ABSTRACT
Thompson argues, in effect, that human beings are generally incapable of caring for the remote future and thus are absolved of a moral obligation to do so. writes Delattre: The destruction of the future is suicidal by virtue of its radical alteration of the significance and possibilities of the present. The meaning of the present depends upon the vision of the future as well as the remembrance of the past. This is so in part because all projects require the future, and to foreclose projects is effectively to reduce the present to emptiness. Yet provision for a posthumous future and respect for the previously recorded wishes of those now dead is commonplace and universally sanctioned. In such a case, those who defend such a duty and urge thoughtful and responsible provision for the future might wish to affirm that life is immediately enriched by the collective agreement of the living to provide for the well-being of the unborn.
