Christopher Kaczor’s The Ethics of Abortion is just out from Routledge. David Boonin, author of A Defense of Abortion, calls it “one of the very best book-length defenses of the claim that abortion is morally impermissible.” Natural law theorist J. Budziszewski says that the book “replies to the most difficult objections to the pro-life position, many of which have not been adequately addressed by previous authors.” Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews calls it “the most complete, the most penetrating and the most up-to-date set of critiques of the arguments for abortion choice presently available.” Don Marquis, author of the widely anthologized article “Why Abortion is Immoral,” calls it “essential reading.” Check it out.
Saturday, December 11, 2010
Kaczor on abortion
Christopher Kaczor’s The Ethics of Abortion is just out from Routledge. David Boonin, author of A Defense of Abortion, calls it “one of the very best book-length defenses of the claim that abortion is morally impermissible.” Natural law theorist J. Budziszewski says that the book “replies to the most difficult objections to the pro-life position, many of which have not been adequately addressed by previous authors.” Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews calls it “the most complete, the most penetrating and the most up-to-date set of critiques of the arguments for abortion choice presently available.” Don Marquis, author of the widely anthologized article “Why Abortion is Immoral,” calls it “essential reading.” Check it out.
But what do you call it, Ed?
ReplyDeleteHi Edward,
ReplyDeleteI'm going off topic here (sorry) but did you ever reviewd 'The Impossibility of God' by M. Martin.
His thoughts are provocative, but sometimes his philosophy is murky
eg: on 'infidels.org' he claims tha the arguments for the existence of God do not prove theism, but could prove polytheism or a finite 'god' as well... claiming that theists havee a gap in proving God.
However I wonder if Martin understands Aquinas at all, since if someone understands some of Aquinas arguments (eg the argument from causality) one can never come to a finite god or many gods, since their 'finite nature' would make them contingent
So I wonder what are your thought on Micheal martin and his philosophy.
matt:
ReplyDeleteI'd bet Doc Feser's opinion of it falls somewhere in the "really, really good" area.
Well, you could imagine something like deism in which God -- although always present, eternally maintaining all that exists -- takes no direct interest in the affairs of humans. That's close enough to deism for government work.
ReplyDelete@james:
ReplyDeleteI assume you mean a God Who does not miraculously intervene in the world? If so, then I think Aquinas would agree: the First Cause, as such, need not miraculously enter into relations with man. To discover that, you need (special) revelation. So what? The First Cause argument was never meant to prove all that can be known about God.
Since the Classical Theistic God is Pure Actuality & is the First Cause in a top down causal chain a miracle can be defined as any Potency the First Cause Actualizes directly as opposed to any particular Potency that is actualized in the chain and has the First Cause as it's Formal Cause rather than it's efficient cause.
ReplyDeleteThus a miracle is not a "violation" of the Laws of Nature since Natural Laws are nothing but the regularities that take place in the chain.
At least this is my take on it.
Maybe I will look into it
ReplyDeleteOh and By the way, could you take a look at my blog post? I am trying to get people's insight.
http://grasshopper13.blogspot.com/2010/12/very-important-question-pro-lifers-must.html