Chapter 5 Parents, Special Obligations and Reproductive Genetics

Abstract

One of the most important assumptions in the bioethical debate on deciding about a child’s genetic makeup is that even if he is born without the expected traits, parents ultimately end up loving him unconditionally. This assumption is supported by common sense and empirical studies but it still could be too weak to handle difficulties based on the possibility that from our individual first-person perspective we cannot know in advance how this experience will change us and our preferences. In this paper I analyze the possibility of justifying the moral principles which can be used to resolve this problem. I start from an analysis of R.M. Green’s ‘Parental Love Almost Always Prevails’ principle. In the second part I present Laurie Paul’s conception of transformative experience and the view about unpredictability of parental love. In the third part I will try to show that the category of special obligations based on relationship-centered reasons is the best way to guarantee the continuity of reasons before and after the child was brought to existence.