The part of the question that I find interesting is the claim that "there is no real consent between an animal and a human because the two are essentially contemplating a different act" (italics added). The question assumes that animals can contemplate. We grant that, for the sake of discussion. Animals contemplate sex biologically, while humans contemplate sex emotionally, according to the question. Suppose two people, X and Y, meet in a bar or club, and drink wine, talk, and dance together intimately. After an hour or so, X says to Y: "shall we go to my place"? Y says "sure," and off they go. As soon as they get inside X's flat [crib, pad], they eagerly embrace, kiss, undress each other, and eventually end up entwined [perhaps coitally] on the sofa, floor, or bed. The consent of X and Y to this sexual act is implicit, not explicit, but that's not the issue here. The claim I quoted assumes that all is well with implicit consent. I will assume that, too, for the sake of discussion. The...

In my reply to Tom's reply, I asked for argument, reasons, what philosophers are supposed to do as philosophers, if not duty-bound to do. And, finally, he did it. Thank you, Tom. Maybe I am thick and hence couldn't read the argument(s) that really did exist between or amongst those three short sentences of the original reply. But if I couldn't see it, did SteveB?

The claim, that "Chances are you are both happier together as things are now," seems to me to be an empirical issue, not a philosophical one. Further, I can imagine many scenarios in which it is false. Much depends on what is meant by "happier." But whether "happier" means "the relationship as whole will be better/happier" or, instead, "your sexual experiences together will be better/happier," it would seem not to be a question that philosophical expertise could answer. I hope that our answers to sex questions do not come to mimic the pop psychology and psychobabble we hear sufficiently on the Jerry Springer and similar shows. Finally, the heart and soul of philosophy is argument, providing reasons for claims, including claims about morality and duties. In the answer to the question above, I cannot find a shred of argument. We should also avoid, that is, pastoral or friendly counseling. Without rigor, philosophy is nothing.

The idea -- "I would hazard a guess that most such relationships pair much older men with much younger women--while again acknowledging that there are exceptions to this generality. Given the prevalence of sexism, such relationships seem to raise reasonable suspicions that they are embodiments of widespread sexist attitudes towards women, who suffer disproportionately from discrimination as they age, and for whom standards of attractiveness (including youthful appearance) are especially oppressive" -- ignores the mountain of evolutionary biological, sociobiological, and evolutionary psychological work done in this area that suggests that the pattern older man-younger woman is to be expected. This work might very well be false or full of oversimplifications, of course, in which case the charges of "oppression" and "sexism" in the pattern might be rightfully made. But the idea quoted too cavalierly writes off the evolutionary/biological underpinnings of such a pattern.

Nicholas is right that there are good reasons to think that rape should not be defined as "unwanted" sex. Although Stephen Schulhofer titled his book on rape Unwanted Sex , he makes it clear that rape, on his view, is to be understood as sex that is not consensual. There has been, of course, debate among rape theorists over the "right" definition of "rape." The law has long employed a "use of force" definition of rape. Recently, the law (in various US jurisdictions) has been moving toward a disjunctive definition of rape: sexual activity either with the use of force or in the absence of consent. (Some jurisidictions make the latter a less serious crime.) It is not difficult to use the philosophical method of counterexamples to argue (more or less convincingly, depending on one's political leanings) that "unwanted," "forced," and "nonconsensual" sex are not identical. Eric Reitan has written a provocative essay in which he argues that rape is an "essentially contested concept" (in the sense of Gallie);...

The claim(nowadays, at least) is mostly associated with feminist legal scholarCatharine MacKinnon---and it is restricted to heterosexual sex inparticular, not homosexual or lesbian sex. Before we proceed, note thatthere is a slight error in the question. The writer moves from "rape"in the first sentence to (in effect) "nonconsensual" sex in the secondsentence. However, it is still being debated whether a nonconsentdefintion of rape is as adequate as, or more adequate than, adefinition in terms of "force." (MacKinnon's writings are implicated inthis debate.) For an account of some of the philsophical arguments, seeJoan McGregor, Is It Rape? , Ashgate, 2005. Hereis one version of the claim in MacKinnon: "Few women are in a positionto refuse unwanted sexual initiatives" from men ("Feminism, Marxism,Method, and the State: An Agenda for Theory," in Feminist Theory: A Critique of Ideology ,edited by Nannerl O. Keohane, Michelle Z. Rosaldo, and Barbara C. Gelpi[Chicago, Ill.: University of...

You write both: "This area belongs to me" and "I am not a bossy person who believes he owns his girlfriend." There's no contradiction if (1) you meant the first as a joke [even if a suspicious one], or if (2) one can own another's genitals yet not own the (whole) person. Kant thought not, but his sexual metaphysics are odd. We might put the problem this way, as a conflict between Roger Scruton ( Sexual Desire ), a sexual conservative, and Betty Dodson, the guru of female masturbation-as-liberation. Scruton thinks that any woman who plays with herself (be it digitally or mechanically) while with her man (her husband, ideally), commits an obscene display that destroys the unitive meaning of the sexual act--even if (if I read him properly) the woman's engaging in some digitalizing helps them achieve orgasm together or nearly together (unification). Scruton doesn't consider that some men might get turned on watching their companions fool around with themselves down there. Or if he would, the men,...

I have but five things, now, to say in reply to this question. (1) Might you post several of the questions that you can think of that are not questions of sexual ethics and seem to you to be anthropological or psychological, not philosophical? Maybe I could show how they are, after all, philosophical, or could be approached philosophically as well as anthropologically, etc. (2) Here is a philosophical task for you: please define "sexual act" for me. I do not mean describe it ("it feels sooooo good"); I mean provide what some philosophers call an "analysis." What is it about sexual acts that make them sexual and that distinguish them from other kinds of acts? This task is not as easy as you might think (and it has practical import; recall Clinton and Lewinsky). (3) Might I suggest that the philosophy of sex deals with ontological, metaphysical, conceptual, historical/textual, and normative (ethical and nonethical) matters? If so, sexual ethics might be a rather small part of the terrain. (4) For a...