Indeed, I think that one objection to necrophelia would, indeed, be that this might involve the violation of the wishes of the one who has died, but of course we can imagine a case in which a person's dying wish is that someone sexually use their body after they have died. I think the more primordial objection to necrophelia is that most of us see the good of sexual intimacy as the loving union of two persons. After death, most of us think that the dead body is a corpse and no longer a person. In the sexual act, the living person is not having intercourse with Pat (non-gender specific name) but with Pat's remains. A qualification may be in order: there are philosophers who are sometimes called animalists who entertain the view that at death you still exist as long as your body endures in tact. Personally, I think that reveals a problem with animalism. They wind up viewing death as a qualitative change, whereas (intuitively) most of us see death as a substantial change, e.g. in a funeral, you are not...

In answer to your first question ("Is kissing a person on the lips other than one's spouse cheating?"), the very idea of "cheating" (conceptually) involves breaking a rule or agreement or promise, and so kissing someone other than one's spouse on the lips would be cheating if you had an agreement (explicit or implicit) that one would only kiss one's spouse on the lips, just as you would be cheating if you cried or laughed or sung a particular song with another person if you had promised only to do so with one's partner / spouse. Before moving to your suggestion about promises, a brief note: I am a little curious about the example you give of kissing as there are many cultures (I have no idea how many) when kissing another person (who is not one's spouse) on the lips is not at all unusual or thought to be even remotely sexual (and thus a domain in which sexual fidelity would not be an issue). Actually, in the first two centuries of Christianity in Europe, unmarried men and women would regularly kiss...

You have raised a question that goes to the heart of one of the most serious relationships: what is the moral role of fidelity and respect in terms of sexual relationships? For many of us in 'the west' the 'cheating' would be equally wrong for a male or female. Just as it would be equally wrong for a male or female to cheat in other areas of life to steal money from innocent children it would seem to be equally wrong for either to cheat on each other. But there are different social, cultural expectations that come into play in some places today that reflect an old, patriarchal bias that tends to look more strictly at cases of adultery or infidelity involving females rather than males. I suggest that there is no viable ethical or religious or evolutionary ground for this imbalance or unfairness today. So, while I suspect that any justification that gives greater allowance to the male is a reflection of distorted values, a perversion of a mature religion or simply bad anthropology, it should probably...

Probably one of the main reasons we shy away from talking with others about sexual attraction unless we are doing so with a partner in a sexually intimate relationship or conversing with a therapist or discussing medical issues (from STD s to pregnancy to birth control) or advising a friend who has asked for advise, is because we see sexual matters as amazingly / profoundly personal and we would find it positively intolerable being told by all sorts of people whether they find you sexy or not. Imagine that in the course of sitting in a coffee shop for an hour you are set upon by hundreds of people who tell you all about their sexual desires as grandmothers who like to have sex while cooking apple pie, former medical students who were expelled from medical school for public nudity, lawyers who have been accused of sexually harassing interns, politicians who will say anything or do anything to get your vote, two tax collectors who have strange, contagious rashes all over their hands and faces and want...

Interesting! Philosophers from Plato to Bertrand Russell and to more recent thinkers, have addressed the value and significance of sexuality. Whether you agree or disagree with his conclusions, Roger Scruton has a book Sexual Desire with terrific examples and very interesting arguments. Thomas Nagel has a very short paper on sexual perversion which I think is quite illuminating. I think that probably the most sustained case for linking sex with reproduction comes from a Roman Catholic perspective, which should not be confused with "the Christian point of view" as many Christians think the telos or value or function of sexual union is valuable for its own sake or is an integral part of the good of intimate love. On that point, it is interesting that the story of creation in Genesis that blesses the union of man and woman before the fall notes that the two shall "become one flesh" (as it is usually translated) and there is nothing added like "the two shall become one flesh so that they may have...

Very interesting! I suspect that you are quite correct that the advent of birth control has done much to alter many people's assessment of the meaning of sex. And it may be that (depending on the kind of birth control used) some of the ethical implications of sex has changed. So, insofar as you can divorce sex and pregnancy, the ethics involving child-birth may be put to one side. But if you look at work on the philosophy of love from the medieval era (roughly from Augustine onward) to this day, there remains in place a tradition that sees what is called "lust" as a kind of degenerated passion. Someone who lusts after another may use the word "love," but in lust one largely seeks self-gratification and perhaps even a sort of possession over someone else rather than truly valuing the beloved for her or his own sake. For an excellent overview of the difference between love and lust, you might check out the book Love and Western Tradition by Denise de Rougemont. On the ethics of prostitution, I...

Tough to say. Off hand it seems that trying to convince her to have such a check-up is profoundly to act in her interest in terms of her fundamental health. Also, it certainly seems that desiring to have a healthy sex life is not something that "taints" or should taint the boyfriend - girlfriend relationship. You mention "authority" --which is an interesting term here, but it may not be out of place. I suppose in a close friendship, we do give authority to our friends to offer (even unasked for) advice. But that authority does seem to be limited by an acceptance of one's friend's or partner's independent judgment. You write about accepting "whatever she decides to do with her own body." That does seem right, don't you think? You cannot (with justice) compel her or trick her into having the check-up, and that leaves you with deciding what the future of your relationship will be like (under the conditions you both commit to) or to decide whether you even wish to continue being in such a relationship...

Good heavens! Unless you both had an explicit understanding that neither would attend an adult party, it is hard to see this as a violation, and even if one did have such an agreement it is hard to see how such a "violation" warrants calling someone a whore and threaten to cut off all sexual intimacy! I am sure this matter is more a topic for a marriage therapist than a professional philosopher, but I shall hesitantly suggest three things: it might be good to shift the questioning from matters of guilt / innocence / confession... to asking what is the most loving thing to do right now....both for your husband and for you. He seems to be treating the event on a par with sustained adultery or, short of adultry, a case of grave, personal betrayal and deception. But rather than getting focussed on whether the event was innocent (from his point of view, for it does sound innocent from your point of view), maybe the focus can be on what would the most loving thing be to do now. Second, the charge of being...

Minor reservation about Professor Smith's observations: Peter may be absolutely right, though I suggest that amidst all the cheerfully multicolored possibilities, I think that there are some clear cut goods and ills or, to use your terms, black and white issues. Perhaps this is similar to many other areas of life in which we (rightfully) expect decency (no improper coercion or harmful manipulation, deception, and so on). But because of the important role of sexuality in intimacy when it is possible to bring others (and oneself) joy or profound harm, I suggest that sexual relations may come with a higher degree of respect and consideration than we expect under other circumstances. The point is difficult to state with clarity or force, but I wager that while many of us can live with a colleague who is occasionally manipulative and misleading about his true aims and not fully trust worthy, but this becomes a great deal more serious if this involves one's lover.

I agree that dismissiveness of such rules (without carefully considering their grounds and implications) does seem unthoughtful, though I am 100% certain that Peter Smith has indeed been careful to reflect on such matters and shares your concern about the spread of AID s, STD s... Be that as it may, you asked whether your reasoning is valid, and I will respond to that question. I suggest that religions like Judaism, Chritianity, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism (the list could go on and on...) give attention to sexuality because each of these traditions has a vision (and practices built on that vision) of human fulfilment, and it is not implausable to think that sexuality has a vital role in human fulfilment. These world religions and others may differ in terms of their view of sexual desire, the mind-body relationship, family, sexual orientation and practice, and so on, but I do not think it bizarre (and here, I suppose, I do differ from Peter) that world religions should take seriously the important...