, when there is a fundamental transformation in the very rules of the game. I do not think it is hyperbole to say that Mark Coeckelbergh’s Growing Moral Relations: Critique of Moral Status Ascription is a book that is situated at, and contributes to what can only be described as, a significant paradigm shift in moral thinking. It is, in other words, a real game changer. The subject of Coeckelbergh’s book is moral status ascription, or more precisely the problem of deciding who is morally significant and what is not. These two small, seemingly simple words, as Jacques Derrida (2005, p. 80) has reminded us, are not unimportant. They make all the difference, for they distinguish between persons who have moral standing and what are considered to be mere things. This decision (quite literally a cut that is made within the very fabric of existence) is typically enacted and justified on the basis of the intrinsic properties of the entity in question. Coeckelbergh calls this transaction ‘‘the properties approach to moral status ascription,’’ and the book begins with a penetrating analysis and critique of this ‘‘normal science.’’ The properties approach is rather straight forward and intuitive: ‘‘identify one or more morally relevant properties and then find out if the entity in question has them’’ (p. 14). But as Coeckelbergh insightfully points out, there are at least two persistent problems with this undertaking. First, how does one ascertain which properties are sufficient for moral status? In other words, which one, or ones, count? The history of moral philosophy can, in fact, be read as something of an on-going debate and competition over this matter with different properties—rationality, speech, consciousness, sentience, suffering, etc.—vying for attention at different times. Second, once the morally significant property has been identified, how can one be certain that a particular entity possesses it, and actually possesses it instead of merely simulating it? This is tricky business, especially because most of the properties that are considered morally relevant are internal mental states that are not immediately accessible or directly observable from the outside. In other words, even if it were possible to decide, once and for all, on the right property or mix of properties for moral standing, we would still be confronted and need to contend with a variant of the ‘‘other minds problem.’’ The history of moral philosophy can be interpreted as an ongoing (and perhaps even an inconclusive) struggle to respond to and resolve these two problems. And significant developments in the field are often the result of identifying some new criteria of inclusion. This is evident, for example, in animal rights philosophy, which, following the suggestions of Jeremy Bentham (2005), shifted attention from an active ability, like speech or conscious thought, to the passive capability of ‘‘Can they suffer?’’ (p. 283). Similarly recent efforts to address the moral status of machines, like artificial intelligence systems and robots, often propose clever reconfigurations of the Turing Test (see Allen et al. 2000; Sparrow 2004) to help ascertain whether an artificial entity actually possesses a particular property or not. Coeckelbergh, although recognizing the importance of these issues and debates, does not engage the question of moral status at this level. He realizes that this endeavor, although having the weight of tradition behind it, can only produce what G. W. F. Hegel called schlechte Unendlichkeit, a bad or spurious infinity that simply turns D. J. Gunkel (&) Dekalb, IL, USA e-mail: dgunkel@niu.edu |
| Starting Page | 239 |
| Ending Page | 241 |
| Page Count | 3 |
| File Format | PDF HTM / HTML |
| DOI | 10.1007/s10676-012-9308-8 |
| Alternate Webpage(s) | https://coeckelbergh.files.wordpress.com/2015/09/gunkelreview.pdf |
| Alternate Webpage(s) | https://doi.org/10.1007/s10676-012-9308-8 |
| Volume Number | 15 |
| Journal | Ethics and Information Technology |
| Language | English |
| Access Restriction | Open |
| Content Type | Text |
| Resource Type | Article |
