Legal Death, Legal Life, Personhood and Abortion

That statemtent implies that it may, as a fetus but not before, reach that status, but it is not assured of doing so, and the "appropriate surrogates" have the right to make medical decisions on it's behalf. You seem to have a particularly dim view of life support as being totally impractical and ultimately useless. None ever regain active conscious thought?(1) If a fetus at week 24 has no upper brain function at all it is comparable to a person on life support with no upper brain function at all. Neither of them are going to gain upper brain function and both are not persons. Your "first person removed from life support" is also not a person, imho, they are brain dead.(2) If a fetus at 24 weeks has upper brain function it is comparable to a person on life support with upper brain function (and all things being equal I would expect the "appropriate surrogates" to make the same kinds of decisions regarding their care). Again with the absolute negative yet. I beg to differ. A 24 week old or older fetus has as good a chance of survival as a prematurely born baby ("preemie"). Some live, some don't.I would say that a premature c-section baby would have a higher degree of survival likelihood if it needs sever medical attention or if death of the mother is immanent. But it is up to the parents to decide what medical treatment is appropriate, just as it is for all young children.And yes, people do chose to with-hold lifesaving medical procedures from being implemented (and children do die) and they do it for religious reasons.Letting the "appropriate surrogates" make the decision is consistent with the current legal, ethical and moral standards that our society uses. That you and I would make different decisions is part of what a free society is about.Enjoy.{{added paragraph breaks just for lam}}This message has been edited by RAZD, 02-05-2005 10:03 AM

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we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand RebelAAmerican.Zen[Deist
{{{Buddha walks off laughing with joy}}}

don't worry (typical male chauvanistic sexist remark related to picture deleted ... ) about it. I just find it interesting that there are (apparently) no statistics that list every single country on the same basis.

Instead of being insulting, why not just try to be reasonable? You managed it through one post. A strawman is when you argue against a position that was not actually your opponent's position. It could be because you misunderstand what he is saying or intentionally misinterpreting what he is saying.If you have a problem with that paragraph then it is perfectly okay to debate it. Problems will arise if it doesn't mean exactly what you think it does, or you pretend to mean it says something else, in order to debate it.Now hold on a second, because I have not addressed what you have done at this point, just explained what a strawman is and how it can cause a problem. This is an admittedly interesting issue and I have now backed you up on this several times, though it is not completely accurate to the point RAZD was making, so not wholly a criticism of his position.You are viewing it as a being in a process and so only if it is known that the process will not (or is not likely to) result in personhood then it is not in the same category as a being which is wholly outside of personhood.RAZD is not arguing based upon the fact that it is in a process, but what an entity is in and of itself. Within the process it does not have characteristics in and of itself such that we would commonly call that (or any other entity) a person.Given that it is not (at that point) a person, based upon its lack of characteristics, an analogous (even if not completely the same) situation to a family with a person on life support arises.Can you make arguments against this analogous situation? Yes. You will need to work to improve your arguments, and I will state up front I don't think you will be able (ultimately) in succeeding to beat his argument. But you could, so go ahead and try. Yet... It seems you are holding a conflicting position on what chances a person on life support has, and indeed that is analogous to a gestational being.While we know what the gestational process is supposed to do, we are not able to predict what the actual future is for any particular pregnancy. And that's about just as good as for a person in a coma, though a pregnancy will normally end in about 9 months and a coma can last for years.So what you are doing is comparing the processes which an entity is undergoing, and I would argue it really doesn't help. But in any case it does not shoot down (so you will have to do this as well) comparisons between the nature of the entities in and of themselves.For much of the gestational period the being is worse off than the coma patient. It is not that it's capabilities have been injured but simply does not have certain capabilities at all. In each case it is the termination of a life, even RAZD has made this point in the OP. No matter if it is mechanical or biological machinery being disconnected (and make no mistake both are actions), the result is the same. Only since the gestational being may be worse off, no capabilities for individual life instead of possible marginal capabilities, it is guaranteed not to live for much longer. I don't see what this matters for the purpose of this discussion. You will need to make this argument much clearer.If it is simply to find a difference between the situations to show that they are not entirely analogous, RAZD can completely agree with no harm to his argument. Analogies do not have to be airtight in similarity, only the pertinent portions for discussion. Well technically there is nothing natural about sticking a dying person into a lung machine, nor preemies into incubators. Neither is any of the science that we use to help pregnant mothers lower the high infant mortality and maternal mortality rate. I don't see where "nature" necessarily makes things right and nonnatural makes things wrong.But in any case that is not actually pertinent to RAZD's argument. He was discussing if you remove the gestational being from the external support system, whether it is organic or not, it will naturally expire (that is no one has to do anything else to ensure its death).Unless you are going to argue that the umbilical cord the placenta and the woman attached to the child are all part of the gestational being, then removal of any of those is analogous to removing lifesupport machinery from a comatose patient. You are correct to say that if you can successfully defeat that portion of his argument, then the conclusion will be refuted. However that does not mean that everything in his argument was incorrect.

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holmes
"...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)"...don't believe I'm taken in by stories I have heard, I just read the Daily News and swear by every word.."(Steely Dan)

It is incorrect to say that the definition of personhood is key to the whole essay, it is key to the view of personhood being a valid marker for deciding whether or not to continue life support.This statement is not in the conclusion, but squarely in the middle of the section on personhood.Looks like another clarification edit may be needed. :sigh:

But that in turn is what you are using to argue for the limits of abortion, correct?That's why I said it would defeat that section and thus the conclusion, not defeat that section and thus everything within the essay. I tried to make that clear.While I do see that there are other portions of the essay which can be used to reach the conclusion, it was your wording which appeared to place a large amount of weight on that particular portion of the overall argument.In truth you haven't really brought in all the other differences which make termination of life support a more rational option in abortion rather than coma.

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holmes
"...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)"...don't believe I'm taken in by stories I have heard, I just read the Daily News and swear by every word.."(Steely Dan)

I had to think about that.Yes and no. What I am arguing is that the definition of personhood has a lot of variables, not the least of which are the personal values of the parents, and that this requires us to have a standard where the decision is left to the "appropriate surrogates" because their values can (and likely will) differ from ours,but I am also arguing that this forms a basis for the "appropriate surrogates" in making those decisions, and it is consistent with the way similar decisions are made for people on life support when there appears to be little chance of the "person" gaining consciousness.We read about the cases like the florida woman (blown way out of proportion imho) where you have an (obvious to me) brain dead body that should be allowed to fully die a natural death with some dignity.We also read about children of religious sects where the parents refuse medical treatment for children and {allow\cause} them to die as a result.For most of us those decisions would tend to differ between a wide variety of possibilities, and we must allow those differences in values to be realized to the same degree to be consistent. That is the ethical approach to these decisions at the end of life, and thus it must also be the ethical approach to these decisions at the start.

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we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand RebelAAmerican.Zen[Deist
{{{Buddha walks off laughing with joy}}}

Isn't that just life?
please...

Life?

I thought you said way back there that people can not make those decsions?I had also said that the real issue here is defining when a baby will actually make it through. How can either doctor or mother make such a decsion?That further imples the comparison you make to be invalid. People on life support at one time could actually make those decsions, where it is obvious that a gestational being will never be able to, nor will it be able to live if we "pull the plug". The 2 scenerios are so different it's scary. Didn't I say differently? Remember the first person ever took off life support? That is different. That is an irreversible condition, due to sustained injury, the injury being natural in this case. I do not have a problem with that, as long as the doctor signs off on it, as is the case with a person on life support. The doctor has to garauntee that the fetus will never make it. Same thing applies, but there has to be 100% certainty that the fetus will not make it. Hence the real issue here (to me anyway).How do we determine that a zygote is not going to make it if it hasn't even had a chance to develop to that stage yet? Let's take him off life support, so that we can put him on life support? Thats not the issue here.
I do have a problem with that anyway. Those are probably the same people who deny blood transfusions. God did give us brains. Even Jesus healed people, so the moral of saving people from suffering is not an issue to me. Maybe not.
*edit* We might make the same decsion, that is.This message has been edited by riVeRraT, 02-05-2005 20:52 AM

Wouldn't that then exclude all gestaional beings before their lungs and brains are developed?I am not a doctor here, so I am not qualified to comment, but wouldn't it be neccesary to reach that stage first before an actual determination could be made on the sucess rate of a fetus?I know there are other tests to determine the outcome, but they are not 100% accurate, unless there is an alien in your belly

We are talking about the distinction between {human life} and {personhood}, lack of {lungs\brains} gets back to {human life} and {pre-human cells}

ummm .... No. Certainly the Doctor cannot make the decision for someone else, that would be ludicrous, they can advise and provide information. The mother makes a decision based on the best information available and what her feeling are on the values involved. Certainly there are cases where there is sufficient information that the fetus is not normal and never will be. But what is gray for one person may not be for another. That is enough. I thought you said she was a vegetable, not an actively conscious person. Why?All the doctor needs to say is that there is no brain function when there should be. That should be enough information for the "appropriate surrogate" to make the decision.Failure to develop properly is an injury? A "natural" injury? Injury implies a causal agent, and that is not the case.The fact that you do not have a problem in these cases shows the validity of the argument: you have levels at which it is okay that fall within the parameters of the criteria, and that is all that is necessary. Actually I was thinking that the second scenario had both "patients" surviving ... Because we do not concern ourselves with that criteria for non-human life. We don't do it for pets or other animals. Humans are notoriously blas about the death of other life forms. And we don't have funerals for failed zygotes. If one life support system is failing or faltering and the fetus is otherwise healthy, wouldn't that make sense? We are talking about a point after all, where plenty of time has passed and the de facto decision has been to keep the fetus to that point, and now we are in the range where preemies can survive.And if there is a question, then I would think that a preemie intensive care unit would have more resources.This is the point that Jazzns was making about the late term abortions issue.
EvC Forum: Legal Death, Legal Life, Personhood and Abortion It is very much the issue here. I admit that I don't understand making such a decision, but I also would not interfere in it, because legally it is allowed. That is part of the diversity of belief and the plurality of values that any system must accommodate and recognize to be equally fair to all. Always a possibility.

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we are limited in our ability to understand
by our ability to understand RebelAAmerican.Zen[Deist
{{{Buddha walks off laughing with joy}}}

That's why it doesn't end with just the Legal death act.
Go here and read the description of irreverisible:
Page Not Found The Doctor must sign off. Yes, but she lived for years. Yes it is the case, a heart attack could leave you on life support, and that is your sustained injury.
Go read the definition of injury.Funny thing about the law, it uses the proper definitions. Maybe not the kind of funeral your talking about, but people do mourn miscarriage, or feel sad about it. Just because we didn't get to know poor ol' zygote, doesn't mean that a woman may feel pain from the lose. Thats called saving life, not killing life.

I think I got what you were and are saying, maybe we are simply talking past each other. While I understood what you were getting at with the surrogate analogy, the personhood issue was used to set bounds for surrogate decisions, correct? The latter was all I was trying to refer to, and I believe that is the angle of attack Rat is making.If he can somehow call the personhood definition you are using into question, specifically as it relates to someone pulling the plug, then he has a valid attack.Right now his attacks seem a bit crude and slightly off target.

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holmes
"...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)"...don't believe I'm taken in by stories I have heard, I just read the Daily News and swear by every word.."(Steely Dan)

As a person? Funny thing about the law, it defines abortion as a constitutionally protected reproductive right of mothers. Case closed then, huh? This is only partly true, and it all depends on personal expectations.Most women don't mourn a miscarriage because they don't realize they are having one. Menstrual cycles of a sexually active woman may often carry gestational beings. The process of getting from fertilized egg, to implanted and growing fetus is hazardous and the odds are not high.For those who reach the point of implantation and recognized pregnancy, there is not always cheer, and a miscarriage is not only a thing of relief, it is sometimes self-induced (ie, abortion).Yes, for those women who reach the stage of realizing they are pregnant and want the child and believe that it is healthy, they will feel bad about a miscarriage.I knew someone who suffered numerous miscarriages and it was quite tragic for her. People like you who pretend gestational beings are "innocent babies" and crank out anecdotal evidence that trusting in God will grant you a healthy child caused her even more suffering. Think of what that meant to her.Believe it or not, a gestational being is gestational, but the woman it is attached to is real and must make her choices within the reality that she cannot know or be guaranteed that the being will end up being a baby, or that she will survive the delivery (even under the best of conditions). Death in birth still outranks death because of abortion.Your position is callous to me as it shoots dice with a woman's life for no better reason than a pretense that gestational beings are babies, a myth that hurts women who actually want to have children but can't (even very Xian ones).

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holmes
"...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)"...don't believe I'm taken in by stories I have heard, I just read the Daily News and swear by every word.."(Steely Dan)