His words after that concern me, if only because of what I see at the bottom of the slippery slope. We do have tort laws that say what “should” be treated and how, and they do create something of a medical priesthood. Science is of course self-correcting, and proper treatment determined by consensus. But even concensual reality is vulnerable to deception…witness the election/s of George Bush!

The interest of a state in the health and well-being of all its citizens is FAR from clear, even in theory. In practice its interest is only in the welfare of voters, and not even this is assured. Add an active disinterest in the welfare of foreign workers, and our system, while possibly as moral as one can get, is far from unassailably so.

Nor is it intended to be. It is meant to enforce the ethical code most comfortable to a certain group of people, at a certain point in time and within a certain geographical boundary. Our concern is for “domestic” tranquility and liberty “for ourselves and our posterity.” It is dangerous (and expensive) to treat local judgements as global ones.

It’s wrong for a child to die “before her time” only because you and I are uncomfortable with it, and together with like-minded people have the power to intervene. If we elevate our viewpoint to a metaphysical principle, the burden of proof is on us. And we CAN’T prove it. There’s a Godelian quality to morality; it can’t ever be entirely consistent. There are inevitable seams, which must be either stitched up with clever words or placed out of sight (in Saipan for instance).

We say a fetus is not a person before a certain point, and may be aborted. In this decision, a woman is not even required to have the religious rationalization enjoyed by the woman above. I support choice. But suppose one were to draw the line, not at the third trimester, but at the aquisition of language? Or of imaginitive insight into the internal state of other minds? A two-year-old might be rightfully considered an animal, and an over-extended family seeking to preserve the fabric of their lives (or a mother seeking to preserve the fabric of her religion) might reasonably choose to invite the neighbors over for a barbecue!

http://www.smh.com.au/national/jail-for-parents-who-allowed-daughter-to-die-20090928-g8×2.html

Criminalizing stupidity is problematic. There are quite a few people, some of whom even pass for intelligent, who believe anthropogenic climate change is a fraud committed by a gang of scientists for obscure but clearly anti-American reasons. They hold the balance of power in the Senate. They threaten the habitability of the entire planet. If anything should be criminal, that should be. But if you make doubt of scientific consensus a criminal offense, you criminalize a vital part of the scientific process itself and create a sort of scientific papacy. And you simply can’t thread that needle. You can’t create a definition of criminal doubt that puts crazy doubters clearly on one side of the fence and sane doubters clearly on the other side. Freeman Dyson is a case in point. He believes the data on climate change, but does not believe we actually need to do anything in particular about it. Where would he land?

Similarly here. You can’t criminalize sincerely held religious belief. But you *can* prevent it from affecting the innocent. The state has a clear interest in the safety, health and well being of all its citizens. This is acknowledged in the preamble to the Constitution. That implies that parental rights, while strong, are not absolute. Children are not a species of slave. And when personal parental beliefs threaten the welfare of a child, those rights can be terminated.

But you don’t need a new law to do that. The law already exists, and such decisions are made daily by family court judges, substituting their judgment for that of parents when parents put their children at risk.

In the US, a mother can avoid that situation by simply avoiding medical care. In a sane society, however, with an actual, functioning national health care system (rather than a national health care market) that would be less likely to happen.

It is quite dangerous to criminalize beliefs, even when they lead to a negative impact on others. But it is precisely at the point where a negative impact on others occurs that the state should be able to step in and say “You can believe whatever you want, but not at the expense of your child or anyone else’s.” And for the same reason, I think vaccination doubters should be made to have their children vaccinated. If you want to be stupid, you have that right, but you lose the right to act on your stupid at the point where it harms other people.

Since the humane perspective has already been so well expressed above, I’ll play devil’s advocate and advance a little ruthless logic. Not because that’s my position of choice, but because I believe these sorts of questions touch upon issues that are deeply related to the future of the planet, and it’s important to look at them in every sort of light.

First I’ll say that any talk of “rights” is itself religious. Some might prefer the word spiritual. I’ve gotten into some heated arguments on this point, but I remain with David Hume on the matter of morality: that it is neither rational, nor even consistent, necessarily, with reason. NOBODY’S view of the situation described above is going to be free of arbitrary metaphysical assumptions.

I am forced to wonder how many people have died from black lung disease so that I may enjoy the convenience of electricity, or lost their childhood to sweat shops so that I may wear affordable clothing. My culture grants me absolution from these injustices. This woman’s own indoctrination is probably that both she and her daughter are assured an eternal life in heaven, provided they adhere to a certain code.

Her ideas may be quaint and her faith misplaced, but I’m sympathetic to the idea that individuality is brief and illusory. During conscious life, either individual material systems (nervous systems) somehow access a transcendent (and more general) reality, or (as seems much less superstitious to me) that reality somehow gets itself into an epistomological knot that requires it to model its experience in the form of matter, energy, brains, people, myself, yourself, etc. Pretty dry stuff–except that a little girl is dead.

In the modern west, we enjoy the fruits of a materialistic worldview, but the price we pay is a particular horror at the idea of mortality. This horror lies behind all the most fevered debates: healthcare, abortion, war, execution–you name it. Yet what seems a clear moral absolute on the individual level is disastrous on the planetary one…there are too many people.

I do not say I support this woman’s behavior, or a law that condones it. But I’m mindful enough of the complexity of the metaphysical tarpit in which she’s stuck (a pit in which an innocent was tragically pulled out of sight) to at least be uncomfortable equating the use of medical care–an artificial expedient–with the eating of food–a natural activity. Logic even suggests that when someone has the capacity for such lethal ignorance, the death of her offspring at least makes it less likely that future generations will be as misguided, therefore lives are saved in the long run when these misfortunes are permitted to occur. It’s because of this Darwinian principle, in fact, that we’re even discussing the matter, rather than shrugging off the recycling of an infected lump of flesh.

The latter attitude might result in a heartier, less plague-ridden species. Not a species I’d want to be a member of…but I can imagine an alien civilization–a noble one–regarding our objections as barbaric.

The child’s right to health and life is a stronger judicial good than the mother’s right to religion. The baby would have been taken to custody and treated.

And that is the way it ought to be. Freedom of religion is a strong judicial good, but human life is even stronger. If those two contradict, the human life should always overtake the religion. Especially when the question is of another human being.

I am not familiar with US concepts of law in such cases, but in my perspective this would be a voluntary manslaughter under aggravating circumstances (gross and intentional negligence).