Speaker: Prof. Tom Douglas (Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics)
Title: The Scope of the Right Against Mental Interference
Abstract: It is standardly thought, in both medical and sexual ethics, that all persons enjoy a right against bodily interference, sometimes referred to as a right to bodily integrity or a right against bodily trespass. The existence of such a right, many would hold, helps to explain why it is generally morally impermissible to conduct medical procedures on people without their consent, to physically assault them, or to subject them to unwanted touching.
Much less commonly considered or endorsed is the thought that we also possess a right against mental interference–against interference with our minds. But there are good reasons to think that we might. First, the considerations standardly invoked in support of a right against bodily interference seem to provide equal, if not stronger, support for a right against mental interference. Second, there are intuitively wrongful forms of mental influence whose wrongfulness is difficult to explain without positing a right against mental interference.
However, the thought that persons possess a right against mental interference raises some very thorny questions about the scope of this putative right. What is mental interference, exactly? And which mental interferences infringe the right against it? In this paper, I begin to answer these questions. I first argue against three accounts of the scope of the right that can either be found in the literature or seem prima facie plausible. I then motivate my own preferred alternative account, and defend it against two objections. On my account, whether a mental influence infringes the right against mental interference depends centrally on whether it operates via a reasons-sensitive process within the influencee.
Time: Thursday 23rd February, 1-3pm
Place: Rātā 119 Meeting Room (Formerly Engineering Core)
Zoom Invite Link: https://canterbury.zoom.us/j/91452106499?pwd=b2RyVzk4Wno4ZVBnYUNCcDNHREsrdz09
Passcode: 266324
