The hypocrisy of being "pro-life"

[Job 33:6]

And, I know that scientists say that human life begins at conception, but this is more of an observer in a laboratory making an observation about a change in physical state of something, than it is a statement made by God.

In paleontology we name fossils all the time. This species is a T rex, this species is a brontosaurus, this species is homo sapiens sapiens etc. But these are human observations moreso than they are Godly statements of truth.

In fact, sometimes scientists change what we call things. 5 years ago we used to say "this is a torosaurus", and our statement was defined based on our personal observation.

And today, torosaurus doesn't even exist. It was reclassified as a juvenile triceratops.

We, the observers, make up words to help us talk about things easier. And how we define things is not necessarily equivelant to how God defines things.

So when a scientist comes along and says "human life begins at conception", we have to remember that this statement isn't necessarily a Godly statement. And its more of a statement made by an observer. It's not that anything physically came into existence, it's just when we, the observers, make the choice (with or without God) to start calling it human.

And if our genes are ever changing, such a statement really has no specific truth to it.

Which is why we need scripture.

 

[coffee4u]

This doesn't say when God creates an individual. At best, assuming we were to take the Psalmist's poetry as literal information (which is an assumption in and of itself), it would merely suggest that God creates within the womb. But there is no clarity on when this is. Week 1, 2, 5, week 20 etc.

Psalms 149:9:
If I take the wings of the morning and dwell in the uttermost parts of the sea, even there your hand shall lead me, and your right hand shall hold me.

While there is nothing in scripture that gives an exact date there is also nothing to contraindicate that God does not see us from the moment of conception either.
That Zygote is still us, yet unformed. The formation happens immediately upon fertilization and very quickly. The heart is already beating by the end of the forth week, so obviously much formation has taken place for that to happen. By 20 weeks the fetus is close to being fully formed just small.

Psalms are obviously poetry and song but that doesn't mean they don't contain truth within them.

 

[Job 33:6]

While there is nothing in scripture that gives an exact date...

That's it^, case settled.

I think that there is something inherently materialistic about the suggestion that life begins at conception. It's an assumption based purely on materialistic events and purely in the absence of discussion of the supernatural.

And it involves almost a willful dependence on scientists over scripture.

 

[coffee4u]

That's it^, case settled.

I think that there is something inherently materialistic about the suggestion that life begins at conception. It's an assumption based purely on materialistic events and purely in the absence of discussion of the supernatural.

And it involves almost a willful dependence on scientists over scripture.

So because scripture doesn't say "Thou are a person after 2.4 seconds" you take that as justification for abortion?

God sees out unformed body and as such the spirit could be there immediately upon conception. This is something only God knows. Given that we can't know we have no right to decide to end life in the womb, no matter how early it is.

 

[Job 33:6]

So because scripture doesn't say "Thou are a person after 2.4 seconds" you take that as justification for abortion?

God sees out unformed body and as such the spirit could be there immediately upon conception. This is something only God knows. Given that we can't know we have no right to decide to end life in the womb, no matter how early it is.

I've said it before, I'll say it again:

It is my opinion that if a hunter can go out with a bow and arrow, and can shoot a deer, that experiences pain, fear and suffering, through its spinal cord and lungs, for sport and enjoyment, so that they can hang it's stuffed body parts on their wall as trophies, then a woman who is raped and may have health risks by carrying out a pregnancy, should have the right to use a morning after pill to destroy a non sentient, non pain and fear experiencing embryo.

And I would happily bring this before God^.

It's not that I think destroying life is a good thing, but rather, I just think that, culturally speaking, people are typically accepting of much more horrendous acts on the day to day. I think a lot of pro-life advocates are blowing the topic out of proportion.

I think that sentience is kind of a main factor for me. A tree isn't sentient, it feels no pain and doesn't suffer when hit with an axe. And if destroyed for some kind of practical reason, it is less morally wrong than destroying something that does experience pain and suffering. And this sounds like simple reasoning, but oddly enough, pro life advocates don't follow this simple reasoning.

 

[coffee4u]

I've said it before, I'll say it again:

It is my opinion that if a hunter can go out with a bow and arrow, and can shoot a deer, that experiences pain, fear and suffering, through its spinal cord and lungs, for sport and enjoyment, so that they can hang it's stuffed body parts on their wall as trophies, then a woman who is raped and may have health risks by carrying out a pregnancy, should have the right to use a morning after pill to destroy a non sentient, non pain and fear experiencing embryo.

And I would happily bring this before God^.

It's not that I think destroying life is a good thing, but rather, I just think that, culturally speaking, people are typically accepting of much more horrendous acts on the day to day. I think a lot of pro-life advocates are blowing the topic out of proportion.

I think that sentience is kind of a main factor for me. A tree isn't sentient, it feels no pain and doesn't suffer when hit with an axe. And if destroyed for some kind of practical reason, it is less morally wrong than destroying something that does experience pain and suffering. And this sounds like simple reasoning, but oddly enough, pro life advocates don't follow this simple reasoning.

Before we had cameras into the womb and proper scans people thought the embryo was a mere lump of nothing for a long time and might have looked like a fish. Technology has allowed us to see how quickly an embryo develops. The 12 weeks old is a recognizable baby with all of the organs, muscles, limbs and bones in place, not a clump of cells and even an 8 week old fetus has been shown to react to stimulation.
They may as well have birthed it and killed it right there in cold blood, but that would mean seeing exactly what they are killing, innocent life. They are not killing a tree, its a human being with fingers, toes and a face and you don't know when it starts to feel pain.
Many babies are aborted further along and they are most definitely feeling pain.

People should not hunt for sport either, it's barbaric.

Plants are not the same form of life. The Bible distinguishes between life with a soul and life without. When something without a soul-plants 'dies' it isn't considered to be biblical death.

 

[SPF]

And its more of a statement made by an observer. It's not that anything physically came into existence, it's just when we, the observers, make the choice (with or without God) to start calling it human.

It's objective, observational science. The physical makeup of a new, unique human organism begins at fertilization. That's objective, scientific fact. A sperm is not a human organism, an egg is not a human organism - a zygote is a human organism. It's not even debated or argued any more among anyone with either an education or a notion of common sense.

I think that sentience is kind of a main factor for me. A tree isn't sentient, it feels no pain and doesn't suffer when hit with an axe. And if destroyed for some kind of practical reason, it is less morally wrong than destroying something that does experience pain and suffering. And this sounds like simple reasoning, but oddly enough, pro life advocates don't follow this simple reasoning.

The problem with your simple reasoning is that you, like usual, discard Scripture as not authoritative. If we use Scripture as our foundation, then we easily recognize that only human beings are created in the Image of God, and that we were created to rule over, and given permission to kill and eat animals.

From a Biblical perspective, human beings and animals are not analogous in relation to inherent moral worth and value.

Thus, when it comes to the intentional and purposeful killing of an innocent human being - it's morally wrong. Discriminating against the human being based upon it's age, level of development, gender, race, etc... is wrong. All human beings, regardless of their level of development possess the same inherent moral worth and value.

 

[Yekcidmij]

I've said it before, I'll say it again:

It is my opinion that if a hunter can go out with a bow and arrow, and can shoot a deer, that experiences pain, fear and suffering, through its spinal cord and lungs, for sport and enjoyment, so that they can hang it's stuffed body parts on their wall as trophies, then a woman who is raped and may have health risks by carrying out a pregnancy, should have the right to use a morning after pill to destroy a non sentient, non pain and fear experiencing embryo.

First, a deer isn't a human baby, which seems to undermine the point of your argument. Why is it morally imperative to treat a deer and a human baby equivalently? Beyond just the scenario you concocted, nobody, including you, treats a deer and human baby as having equal moral value.

Second, your analogy is a non-sequitur. Why not conclude from your analogy that it's wrong to hunt deer for sport rather than it's ok to kill a baby? Whether or not it's permissible or impermissible to hunt deer for sport seems irrelevant to the question on whether or not it's permissible to kill a baby in utero, and certainly the conclusion of one doesn't seem to warrant a conclusion about the other.

And I would happily bring this before God^.

So what? People bring all sorts of wrong ideas to God or believe that their positions are justified by God; you'll just be another.

It's not that I think destroying life is a good thing, but rather, I just think that, culturally speaking, people are typically accepting of much more horrendous acts on the day to day.

Is this you saying that both killing a deer and a human baby are bad things, but you think they should be permissible because people are more accepting of them? This is hardly a sound moral criteria for evaluating any moral claim.

I think a lot of pro-life advocates are blowing the topic out of proportion.

How so? Though I'm sure I don't speak for all, most pro-life advocates really have a couple of simple premises: (1) an embryo is a human life and (2) human life is sacred. Most pro-life positions follow from those. Those don't look to me to be unreasonable positions, even if you disagree with their validity, so it's hardly worth claiming that people are blowing things out of proportion. Maybe you're the one really blowing things out of proportion?

I think that sentience is kind of a main factor for me. A tree isn't sentient, it feels no pain and doesn't suffer when hit with an axe. And if destroyed for some kind of practical reason, it is less morally wrong than destroying something that does experience pain and suffering. And this sounds like simple reasoning, but oddly enough, pro life advocates don't follow this simple reasoning.

So is the avoidance of pain the governing criteria for evaluating moral claims? This will be an unsustainable position. It will be rather easy to conjure up situations and actions where pain is avoided, yet the actions and situations are still morally impermissible.

 

[Job 33:6]

First, a deer isn't a human baby, which seems to undermine the point of your argument. Why is it morally imperative to treat a deer and a human baby equivalently? Beyond just the scenario you concocted, nobody, including you, treats a deer and human baby as having equal moral value.

Second, your analogy is a non-sequitur. Why not conclude from your analogy that it's wrong to hunt deer for sport rather than it's ok to kill a baby? Whether or not it's permissible or impermissible to hunt deer for sport seems irrelevant to the question on whether or not it's permissible to kill a baby in utero, and certainly the conclusion of one doesn't seem to warrant a conclusion about the other.




So what? People bring all sorts of wrong ideas to God or believe that their positions are justified by God; you'll just be another.



Is this you saying that both killing a deer and a human baby are bad things, but you think they should be permissible because people are more accepting of them? This is hardly a sound moral criteria for evaluating any moral claim.



How so? Though I'm sure I don't speak for all, most pro-life advocates really have a couple of simple premises: (1) an embryo is a human life and (2) human life is sacred. Most pro-life positions follow from those. Those don't look to me to be unreasonable positions, even if you disagree with their validity, so it's hardly worth claiming that people are blowing things out of proportion. Maybe you're the one really blowing things out of proportion?



So is the avoidance of pain the governing criteria for evaluating moral claims? This will be an unsustainable position. It will be rather easy to conjure up situations and actions where pain is avoided, yet the actions and situations are still morally impermissible.

Catch up with the conversation. Who says a day old embryo is human? It doesn't say that in scripture.

And the topic is titled "the hypocrisy of being "pro-life"". I'm simply pointing out that if someone can shoot a deer through the lung with a bow and arrow, watch it scream in pain and fear and bleed out as it collapses on the ground, so that we can stuff its body parts and hang them on the wall for fun, then there's no reason for them to think that they have a moral high ground for protecting non pain feeling, non sentient embryos, especially in instances involving rape or where the mothers health is jeapordised by the pregnancy. And if one is culturally accepted, I'd say the other should be too, for the sake of being consistent.

And yes, someone could lie to another person and deceive them, all the while slipping drugs into their food to render them unconscious before killing them, but this collective effort of lying, deceiving, drugging etc. Results in an immoral act. I'm not sure what anti suffering hypotheticals you otherwise had in mind.

 

[Job 33:6]

It's objective, observational science. The physical makeup of a new, unique human organism begins at fertilization. That's objective, scientific fact. A sperm is not a human organism, an egg is not a human organism - a zygote is a human organism. It's not even debated or argued any more among anyone with either an education or a notion of common sense.

The problem with your simple reasoning is that you, like usual, discard Scripture as not authoritative. If we use Scripture as our foundation, then we easily recognize that only human beings are created in the Image of God, and that we were created to rule over, and given permission to kill and eat animals.

From a Biblical perspective, human beings and animals are not analogous in relation to inherent moral worth and value.

Thus, when it comes to the intentional and purposeful killing of an innocent human being - it's morally wrong. Discriminating against the human being based upon it's age, level of development, gender, race, etc... is wrong. All human beings, regardless of their level of development possess the same inherent moral worth and value.

You're still not resolving your dilemma. And you're saying that I'm not using scripture as my foundation, but your argument for life at conception is resting not upon scripture but upon secular science.

When I take ham, cheese and two slices of bread, and I put them together and make a ham sandwich, I am not bringing a sandwich into existence. I'm simply reshaping that which already exists.

Just the same, when two cells fuse or when a sperm meets an egg, nothing is coming into existence but rather it is the reforming of that which already exists.

When God creates, God brings things into existence that previously did not exist. When God created the universe as an example, God did not take a pre-existing universe and reshape it, He brought the universe into existence from non-existence.

And when God created you and me and everyone else, let's say my name is George. "George" didn't always and eternally exist before God created George. God brought George into existence from non-existence in his creation of human life.

Notice the difference between your argument that human life begins at conception (when pre existing cells and dna fuse), and the understanding that when God creates, He isn't reforming pre-existing matter, but rather He brings something which doesn't already exist, into existence.

Until you can get around this issue, your suggestion that human life begins at conception holds no merit because you're looking at the reforming of things that already exist in a materialistic world, rather than looking at things coming into existence. Your understanding of when human life comes into exostence, is dependent upon a chemical reaction between cells that already exist.

You're presenting a very naturalistic position dependent upon scientific research, rather than basing your position on the actions of God.


But one point further, remember that people simply attribute names to things for ease of conversation. One year we used to call certain dinosaur fossils by the name of "torosaurus", and the next year we started calling them "triceratops" and we realized that "torosaurus" didn't actually exist. The point being that just because we call something by a name, doesn't mean that it is what God created in His image. We change names of things all the time in science. What ultimately matters isn't what we, the scientists, call things. What matters is what God actually creates.

 

[Yekcidmij]

Who says a day old embryo is human?

It looks like biological taxonomy to me, but you were at a different middle school than me, so maybe you learned something different. But I do have yet to figure out why an embryo in a human female has yet to come out as a horse or a bear or a giraffe or a tree, and so I would be interested in hearing your taxonomy and your explanation as to why embryos resulting from conception between two humans always follow the biological development process of a human....and yet you somehow believe it's a different genus and species than every other human. Please explain....

I mean really though, I think your ideology is driving you to the absurd conclusion that embryos resulting form the conception of human male's and females are not really human, but are of some other genus and species. I think you have to conclude this because you probably agree with the pro-life premise that human life is sacred in some way and so you have to find a way to deny that embryos in human females are also human in order to allow for people to kill them. Yet you will be a rather great pains to explain why and how every one of these non-homo sapiens magically turns into a homo sapien. And I think your explanations to this natural, biological process will have to appeal to some non-biological, and probably arbitrary, properties like the location of the baby, how much O2 is in it's lungs, it's degree of dependency on a parent, or you will have to mistakenly point to a development stage rather than classifying the organism itself. I dunno, take your pick, but I think you'll be driven by ideology and not simple scientific observation.

It doesn't say that in scripture.

Who says it did? I mean, if scripture concludes that embryos in human females are really horses or flowers, maybe there's a problem, but I haven't seen that verse yet.

And the topic is titled "the hypocrisy of being "pro-life"".

Ok, thanks for the tip.

I'm simply pointing out that if someone can shoot a deer through the lung with a bow and arrow, watch it scream in pain and fear and bleed out as it collapses on the ground, so that we can stuff its body parts and hang them on the wall for fun, then there's no reason for them to think that they have a moral high ground for protecting non pain feeling, non sentient embryos, especially in instances involving rape or where the mothers health is jeapordised by the pregnancy. And if one is culturally accepted, I'd say the other should be too, for the sake of being consistent.

And I simply pointed out some flaws in your reasoning. So there's that.

And yes, someone could lie to another person and deceive them, all the while slipping drugs into their food to render them unconscious before killing them, but this collective effort of lying, deceiving, drugging etc. Results in an immoral act.

So that looks to be inconsistent with the reasons you previously gave. At this point you should probably abandon the idea you previously implied where attitudes and behaviors that avoid pain are necessarily morally permissible.

 

[Job 33:6]

It looks like biological taxonomy to me, but you were at a different middle school than me, so maybe you learned something different. But I do have yet to figure out why an embryo in a human female has yet to come out as a horse or a bear or a giraffe or a tree, and so I would be interested in hearing your taxonomy and your explanation as to why embryos resulting from conception between two humans always follow the biological development process of a human....and yet you somehow believe it's a different genus and species than every other human. Please explain....

I mean really though, I think your ideology is driving you to the absurd conclusion that embryos resulting form the conception of human male's and females are not really human, but are of some other genus and species. I think you have to conclude this because you probably agree with the pro-life premise that human life is sacred in some way and so you have to find a way to deny that embryos in human females are also human in order to allow for people to kill them. Yet you will be a rather great pains to explain why and how every one of these non-homo sapiens magically turns into a homo sapien. And I think your explanations to this natural, biological process will have to appeal to some non-biological, and probably arbitrary, properties like the location of the baby, how much O2 is in it's lungs, it's degree of dependency on a parent, or you will have to mistakenly point to a development stage rather than classifying the organism itself. I dunno, take your pick, but I think you'll be driven by ideology and not simple scientific observation.



Who says it did? I mean, if scripture concludes that embryos in human females are really horses or flowers, maybe there's a problem, but I haven't seen that verse yet.



Ok, thanks for the tip.



And I simply pointed out some flaws in your reasoning. So there's that.



So that looks to be inconsistent with the reasons you previously gave. At this point you should probably abandon the idea you previously implied where attitudes and behaviors that avoid pain are necessarily morally permissible.

As I've stated before, it's not about what science says, it's about what God says.

When I take ham, cheese and two slices of bread, and I put them together and make a ham sandwich, I am not bringing a sandwich into existence. I'm simply reshaping that which already exists.

Just the same, when two cells fuse or when a sperm meets an egg, nothing is coming into existence but rather it is the reforming of that which already exists.

When God creates, God brings things into existence that previously did not exist. When God created the universe as an example, God did not take a pre-existing universe and reshape it, He brought the universe into existence from non-existence.

And when God created you and me and everyone else, let's say my name is George. "George" didn't always and eternally exist before God created George. God brought George into existence from non-existence in his creation of human life.

Notice the difference between your argument that human life begins at conception (when pre existing cells and dna fuse), and the understanding that when God creates, He isn't reforming pre-existing matter, but rather He brings something which doesn't already exist, into existence.

Until you can get around this issue, your suggestion that human life begins at conception holds no merit because you're looking at the reforming of things that already exist in a materialistic world, rather than looking at things coming into existence. Your understanding of when human life comes into exostence, is dependent upon a chemical reaction between cells that already exist.

You're presenting a very naturalistic position dependent upon scientific research, rather than basing your position on the actions of God.


But one point further, remember that people simply attribute names to things for ease of conversation. One year we used to call certain dinosaur fossils by the name of "torosaurus", and the next year we started calling them "triceratops" and we realized that "torosaurus" didn't actually exist. The point being that just because we call something by a name, doesn't mean that it is what God created in His image. We change names of things all the time in science. What ultimately matters isn't what we, the scientists, call things. What matters is what God actually creates.

 

[Job 33:6]

" It looks like biological taxonomy to me"

Also, if you are familiar with biological taxonomy, you would also be aware that we scientists constantly debate over how life is classified. We are constantly changing and reclassifying what we call certain things. Hence my example above regarding torosaurus and triceratops. Human defined taxonomy is not equivalent to God's truth. You're confusing man's word with God's word.

 

[Yekcidmij]

Also, if you are familiar with biological taxonomy, you would also be aware that we scientists constantly debate over how life is classified. We are constantly changing and reclassifying what we call certain things.

So in your professional biology experience, in the academic literature what are the currently identified and debated genus and species for embryos in human females?

 

[Job 33:6]

So in your professional biology experience, in the academic literature what are the currently identified and debated genus and species for embryos in human females?

You're missing the point, The point is that humans do not define what God does or does not create.

And if we can argue over one species we can argue over any of them, because it is a human perspective and human conflict and human ideas.

All of which is independent of what God actually creates.

 

[Yekcidmij]

You're presenting a very naturalistic position dependent upon scientific research,

So you agree that my position is scientific. Thanks.

 

[Job 33:6]

So you agree that my position is scientific. Thanks.

I agree that it is a scientifically accurate statement to say that something like you and me can be called human.

My disagreement is over what our scientific definition is in comparison to what God was talking about when he said that we were created in his image.

 

[Yekcidmij]

You're missing the point,

No, I was responding to your post in which you tried to assert some scientific credentials and appeal to scientific processes in order to advance your argument. However, when scrutinized, your reasoning was irrelevant, and misguided, so now you have to tack around.

 

[Job 33:6]

I agree that it is a scientifically accurate statement to say that something like you and me can be called human.

My disagreement is over what our scientific definition is in comparison to what God was talking about when he said that we were created in his image.

To clarify, when we are created in God's image, I do not think that God meant we are created with bilateral symmetry a spinal cord five fingers and toes two eyes etc.

I don't think that taxonomy reflects what God meant in scripture. But rather that taxonomy is something that we have scientists simply use to make conversation easy for ourselves. It's something that we create and use, But it is not necessarily what God said or defined. Science is man's word and taxonomy is man's word, It is not God's word.

 

[Job 33:6]

No, I was responding to your post in which you tried to assert some scientific credentials and appeal to scientific processes in order to advance your argument. However, when scrutinized, your reasoning was irrelevant so now you have to tack around.

The reasoning is fair. As I said in my post just above, when discussing taxonomy, we are using man-made scientific definitions for things. This is not equivalent to God's word. This is man's word. subject to change and is subject to error. Which is why we cannot depend on man's scientific taxonomic classifications as a substitution for God's word.

Our scientific definition of any animal is our definition alone. And when God created us in his image, I don't think that God meant that he created us with a spinal cordarms and two legs and two eyes and a nose.

All of these things are just concepts that we the scientists use to define things for ease of discussion. But if a human is born without two arms or two legs that doesn't make them any less created in the image of God.

Because in the end it is not taxonomy or human classification that determines what God created and meant.

Being created in God's image is not something dependent upon taxonomy, morphology, or any specific physical traits.