anti-abortion folks still get abortions

I notice you've dropped the whole equal-footing-with-a-doctor thing.You accused me of twisting your words and taking things out of context, as well as displaying irrational thought, illogical thinking, and poor taste.Show me how your post can be read another way, or apologize.As for the rest... Of...? Sure I do. I think body, mind, and soul are increasingly abstract ways of describing the same thing. Accordingly, I think every living being has a soul.Whether it's a soul worth mourning is an entirely different story. Every time I wash my hands, I slaughter billions of innocent souls, and I don't exactly weep buckets over it. There's the relevant question. And for what feels like the millionth time, why on Earth would someone who can't tell the difference between a rat and a human be qualified to say what makes something human?

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"We had survived to turn on the History Channel
And ask our esteemed panel, Why are we alive? And here's how they replied:
You're what happens when two substances collide
And by all accounts you really should have died."
-Andrew Bird

You may be right, but its the 8-9 months before he's 0 years old that's the question.Earlier RAZD had an excellent thread on the question of if a fetus is indeed alive, or at least that such would qualify as "dead" using medical criteria for death. The cells may be living, but not necessarily the entity. And the cells may be "human", but that does not make the entity a person.

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holmes
"Some day the piecing together of dissociated knowledge will open up such terrifying vistas of reality, and of our frightful position therein, that we shall either go mad from the revelation or flee from the light into the peace and safety of a new dark age." (Lovecraft)

If you don't want to answer the questions fine.Maybe you shouldn't be reading my post any other way, than the way it was written.I am not a doctor.
Nothing in science is ever proven.Pretty simple.Maybe if you read it that, way is because that's the way you feel about it.Medicines opinion of when life begins has nothing to do with why I believe in what I belive in. So it is irrelevant to my thinking. The question when life begins is not exclusive the reason why we can rip a LIVING thing out of a womb.When life begins is not exclusively a medical question either, so medicine does not have the final word on it. Couple that with what are the odds that medicine can be wrong, and is only our best attempt, then amount of influence medicine should have on the whole subject is almost null.It is a fact that a zygote is a living thing with human DNA. That is about the only thing I will accept from medicine about it. If left alone will those "souls" grow into your child?Again you take the concept of a human soul out of context, twist the words around using "souls" of bacteria which tatally have nothing to do with a human soul, and make some kind of abstract comparison. Same thing crash did with the fetus of a rat. It has nothing to do with it. Who says I can't?
I was tricked. Anyone who is versed on the subject knows it was a TRICK. If it wasn't a trick, then he would have asked me can you tell the difference between a human fetus, and a rats fetus, just by looking at them.I would have probably answered no. Then explained that it doesn't matter anyway. The rat's fetus is nothing more than a rat's fetus, which is different than a humans fetus. The rat's fetus will never grow into a human, no matter how much we discuss it. So it is a mute point. The fact that he did it, and your riding it shows the emptyness of your arguement about abortion.I have heard some pretty scary things about abortion in this thread. I have heard human life described in many ways, most of them I would consider ruthless, and empty. It is clear that the respect for human life, and the process that keeps it going is being made a mock of.Funny though, everyone here arguing about it share the same thing. That is how we got here.You know the only real difference between a zygote and a 2 year old child?

Yes, I participated in that thread. He used the laws about someone being "legally dead" to describe a zygote.Again, it was a mute point because,
#1 People who are dead will always be dead.
#2 If you cause someones death, you can go to jail for it
#3 the law was written for people who have already been born
#4 There is no natural cause of death in the case of abortion, it is unatural.His whole argument, and everyone elses here assumes that time doesn't happen. Which is just not true.

You asserted that doctors would agree that a fetus is objectively living. You have not given evidence to suggest that they would.I mentioned RAZD's thread and you gave me some arguments that the discussion was moot. Working backward... That is wholly irrelevant to the question of whether a fetus is a living person. That doesn't help your case, as if doctors all believed fetuses were living persons they'd have crafted rules for them. But I would argue the rules apply to fetuses anyway. Or are you suggesting that there are different criteria for death for a fetus? Again, wholly irrelevant to the question of if a fetus is a living person. How can that possibly make his argument a moot point? This is really the only point which goes to the discussion in RAZDs thread. I would point out that it is not true as people really have come back from clinical death, and one would think a practicing Xian would not advance this notion, but on the whole you are correct.It combines with your final statement... This is not quite true. I do assume time happens. For some time means a fetus is heading for certain death (never to be born) and in some cases taking the mother with it.In any case RAZD's position did not hinge on this. The point was to define when a fetus would fulfill the criteria of a living person. It was useful to show that for some period of time fetuses so not qualify as alive (as they certainly do qualify as "dead").There is no question that cellular life is going on. The cells are alive and moving through stages to get to a person. The argument from many supporting abortion is that cellular life does not equate to living person, or individual life. Certainly before implantation there is nothing but a mass of cells. During gestation (after implantation) the fetus takes on more characteristics of individual life. Much of that time does not seem to be anything close to an individual, but rather a more complex mass of cells.Again, I do not think it is safe for you to claim that doctors would view the fetus as objectively alive in the sense of a living person. If you mean simply living tissue, then they do the same for cancer, and remove that pretty easily.

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holmes
"Some day the piecing together of dissociated knowledge will open up such terrifying vistas of reality, and of our frightful position therein, that we shall either go mad from the revelation or flee from the light into the peace and safety of a new dark age." (Lovecraft)

The way it was written is laid out, in full context, above. All you've done is repeat yourself, without the context.If a doctor does have more expertise than you, then his opinion carries more weight. If it doesn't carry more weight, that puts you on equal footing.So which is it? Got it. The facts of biology have nothing to do with your thoughts on the study of life. Tell me again how you're not saying that the fact that nothing is proven in science puts you on equal footing with a doctor. It'll be funny.After that, it would also be funny if, the next time you get an infection of some kind, you told the doctor that because medicine can be wrong, and is only our best attempt, you would prefer to not be given any antibiotics. Got it. You won't accept anything medicine tells you that disagrees with what you've already decided. Nope. Neither will a zygote, for that matter. It requires constant nourishment and care from the mother.Left alone, it would be nothing but a really gross pile of goo within seconds. So when it comes to the facts of biology, you want to speak solely about your personal beliefs. But when it comes to the what the concept of a "soul" means, you think my personal beliefs are irrelevant?Call me irrational again. It'll be funny. You did. In post 250. Really? Then how come, even after you knew the truth, you continued to make mistakes about them? Yep. If Crash had told you the answer ahead of time, you probably would have gotten the question right.He's such a meanie. I'm not mocking anything. In fact, I'm exercising great self-control by not mocking your atrocious grammar. There are a vast number of differences. Heck, looking at that picture I posted earlier, a few big ones come to mind.But feel free to arbitrarily decide on the only real difference.

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"We had survived to turn on the History Channel
And ask our esteemed panel, Why are we alive? And here's how they replied:
You're what happens when two substances collide
And by all accounts you really should have died."
-Andrew Bird

Yes, it is relevant. You should by logic include all variables if you are going to argue a position. Since time is no longer a factor in the equation, yes and no. specifically yes, fundementally no. You can't just say it is irrelevant, you have to explain why. In this whole thread, have I used God as a reason to be against abortion? I am not forcing my religious views on anyone here, I felt this way before I believed in God. As I have stated, this is a medical condition that I would see fit to allow abortion. It is however a judgement call sometimes. Sure their alive. Leave it alone, and it will continue to be alive.
His whole arguement revolves around ripping the zygote, or whatever from the womb.He is comparing a natural process to a unatural one. So time doesn't exist? living cells. Will cancer ever turn into a human?

Well, not another human, but it is made of human tissue.

Neither. They are just facts. You drew the conclusion. Again putting words in my mouth.The question of when life begins is not solely a medical one. This will be the 3rd time I explain it, if I do. Yes, I will. I will remind the doctor that my son is allergic to amoxicillin, and it is in his records, and he almost killed my son with it. I am sticking to the facts. Not opinions.
There are many doctors that believe life begins at inception. When life begins is still not clear when it comes to medicine, why are we arguing this? So does an infant. So it's ok to kill an infant. That is what your saying. So now explain yourself. I cannot draw any other conclusion based on what you said. Oh I see, so now time matters?Which is it, time doesn't matter, or time matters? I was not incorrect in saying what I said about the 2 pictures.
I explained myself very clearly on the fundamental similarities I saw in the 2 pictures. Whether it was a rats fetus, or a human one.Give it up. If I show you a bolt from a connecting rod on a 350 Chevy, how would you know which motor it came from? Don't they all look the same?That doesn't change the fact that it can only fit in one motor. So it doesn't matter what I think is a rat's fetus, or not. It has nothing to do with my conclusion. This is the second time I am telling you this, drop the rat's fetus BS, it doesn't matter, really.If I where to truly test which one is what, I would let it grow, or do a DNA test, or just look at the mother. It's pretty firkin simple.Give it up. I mean if he would have showed me a picture of a human fetus, compared to a rat's fetus. If you cannot tell the difference between the 2 by looking at them, then it doesn't matter how much education I have. A doctor might not be able to tell the difference either if he was tricked. So there is no point in mentioning it. It is completely irrelevant to the argument. So you can feel free to drop it now. It is not logical in the least. I have yet to compare the 2 pictures, because it is not relevant to my position. I never claimed to be good at that, so it's ok. I am feeling lazy this morning, and I do not feel like spell correcting. I do apologize for it. But please, don’t ever let me catch you making a spelling error, or grammar error, as I don’t want to have to point out that you’re a hypocrite. It seems that every single person that comments about grammar and spelling has a few of their own errors, I have choosen not to pursue it unless I really can't understand what they are saying.But really, what does grammar have to do with when human life begins. If you cannot understand what I mean, then ask, I will gladly explain. Argue the point, not the person. Like I said, it is irrelevant to my position. But just for kicks, lets look at them side by side. Well what do you know, they do look different, so what.

Is that supposed to be some kind of valid point that has to do with what we are talking about?Maybe I should kill off my kids, and just have tumors, it's the same thing right?

Well according to you, you already did kill off one of your kids. I on the other hand don't equate having an abortion with the killing of the already born.

Right, I'm calling official dishonesty shenanigans now.Is a doctor more qualified to speak on the subject than you, or are you equally qualified? A straightfoward answer would be appreciated. Fantastic. Please tell us what else informs your opinion on this matter. I don't see how your son's allergies are relevant to whether or not you take antibiotics. But either way, ignore those records. They're medical, and medicine is just a best attempt! Pump your son full of amoxicillin; maybe this time it'll work.I also hope you didn't let the doctor do anything to help your son when he had his allergic reaction. Medicine is just a best attempt, after all. This would carry more weight if you hadn't just said that you would ignore whatever medicine told you, if it disagreed with your preconceived notions. Love to. An infant and a zygote are at entirely different stages of development. One is a human life, one is not. Therefore, it is okay to terminate a pregnancy, in the same way it's okay to menstruate, or flush semen down the toilet, and not okay to kill an infant.See how easy that was? Your turn. Of course time matters. Time is what turns kittens into cats. Or in this case, a piece of a woman into an independent being.Before it's an independent being, it's a part of the mother, making it her choice whether she wants it or not.Regardless, I think you're mixing up posters. I don't believe you and I have discussed time until now. Yes, and what you saw was incorrect.Unless a human is, in fact, a rat. I wouldn't be able to know. I don't have the expertise or knowledge.I also would not presume to give people advice on car maintenance. Yes, yes, you were tricked. It was a mean ol' prank.Immediately after you gave your answer, Jar pleaded with you to put a little research into the matter before answering. You accused him of taking your answer out of context, and stuck by it.Once Crash sprang the correct response on you, you continued to make mistakes about them.But you were tricked! TRICKED, I SAY! Christ, take a joke, guy. How come you asked me the difference between "a zygote and a 2 year old child," and then posted pictures of a rat fetus and a human fetus?Were you tricked again?This message has been edited by [Dan's Clever Alias], 04-05-2006 11:47 AM

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"We had survived to turn on the History Channel
And ask our esteemed panel, Why are we alive? And here's how they replied:
You're what happens when two substances collide
And by all accounts you really should have died."
-Andrew Bird

You can call China, I don't care what you think. The last thing in the world I am is dishonest, so if you continue to call me that, we are done. Dude, don't you get it. I never said that he is or isn't. I am saying it doesn't matter. The medical aspect of it has little to do with it.
Life is a philosophical issue, as well as a moral one, and a religious one.Technically speaking a doctor should be able to know more about medicine than me, but that is not the issue here. That is the issue you and frog are making of it. Again, I will tell you that there are doctors that will disagree with you and frog, are they wrong? AM I? I need to do that again? How many times have I done it in this thread alone. I am tired of it already. Your comprehension sucks. I would hope so, since he caused it.What part of he almost killed my son didn't you understand?As a matter of fact with all his knowledge, he almost did it three times. Good thing I have a brain and recognized his mistakes. Alright. Medicine has told me both things, as far as I know. There are medical arguments for both positions, as I have stated to you several times. So the decision is not purely medical, I stated that a few times also. Love to?Totally irrelevant points. Has nothing to do with when a sperm makes it into an egg, from the act of intercourse.I am not against masturbation.
But it does have its down sides. I don't make a big deal about it, because you are not playing games with human life. A sperm is not human life. Why?At what point does it become independent? Pop quiz, what exactly did I say was the fundamental similarity? But you would know it was a bolt.A fetus, is a fetus, whether it's from a rat, or a human, has no bearing on how I feel about abortion. MY ability to recognize one, when I wasn't even asked if I could tell the difference between a human fetus, and rat's fetus, is a trick question, and irrelevant to the argument.The way the question was presented was made so that I would think it was a human fetus. That's the subject we were on, human abortion, not rat abortion. Why would I stop to think about it? Crash decided to change the topic mid stream without letting me or anyone else know.The fact that a human fetus, and a rat's fetus look very similar has no bearing on abortion from my standpoint. It's a stupid point.What he is saying is, that because I cannot distinguish the difference between a rat's fetus, and a human, when I wasn't even asked to, somehow means that ripping human life from the womb is ok.Isn't that just stupidity?IF he wanted to make a relevant comparison, and try to express that human life at that stage in the game is not life, because it resembles a rat fetus, then he should have posted pictures of the 2 fetus's, not a human child, and a rat's fetus. But he didn't because he was trying to trick me. It's called a smear tactic. That is exactly what this thread is all about, Joyce and her smear tactic.I stand by my original statements. If I wanted to I could do some surveys, and I am sure that tree huggers, liberals, and PETA people are mostly for abortion, or at least a good portion of them will be. That to me makes them hypocrites. They stick up for life no matter how insignificant, yet will rip babies from wombs, because it is not life.According to Joyce's logic, then abortion is really not ok.
I wouldn't do what Joyce is doing, or you, or crash. It's just not logical arguing.The truth is, it doesn't matter what people do or believe. The point is we should not be smearing each other into what is right or wrong. That is exactly what crash did, and what your trying to do, and what Joyce is trying to do. Why waste our time on that. Ultimately there is the answer of whether it is right or wrong.A rat's fetus is just as precious to a rat, as a human fetus is to a mother. What is the point of showing me the difference? or trying to prove that I do not know the difference when tricked into thinking otherwise?It has no bearing on why I think life starts at inception. I considered that, and my fundamental similarity that I stated, has nothing to do with whether it is human or rat, so it makes no difference, are you getting that? Because it doesn't matter!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!I am not trying to distinguish the difference between a rat's fetus, and a human one. No, I posted the 2 pictures, because that is the way I would have done it. To make a relevant comparison. It is obvious when you post the 2 pictures that there is a difference, not when you post a picture of a child and a fetus. I am showing you how silly it is.edited to fix my horrible spelling. I noticed you spelled a word wrong, lol This message has been edited by riVeRraT, 04-05-2006 03:05 PM

Your righteous indignation would carry more weight if you had the ability to answer an incredibly straightforward question honestly. Weird. Earlier in the thread, you said, "In this whole thread, have I used God as a reason to be against abortion? I am not forcing my religious views on anyone here, I felt this way before I believed in God."So... it in fact boils back to philosophy and religion. Sigh. You could have saved us all some time and said that in the first place. But fine, stock response: your personal philosophy and religion are not something you can push on others. Your son has an allergy. That sucks. (Honest.)Where it's skipping a beat is where you jump from this to dismissing medicine. An allergy is unforseeable before a reaction. One fetus is not going to surprise you by having more claim to human life than another of the same age. Yeah, you keep saying that. But these medical arguments for life beginning when sperm hits egg are?If you'd like some medical arguments against, we have the fact that a just-fertilized egg has no central nervous system, no brain, no heart... in fact, nothing to qualify it as even remotely human. You asked for the difference between killing a zygote, and killing a human. I gave it to you. You're shifting topics in your response.See the earlier point about your righteous indignation. For the same reason it would be her choice if she wanted to cut off her hand. It's a potential human life. That's what you're on about here, isn't it? You pointed to reliance on their mother as a similarity.You also said, "there is no fundamental difference between the 2." You stressed it pretty fiercely, in fact. Bold and italics. Yep. Someone would ask, "What kind of motor was this from?" And I would blink a couple times, and respond, "Um... it's a bolt?"So am I the guy you want telling you what to do with your car? Hells no. I suck at it. Sigh... see above. Jar warned you, you handwaved away the idea that you should do some research, you kept messing it up afterwards, blah blah blah. Been through it all before. Because thinking is good, especially when stating absolutes. It results in better arguments. Feel free to take Crash's arguments up with Crash. This is not a point I've ever made. How is that hypocrisy? They stand up for what they consider life, but not for what they don't consider life."Hypocrite" is not a synonym for "disagrees with riVeRraT." To some mothers, sure. But it should be fairly obvious that a woman does not consider her fetus especially precious if she's trying to abort it. It has no relevance to the point you are trying to make. I am aware of that. But as I said... damn, 32 posts ago... you and I are not making the same point.This is why it's called a debate, you see. A quick glance at our exchange shows this to be, if not total bunk, at least very poor communication on your part: At this point, you posted the two pictures.

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"We had survived to turn on the History Channel
And ask our esteemed panel, Why are we alive? And here's how they replied:
You're what happens when two substances collide
And by all accounts you really should have died."
-Andrew Bird

Of course not, but it is what drives us, and we collectively determine what is legal or not.This is irrelevant to whether it is actually wrong or not. I remain open to the idea that I may be wrong. I am not dismissing it, just pointing out that it makes mistakes, many. Probably what we know is relatively little, so why should it govern our morals? We should just use medicine for what it is worth, our best effort at saving lives, not killing them. Is there human DNA in there?Maybe I should update my position to say that when a woman is officially pregnant, not just sperm meeting egg.

quote:

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Fertilization, implantation, appropriate endometrial lining and hormonal support are all necessary in order for a pregnancy to be viable. Come look at these factors with us for a better understanding of not only what can go wrong in the case of the infertile couple but also how these processes can be augmented and supported through fertility treatments.

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http://infertility.about.com/od/earlypregnancy/ Sperm are quite the little hot rods wouldn't you say?If fertilization wasn't so significant, why would people be spending thousands to try and get fertilized?It is truly a blessing when this takes place, whether it's from God or evolution, or whatever.What is funny is, if we found this sort of activity going on, on Mars, it would be signs of intelligent life, and we would never do anything to harm it.There are many similarities between the NO that a sperm releases when entering an egg, to our own release of it in our bodies. The whole process is entirely human. Sure, half of one, if you get it out in time. If you don't have intercourse, then it will never be life. It's all about the liability of having intercourse, not self satisfaction. You see how you put it, compared to how I put it. You reversed it, and made it sound like I meant there was no fundamental differences at all. I specified the similarity I was talking about, you took it beyond that to mean something I did not.A better question to ask after reading my statement was, is that the only similarity, or is there similarities, and differences. Fundamentally to me, if the fetus was a human, and it should have been to stay on topic, there isn't much difference but time. It is a natural course of events. I bet you we could find more similarities than differences. Right, doesn't change the fact that it is a bolt. Your using it, so your an accessory to the crime. Guilty as charged.
If you agreed with me about the relevance to this whole discussion you would have dismissed it as the rubbish that it is. It's what they consider life that makes them the hypocrites. Yes, I expressed myself poorly then. So much to say, so little time.