Comments on: Selecting Difference http://www.concurringopinions.com/archives/2006/12/selecting_diffe.html The Law, the Universe, and Everything Tue, 14 Feb 2012 05:18:12 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.2.1 By: Frank http://www.concurringopinions.com/archives/2006/12/selecting_diffe.html/comment-page-1#comment-56124 Frank Tue, 05 Dec 2006 21:02:53 +0000 http://www.solove.org/archives/2006/12/selecting-difference.html#comment-56124 I think Kathleen Norris has crafted an eloquent and moving account of the immense and unique contributions made by disabled individuals (in her case, a sister with Down's syndrome) in her book, The Cloister Walk. On the other hand, one of the normative guideposts I take seriously in contemplating the ethics of reproduction is the Jonas-ian principle of "openness to the unbidden" (recently rearticulated in the NCBE report Beyond Therapy, Habermas's The Future of Human Nature, and Sandel's Atlantic Monthly article). And I think that, to the extent that we might want to invoke this principle to avoid eugenics, we should also be willing to apply it to limit parental autonomy in cases like this. I think Kathleen Norris has crafted an eloquent and moving account of the immense and unique contributions made by disabled individuals (in her case, a sister with Down’s syndrome) in her book, The Cloister Walk.

On the other hand, one of the normative guideposts I take seriously in contemplating the ethics of reproduction is the Jonas-ian principle of “openness to the unbidden” (recently rearticulated in the NCBE report Beyond Therapy, Habermas’s The Future of Human Nature, and Sandel’s Atlantic Monthly article). And I think that, to the extent that we might want to invoke this principle to avoid eugenics, we should also be willing to apply it to limit parental autonomy in cases like this.

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