has raised many valid points against somebody–but I’m not sure who; certainly not me. I never “argue[d] that the anti-stem-cell argument is demonstrably correct because passionate people hold it and their passion is undergirded by the rightness of their argument.” John returns to this point in his conclusion; I have no idea what I wrote that could possibly make him think I hold that strange view. His insinuation that I haven’t spoken to people who support stem-cell research is, I would like to think, beneath him.

To recap: I agreed with Krauthammer and John that the mere fact that some people oppose a particular government policy cannot be a decisive objection to that policy. To take the example that Krauthammer brought up, I quoted, and John then reiterated: the mere fact that many pacifists object to a war, and to their money’s being spent on a war, is not a decisive reason not to go to war. So far, we agree.

But if the opponents of the policy are right that embryonic stem-cell research is an evil, then having the state encourage and subsidize it is an additional evil. (Obviously I did not suggest that to make that observation was to make an argument that they are correct; I merely stated my view that sound reasoning does, in fact, yield that conclusion.) To make people complicit in something they mistakenly think is an evil is not as bad as to make them complicit in something that is actually an evil. So a full evaluation of the rightness or wrongness of subsidizing embryonic stem-cell research cannot prescind from the question of whether that research is morally licit.

But–and here is where the question of necessity comes in–it is possible to be agnostic on the question of whether the research is morally licit while thinking that we should avoid making people pay for something they think is immoral if we don’t have to. If, say, 40 percent of the public is opposed to a war, that is a reason not to engage in the war if the war is not a necessary one. It may not be the top consideration–one can make the argument that if a war isn’t necessary, we shouldn’t wage it regardless of the composition of public opinion–but it’s not an obviously irrelevant consideration either.

If John wants to continue this discussion, I hope that this time he can describe my views in a way that at least rises to the level of caricature.