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Science says nothing at all about this subject, for the simple reason that "new human being" is not a scientific concept -- it has no scientific definition.The science on when a new human being comes into existence is fairly settled at this point.
I had to laugh at this naive post for humans almost ALWAYS treat other humans as a means to an end! A friend asked me yesterday to accompany him to a meeting tonight because he wanted company. My wife asked me the day before "to help" her pull her cell phone charger out of the wall because she wanted to stow it. My boss asked me to provide a quote to a customer because that is how we get more business and profits.
- Roe v Wade discovered a pregnant woman has the right to privacy, which implies the right to kill so long as no one in government knows about it.
The reason the baby does not have a right to its own life is that rights pertain to actual moral agents. Recent studies suggest the human brain is not fully formed until 25 years of age. Certainly an unborn is not only NOT a rational choice maker, it is no kind of choice maker. Sure, I concede the human baby has the potential to one day be a moral agent. However, potential is not actual.
My reading is that they used privacy is a somewhat specific sense: the right not to have the government forbid something unless there's a good reason for it. This isn't what people typically mean by privacy today.I haven't read Roe since law school, so I am somewhat fuzzy on the reasoning, but the primary concern was the right to privacy in healthcare decisions, not the right to kill whomever you want as long as it happens in the privacy of your house.
My reading is that they used privacy is a somewhat specific sense: the right not to have the government forbid something unless there's a good reason for it. This isn't what people typically mean by privacy today.
It's based on a concept that I'm not sure the current Supreme Court believes: that the bill of rights doesn't enumerate every right, but is just an example of things the government should not do.
I'm sure you're aware that adding a bill of rights was controversial because people were afraid it would be understood as the only rights we have. That's specifically what today's originalists are doing.
I'm working by memory, but my memory is that they thought the legitimate purpose of regulation was to control potentially-dangerous medical procedures. They observed that because abortion is less dangerous than finishing the pregnancy up to the end of the first trimester, no regulation should be done then.I think it goes deeper than that, since Roe does state that the government can have a legitimate interest in the fetus's potential life. So obviously they recognized a good reason for it. The question here is specifically how to balance individual's right to privacy against the state's interests, though I don't remember the exact calculus.
Since the original intent was not to restrict rights to listed ones, I think originalism is self-contradictory.I would agree, though I'm honestly somewhat skeptical of the possibility of really being an originalist at all. Scalia came closest, but conservative justices have certainly been known to creatively interpret the Bill of Rights in favor of certain interests as well.
I'm working by memory, but my memory is that they thought the legitimate purpose of regulation was to control potentially-dangerous medical procedures. They observed that because abortion is less dangerous than finishing the pregnancy up to the end of the first trimester, no regulation should be done then.
You're right, however, that there was a balancing act, as always.
Since the original intent was not to restrict rights to listed ones, I think originalism is self-contradictory.
I would have probably said that rights apply to human lives, rather than specifying moral agents
Are you implying that people aren't fully moral agents until age 25? Are there degrees of moral agency?
I'm not sure this is justification for being able to kill the life though. We could easily think of other situations where a person isn't a rational choice maker, for whatever reason. I could think of several mental conditions where a person wouldn't be a rational choice maker, yet I think you would be hard pressed to say it was therefore morally permissible to kill them.
IAdditionally, I'm not so sure that at some point an unborn baby doesn't become a rational choice maker while in the womb.
IThe unborn in this case certainly behaves in such a way that suggests that it thinks it has a right to life. And though it may be minimal in rational choices, it does seem to be able to make at least one key rational decision regarding it's own life - avoid the needle.
Thinking is not the criteria. I am unaware of any behavior of a baby that suggests it makes any choices, that it is any more than a response creature.
I find it pretty unpersuasive and quite a stretch that biological reproduction is akin to slavery.
I think you may be able to argue that in such cases as rape and the life of the mother that it's more akin to slavery
Do you think it could be successfully argued that since the normal reproduction process is slavery, and that since slavery is immoral, then reproduction ought to be prohibited?
I doubt the right to privacy implies the right to kill so long as the government doesn't know about it.
And just a little semantics here, but I'm not sure that the Supreme Court discovers anything so much as offers an opinion. In fact, they called it an opinion, not a discovery.
Is a protector a slave? I'm not sure how one goes from enslaved to protector.
I don't think a persons rights are dependent on what the government knows or doesn't know, and I'm not sure that just because a government can't protect everyone's rights all the time that it shouldn't recognize those rights all the same and protect them in some sensible, albeit imperfect, manner. If the government is to have any purpose, then among it's chief purposes is to ensure the rights of the people.
Are you suggesting here that if the government does come to know about rights violations that it is ok to do something about it? So if indeed the unborn had their natural rights violated in an abortion, and the government knows about it, then it is permissible for the government to act? For example, the government knows of Planned Parenthood clinics. So if a rights violation is occurring, would the government be justified in shutting down the clinics and penalizing doctors?
Rights are a moral principle pertain to a person's freedom to choose in a social context. So, moral agency, the capacity to makes choices, is a prerequisite. Another poster already pointed out how an adult in a coma or deemed braindead obviously cannot make health care decisions. Someone, a health care advocate takes on the right to make decisions on their behalf.
By the way, this is the same argument against free health care. "Free" means the doctor becomes a slave to the patient.
Your analysis here makes absolutely no sense. People who are comatose do not lose their rights.
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