morality of how we treat the dead.

[cab21]

the recent story about Planed Parenthood getting consent from parents that choose to abort in the second trimester to donate the bodies for medical research had me wonder about how we treat the dead and it's morality.

 

i think humans do things to the dead that we don't do to the living, such as burial, cremation, autopsy and medical research. for those that die of induced abortions, or misscarry, there is no consent known for how they would have wished for their bodies to be handled after death.

 

a thought that i came up with is that it would be ok for a parent to decide for how the dead person's body is treated, as long as that parent did not commit a violation against the body to cause the death, like one might consider a elected second trimester abortion to be such a violation.

 

if this ishue  of how we treat the dead was looked at according to UPB, how would that go?

 

[Better Future]

What the dead don't know, can't hurt them.

[AynRand]

I don't believe the dead are applicable under the non agression principle, so treating a corpse as property is fine just as you would treat a rock.

[Merrifield]

Would it change anything if the mother was paid for the aborted body?

[cab21]

paying a mother for the aborted body, i think there might be two catagories

1 the abortion was done in the first trimester, or before a line drawn where afterwords its considered immoral to abort

2  the abortion was done past the first trimester, or after a line drawn where afterwords it's considered immoral to abort.

 

in category 1, the women would not have committed a violation against the embryo, and would be able to sell

in category 2, the women has committed a violation against the life, and it would be immoral for the women to then decide what to do with the body of the life she choose to immorally take.

 

 a person could own and choose to sell property morally obtained, but not property immorally obtained.

[RestoringGuy]

It does not make sense to me to discuss the morality of treatment of a dead person's body, while not discussing the artificial ghost-body we give them using estates, inheritance, wills, trusts, etc.  The signature (audio recording, systems of consent, or whatever you want to call it) means only that a living person agreed.  What is the first-principle foundation reason to care after they're dead?  Why is their stuff (the body too) not once again a state of nature? The contract too, just paper.  To me it seems when a person is dead we can either treat the signature/consent as a dead artifact having no moral weight, or we can say it has moral weight and invent an origin of ongoing morality (ie. a spirit lives on through words, like the Bible).  Even the words I write now probably have no worthwhile meaning to you, unless I am able to respond, explain, etc. all of the things, proving I am presently conscious and not just an ancient echo from some dead guy.  I mean you are not obligated to accept something just because it's written down.  I think truth has to resonate as an inescapable conclusion which a consciousness is capable of defending.

[cab21]

 i think with wills, those are done by the living, to be executed once the living are dead.

so it's violating the still living, who are the recipients of the property, if the will is not honored by society, and not violating the dead person.  the dead don't care, but it's no longer their property, its the property of whoever the person gave the property to while still living.

 

when living, we have contracts that shift ownership at certain events, so the event of death shifts ownership in a will, so the recipient is the new owner, and still living, and it's not to honer a dead person that the contract get fulfilled, but to honer the living person.

 

the new owner has the choice to not accept ownership of the property, and do what the new owner wishes, just like a owner can forfeit any property.

[RestoringGuy]

 i think with wills, those are done by the living, to be executed once the living are dead.

so it's violating the still living, who are the recipients of the property, if the will is not honored by society, and not violating the dead person.  the dead don't care, but it's no longer their property, its the property of whoever the person gave the property to while still living.

 

when living, we have contracts that shift ownership at certain events, so the event of death shifts ownership in a will, so the recipient is the new owner, and still living, and it's not to honer a dead person that the contract get fulfilled, but to honer the living person.

 

the new owner has the choice to not accept ownership of the property, and do what the new owner wishes, just like a owner can forfeit any property.

 

There is an interval, however short, that the owner is dead and wills are yet-to-be-executed.  It will take a few seconds to even know the owner has died.  Unless the heir is standing there wrapping their arms around the property during the owner's last breath, this new "owner" must rely on a piece of paper.   It's an artifact, a memory, or some other manufactured tool of culture.  There is always some process to claim the property, that contract is now like the Bible.   We are told to believe in it -- to obey it.  Now I will say how  this morality is faulty.

 

I understand "the event of death shifts ownership", but only the paper might say that, the dead person does not.  I think there's some agreement  consciousness is needed (a rock cannot own another rock).  However the dead body, having once written the will, is no longer a conscious entity -- so morally it's a rock.  To use its signature as a form of ownership proof -- well how is that different that using a rock (or the Bible) as a form of proof?  I guess you must sort it out only some time after death, and explain somehow why it's immoral to reject what the piece of paper says -- why people who did not sign it are somehow bound by it.

 

Imagine the so-called "new owner" steps up two minutes (or maybe two decades) after death and says something like "I have this paper that proves the owner transfered the property!"  Well I can say "no, you are trying to retroactively stake a claim -- for a brief time there was no owner, there was no property, I was here first -- what you have is paper, no better than a contrary one I just wrote up?"  And this moment is where the dead must be believed to have an eternal soul -- they possess some kind of moral holding spot.  Their little "will" artifact is to be accepted by faith alone.

[cab21]

There is an interval, however short, that the owner is dead and wills are yet-to-be-executed.  It will take a few seconds to even know the owner has died.  Unless the heir is standing there wrapping their arms around the property during the owner's last breath, this new "owner" must rely on a piece of paper.   It's an artifact, a memory, or some other manufactured tool of culture.  There is always some process to claim the property, that contract is now like the Bible.   We are told to believe in it -- to obey it.  Now I will say how  this morality is faulty.

 

I understand "the event of death shifts ownership", but only the paper might say that, the dead person does not.  I think there's some agreement  consciousness is needed (a rock cannot own another rock).  However the dead body, having once written the will, is no longer a conscious entity -- so morally it's a rock.  To use its signature as a form of ownership proof -- well how is that different that using a rock (or the Bible) as a form of proof?  I guess you must sort it out only some time after death, and explain somehow why it's immoral to reject what the piece of paper says -- why people who did not sign it are somehow bound by it.

 

Imagine the so-called "new owner" steps up two minutes (or maybe two decades) after death and says something like "I have this paper that proves the owner transfered the property!"  Well I can say "no, you are trying to retroactively stake a claim -- for a brief time there was no owner, there was no property, I was here first -- what you have is paper, no better than a contrary one I just wrote up?"  And this moment is where the dead must be believed to have an eternal soul -- they possess some kind of moral holding spot.  Their little "will" artifact is to be accepted by faith alone.

 

 i guess the other option for a will is for a person to name as a co-owner any property the owner wants to pass on. the bank account and estate and such  could have every name down the line of succession already on it. i'm sure there would be a process to do essentially the same thing as a will does today through saying that multiple people have ownership. then only under some mass event would there no longer be a owner, and things might then be up for grabs. that would get rid of any transfer or time between ownership and a executed will, since the co-owner would still be alive and a owner.