Abortion and Infanticide

[brightlights]

Well, that´s my entire point. We don´t get anywhere with considering two different issues (or better: two issues that at least one of the participants considers significantly different) as though they were the same. By proposing to discuss infanticide and abortion (but not, e.g. masturbation) simultaneously you have stacked the deck by already basing the discussion on what you think are significant differences and what aren´t.

Ok fair enough. I see what you're saying. The debate can be totally limited to abortion, then.

 

[cantata]

Not specific experiences. Experiences period. It would be bad for you to die because death prevents you from experiencing future things period. Judge for yourself whether or not that is bad for you. I personally don't want to stop experiencing things, especially joy.

Experiencing nothing-at-all is neutral. I really can't say I mind whether or not I wake up tomorrow, except that it would make my parents very sad if I didn't. As far as I'm concerned, it would be a completely neutral situation. Death is not like sitting in an empty room with nothing to do. It's simply the end of experience - and you won't be there to experience not experiencing anything, so it doesn't matter.

The idea that it could possibly bother you to be not experiencing anything is silly. You won't be experiencing being bothered by it, either.

 

[PetersKeys]

I don't really understand this.

Every time I make a choice, I am prevented from having the set of future experiences that would have ensued if I'd chosen differently. I don't usually miss those experiences, and if I do, I miss them only by virtue of the fact that I am alive to miss them.

Why is it bad (as opposed to neutral) for experience to stop?

relative moralism. if there even is such a thing. how is it bad for the fetus you keep asking. It has to do with human rights. Your very clear on the rights of the woman. So why not the rights of the child.

The choice is made when the woman has sex, and yes she is consenting to pregnancy and all its risks everytime she has sex.

 

[cantata]

relative moralism. if there even is such a thing. how is it bad for the fetus you keep asking. It has to do with human rights. Your very clear on the rights of the woman. So why not the rights of the child.

I've never heard of relative moralism. Perhaps you're thinking of moral relativism.

I'm afraid I don't believe in rights, except for legal rights. I know how it's bad for a woman not to be able to choose what happens to her body. I don't know how it's bad for a foetus (or anyone else, in fact) to stop existing. Do explain.

The choice is made when the woman has sex, and yes she is consenting to pregnancy and all its risks everytime she has sex.

I don't see what that has to do with anything. You may as well say that she consents to having chlamydia when she has sex, so we shouldn't give her medical treatment if she contracts it. She does indeed consent, in a sense, to the risks involved with sex, including conception; but that doesn't mean she consents to carry any pregnancies to term, any more than she consents not to have treated any infections she contracts.

In any case, I still don't know why it's bad for a foetus to be aborted. Until I know that, I can't object to abortion, even if women do consent to conception every time they have sex.