Empirical postulates of sexual morality

In the post on sexual morality, I covered only those parts of sexual morality that are necessarily true. Those propositions follow necessarily from my concepts of the human being as a rational animal that reproduces sexually, and of his sexual powers as oriented toward this reproduction; therefore, they must always remain true as long as those concepts still apply to human beings.

However, it is difficult to apply those propositions in conduct without a more detailed understanding of particular cases. It happens that the way in which I would tend to generate such an understanding is liable to the formulation of some general empirical postulates, which I believe apply for the most part, and in most cases, although not necessarily and in every case, since they constitute my generalized analysis of contingent empirical conditions, and do not follow from the anthropological concepts. To communicate my thinking as clearly as possible, therefore, I have written down these postulates.

Postulate 1 — Monogamy is, for the most part, helpful to the end of marriage, and ought to be encouraged within it.

When multiple men have sex with the same woman, it can be hard to determine the father of each child she has, which is relevant to the custody obligations involved – although this is less of a problem now that we have DNA tests. Besides this peculiarity, I believe that it is also generally difficult to efficiently arrange for the care of children when the same person is involved in multiple marriages.

Postulate 2 — Antiphysical acts are, for the most part, justified, so that a preference for them is usually virtuous.

I believe that the exceptional conditions which I said could justify antiphysical sexual acts in fact hold for most cases wherein they are performed. Insofar as this condition holds, homosexual tendencies should be considered virtuous, since they tend toward relationships of pure friendship, without debasement of the rational faculty by submission to the reproductive impulses.

Postulate 3 — Entelechic acts are, generally, not helpful to the end of marriage when done under a certain age, and ought to be discouraged in such cases.

Since teenage pregnancies are associated with negative consequences for the mother’s health and the child’s development, they produce difficulties for the end of marriage, which is childrearing; so, they cannot be rationally preferred to reproduction at a later age. Additionally, since people generally seek to establish their career and professional education during their youth, young parenthood is likely to interfere with a couple’s ability to materially provide for their child; the child’s spiritual welfare is also likely to suffer from being raised by immature parents. For these reasons, reproduction is best delayed until these issues no longer endanger the goal of childrearing, which tends to happen around age 20.

Postulate 4 — Antiphysical acts are usually not justified when done within any kind of subordinate relationship, including all relationships with a significant age disparity.

Sexual acts performed within a friendship, in the sense defined, are performed by persons who hold all things in common, including each other’s bodies. This community benefits from, and adds to, the intensity of sexual excitement; and this fact seems to be the foundation for the fact that antiphysical sexual acts may contribute to a friendship, so that they are justified within it. Within unequal relationships, it seems in turn that, similarly, their inequality is reinforced by the act; this hinders the relationship’s attaining to equality, which is the goal of all unequal autotelic relationships. Since the act is contrary to the end of the relationship in this case, it is irrational to perform, and therefore immoral.