I have some sympathy with the deaf couple who wanted to choose to have a deaf baby. People do not have a positive moral right to make such a choice. However, I think that it would be morally permissible and that it should be legally permissible to do so. It is wrong to deafen a child who would otherwise have been able to hear. It is not wrong to choose to have a deaf baby who otherwise would not have been born.

I have some sympathy with the deaf couple who wanted to choose to have a deaf baby. People do not have a positive moral right to make such a choice. However, I think that it would be morally permissible and that it should be legally permissible to do so. It is wrong to deafen a child who would otherwise have been able to hear. It is not wrong to choose to have a deaf baby who otherwise would not have been born.

Consider an analogy. Suppose that, in a loch, several children are drowning. Suppose that you have the time and energy to rescue only one of them. None of the children has a stronger moral or legal claim than another to be rescued. None has a positive moral or legal right to be rescued. If you choose to save one of the children, there is no moral obligation to try, if possible, to choose to save the healthiest one. If, somehow, you knew that one of the children was deaf and you made a deliberate attempt to save that child rather than one of the rest, you would not be doing anything wrong. You would not be causing harm.

The action would be morally permissible. It would be outrageous if such a deliberate choice were to be made illegal.

I would suggest that much of the reaction to the deaf couple's request was based on emotional squeamishness rather than moral principle.
Professor Hugh McLachlan,
Glasgow Caledonian University.