{"id":233,"date":"2010-01-19T15:31:36","date_gmt":"2010-01-19T14:31:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.bmj.com\/medical-ethics\/?p=233"},"modified":"2010-01-20T22:37:05","modified_gmt":"2010-01-20T21:37:05","slug":"welfare-principles-and-an-unexpected-attack","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.bmj.com\/medical-ethics\/2010\/01\/19\/welfare-principles-and-an-unexpected-attack\/","title":{"rendered":"Welfare, Principles, and an Unexpected Attack"},"content":{"rendered":"

First up, this may seem like a bit of a diversion from JME<\/em> core concerns, but – as I hope will become clear – it has to do with moral philosophy, so that’s enough of a link.<\/p>\n

Obviously, news for the last week or so has been dominated by the earthquake in Haiti and its aftermath.\u00a0 There has been an enormous show of public support – and the Disasters Emergency Committee can be found here<\/a>.\u00a0 An alternative route to donate would be via Richard Dawkins’ outfit, Non-Believers Giving Aid<\/a>.\u00a0 But I have to admit that there’s something about this second organisation that seems a bit off-colour to me. It has to do with the proselytising tone of the scheme.\u00a0 Its website says that<\/p>\n

[w]hen donating via Non-Believers Giving Aid<\/strong>, you are helping to counter the scandalous myth that only the religious care about their fellow-humans.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

It’s obvious to anyone who thinks about it that you don’t have to be a believer to be a good person; and it’s also obvious that there’re plenty of religious nutjobs already on the case in Haiti: for example, according to reports, one group of fundies is sending emergency solar-powered talking bibles<\/a>, and\u00a0Scientologists are sending people to do whatever it is that Scientologists do<\/a>.\u00a0 More generally, I’m a bit suspicious of organisations like CAFOD, Christian Aid, Islamic Relief, and so on\u00a0– they’re implicitly proselytising and exclusive in a way that a secular organisation like Oxfam, the ICRC or MSF isn’t, in an “Oooh, look at us, being all Christian\/ Muslim\/ whatever” sort of a way.\u00a0 (Or maybe the denominational names are based on the supposition that people’re more likely to donate to an organisation that represents their sect.\u00a0 Or maybe they’re pandering to donors’ sectarianism.\u00a0 I don’t know.)<\/p>\n

But while the Dawkins Foundation is doing excellent work to promote reason in general, I can’t see how extending the squabble to the aid campaign is doing anyone any good: it strikes me as being small-minded and, if I’m honest, a touch childish.\u00a0 If the best routes for aid supply have been established by a religiously-motivated charity, then that’s fine by me.\u00a0 That’s what the DEC seems to think, and I’ll believe ’em.<\/p>\n

What has this to do with the JME<\/em>?\u00a0 Well, a few months ago I made a post about prayer at the bedside<\/a>, the tone of which was fairly robustly anti.\u00a0 It was informed by the thought that, when it comes to providing relief from suffering, that relief shouldn’t really come ideologically packaged.\u00a0 That’s why I’m suspicious of Christian Aid, Islamic Relief, and so on.\u00a0 It’s why I’m equally suspicious of this atheist push in Haiti.\u00a0 If it’s bad\u00a0or\u00a0wrong for a doctor to say, “Look at me, being Christian\/ Muslim\/ whatever and caring for you!” – and it obviously is – then the same applies to the RDF saying “Look at me, being non-religious, caring for you!”.\u00a0 If it’s welfare that’s doing the moral legwork, then that’s what counts.<\/p>\n

On the other hand, there’s a wider moral question that could be asked at the same time: suppose someone’s motivation to provide aid for another person is wholly to do with some point of principle – so, for example, it might be a religious person acting not directly because of suffering but because they believe that their deity commands it, or as a means of spreading the Word; or it might be an atheist acting mainly to make the point that atheists are good people, too.\u00a0 Does this make a moral difference?<\/p>\n

If you’re Kant, it might.\u00a0 He famously thought that actions that only accorded with the moral law had no true moral worth; this means that actions driven by sympathy had less moral worth than those driven by a rather dour Calvinist sense of duty.\u00a0 Indeed, he hints that it may be morally better not to have sympathy, just because, and just in case,\u00a0it might turn out that that’s what drives you.\u00a0 Kant here is clearly talking gibberish.<\/p>\n

But still there’s something to the idea that motivation makes a difference: we might want to ask about the person who does the right thing for the wrong reason (or vice-versa<\/em>), and we might be a bit more reluctant to heap praise on a person who would have done the right thing as a anyway for reasons other than its rightness.\u00a0 To what extent would he be praiseworthy (or blameworthy)?\u00a0 My hunch is that most people would think that the motivation at least adds moral shine or moral tarnish to an action; noone, I think, suggests that doing\u00a0a good thing by accident is in the same league as doing it for the right reason, whatever that might turn out to be.\u00a0 And I think that that is correct: I think that a proselytiser risks compromising the moral worth of his action.\u00a0 Not diminishing, necessarily – but compromising.<\/p>\n

And yet… if he still makes the world a better place…<\/p>\n

So here’s the question: is the motivation morally important?\u00a0 I lean towards the idea that the difference between doing right thing for the right or wrong reason is a bit like the difference between a shiny new 2010 \u00a31 coin, and a battered and dull one from 1983.\u00a0 There’s something more satisfying about a new coin, even though it’s worth exactly the same; they’re both decus et tutamen<\/a><\/em>.\u00a0 (It’s not just me, is it?)\u00a0 But that seems to make the difference aesthetic, rather than moral.\u00a0 Does that seem correct?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

First up, this may seem like a bit of a diversion from JME core concerns, but – as I hope will become clear – it has to do with moral philosophy, so that’s enough of a link. Obviously, news for the last week or so has been dominated by the earthquake in Haiti and its […]<\/p>\n

Read More…<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[511,591,475,403],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-233","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-in-the-news","category-life-and-death","category-politics","category-rant"],"yoast_head":"\nWelfare, Principles, and an Unexpected Attack - Journal of Medical Ethics blog<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/blogs.bmj.com\/medical-ethics\/2010\/01\/19\/welfare-principles-and-an-unexpected-attack\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Welfare, Principles, and an Unexpected Attack - Journal of Medical Ethics blog\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"First up, this may seem like a bit of a diversion from JME core concerns, but – as I hope will become clear – it has to do with moral philosophy, so that’s enough of a link. 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