Yet another weird SF fan


I'm a mathematician, a libertarian, and a science-fiction fan. Common sense? What's that?

Go to first entry


 

Archives

<< current
 
E-mail address:
jhertzli AT ix DOT netcom DOT com


My Earthlink/Netcom Site

My Tweets

My other blogs
Small Sample Watch
XBM Graphics


The Former Four Horsemen of the Ablogalypse:
Someone who used to be sane (formerly War)
Someone who used to be serious (formerly Plague)
Rally 'round the President (formerly Famine)
Dr. Yes (formerly Death)

Interesting weblogs:
Back Off Government!
Bad Science
Blogblivion
Boing Boing
Debunkers Discussion Forum
Deep Space Bombardment
Depleted Cranium
Dr. Boli’s Celebrated Magazine.
EconLog
Foreign Dispatches
Good Math, Bad Math
Greenie Watch
The Hand Of Munger
Howard Lovy's NanoBot
Hyscience
Liberty's Torch
The Long View
My sister's blog
Neo Warmonger
Next Big Future
Out of Step Jew
Overcoming Bias
The Passing Parade
Peter Watts Newscrawl
Physics Geek
Pictures of Math
Poor Medical Student
Prolifeguy's take
The Raving Theist
RealityCarnival
Respectful Insolence
Sedenion
Seriously Science
Shtetl-Optimized
Slate Star Codex
The Speculist
The Technoptimist
TJIC
Tools of Renewal
XBM Graphics
Zoe Brain

Other interesting web sites:
Aspies For Freedom
Crank Dot Net
Day By Day
Dihydrogen Monoxide - DHMO Homepage
Fourmilab
Jewish Pro-Life Foundation
Libertarians for Life
The Mad Revisionist
Piled Higher and Deeper
Science, Pseudoscience, and Irrationalism
Sustainability of Human Progress


























Yet another weird SF fan
 

Monday, August 22, 2005

Arkes vs. Gelerntner vs. Dobson vs. Embryonic Stem-Cell Research

Hadley Arkes is highly critical of David Gelerntner's criticism of James Dobson's comparison of embryonic stem-cell research to the Holocaust. As anybody following this blog knows, I'm critical of embryonic stem-cell research (ESR). On the other hand, there are some strong differences between genocide and ESR. First, the intent of the Nazi genocide was ensure that there would no more Jews. The intent of ESR is not to eliminate all embryos. Second, some of the arguments for ESR are part of old traditions. Before embryology was developed in the 19th century, it made some sense to adhere to the belief that early embryos only possessed a vegetable soul. Third, ESR is not necessarily centrally planned. A state government or private foundation can also get involved.

I think slavery is a better analogy on all three counts. First, the intent of slavery was not to eliminate all slaves, but to exploit them. Second, there were defenses of slavery that went back to Aristotle; it wasn't something made up out of whole cloth. Third, slavery was also usually decentralized.

There's another reason to beware of Nazi analogies. They have been overused to such an extent that it makes sense to treat anybody using a Nazi analogy as a crackpot or even as the victim of a brain-eating zombie. You may think you have a valid analogy and I may think you have a partly-valid analogy but anybody else will think you sound like a nut. I don't think slavery analogies have been overused yet.

0 Comments:

Post a Comment

<< Home

 
Profiles
My Blogger Profile
eXTReMe Tracker X-treme Tracker


The Atom Feed This page is powered by Blogger.