Suppose you could replace an otherwise healthy, non-self-conscious human with another possible, healthy, non-self-conscious human (who otherwise would not have existed). What makes the replacement permissible is that existing, non-self-conscious humans are a lot like existing non-self-conscious fish.
. . . beings who are conscious but not self-conscious more nearly approximate the picture of recepticles for experiences of pleasure and pain, because their preferences will be of a more immediate sort. They will not have desires that project their images of their own existence into the future. Their conscious states are not linked over time. We can presume that if fish become unconscious, then before the loss of consciousness they would have no expectations or desires for anything that might happen subsequently, and if they regain consciousness, they have no awareness of having previously existed. Therefore if the fish were killed while unconscious and replaced by a similar number of other fish who could be created only because the first group of fish were killed, there would, from the point of view of fishy awareness, be no difference between that and the same fish losing and regaining consciousness. (Practical Ethics, 126 ff.)
This is an interesting claim, but it is difficult to see how it could be true.
Suppose it is true that P's life is simply one experience of pleasure at t1 and another experience of pleasure at t2. Since P does not conceive of himself as a single being that exists at two distinct times, t1 and t2, we are told that there is no morally important metaphysical difference between a world w in which P experiences E at t1 and P experiences E' at t2 and a world w' in where P is killed at t0, replaced by P', and P' experiences E at t1, and P' experiences E' at t2. The conditions for P's endurance over t1 and t2 include a level of psychological connectedness that does not obtain.
But if that were true then at every moment of a non-self-conscious human's (NSC) life there would exist a being that is not linked in any metaphysically interesting way with the being of the preceding moment. At each moment we have effectively a distinct conscious being.
1. If it is true that at every moment of a NSC human's life there exists a being that is not linked in any metaphysically interesting way with a being of the preceding moment, then it is not possible to take the life of any conscious but non-self-conscious human, P. At each moment t, P has exhausted his temporal existence and another being P' has come into existence.
2. If it is true that at every moment of a NSC human's life there exists a being that is linked in an metaphysically interesting way with a being of the preceding moment, then it is not permissible to take the life of any non-self-conscious human, P. At each moment t, P has short-term desires that will be frustrated by taking P's life.
Consequence (1) is absurd. Certainly we can take the life of a non-self-conscious human being. But then we are left with consequence (2).
You write: "But if that were true then at every moment of a non-self-conscious human's (NSC) life there would exist a being that is not linked in any metaphysically interesting way with the being of the preceding moment. At each moment we have effectively a distinct conscious being."
I am unclear as to what you mean here. How do we get from a NSC to there being a conscious being? Please explain.
I am unclear as to what you mean here. How do we get from a NSC to there being a conscious being?
I probably wasn't clear. We are assuming that the non-persons are conscious but not self-conscious. So they have no awareness of themselves as distinct beings or selves, but they do have conscious experiences. The idea, if I'm folloing the argument Singer offers, is that the sequence of conscious experiences are not connected in the right way for them to be the experiences of an enduring human being or, maybe, an enduring human self. I'm trying to avoid the use of 'person', since trivially there is no enduring person.
Mike
Thanks for the clarification. I see your point.
In consequence 1, the problem that I have is that I think you do not make a distinction between 'life' and 'consciousness.' P at t1 and t2 would be the same living P even if was not consciousness of what independently happened at t1 and t2. My dog Rufus eats at t1 and eats again at t2. He is conscious of eating at t1 and t2 but not conscious of having eaten at t1 when he is eating at t2. He would have to be self-aware in order to make the connection between what happened at t1 and t2. He does not know that he is the same dog that ate at t1 when he is eating at t2. But I do. I am the one who makes the connection, which enables me to say that the experiences of P are related even if P does not, and cannot, make this relationship. Internally to P, P may have no idea of temporal existence, However self-aware beings do and subsequently can attach temporality to non-self aware beings. I know that P at t2 is the same P as the one at t1. Because of this I may think that it is not permissible to kill P because there is only one P and I value that P.
In consequence 1, the problem that I have is that I think you do not make a distinction between 'life' and 'consciousness.' P at t1 and t2 would be the same living P even if was not consciousness of what independently happened at t1 and t2. My dog Rufus eats at t1 and eats again at t2. He is conscious of eating at t1 and t2 but not conscious of having eaten at t1 when he is eating at t2.
Consequence (1) is just one possible consequence of Singer's argument. If we suppose that the persistence conditions for Rufus are not the persistence conditions for a material object, but rather the persistence conditions for a conscious being, then what you have are a series of Rufuses (Rufi?)--a series of independent conscious states that are no more a single conscious being than are, taekn together, the conscious state of Rufus at t1 and the conscious state of Bongo at t2. On the other hand, if Rufus is a material object, then I think Singer is right. He is replaceable without moral cost.
It seems to me that Singer is wrong, at least regarding certain types of NSC beings. Using Rufus as an example, how do we explain how Rufus recognizes me at t2? It would seem to me that if Singer is correct, then Rufus at t2 should not remember me if that experience is completely isolated from the experience at t1. I take it that in order for Singer's argument to work it is not possible for a 'new' Rufus to recognize me at t2, but certainly he does. It seems to me that many of the experiences he has relies on him 'remembering' prior experiences of a similar nature around which he builds a set of response attitudes (beliefs) to certain stimuli, similar to what happens when I see my wife after an absence. Self-awareness is a puzzle in so far as from my self-aware perspective, I can only know that I am self-aware. I infer others self-awareness based on clues derived from experiencing them and relating them to how I perceive the experiences we are sharing. The more others resemble me in response to the shared experience, the more I am inclined to confer self-awareness on them. So, is Rufus self-aware? I think so in so far as self-awareness would admit to degrees. At times I am less self-aware and at times I may not be self-aware at all. What I am getting at is that Singer's argument on replacabilty rests on conclusions about others that do not seem to be completely warranted. They seem a bit ad hoc.
Does that leave us with #2? I think a problem arises around, "then it is not permissible to take the life of any non-self-conscious human, P. At each moment t, P has short-term desires that will be frustrated by taking P's life." First, there is a change between 1 and 2 from what is possible to what is permissible. That would need to be explained. Additionally it seems clear that in certain circumstances it is permissible to kill a NSC being. For example, if that being is suffering and the suffering cannot be alleviated, or if a SC being loses her self-awareness and has made it clear prior to losing her self-awareness that she wants to die if certain conditions persist.
So I think both 1 and 2 are both wrong. What do you think?
Does that leave us with #2? I think a problem arises around, "then it is not permissible to take the life of any non-self-conscious human, P. At each moment t, P has short-term desires that will be frustrated by taking P's life." First, there is a change between 1 and 2 from what is possible to what is permissible
Yes, in (2) the question is whether it is permissible to kill a being that has desires or preferences that reach across times t1 and t2 in order to replace him with another being. I think Singer's answer ought to be no. It ought to be no for the same reasons that it is not permissible to kill and replace a person. Person's have prefenrecnes that reach over longer periods of time, but it is not clear to me why that should matter. Persons have explicit preferences for continued existence, but again I can't see why one would have to have that preference explicitly. If a non-person wants at t1 to experience more happiness at t2, then it would be strange to add, but the non-person does not want at t1 to continue to exist at t2.
So my point is that, once we have preferences reaching across times, it really does not matter (or should not for Singer) whether those preferences reach long term or short term. Recallm his argument against the permissiblity of replacing persons is that it results in the frustration of preferences. That's supposed to be wrong.