Abortion

[The_Horses_Boy]

What really gets me annoyed on the matter of abortion is that people try to trivialize unwanted human life by calling it a fetus. If it has a beating human heart, a functioning human brain, a human nervous system, a human head, human eyes, human skeletal structure, why is it not called a human? It is a human, to anyone that can look at the facts objectively. The only thing is that it is not a fully developed human, and if you want to cite that then I'll cite that the human brain isn't fully developed until after the age of 25.

 

[mothcorrupteth]

It isn't a human because that makes us feel comfortable killing it, the same way calling Jews parasites made the Nazis more comfortable about killing them, and the same way claiming that black men have no souls made Confederate slaveowners more comfortable about what they did. Funny. I've actually heard a pro-abortionist refer to an embryo/fetus as a "parasite," and if I placed her libertarian rhetoric about not telling her what do with her body next to the Confederate's diatribe about keeping my hands off his property, I can scarcely tell the difference. Noble and correct in principle, but still rationalization.

 

[burrow_owl]

A question that strikes me as fundamental to this issue, yet rarely asked, is: why is it wrong to kill other people? What is it about people that obligates us not to kill them?

I wonder if a lot of disparity on the question of abortion comes down to different approaches to this question.

 

[noparty]

Countdown to having the thread closed in 3...2...1...

 

[platzapS]

I don't think anyone denies a fetus is human. The question is of personhood--whether the fetus has the rights of a born human. Also, the fetus is--however loaded the word may be--a parasite.

 

[Allister]

If it has a beating human heart, a functioning human brain, a human nervous system, a human head, human eyes, human skeletal structure,

what about before these things are developed, say when it is only a small cluster of cells?

 

[mothcorrupteth]

I don't think anyone denies a fetus is human. The question is of personhood--whether the fetus has the rights of a born human. Also, the fetus is--however loaded the word may be--a parasite.

At the basest of levels, the word person comes from a Greek word meaning "mask," the connotation being that a person is an identity. A fetus has a very distinct genetic identity, and it also already has a temperament, which psychological theory has traditionally identified as a dimension of personality. Furthermore, a parasite lives on an organism of another species, which is not the fetus's state of affairs (neither was it the Jews', for that matter).

what about before these things are developed, say when it is only a small cluster of cells?

What about it? Are not certain packets within this cluster already preparing to specify into the structures mentioned? And aren't you and I just extraordinarily large clusters of cells, when viewed from a certain intellectual perspective? Shall I kill you because your cluster's existence is inconvenient to mine?

 

[DieHappy]

A question that strikes me as fundamental to this issue, yet rarely asked, is: why is it wrong to kill other people? What is it about people that obligates us not to kill them?

Compassion

I wonder if a lot of disparity on the question of abortion comes down to different approaches to this question.

Sure. A pro-abortionist would weigh the inconvenience of carrying to term and raising the child more heavily than ending the life. They may make themselves feel better about it by believing that the life has no "personhood" or by believing it's ok to get rid of inconveient lives, but that's the scale. The pro-lifer says that the life is worth saving because we have compassion for humans and it is, without any doubt, human. That weighs that side down much more.

 

[burrow_owl]

The pro-lifer says that the life is worth saving because we have compassion for humans and it is, without any doubt, human.

Here's what you're saying: if people have people have compassion for organism X such that they want to save its life, then killing X is wrong.

First, it'd be hard to escape relativism on this view; people have different views on which organisms should be spared, so you either have to resort to relativism ('if group Y has compassion for organism X, then killing X is wrong for Y') or to some strange consensus position that would be difficult to defend ('if N number people have compassion for Y, then killing Y is wrong for everyone'). This is just a moral variant of might makes right, and very compelling.

Neither of those grounds for defending the immorality of murder is strong.

 

[The_Horses_Boy]

I don't think anyone denies a fetus is human. The question is of personhood--whether the fetus has the rights of a born human. Also, the fetus is--however loaded the word may be--a parasite.

We have two basic definitions of a parasite. In the first definition, an unborn child is not a parasite because it is of the same species. In the second definition... Well, people on life support, or even Social Security are parasites, and there is as much logical reason to murder them for it as is for an unborn child.

1.an organism that lives on or in an organism of another species, known as the host, from the body of which it obtains nutriment. 2.a person who receives support, advantage, or the like, from another or others without giving any useful or proper return, as one who lives on the hospitality of others.

It isn't a human because that makes us feel comfortable killing it, the same way calling Jews parasites made the Nazis more comfortable about killing them, and the same way claiming that black men have no souls made Confederate slaveowners more comfortable about what they did. Funny. I've actually heard a pro-abortionist refer to an embryo/fetus as a "parasite," and if I placed her libertarian rhetoric about not telling her what do with her body next to the Confederate's diatribe about keeping my hands off his property, I can scarcely tell the difference. Noble and correct in principle, but still rationalization.

I think that you've pretty much got it.

what about before these things are developed, say when it is only a small cluster of cells?

It is a human life, the matter is simply at what stage of development people are willing to recognize that. As I've said before, even adults aren't fully developed.

Sure. A pro-abortionist would weigh the inconvenience of carrying to term and raising the child more heavily than ending the life. They may make themselves feel better about it by believing that the life has no "personhood" or by believing it's ok to get rid of inconveient lives, but that's the scale. The pro-lifer says that the life is worth saving because we have compassion for humans and it is, without any doubt, human. That weighs that side down much more.

Well said. Thanks.

 

[burrow_owl]

In the first definition, an unborn child is not a parasite because it is of the same species. In the second definition...Well, people on life support, or even Social Security are parasites, and there is as much logical reason to murder them for it as is for an unborn child.

Into which category do parasitic twins fall?

 

[Allister]

Are not certain packets within this cluster already preparing to specify into the structures mentioned

preparing...yes. but preparation or potential human is not human.

And aren't you and I just extraordinarily large clusters of cells, when viewed from a certain intellectual perspective? Shall I kill you because your cluster's existence is inconvenient to mine?

again, yes, we are an extraordinary large cluster of cells, but a large cluster that can think, live independantly, move, feel.... and actually has an identiy. A cluster of cells a couple days after conception is a totally different ball game. it has none of the above elements. why not exteact it from the body and let it live on its own, if it can survive....great.

would you argue the same for a cell at the moment of conception?

 

[RonPaulJr]

What really gets me annoyed on the matter of abortion is that people try to trivialize unwanted human life by calling it a fetus. If it has a beating human heart, a functioning human brain, a human nervous system, a human head, human eyes, human skeletal structure, why is it not called a human? It is a human, to anyone that can look at the facts objectively. The only thing is that it is not a fully developed human, and if you want to cite that then I'll cite that the human brain isn't fully developed until after the age of 25.

No government has the right to make laws considering the intent of a sexual relationship between two people.
This only leads to a legal definition of what sexual intercourse is, this one indicate that sexual intercourse from a legal stand point would be for procreation. Meaning laws could be made to when you could or could not have sex. Who we could have sex with, that is bad because even the most conservative married couple would not be to happy if Bushy was telling them when to, how to, why to do “it”.
Keep the Government out of my bed room; it is such a simple thing to ask.

 

[DieHappy]

Protecting the unborn has nothing to do with creating the unborn!!!!!!!

There are a dozen threads in ethics and morality about gay sex, go there and post this.

 

[RonPaulJr]

Protecting the unborn has nothing to do with creating the unborn!!!!!!!

I guess sexual education is important.

 

[CCGirl]

It is noone else's business what people choose to do with their bodies. Do you want your medical decisions publically debated? This is an issue for medical personnel only, not politicians.

 

[The_Horses_Boy]

It is noone else's business what people choose to do with their bodies. Do you want your medical decisions publically debated? This is an issue for medical personnel only, not politicians.

Law is not the responsibility of politicians? I beg to differ!

And I'm sorry to tell you but you don't have any organs in your body that have their own skeletal structure, their own human brain, their own human heart, their own human nervous system, et cetera et cetera et cetera

 

[RonPaulJr]

Law is not the responsibility of politicians? I beg to differ!

And I'm sorry to tell you but you don't have any organs in your body that have their own skeletal structure, their own human brain, their own human heart, their own human nervous system, et cetera et cetera et cetera

There should be no law because of potential of great harm by the implied definitions which the laws carry.

 

[mothcorrupteth]

preparing...yes. but preparation or potential human is not human.

Your argument would be valid if our hypothetical potential human were presently a wad of clay, but it is a cluster of cells with an essentially human genetic identity. If you reject the idea that a blastocyst is essentially human simply because it doesn't possess the same biological structures as the exemplar of a fully developed adult, then to be consistent you must reject all theory-based views of categorization. Therefore--by the standards of your definition--the caterpillar who has only the potential to become a butterfly is not, in fact, class Insecta, order Lepidoptera. Congratulations on destroying Linnaeus's life work in one fell, arbitrary swoop.

again, yes, we are an extraordinary large cluster of cells, but a large cluster that can think, live independantly, move, feel.... and actually has an identiy. A cluster of cells a couple days after conception is a totally different ball game. it has none of the above elements.

What if I am mentally retarded? Mildly? Moderately? Severely? Profoundly? At some point, my IQ gets so low that I don't meet your criteria of thinking and being able to live independently (and the diagnostic categories I've gone through are fairly arbitrary when this is a continuum anyway); is it okay to kill me when I reach that point? If I were brain damaged tomorrow, would it be okay for you to kill me? If I lost my legs in a car accident tomorrow, I would not be able to move; could you kill me then? What if I were an Antisocial Personality (a psychopath) and had no conscience or an autistic child with no theory of mind? In either case, I certainly wouldn't be able to "feel" for another person. Nor if I were blind or deaf would I be able "feel" in one of my sensory modalities. Would you kill me then? After all, I am lacking one or more of the characteristics that defines a human for you.

why not exteact it from the body and let it live on its own, if it can survive....great.

Before the Holocaust, the Nazi party convinced the German people it was okay to kill retards and the mentally ill because these people were not independent, could not survive without others to help them. They were weak, a tax on the human gene pool, and in Hitler's world, only the strongest and fittest deserved to live (he truly was an evolutionist first and a Norse paganist second). Are you prepared to adopt that same logic?

would you argue the same for a cell at the moment of conception?

Indeed I would. A zygote has a distinct genetic identity that is undeniably Homo sapiens.

It is noone else's business what people choose to do with their bodies. Do you want your medical decisions publically debated? This is an issue for medical personnel only, not politicians.

A zygote/blastocyst/embryo/fetus has a genetic identity that is separate from the mother's. It is no more a part of her body than the dust mites in her eyelashes. Just as my property rights to a knife extend only so far as when I've decided to place that knife maliciously in your neck, your self-proclaimed "right" to your body extends only so far as when it intrudes on another life. And how does this "right" extend to a fetus but not to suicidal persons or trichotillomania patients? After all, if a person wants to kill himself or pull out all his eyelashes, that's his own business, isn't it? Clinical intervention's out of the question.

 

[Lord_Marx]

Holocaust, holocaust, holocaust… Why do people see the need to exploit tragedies to support their argument?