Should trying to conceive a child be made illegal if personhood starts at conception?

[Hank77]

It's just that from a Christian worldview that pain should be dampened by a belief that their loved ones are in a place of eternal happiness and they'll be reunited for all eternity.

I think this is the true view of most Christians. Grief but grief that is comforted/dampened by belief in eternal life.

 

[S.O.J.I.A.]

if the LORD wants to abort a child He has the right to do so.

 

[Mary Meg]

We're trying to argue from your worldview. And maybe we're not doing a good job of it. We're well aware that miscarriages can be an extremely painful experience. Because we atheists don't believe that we'll ever be reunited in heaven, which is a realm of eternal bliss. But Christians do profess to believe that. So that leaves us confused. Why are they sad? Don't the believe the things they profess to believe?
Of course we're also well aware that a Christian experiences the pain they feel in this life just as an atheist does. It's just that from a Christian worldview that pain should be dampened by a belief that their loved ones are in a place of eternal happiness and they'll be reunited for all eternity.

There are a lot of Christians -- really, I guess it's the new, modern trend -- who present funerals as "celebrations of life," who try to make it a joyous occasion, who play happy music and party it up. But I find this extremely sad. Even at these kind of funerals, I see the family fighting back tears, struggling to keep their happy faces on, pretending death is something that it's not. Yes, we should celebrate and be consoled that we believe our loved one has passed to God's glory and that we'll see them again -- but the truth is, death, no matter what the one who's passed might be gaining, is loss for us who are left behind.

What you atheists don't seem to understand is that it's not supposed to be this way. Death is a great insult to the human person and to the human community. It's a trauma. It's something that rips away loved ones from our side and takes them from us for the rest of our earthly lives. Christians believe that in God's original plan, humans were meant to enjoy eternal fellowship with God -- but that death came about as a result of sin. Salvation restores us to the promise of eternal life, and yes, we can hope in the Resurrection that we'll see our loved ones again -- but death is still death. Loss is still loss. You and the other guy write as if Christians, because they believe in something supernatural, aren't supposed to experience natural human emotions. Let us grieve, please.

 

[Dave-W]

Except if you're a Christian, then you get to live forever.

Not in this physical existence.

 

[Dave-W]

You and the other guy write as if Christians, because they believe in something supernatural, aren't supposed to experience natural human emotions. Let us grieve, please.

I agree so much with this. A couple of years ago I was in a discussion where the OP and others agreeing with him posited that God is totally devoid of emotion and we his followers should rid our selves of this plague which was obviously a result of the fall. I tried to show them from scripture how God the Father and Jesus both displayed strong emotion; but it was not well received.

Paul wrote in 1 Thes. 4.13 that “we do not grieve as those who have no hope,”. A pastor once told me that meant that if you grieve, you are an unbeliever who has no hope.

That is nothing more than a load of [expletive deleted].

The Jews have developed a very effective way of accounting for and moving thru and past grief, and it is more or less followed by us Messianics as well.

 

[ViaCrucis]

I was thinking we should jail the person who designed those natural processes.

How would one jail evolution? Also evolution isn't a person.

-CryptoLutheran

 

[Dave-W]

I was thinking we should jail the person who designed those natural processes.

??????

 

[-Sasha-]

I'm just exposing the inconsistencies of the pro life rhetoric. Millions of children die in the womb and no one bats an eye.

I pray for the souls of miscarried babies as well as aborted ones...

 

[Rajni]

http://www.webmd.com/baby/guide/pregnancy-miscarriage

The chance that a person is killed involuntarily is way too high. Let's take a conservative estimate and say the number is somewhere between 10% and 50%. In 2015 there were almost 4 million live births in the United States. That means that between 400,000 and 4 million people (babies / fetuses / zygotes) died to achieve that number.

If every time you drove a car there was a 10 to 50% percent chance that a person ends up dead, you would not be allowed to drive a car.

Should people who think personhood starts at conception be in favor of criminalizing pregnancies? Or is it OK for millions of children to die as long as it results in an equal or greater number of live births?

Actually, if the "age of accountability" thing is true,
it should be commended rather than criminalized.
In such a scenario, those souls would go straight to
heaven before reaching that dreaded age where
they lose their initial salvation to personal liability.

-

 

[blackribbon]

http://www.webmd.com/baby/guide/pregnancy-miscarriage

The chance that a person is killed involuntarily is way too high. Let's take a conservative estimate and say the number is somewhere between 10% and 50%. In 2015 there were almost 4 million live births in the United States. That means that between 400,000 and 4 million people (babies / fetuses / zygotes) died to achieve that number.

If every time you drove a car there was a 10 to 50% percent chance that a person ends up dead, you would not be allowed to drive a car.

Should people who think personhood starts at conception be in favor of criminalizing pregnancies? Or is it OK for millions of children to die as long as it results in an equal or greater number of live births?

Miscarriage is simply death. Guess what, 100% of all people will die at some time. The only questions is at what age. Be it 2 days gestation or 99 years, it is the same. Dying isn't bad. It is what opens the door to allow us to be with Jesus physically and eternally. It is as normal as breathing. How can conceiving a baby be a bad thing? It is also as natural as breathing and dying, too.

 

[ranunculus]

Pro-life isn't about numbers, it's asks the question 'Is it ethical and moral to allow a person to end the life of another person, even though that person is still in the womb?'

*edited to ask, 'Is it ethical and moral to allow a person to accidentally end the life of another person 50% of the time, even though that person is still in the womb?'

imo, this argument is even more ridiculous.

If you let someone drive a car and half the time they kill someone, do you take their license away?
If you let someone get pregnant and half the time they kill someone, do you still let them get pregnant?
Or is it ridiculous because a fetus isn't a person?

 

[FireDragon76]

You're suggesting that pro-life people should embrace the genocide of the entire human race because of the chance that a natural process may occur?

I mean... wow...

There are some types of academic ethicists and philosophers that might take that position, though. Some have argued there is no value in potential human life, only actual lives.

 

[ranunculus]

There's one other interesting thing to consider. About 30-50% of fertilizations end in miscarriage. (This includes women who don't know they're pregnant. If you count only known pregnancies the percent is smaller. That's why you see two different numbers.)

The usual conservative assumption is that about 10% of adults are saved. Under the usual assumptions, everyone dying in infancy is saved. So that implies that between 75% and 83% of the people in heaven are fetuses.

This is, of course, not logically impossible. But it's at the very least an unexpected picture.

Interesting thought.
If this tiny poll is anything to go by, about half the Christians on the general theology board think babies go straight to haven or at least not to hell.
Are the souls of some babies predestined to hell?

Of course with the historically high death rate of children for hundred of thousands of years, heaven should be filled with people who have never had a conscious thought in their lifetime.

 

[FireDragon76]

The difference is that miscarriages are natural deaths that are occurring on their own. Abortions are not. It's the elective termination of a pregnancy.

Also, it's not true that "no one bats an eye". Many women are deeply saddened by miscarriage.

 

[ranunculus]

You and the other guy write as if Christians, because they believe in something supernatural, aren't supposed to experience natural human emotions. Let us grieve, please.

Humans are all wired largely the same, so unless you're a psychopath, we all feel grief and loss and sadness. No one is denying that.
But you have to understand that we see an inherent contradiction between your actions and your professed beliefs.
Like that jerk Desk Trauma said, if someone just skipped all the suffering of life, skipped the risk of not being a Christian damning them and entered into a realm of eternal bliss, then your wanting them to still be here in this life is puzzling.

 

[ranunculus]

How would one jail evolution? Also evolution isn't a person.

-CryptoLutheran

Should trying to conceive a child be made illegal if personhood starts at conception?

Look, the way I see it, if I start from your worldview that a God created this universe, then that God presumably had options. Yet he chose to create a universe where so many fertilized eggs are aborted naturally. Not to mention the historically high death rate of children (500 or so in a 1000 for literally millennia, and if you're an old earth believer, even longer.)

And that's why I jokingly said he should be jailed (for gross incompetence and malice). Of course I don't believe in that God, I'm just operating from your worldview that a God created this universe.

 

[ranunculus]

Actually, if the "age of accountability" thing is true,
it should be commended rather than criminalized.
In such a scenario, those souls would go straight to
heaven before reaching that dreaded age where
they lose their initial salvation to personal liability.

-

Do you think it's a problem if 95% of inhabitants of heaven never had a conscious thought in their lifetimes?

 

[ranunculus]

Miscarriage is simply death. Guess what, 100% of all people will die at some time. The only questions is at what age. Be it 2 days gestation or 99 years, it is the same. Dying isn't bad. It is what opens the door to allow us to be with Jesus physically and eternally. It is as normal as breathing. How can conceiving a baby be a bad thing? It is also as natural as breathing and dying, too.

I think you're entering the naturalistic fallacy, in that because something occurs naturally it's OK or moral.
If you ask, how can conceiving a baby be a bad thing? Well that's the point of this thread. Sure, it's part of the natural processes that as many as 50% of pregnancies end in miscarriage. But just because something occurs naturally, doesn't mean we have to like it.

I'll go back to the example I gave to Hank77.
If you let someone drive a car and half the time they kill someone, do you still let them drive?
If you let someone get pregnant and half the time they kill someone, do you still let them get pregnant?
Or is my analogy faulty because a fetus isn't a person?

 

[ranunculus]

Also, it's not true that "no one bats an eye". Many women are deeply saddened by miscarriage.

I'm not talking about the individuals who are stricken with grief after suffering a loss.
I'm talking about the larger society.
If you follow my logic in the opening post, as many as 4 million babies, fetuses, zygotes have to die in order to get to 4 million live births. That's a huge number. Why is it OK, why is it permissible? Is it OK because it happens naturally? Or is it OK because the unborn don't yet have the same rights as you or me?
If 4 million Americans died of smallpox every year, do you think something would be done about it?

 

[FireDragon76]

I'm not talking about the individuals who are stricken with grief after suffering a loss.
I'm talking about the larger society.
If you follow my logic in the opening post, as many as 4 million babies, fetuses, zygotes have to die in order to get to 4 million live births. That's a huge number. Why is it OK, why is it permissible? Is it OK because it happens naturally? Or is it OK because the unborn don't yet have the same rights as you or me?
If 4 million Americans died of smallpox every year, do you think something would be done about it?

"the larger society" is an abstraction, it could mean anything. Real people do care about miscarriages. It's why people go to doctors when they are pregnant and take steps to try to minimize miscarriages, such as putting warnings on cigarettes and alcohol, and medications, for instance.