The Moral Foundations of Parenthood

The Moral Foundations of Parenthood PDF

Author: Joseph Millum

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2018

Total Pages: 170

ISBN-13: 0190695439

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Most people believe that parents have moral rights and responsibilities regarding their children. These rights and responsibilities undergird the nuclear family and are essential to the flourishing of its members. However, their basis and contents are hotly contested. Do a child's genetic parents have a right to parent her? The importance of genetic ties is affirmed by many people's gut responses, everyday talk, and many court decisions, but the moral justification for tying parenthood rights to genetics is unclear. Parents are routinely permitted to make far-reaching decisions about their children's medical care, education, religious practice, and even how to punish them. When can parental rights be limited by the interests of the child or society? Matters are no more settled when it comes to parental responsibilities. It is commonly thought that if a man conceives a child through voluntary sexual intercourse he acquires parental responsibilities, even if he took every precaution against conception. On the other hand, sperm donors are widely-though not universally-thought to have no responsibilities towards their progeny. What is the basis for these disparate judgments? Parents are expected to do a lot for their children as they raise them. But there are surely limits. Sometimes parents have to balance the needs of multiple family members or just want to have time for themselves. What is the extent of their parental responsibilities? In The Moral Foundations of Parenthood, Joseph Millum provides a philosophical account of moral parenthood. He explains how parental rights and responsibilities are acquired, what those rights and responsibilities consist in, and how parents should go about making decisions on behalf of their children. In doing so, he provides a set of frameworks to help solve pressing ethical dilemmas relating to parents and children.

The Ethics of Parenthood

The Ethics of Parenthood PDF

Author: Norvin Richards

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2010-07-06

Total Pages: 304

ISBN-13: 0199889767

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In The Ethics of Parenthood Norvin Richards explores the moral relationship between parents and children from slightly before the cradle to slightly before the grave. Richards maintains that biological parents do ordinarily have a right to raise their children, not as a property right but as an instance of our general right to continue whatever we have begun. The contention is that creating a child is a first act of parenthood, hence it ordinarily carries a right to continue as parent to that child. Implications are drawn for a wide range of cases, including those of Baby Jessica and Baby Richard, prenatal abandonment, babies switched at birth and sent home with the wrong parents, and families separated by war or natural disaster. A second contention is that children have a claim of their own to have their autonomy respected, and that this claim is stronger the better the grounds for believing that what the child's actions express is a self of the child's own. A final set of chapters concern parents and their grown children. Views are offered about what duties parents have at this stage of life, about what is required in order to treat grown children as adults, and about what obligations grown children have to their parents. In the final chapter Richards discusses the contention that parents sometimes have an obligation to die rather than permit their children to make the sacrifices needed to keep them alive, arguing that a leading view about this undervalues both love and autonomy.

Conceptions of Parenthood

Conceptions of Parenthood PDF

Author: Michael W. Austin

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2016-05-23

Total Pages: 146

ISBN-13: 1317162528

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Our parents often have a significant impact on the content of our beliefs, the values we hold, and the goals we pursue and becoming a parent can also have a similar impact on our lives. In Conceptions of Parenthood Michael Austin provides a rigorous and accessible philosophical analysis of the numerous and distinct conceptions of parenthood. Issues considered are the nature and justification of parental rights, the sources of parental obligations, the value of autonomy, and the moral obligations and tensions present within interpersonal relationships. Austin rejects the 'proprietarian', 'best interests of the child', and 'biological' conceptions of parenthood as failing to generate parental rights and obligations but considers more sympathetically the 'custodial relationship', 'consent', and 'causal' conceptions of parenthood and ultimately defends a 'stewardship' conception. Finally Austin explores the 'stewardship' view for practical and moral questions related to family life and social policy regarding the family, such as the education of children, the religious upbringing of children and state licensing of parents.

The Ethics of Parenthood

The Ethics of Parenthood PDF

Author: Norvin Richards

Publisher: OUP USA

Published: 2010-07-06

Total Pages: 304

ISBN-13: 0199731748

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Introduction -- The rights of biological parents -- Who has parent rights? -- Whose child is this? -- Abuse, neglect, and the state -- The autonomy of children -- Raising a child -- Moral education -- Bad behavior -- Loving one another -- Having grown children -- Filial obligations -- The graceful exit.

Procreation, Parenthood, and Educational Rights

Procreation, Parenthood, and Educational Rights PDF

Author: Jaime Ahlberg

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2017-01-20

Total Pages: 435

ISBN-13: 1315465515

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Procreation, Parenthood, and Educational Rights explores important issues at the nexus of two burgeoning areas within moral and social philosophy: procreative ethics and parental rights. Surprisingly, there has been comparatively little scholarly engagement across these subdisciplinary boundaries, despite the fact that parental rights are paradigmatically ascribed to individuals responsible for procreating particular children. This collection thus aims to bring expert practitioners from these literatures into fruitful and innovative dialogue around questions at the intersection of procreation and parenthood. Among these questions are: Must individuals be found competent in order to have the right to procreate or to parent? What, if anything, can justify parents' special authority over, or special obligations toward, their children, particularly children they biologically procreate? How is the relationship between the right to procreate and the right to parent best understood? How ought liberal societies understand the parent-child relationship and the rights and claims it gives rise to? A distinguishing feature of the collection is that several of its chapters address these issues by drawing on philosophical work in the realm of education, one of the most controversial areas in the ethics of parenthood. This book represents a distinctive synthesis of topics and literatures likely to appeal to scholars and advanced students working across a wide range of disciplines.

Procreation and Parenthood

Procreation and Parenthood PDF

Author: David Archard

Publisher: Oxford University Press, USA

Published: 2016-01-02

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13: 9780198748151

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Seven essays on some of the main ethical issues raised by producing and rearing children.

Pursuing Parenthood

Pursuing Parenthood PDF

Author: Paul Lauritzen

Publisher:

Published: 1993

Total Pages: 200

ISBN-13:

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Begins by identifying the basic objections that have been raised to reproductive technology by the Catholic Church and others and shows why many of these criticisms are misplaced. This book argues that critics of reproductive technology have too frequently assumed that genetic connection is the sole basis of parental obligation.

Permissible Progeny?

Permissible Progeny? PDF

Author: Sarah Hannan

Publisher: Oxford University Press

Published: 2015-09-03

Total Pages: 288

ISBN-13: 0190463708

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This volume contributes to the growing literature on the morality of procreation and parenting. About half of the chapters take up questions about the morality of bringing children into existence. They discuss the following questions: Is it wrong to create human life? Is there a connection between the problem of evil and the morality of procreation? Could there be a duty to procreate? How do the environmental harms imposed by procreation affect its moral status? Given these costs, is the value of establishing genetic ties ever significant enough to render procreation morally permissible? And how should government respond to peoples' motives for procreating? The other half of the volume considers moral and political questions about adoption and parenting. One chapter considers whether the choice to become a parent can be rational. The two following chapters take up the regulation of adoption, focusing on whether the special burdens placed on adoptive parents, as compared to biological parents, can be morally justified. The book concludes by considering how we should conceive of adequacy standards in parenting and what resources we owe to children. This collection builds on existing literature by advancing new arguments and novel perspectives on existing debates. It also raises new issues deserving of our attention. As a whole it is sure to generate further philosophical debate on pressing and rich questions surrounding the bearing and rearing of children.

Parents and Virtues

Parents and Virtues PDF

Author: Sonya Charles

Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield

Published: 2019-03-11

Total Pages: 147

ISBN-13: 1498550061

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Although individual parents face different issues, Sonya Charles believes most parents want their children to be good people who are happy in their adult lives. Parents and Virtues: An Analysis of Moral Development and Parental Virtue starts from the question of how parents can raise their child to be a moral and flourishing person. At first glance, readers might think this question is better left to psychologists rather than philosophers. The author proposes that Aristotle’s ethical theory (known as virtue theory) has much to say on this issue. Aristotle asks how we become moral people and how that relates to leading a good life. In other words, his motivating questions are very similar to the goals parents have for their children. The first part of this book details what the basic components of Aristotle’s theory can tell us about the project of parenting. In the second part, the focus shifts to consider some issues that present potential moral dilemmas for parents and discuss whether there are specific virtues we may want to use to guide parental actions. Parents and Virtues will be of particular value to scholars and students who work on the ethics of parenthood, virtue theory, and bioethics.

Moral Parenthood

Moral Parenthood PDF

Author: Joseph Millum

Publisher:

Published: 2017

Total Pages:

ISBN-13: 9780190695460

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This work provides a philosophical account of the foundations of moral parenthood. It explains how parental rights and responsibilities are acquired, what those rights and responsibilities consist in, and how parents should make decisions for their children. In doing so, it provides a set of frameworks to help solve pressing ethical dilemmas relating to parents and children.