If 1) we are morally responsible for the foreseeable results of my actions and inactions and if 2) all human beings will eventually die can I derive that 3) biological parents are morally responsible for the death of their children? I would expect most people to agree with (1) and (2), and to be shocked by (3). In addition, life can be worth living (the beauty and the richness of its experience hopefully offset the pain and suffering that come with it), but this seems to be a personal opinion that I have no right to impose on others. So, what right do biological parents have to impose their views (on such important matters) on future human beings that don't yet exist? Thanks.

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I suspect that most people would think, on reflection that principle (1) is too strong. For instance, if it foreseeable that, because of your bad character, you will free-ride on fair rules of cooperation that we establish, does that make us morally responsible for your free-riding? I doubt it. At most, we should be responsible for what we freely cause. But we are not the cause of everything that foreseeably results from our actions. So I don't see that A's giving birth to B causes B's eventual death. If B dies by drowning that is caused by his falling into the the river, being unable to swim, or being too weak for the current (etc) not by his parents conceiving him. The most that could be said, and I'm not too confident even of this, is that parents are a foreseeable cause of their children's mortality (as opposed to any particular time, manner, and place of death). As I say, I'm not even sure that's right. But, if it was, so what? That would mean that we were morally responsible for our children's mortality. That doesn't sound so monstrous.

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