I am very curious about Sarte’s position on
people in vegetative states. In class, Dr. J said that Sarte would consider
them en-soi and in-human, therefore we would have no moral responsibility to
them. At first, this made complete sense to me. But after listening to the rest
of the lecture, I am not so sure. These people are in a permanent vegetative
state, and they cannot transcend this, as they have lost their ability to
think. However, could their Doctor not transcend this so-called “fact”? Sarte
believes that we must set projects for ourselves, and while they may seem
impossible, we have a duty to try and complete these. Look how far we have come
in science - it is completely reasonable to believe that we can repair severe
brain damage at some point. Since those in a vegetative state were once human,
and since it is possible that they can regain their humanity and their freedom,
do we not have a moral obligation to them just as we do to any other human? In
fact, aren't we in bad faith if we deny our ability to transcend – if we simply
resign ourselves to the status quo and chalk it up to facticity? If the Doctor
says to himself, “No, a doctor cannot help this man, because that is not what a
doctor can do,” is he not playing at being a doctor just as the waiter was
playing at being a waiter? The Doctor does not have to define himself by others
in his profession and their perceived limits.
However, if we take this ability to transcend as
true, we have other problems. If we choose to use our time and effort for
finding a cure for people in permanent vegetative states, we choose to take
away our time and effort from finding a cure for cancer, or malaria, or AIDS.
Do you not still have a moral obligation to those people who suffer from those
diseases? Since they are still human, and have the ability to think for
themselves, is it stronger that the obligation to the potential human? Or, if they are terminal, do you have just as much
obligation to them as the potential human? They are condemned to die just as
the person in the vegetative state is. But we are all condemned to die someday
- so what is the cutoff? And if the person in the permanent vegetative state is
a potential human, and we have no obligation to him, then what does that say
about our stance on abortion? A fetus is not a human, but has the potential to
be one. Do we have an obligation to the fetus, but not the person in the vegetative
state? Why? Does amount of effort play a role in this decision (the fetus will
simply be born, while we must use many resources to revive the person in the
vegetative state)?
In regards to your first point it's important to differentiate between the doctor and the vegetable. The person in the vegetative state cannot make any projects for themselves, they are at this time cannot act and do not have any responsibilities or freedom, they are en-soi. The doctor on the other hand does have the responsibility to try and save the person in the vegetative state, because he is still able to make and carry out actions. You ask what the cutoff point for dying people is, to which I believe Sarte would say that as long as a person is living, even with a terminal illness, that we have the responsibility to try and help this person. Remember that Sarte basically gives us the task of being responsible of the world and all it's inhabitants, including those who will die. In regards to the fetus question, I think that because the fetus cannot act and set goals, it would be considered an en-soi, because being a fetus is all it can do.
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ReplyDeleteI agree with Caleigh that fetuses and people in vegetative states are beings en-soi. They cannot transcend their facticity – or the environment they find themselves in. It is true that some beings en-soi are en-soi for the duration of their existence while some beings en-soi have potential for transcendence. It makes sense for us to consider these two types of beings en-soi differently based on their potential. However, doing this kind of thinking is like doing the part of the utilitarian calculus where we predict the future and determine the value of things based on what they could become. This would mean that fetuses are not equal – considering that they have different potentials. We are justified to kill some fetuses but not others. A fetus that will develop with severe disabilities is worth much less than another. On a second note, we kill sperms all the time and never think too much about it – is this actually a moral thing to do? Wouldn’t some sperm worth much more than others based on their potential?
ReplyDeleteI think Sartre would disagree that we are only morally responsible for other beings in so far as they are also beings pour-soi. Instead, we are responsible for the welfare of beings en-soil as well as beings pour-soi. If a utilitarian calculus is what we could imagine to serve the whole world better, then we might have to say that the lives and happiness of many other animals and things in our planet matter more than a person in vegetative state or an unwanted fetus. Existentialism does not tell us what we should do about people in vegetative states or fetuses, it just tells us that we have the obligation to make a moral choice because whatever we do, we are responsible for the consequences our choice has on humanity and the world.
Also, a fetus cannot “just be born”. Child birth sucks the life out of the parent, if I may put it that way. The birth of child demands sacrifice of the time, emotion, energy, and sense of freedom of many adults. Every single choice we make, whether it is pulling the plug or abortion, we make an impact on the future of the world. This is what we must take into account when making any decision.
Does Sartre believe that we have moral responsibility to en-soi? I would think that we are only responsible for en-soi in that we must not eradicate them because of the harm it may cause to other por-soi. I think Sartre would say we are only responsible for the lives of other por-soi (why that is the case I am not certain). If we were responsible for the lives of en-soi, eating would always be an immoral decision (because both plants and animals are killed in the process). We would also be responsible for making sure that no animal kills another, but once you get there all life (except maybe plant life) will die from starvation. Even though I am not 100% sure as to why we are only responsible for other por-soi, I would not be able to say why we are responsible for en-soi. Getting to your question Megan, I think that if we define a vegetative person as en-soi, or non-human, then we have no responsibility to them (although doctors could still try and save them) but if they ever become "normal" then our responsibility to them would resume. The same goes for the fetus, and as we have discussed the problem seems to be how we define things. Do we consider a fetus or vegetative person "human" and therefore por-soi, or do we label them as non-human and en-soi?
ReplyDeleteI think everyone is assuming a moral system that Sartre talks nothing about, at least as far as our reading goes. What I have deduced--and I highly encourage everyone to read my most recent blog post concerning this... here is the link http://ethicsatrhodes2013.blogspot.com/2013/11/sartrean-responsibility-actually-is-not.html--is that Sartre's conception of responsibility has no moral implications on its own (if you disagree with this, you must read my blog post first so you understand how I got to this conclusion).
ReplyDeleteSo my question is: what obligations are you talking about? And I don't recall Sartre proposing a value system either.
I guess, it should be noted, that potentiality means nothing to Sartre, or most philosophers. Kant harps on a priori reasoning for this very reason--it isn't grounded in consequence or undetermined factors. In common speech, people often talk about potential as something more than what it actually is--nothing. For example, i've heard people talk about how many more great books David Foster Wallace would have written had he not written himself off of the planet. To Sartre, and to me, these conjectures make no since. In the same way, to think about a doctor considering the potential for future technology somehow saving a vegetable's life is inconsistent with reality.
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