The following is dedicated to promoting a version of the disability critique of negative genetic selection while navigating claims that launching such a critique threatens reproductive liberty or is unavoidably antichoice. I highlight problematic conceptual assumptions regarding genetics and choice made by proponents and opponents of selection alike and bring out the underlying ableist values of the prevailing conversation. Ableism is discrimination against persons on the basis of perceived disability. I conclude that the existing social and institutional milieu surrounding genetic (...) selection threatens persons who experience difference with stigma and its accompanying political and social disadvantages. My .. (shrink)

Research shows that a high majority of parents receiving prenatal diagnosis of intellectual disability terminate pregnancy. They have reasons for rejecting a child with intellectual disabilities—these reasons are, most commonly, beliefs about quality of life for it or them. Without a negative evaluation of intellectual disability, their choice makes no sense. Disability-based abortion has been critiqued through virtue ethics for being inconsistent with admirable moral character. Parental selectivity conflicts with the virtue of acceptingness and exhibits the vice of wilfulness. In (...) this paper I claim that, beyond failures of moral virtue, disability abortion often involves failures of epistemic virtue on the part of parents. I argue two things: parents believe something false, or at least contested, about life with intellectual disability—and they do so because they are not epistemically conscientious. I first explain why a central motivation for disability abortion—that it prevents harm to the child—is mistaken. I next give a brief account of intellectual virtue and culpable ignorance. I then indicate why many parents fail to be intellectually virtuous when choosing to terminate pregnancy. I focus on elimination of intellectual disability and have little to say about physical and sensory impairments. (shrink)

Given the explanatory stalemate between ‘embedded’ (EMB) and ‘extended’ (EXT) cognition, various authors have proposed normative and moral arguments in favour of EXT. According to what we call the “extended cognition moral narrative” (EXT-MN) (Cassinadri, 2022), we should embrace EXT and dismiss EMB, because the former leads to morally preferable consequences with respect to the latter. In this article we argue that two arguments following the EXT moral narrative are flawed. In Sect. 2.1 and 2.2, we present respectively King (2016) (...) and Vold’s (2018) ‘argument from assessment of capacities’ (AAC) and Clowes (2013), Farina and Lavazza’s (2022a) ‘cognitive diminishment argument’ (CDA). The AAC states that we should embrace EXT over EMB since the former is better at attributing cognitive credit to individuals with learning disabilities who use assistive tools to complete their learning tasks, thus avoiding their marginalisation. The CDA states that EMB implies a morally undesirable picture of the agent in terms of cognitive diminishment. In Sect. 3, we clarify and criticise the underlying assumptions of the AAC and CDA: the “cognitive credit assumption”, the “marginalisation assumption” and, more generally, an ableist conception of disabled agency. In Sect. 3.1, we discuss the role of moto-perceptual skills and metacognitive credit involved in complex cases of tool-use, to demonstrate that the EXT-MN is uninformative in addressing these cases. To conclude, in Sect. 4 we argue that AAC and CDA fail to present EXT as descriptively and normatively superior to EMB. (shrink)

Human rights have recently impacted on current conceptualisations of the rights and obligations owed to individuals with impairments, culminating in the UN Convention for the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. Particularly significant is Article 12, where interpretations have heralded a “will and preferences” paradigm which rejects substituted decision-making mechanisms, even in situations where an individual should make personally harmful or unwise decisions about their treatment, care, or relationships. This paper explores problems with “strict” and “flexible” interpretations of Article 12, focusing (...) specifically on safeguarding issues in cases of relational abuse, exploitation, and coercion. Drawing analogies with feminist arguments opposing violence against women in the domestic sphere, I challenge the private/public and individualistic account of autonomy which is implicit in interpretations of the “will and preferences” paradigm, and suggest that proponents of Article 12 should consider the possible justifiability of expanded protectionist measures in cases of abuse involving individuals with impairments. (shrink)