I think it is a very topical argument- mind you I am genuinely not taking a position, I am exploring the logical consequences of the argument. There are pitfalls in the line or reasoning going on the argument that they are making. This is how philosophical discourse works. It’s how arguments and logic works. Being emotional about it is fine, but it’s not conducive to exploring the consequences of the argument.
The reason incest is frowned upon and often illegal is because of the danger it poses to any potential offspring.
The purely hypothetical counter argument here would be that what constitutes a “defect” or “danger” is highly subjective and prone to abuse. Where do we draw the line? Either there is no line and anyone can freely breed offspring, or we are in dangerous territory where we are determining which qualities we as a society deem “unwanted”. What do we mean by “defect”? What do we mean by “unwanted”?
At a population scale, genetic diversity is critical to survival of a population, and a collapse of genetic diversity through too much inbreeding tends to lead to a very unhealthy population
Well that is an argument from utility. Who is to say that people must subject themselves to the “critical survival of a population”? What if people don’t care? If they refused to, what would we do? Force them not to breed, by, say sterilizing them? Surely you see the issue here.
I think it is a very topical argument- mind you I am genuinely not taking a position, I am exploring the logical consequences of the argument. There are pitfalls in the line or reasoning going on the argument that they are making. This is how philosophical discourse works. It’s how arguments and logic works. Being emotional about it is fine, but it’s not conducive to exploring the consequences of the argument.
The purely hypothetical counter argument here would be that what constitutes a “defect” or “danger” is highly subjective and prone to abuse. Where do we draw the line? Either there is no line and anyone can freely breed offspring, or we are in dangerous territory where we are determining which qualities we as a society deem “unwanted”. What do we mean by “defect”? What do we mean by “unwanted”?
Well that is an argument from utility. Who is to say that people must subject themselves to the “critical survival of a population”? What if people don’t care? If they refused to, what would we do? Force them not to breed, by, say sterilizing them? Surely you see the issue here.