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Dignity, Disability, and Lifespan
Author(s) -
Kerstein Samuel J.
Publication year - 2017
Publication title -
journal of applied philosophy
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.339
H-Index - 30
eISSN - 1468-5930
pISSN - 0264-3758
DOI - 10.1111/japp.12158
Subject(s) - dignity , argument (complex analysis) , value (mathematics) , value of life , position (finance) , psychology , medicine , law , computer science , political science , economics , microeconomics , finance , machine learning
In the P araplegia C ase, we must choose either to preserve the life of a paraplegic for 10 years or that of someone in full health for the same duration. Non‐consequentialists reject a benefit‐maximising view, which holds that since the person in full health will have a higher quality of life, we ought to save him straightaway. In the U nequal L ifespan C ase, we face a choice between saving one person for 5 years in full health and another for 25 years in full health. Frances K amm has recently unfurled an E qual R espect A rgument in an effort to support the position that while we ought to give each person a 50% chance of being saved in the P araplegia C ase, we are morally permitted to save straightaway the person who would live longer in the U nequal Lifespan case. The article tries to show that a K ant‐inspired account of the dignity of persons is far more successful than K amm's argument in supporting this position. The K ant‐inspired account owes this success to its conceiving of respect for persons not primarily as respect for their pursuit of what is of value for them, but rather as respect for the value in them.