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Author Topic:   Evangelical Switch from Pro-choice to Anti-abortion
Percy
Member
Posts: 22359
From: New Hampshire
Joined: 12-23-2000
Member Rating: 4.8


Message 311 of 441 (837755)
08-08-2018 3:12 PM
Reply to: Message 309 by Tangle
08-08-2018 1:49 PM


Re: If abortion is understood to be ending a human life, THEN we can talk alternatives
Tangle writes:
I'm going to ignore most of your reply because it's all been done several times. And I'm bored with it. I'll pick out a couple of points.
I thought you said you were done two or three days ago - I was surprised when you kept going. Sorry I'm boring you.
You keep insisting you know my thinking, so let me comment a bit about your own. You think that because you haven't been able draw an admission that life begins at conception
I don't think life begins at conception and I've never said that life begins at conception. Moreover, even if I did think that life begins at conception I've said that it would be irrelevant to the debate.
But you did call it things like a "potential human life" and a "potential human being", and you called conception the definitive event, and then you called aborting it a harm when harms only apply to actual human beings. Are you sure you're not hiding your true feelings, maybe even from yourself?
Maybe inside you believe abortion is wrong but that it's impractical to ban it. So you rationalize that though it's a harm (a wrong) it's one we feel guilty about, and as long as we feel guilty we can keep doing it.
Once you obtain that admission you'll push for earlier and earlier admissions of when life began until you reach conception. And you're somehow going to do this based upon how you feel.
Weird how we can discuss this for so long and you can be as wrong as this. Which you'll now say is all my fault...
I would only fault you for telling me how wrong I am and then not providing the correct information. If my surmise is wrong then explain where you were going with trying so determinedly to extract an admission that killing a fetus just before imminent birth is a harm? Weren't you just going to extend that harm, in gradually diminishing amounts, back along your continuum to conception?
Sorry if I'm wrong, but it seems a natural conclusion. You were arguing forward from conception, and I didn't find that persuasive. Then you suddenly began arguing about birth, and I naturally assumed you had decided to start at the opposite end from conception and argue backward from there.
Okay, so possibly because you do recognize that abortion at this point makes no sense, you're going with the kill scenario. Is the fetus alive at this point? Despite that you won't answer this question, everything you say points to you believing that the fetus is alive just before birth. If you are correct then that means it *can* be killed (as opposed to things which are not alive and so cannot be killed), and killing it would be murder.
Of course the foetus is alive the moment before birth - how could it not be. Is it dead? Does it only come alive after birth? What an insane question.
Yes, I know it's a possibility you have difficulty entertaining. There's a familiar feel to this, to be discussing with someone who simply declares things so while calling other people's inquiries insane.
My question is not a real scenario, it's a moral thought experiment, like the trolley problems - it's intended to unpick this dilemma. If you allow the woman to skewer the baby the moment before birth because you believe it to be the woman's choice, why do you not allow it a moment after? What has changed? It's a big moment, on one-side is death on the other is life. Why has the moral imperative changed?
Because after birth it is a living human being. Before birth I don't know.
If you're doing what you feel is right does that makes it okay?
Not I, we. The collective, majority opinion. We try to do what's right given what we know and feel when forced to make a decision/policy. That's all we can do.
There's a significant problem with this. Part of it lies outside the scope of this discussion, so as briefly as possible, the laws of a region don't necessarily reflect "collective, majority opinion." If you're watching the primaries here in the US then you understand that, and if you're not then I'll just say that only a small and usually more extreme subset of voters tend to vote in primaries, and it isn't an unfrequent occurrence for the candidates in the main election to represent the fringe elements of their respective parties. This is the choice Republican voters faced with Trump in 2016 - Trump didn't represent anything resembling the mainstream of the party, but the only alternative was a Democrat, so most voted for Trump.
I think you experience the same thing on your side of the pond when coalition governments become necessary and small parties have a disproportionate sway over governance.
These issues with representative government mean that our laws are only inconsistently representative of the "collective, majority opinion." Some pretty horrible things have been done by supposedly representative governments that, by the laws they instituted, were perfectly legal.
--Percy

This message is a reply to:
 Message 309 by Tangle, posted 08-08-2018 1:49 PM Tangle has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 312 by Tangle, posted 08-08-2018 4:05 PM Percy has replied

  
Percy
Member
Posts: 22359
From: New Hampshire
Joined: 12-23-2000
Member Rating: 4.8


(2)
Message 320 of 441 (837769)
08-08-2018 7:48 PM
Reply to: Message 312 by Tangle
08-08-2018 4:05 PM


Re: If abortion is understood to be ending a human life, THEN we can talk alternatives
Tangle writes:
Conception is a definitive point and is the start of potential human life. As such there is a harm involved in interfering with its development. That harm increases from the negligible to the most extreme.
I would say that conception is a well defined point on the way to a new human being. The rest of what you say is just something you believe.
I believe abortion is a wrong full stop.
Ah, that you believe this makes this discussion make more sense.
But it is a justifiable wrong up to a point.
You know it's wrong but justify it? I think you may be conflicted.
It's always a harm but the harm is on a continuum from almost none - the IUD - to murder. - killing a baby just before birth.
Yes, I understand you feel this way.
So you rationalize that though it's a harm (a wrong) it's one we feel guilty about, and as long as we feel guilty we can keep doing it.
Close. But not quite correct. It's a wrong but it's a necessary wrong that we have to live with. But we should always know that there's a harm here.
If this is what you believe then that's fine, but you should speak for yourself instead of saying "we."
Yes, I know it's a possibility you have difficulty entertaining. There's a familiar feel to this, to be discussing with someone who simply declares things so while calling other people's inquiries insane.
And yet you still can't explain why a baby is not alive a moment before birth but alive a moment after. Why not?
A better question is why you're asking why I can't explain it just before quoting the sentence where I explained it. And how did you manage to misstate what I think a mere quarter inch from where you quoted me saying what I think?
Because after birth it is a living human being. Before birth I don't know.
Exactly what information are you lacking?
When does life begin?
You know that if the baby is removed from the woman it will be what you call 'alive'. You seem to know what alive is but not what 'dead' is. It's binary you know.
I think you're confusing two different senses of the word alive. The fetus is not dead before birth. The question is whether it's a living human being before birth, and if so, when did it become a living human being?
There's a significant problem with this.
Yeh, it's called the human condition.
No no, I was referring to your claim that the "collective, majority opinion" makes something okay. It doesn't make it okay.
Part of it lies outside the scope of this discussion, so as briefly as possible, the laws of a region don't necessarily reflect "collective, majority opinion." If you're watching the primaries here in the US then you understand that, and if you're not then I'll just say that only a small and usually more extreme subset of voters tend to vote in primaries, and it isn't an unfrequent occurrence for the candidates in the main election to represent the fringe elements of their respective parties. This is the choice Republican voters faced with Trump in 2016 - Trump didn't represent anything resembling the mainstream of the party, but the only alternative was a Democrat, so most voted for Trump.
I think you experience the same thing on your side of the pond when coalition governments become necessary and small parties have a disproportionate sway over governance.
Of course, it's an imperfect system. but it's what we've got until we improve it.
Yes, it's what we've got, and it means our laws don't consistently represent the "collective, majority opinion," which means it doesn't make something okay.
By and large we get the will of the people and our institutions reflect our feelings. Hence Texas, hence guns. Hence Sweden publishes it's citizen's tax returns but your president doesn't. The American culture is what it is - generally right wing, strangely religious and conservative religious at that, fearing liberalism still dreaming of the frontier and individualism. Not all want that but just at the moment that's where you are and your wackier laws reflect it.
Tell me about it.
These issues with representative government mean that our laws are only inconsistently representative of the "collective, majority opinion." Some pretty horrible things have been done by supposedly representative governments that, by the laws they instituted, were perfectly legal.
Of course, but I've lost your plot.
I was explaining why, contrary to your claim, our laws do not necessarily represent the "collective, majority opinion," and so the fact that a law has been enacted doesn't make something okay. It might represent the best we can do, but that doesn't make it okay. You think abortion is not okay, and if you're right then laws enacted by our government do not make it okay.
AbE: I alluded to this in an earlier message, but it bears repeating. Even if our government did successfully represent the "collective, majority opinion," that doesn't make okay anything it makes legal. Governments don't have that kind of power.
--Percy
Edited by Percy, : AbE.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 312 by Tangle, posted 08-08-2018 4:05 PM Tangle has not replied

  
Percy
Member
Posts: 22359
From: New Hampshire
Joined: 12-23-2000
Member Rating: 4.8


(1)
Message 321 of 441 (837770)
08-08-2018 8:07 PM
Reply to: Message 316 by Tangle
08-08-2018 5:00 PM


Re: If abortion is understood to be ending a human life, THEN we can talk alternatives
Tangle writes:
How does an IUD prevent pregnancy?
Both types of IUDs work primarily by preventing sperm from fertilizing an egg. The copper IUD releases copper into the uterus, which works as a spermicide. The others release a form of the hormone progestin into the uterus. The progestin thickens the cervical mucus so that sperm can't reach the egg. In some women, progestin may also prevent ovulation.
How do you explain this from your Message 217:
Tangle in Message 217 writes:
No. The IUD works by preventing the fertised egg implanting. It's a very, very early abortion.
--Percy

This message is a reply to:
 Message 316 by Tangle, posted 08-08-2018 5:00 PM Tangle has not replied

  
Percy
Member
Posts: 22359
From: New Hampshire
Joined: 12-23-2000
Member Rating: 4.8


(1)
Message 322 of 441 (837771)
08-08-2018 8:18 PM
Reply to: Message 317 by ooh-child
08-08-2018 5:21 PM


Re: If abortion is understood to be ending a human life, THEN we can talk alternatives
When I saw your discussion with Tangle about IUDs I went to Wikipedia and read up. I couldn't believe it was saying that both types of IUD prevent fertilization, because I was taught they prevented implantation back in my 1969 sex ed class. This explains it:
ooh-child quoting from her source writes:
Now, back to contraception. When church officials argue that the IUD could be an abortifacient, they are relying on research from the 1970s that indicated that the IUD could affect an embryo's ability to implant.
This excerpt refers to research from the 1970s, so the timeframe doesn't line up exactly, but I still think that explains it. Thanks for posting that.
--Percy
Edited by Percy, : Fix gender reference.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 317 by ooh-child, posted 08-08-2018 5:21 PM ooh-child has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 323 by ooh-child, posted 08-09-2018 11:00 AM Percy has seen this message but not replied

  
Percy
Member
Posts: 22359
From: New Hampshire
Joined: 12-23-2000
Member Rating: 4.8


(2)
Message 336 of 441 (837834)
08-09-2018 6:37 PM
Reply to: Message 333 by Tangle
08-09-2018 4:51 PM


Re: If abortion is understood to be ending a human life, THEN we can talk alternatives
Tangle writes:
Neither you nor Percy will deliberate on the consequences of that which is the possibility of very late term abortion.
I don't think either Jar or I thought that was the topic. I thought you were expressing the point of view that termination of a pregnancy is a continuum of increasing harm from conception to birth, and we were disagreeing.
According to Wikipedia the harm principle holds that people's actions should only be limited by their ability to harm other people. Does the harm principle apply to a zygote? A blastocyst? An embryo? A fetus? Are any of these a person?
I found a strong but less nuanced statement of your position at J.S. Mill and the Pro-Life Cause that I shall quote because I believe it contains the same flaw:
quote:
But this principle [the Harm Principle] amply supports the idea that the law should protect the unborn from abortion precisely insofar as abortion harms the unborn. All that is required to make this case is to show that unborn beings in a human womb really are human beings, as developmental biology reveals, and that the Harm Principle should be considered to extend to the protection of all human beings.
The flaw that I see is that I don't think developmental biology really shows that "unborn beings in a human womb really are human beings"? His whole argument hinges on that being true. Is, for example, a zygote a human being? The Wikipedia article on human beings helpfully reminds us:
quote:
The zygote divides inside the female's uterus to become an embryo, which over a period of 38 weeks (9 months) of gestation becomes a fetus. After this span of time, the fully grown fetus is birthed from the woman's body and breathes independently as an infant for the first time. At this point, most modern cultures recognize the baby as a person entitled to the full protection of the law, though some jurisdictions extend various levels of personhood earlier to human fetuses while they remain in the uterus.
So some jurisdictions extend some level of personhood to the fetuses, some don't. Of those that do, undoubtedly the level of personhood extended and the degree of development to which it extends varies.
That is, there is no consensus. The position any culture or legal system takes is based upon feelings that obviously vary widely, not facts.
So another way of asking your question is, "When should full rights of personhood be extended?" I think that at a minimum the right to life should be extended after birth. Prior to birth I do not know.
--Percy

This message is a reply to:
 Message 333 by Tangle, posted 08-09-2018 4:51 PM Tangle has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 338 by Tangle, posted 08-10-2018 2:44 AM Percy has replied

  
Percy
Member
Posts: 22359
From: New Hampshire
Joined: 12-23-2000
Member Rating: 4.8


(4)
Message 342 of 441 (837877)
08-10-2018 9:43 AM
Reply to: Message 338 by Tangle
08-10-2018 2:44 AM


Re: If abortion is understood to be ending a human life, THEN we can talk alternatives
Tangle writes:
Percy writes:
So another way of asking your question is, "When should full rights of personhood be extended?" I think that at a minimum the right to life should be extended after birth. Prior to birth I do not know.
'Personhood' is a concept I find difficult to make much use of.
the quality or condition of being an individual person.
Actually I think it is more useful than "alive" because you were intermingling two different senses of the word alive. There is the sense in which a living organism is alive, and there is the sense in which an individual cell of a living organism is alive, such as a liver, kidney or sperm cell. Fetal development is particularly vulnerable to this confusion since the eventual baby begins as a zygote (a single cell) and ends at birth with billions of cells. The concept of a continuum of development fits well, but not so much your concept of a continuum of increasing harm with termination, especially because of the severe inconsistency of denying any possibility of harm to cells that preceded the zygote, such as sperm and egg and the creatures responsible for their formation.
For example, when an 18-year old man is killed, is it just the man who is killed or is it also the children he would undoubtedly have had, and later the grandchildren? If that seems silly to you then it might be because of your determination to consider the zygote/bastocyst/embryo/fetus in isolation independent of all else. But not everyone sees the world as so neatly compartmentalized.
Framing the argument a certain way and then channeling your efforts into badgering other people to squint through your lens and see things your way has the obvious drawbacks you've experienced thus far. I understand the points you're trying to make, and I'm fine with you having your point of view and am not trying to convince you to change it, but I don't see things your way because your position is not backed by facts but by feelings and by noting that many others share your feelings. As I've pointed out several times, majorities have felt wrong before and will feel wrong again. The "50 million Frenchmen can't be wrong" argument is a common fallacy.
There's another important factor not heretofore mentioned, and that's the effort and attention societies pay to the child once born. It is not matched by the effort and attention paid to the unborn. Once a child comes into this world they are largely subject to the whims of the parents, for example:
Babies should have checkups at 1 week, and then every month thereafter. Are there any laws requiring this and government agencies responsible for tracking this? No. How can we justify invasively infringing upon the rights of the woman prior to birth while doing virtually nothing to guarantee the health and welfare of the baby after birth? Yes, there's child services, but their understaffing and ineffectiveness is amply illustrated by the number of cases that slip through their fingers, such as SUV carrying family appears to have been intentionally driven off California cliff, tragedy exposes flaws in welfare system. Headlines about failures in child service agencies appear all the time.
So I don't know when the zygote/blastocyst/embryo/fetus becomes sufficiently "alive" to begin to be extended some of the rights of personhood, in particular the right to life, but I do strongly feel that the concern expressed by so many for the unborn is misplaced. It would be better placed on the born.
--Percy

This message is a reply to:
 Message 338 by Tangle, posted 08-10-2018 2:44 AM Tangle has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 343 by Tangle, posted 08-10-2018 11:53 AM Percy has replied

  
Percy
Member
Posts: 22359
From: New Hampshire
Joined: 12-23-2000
Member Rating: 4.8


(1)
Message 349 of 441 (837921)
08-10-2018 9:19 PM
Reply to: Message 343 by Tangle
08-10-2018 11:53 AM


Re: If abortion is understood to be ending a human life, THEN we can talk alternatives
Tangle writes:
Percy writes:
Actually I think it is more useful than "alive" because you were intermingling two different senses of the word alive. etc
You've just said all the same stuff all over again in a slightly different way and completely avoided answering any of the questions I asked you.
It seemed to me that you repeated all your same questions in a slightly different way while ignoring the answers already provided. I think if you look through the questions in your Message 338 and then reread my Message 336 you'll find the answers already there, but I don't mind going back through your message and composing responses to everything you said. All the following quoted text is from your Message 338.
The distinction you are making is that the baby is alive outside of the woman but inside the woman it's not - or at least you don't know. This, being outside the woman is presumably your understanding of 'personhood' and 'living'.
This really does feel like I'm just repeating what I already said, but anyway, concerning "living", I had suggested that the concept of "personhood" was more helpful. This avoids confusion of the sense of alive possessed by a cell or organ that is part of a living creature, versus the sense of alive possessed by the living creature itself. Another way to say the same thing is that living tissue is alive in one sense, while a living plant or animal is alive in another. "Personhood" avoids this confusion that I think had infected some of your points.
I asked you whether the baby - because it is now a fully developed human baby - is 'alive' the moment before birth.
"Alive" in what sense?
You say you don't know.
I don't. Neither do you. You feel - you don't know.
I say that is observably absurd.
I already know you feel this way.
The only way the baby is different at the moment before birth is that it is still dependent on the mother for its food supply, waste management and oxygen.
You left out one crucial way it is different before birth: it is unborn.
Artificially removed from the mother the baby would behave exactly like a newborn baby.
"Artificially removed from the mother" just means a caesarian section - of course it would behave exactly like a newborn baby. That's what it is.
Is it the fact that the mother is providing the life support the thing that doesn't make it alive or a person?
I'm trying to avoid the term "alive" because of the confusion I described above. The reason I don't know whether it is a person is because it is unborn. And as mentioned earlier, jurisdictions are inconsistent as to whether and to what degree they extend the rights of personhood to the unborn. That is, opinions vary. In the absence of facts I choose not to have an opinion.
I don't think I've said anything so far that I haven't already said - I hope this is helping.
If so does the mother have the right to remove the life support of a premature baby?
The baby having been born, no, she does not.
Does the baby only become a person at full term? If not, why not?
I'm not sure what you mean by "at full term." Looking this up for clarification I see that a full term baby is one that is born between 39 weeks and 40 weeks, 6 days. Unfortunately that doesn't help me tell whether you meant before or after birth by "at full term." I'll answer both ways.
If by "at full term" you mean the baby has been born then the answer is yes, once born the baby is a person.
If by "at full term" you mean the fetus has not been born then the answer is I don't know whether the fetus is a person prior to birth.
All modern western societies give the unborn rights, and I expect others do too. Why do you think they do that?
I think those that do do it because they feel it is a person.
And btw, harm does not extend only to 'persons'; smashing a window is a harm, kicking a dog is a harm. Killing a baby just before birth without medical necessity is a serious crime that would likely result in imprisonment. Why would that be if it was not a harm?
That would be because they feel the fetus has been harmed.
I find it difficult to even imagine that the baby just before term is not alive and a person.
I know.
But if I take your position of 'not knowing' shouldn't we at least use the precautionary principle and assume that it is?
I haven't objected to that, but we should acknowledge that we're acting not out of knowledge but in reaction to our feelings. You already acknowledged that the "abortion just prior to birth" scenario is a thought experiment that isn't really possible. Under most circumstances all you can do after about six or seven months is induce, which causes birth, not an abortion. The decision you've been trying to force people to make about whether abortion just prior to birth is murder would never really come up, not even remotely.
Moving on to your current Message 343...
You seems overly concerned about a time when the foetus does not exist, while refusing to think about when it is a fully formed baby about to born.
It isn't that I haven't thought and read about it. It is that I admit what I do not know.
There is no equivalence here. All this stuff about grandfathers is irrelevant, we're only factually concerned about abortion and life, nothing else.
I think you use the word "we" more often than is justified.
There can not be life, in the ways that we're meaning - human life - unless and until the cells from two individuals fuse.
Neither can there be new human life without sperm and egg existing first, and the producers of sperm and egg, and so forth. Labels like "absurd" and "irrelevant" are expressions of how you feel, not things you've demonstrated.
All actions before that are irrelevant and reduce the argument to the absurd.
I know you feel this way.
--Percy

This message is a reply to:
 Message 343 by Tangle, posted 08-10-2018 11:53 AM Tangle has not replied

  
Percy
Member
Posts: 22359
From: New Hampshire
Joined: 12-23-2000
Member Rating: 4.8


Message 364 of 441 (837991)
08-11-2018 6:17 PM
Reply to: Message 362 by Tangle
08-11-2018 5:12 PM


Re: If abortion is understood to be ending a human life, THEN we can talk alternatives
I've greatly resented Paul Ryan's reluctance as Speaker of the House to stand up to Trump, but he said something recently that made me realize that maybe what I perceived as lack of backbone or perhaps even complicity was much more wise than I thought: "The pissing match doesn't work." When Trump senses he's losing he just turns the issue into a pissing match. It's his specialty.
This explains why some discussions here never go anywhere. Once one side decides to turn it into a pissing match there's nothing the other side can do to prevent it. No one wins, or can win.
Can we bring this discussion back from the brink?
--Percy

This message is a reply to:
 Message 362 by Tangle, posted 08-11-2018 5:12 PM Tangle has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 365 by Faith, posted 08-11-2018 7:43 PM Percy has replied
 Message 370 by Tangle, posted 08-12-2018 3:55 AM Percy has seen this message but not replied

  
Percy
Member
Posts: 22359
From: New Hampshire
Joined: 12-23-2000
Member Rating: 4.8


(1)
Message 371 of 441 (838012)
08-12-2018 9:14 AM
Reply to: Message 365 by Faith
08-11-2018 7:43 PM


Re: If abortion is understood to be ending a human life, THEN we can talk alternatives
Faith writes:
So far you've refused to take a position, human life/not human life at any point before birth.
So far there have only been attempts to convince me toward a position using feelings, beliefs and sentiments.
I think my position is summed up pretty well in the Supreme Court's Roe v. Wade decision quoted in the same Abortion in the United States artcil you cited in your Message 369:
quote:
A central issue in the Roe case (and in the wider abortion debate in general) is whether human life or personhood begins at conception, birth, or at some point in between. The Court declined to make an attempt at resolving this issue, noting: "We need not resolve the difficult question of when life begins. When those trained in the respective disciplines of medicine, philosophy, and theology are unable to arrive at any consensus, the judiciary, at this point in the development of man's knowledge, is not in a position to speculate as to the answer." Instead, it chose to point out that historically, under English and American common law and statutes, "the unborn have never been recognized ... as persons in the whole sense", and thus, the fetuses are not legally entitled to the protection afforded by the right to life specifically enumerated in the Fourteenth Amendment. So, rather than asserting that human life begins at any specific point, the court simply declared that the State has a "compelling interest" in protecting "potential life" at the point of viability.
I think that pretty well sums up my position, though there's a lot of ambiguity surrounding the term "viability." The viability of an incompletely developed fetus is dependent upon the technological sophistication of available technology at any given birth facility. It isn't a term with any objective definition.
--Percy
Edited by Percy, : Grammar, clarity.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 365 by Faith, posted 08-11-2018 7:43 PM Faith has not replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 373 by NoNukes, posted 08-12-2018 1:46 PM Percy has replied
 Message 375 by Tangle, posted 08-12-2018 3:06 PM Percy has replied

  
Percy
Member
Posts: 22359
From: New Hampshire
Joined: 12-23-2000
Member Rating: 4.8


Message 376 of 441 (838041)
08-12-2018 8:18 PM
Reply to: Message 373 by NoNukes
08-12-2018 1:46 PM


Re: If abortion is understood to be ending a human life, THEN we can talk alternatives
NoNukes writes:
It isn't a term with any objective definition.
That is not correct. You have just given an objective definition.
*I* gave an objective definition? I said it had a lot of ambiguity, that it's dependent upon "the technological sophistication of available technology at any given birth facility." The point of viability in a primitive tribe in the Amazonian basin would be much different than in a modern hospital. Maybe you're right that "variable" is a better adjective, but I think everyone knew what I meant.
I do find agree with Tangle and Faith on one point. I don't understand the reluctance to acknowledge that an unborn child, a few seconds before birth, is a human life. And in fact, it is only in an extreme situation where anyone would consider an abortion in that situation.
The argument has been framed several different ways. First there was a continuum of increasing harm, then potential human life, then different uses of the word "alive", now human life. The term I preferred was personhood, and jurisdictions vary as to whether and at what point and by how much they extend personhood to a fetus. If you ask me if I *know* the right answer then no, I don't, and I don't think anyone else does, either.
About an abortion just a few seconds before birth, I've commented a couple times that that doesn't seem possible to me. I'm no expert on obstetrics, but after about six or seven months I would think that inducement is almost always all that is possible, which results in birth. After it is born a baby has the basic rights of personhood. Abortion within just a few seconds of birth has always been a red herring. The real uncertainty is back before six or seven months.
Tangle also asked the question a different way, whether a woman can kill her fetus shortly before birth ("If a woman stuck a knitting needle through her cervix and skewered her baby moments before it was born..."). This gets back to the question of whether the fetus has personhood. I don't know.
--Percy

This message is a reply to:
 Message 373 by NoNukes, posted 08-12-2018 1:46 PM NoNukes has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 378 by NoNukes, posted 08-12-2018 9:20 PM Percy has replied

  
Percy
Member
Posts: 22359
From: New Hampshire
Joined: 12-23-2000
Member Rating: 4.8


(1)
Message 377 of 441 (838042)
08-12-2018 8:45 PM
Reply to: Message 375 by Tangle
08-12-2018 3:06 PM


Re: If abortion is understood to be ending a human life, THEN we can talk alternatives
Tangle writes:
But it's still obvious that the fertilised egg marks the start of process in the development of a human being and that the foetus a moment before birth *is* a fully formed human. I really don't understand the objection to that.
Well, it sounds innocuous enough, and normally I would have no objection, but not given where we began combined with the discussion's history where you called fertilization definitive and the beginning of a continuum where termination brings increasing harm that everyone knows must be true. If what you just said implies this then naturally I do not agree.
--Percy

This message is a reply to:
 Message 375 by Tangle, posted 08-12-2018 3:06 PM Tangle has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 381 by Tangle, posted 08-13-2018 3:47 AM Percy has replied

  
Percy
Member
Posts: 22359
From: New Hampshire
Joined: 12-23-2000
Member Rating: 4.8


Message 387 of 441 (838114)
08-14-2018 8:15 AM
Reply to: Message 378 by NoNukes
08-12-2018 9:20 PM


Re: If abortion is understood to be ending a human life, THEN we can talk alternatives
NoNukes writes:
Maybe you're right that "variable" is a better adjective, but I think everyone knew what I meant.
I am not going to apologize for insisting on another term.
Why would anyone expect you to?
I think the distinction between variable and subjective is important.
I think your complaint's a red herring distracting from the real issue, that the point of viability cannot be objectively established.
The question instead is whether an unborn child at that point is a human life and not whether you would perform an abortion.
I've said many times that I don't *know*. Naturally I have my own personal feelings and opinions, but I would never foist them on others nor think them worth discussing since they have no basis in fact. Anyone who thinks they *know* when life begins can only build a case upon feelings and opinion.
Tangle also asked the question a different way, whether a woman can kill her fetus shortly before birth ("If a woman stuck a knitting needle through her cervix and skewered her baby moments before it was born..."). This gets back to the question of whether the fetus has personhood. I don't know
Well under US law an unborn baby is not a person. That means that she would have to be charged with something other than homicide. If you mean something else by personhood, you'll need to tell me what you mean.
Is US law based upon fact or upon feelings and opinions?
--Percy

This message is a reply to:
 Message 378 by NoNukes, posted 08-12-2018 9:20 PM NoNukes has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 393 by NoNukes, posted 08-14-2018 12:35 PM Percy has replied

  
Percy
Member
Posts: 22359
From: New Hampshire
Joined: 12-23-2000
Member Rating: 4.8


Message 388 of 441 (838115)
08-14-2018 9:07 AM
Reply to: Message 381 by Tangle
08-13-2018 3:47 AM


Re: If abortion is understood to be ending a human life, THEN we can talk alternatives
Tangle writes:
but not given where we began combined with the discussion's history where you called fertilization definitive and the beginning of a continuum...
Biologically speaking, this can't be denied.
Most certainly, but I wasn't saying anything so obvious. You just made it look that way because of where you split my sentence that summarized what you believe. You split it right before the qualifying phrase that the continuum has increasing harm with termination.
...where termination brings increasing harm that everyone knows must be true. If what you just said implies this then naturally I do not agree.
Our point of difference is in harm or no harm in abortion and whether there is a continuum of increasing harm. As I understand you, you can not accept any harm towards an foetus at any point in the developmental process. You say that harm can only involve a born baby. You say that this is because you don't know whether a foetus is alive or not.
I tried various ways to persuade you that harm may be involved here, from pointing out that harm can involve the non-living - like smashing a window - or the non-human, like kicking a dog.
Mill's principle doesn't extend to effects unrelated to people. If you smash someone's window then you are depriving someone of property, and that is a harm. Or if you kick someone's dog and they have to go to the vet then you are also depriving someone of property (there's the vet bill, and then if it's a working dog there's deprivation of services). But if you legally kill a deer in the woods that is not a harm since you have not harmed any person with regard to person or property.
In order to try to get to the bottom of the harm and alive issue I asked you the theoretical question of whether it would be morally ok for a mother to kill the unborn baby just before birth.
I said I don't know.
The point of this question being that the foetus just before birth is a fully formed baby capable of life outside the woman. I don't think you've ever properly addressed this. I'm not suggesting that this is a real life or practical question requiring practical answers, it's purely a theoretical question intended to see where these 'alive' and 'harm' ideas begin and end.
Is the fetus, capable of life outside the womb, a person with a right to life? Support your answer with facts.
I note that you have changed your 'alive' requirement to a 'person' requirement.
My 'alive' requirement? The 'alive' requirement was yours, eschewed because you were slipping back and forth between different senses of the word 'alive'.
I don't feel that this changes anything except in a technical, legal sense.
If removes the ambiguity and takes the discussion to the heart of the matter. Is the fetus a person, and if so what rights does it have? Support your answer with facts.
You point to Roe:
quote:
the unborn have never been recognized ... as persons in the whole sense", and thus, the fetuses are not legally entitled to the protection afforded by the right to life specifically enumerated in the Fourteenth Amendment. So, rather than asserting that human life begins at any specific point, the court simply declared that the State has a "compelling interest" in protecting "potential life" at the point of viability.
I say that the phrase 'compelling interest in protecting potential life at the point of viability', accepts that there is a harm involved in killing a foetus at some point before birth and we therefore have a moral duty to protect the foetus from this harm.
You conclusion about a moral duty to protect the fetus is your own view and is nowhere found in Roe v. Wade.
I note too that this is 'simply declared' not objectively proven, but declared as a moral position.
You are correct that it is "simply declared that the State a 'compelling interest'", but that isn't equivalent to declaring it a moral position.
And you say you agree with this.
No, I don't agree with this.
So you leave me confused about your refusal to accept what seems to me to be a very obvious point that harm can and does exist before birth.
That's because you assume true your own chain of rationalizations, ones you already know I don't accept and have rebutted.
--Percy

This message is a reply to:
 Message 381 by Tangle, posted 08-13-2018 3:47 AM Tangle has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 391 by Tangle, posted 08-14-2018 12:08 PM Percy has replied

  
Percy
Member
Posts: 22359
From: New Hampshire
Joined: 12-23-2000
Member Rating: 4.8


Message 404 of 441 (838158)
08-14-2018 5:01 PM
Reply to: Message 395 by Tangle
08-14-2018 1:24 PM


Re: If abortion is understood to be ending a human life, THEN we can talk alternatives
Tangle writes:
Stile writes:
Tangle's other-end-absurdity: to say that killing a baby moments-before-it's-born is better than killing a baby moments-after-it's-born.
For the record, Tangle says that there is no difference between killing a baby just before birth and killing it just after. It's Percy that seems to think that there is.
Percy doesn't know if there is.
How on earth these mistakes keep being made is interesting but very frustrating.
Yes, very.
--Percy

This message is a reply to:
 Message 395 by Tangle, posted 08-14-2018 1:24 PM Tangle has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 409 by Tangle, posted 08-15-2018 4:22 AM Percy has replied

  
Percy
Member
Posts: 22359
From: New Hampshire
Joined: 12-23-2000
Member Rating: 4.8


Message 412 of 441 (838172)
08-15-2018 7:17 AM
Reply to: Message 391 by Tangle
08-14-2018 12:08 PM


Re: If abortion is understood to be ending a human life, THEN we can talk alternatives
Tangle writes:
Percy writes:
Most certainly, but I wasn't saying anything so obvious.
But I was, and I did so many times.
There are two minor issues here. One is why you feel the need to keep repeating what is already obvious to everyone, namely that the development from zygote to fetus is a continuum. Many natural processes are a continuum, there's no controversy here, no one's disputing it, yet you feel the need to repeat it "many times." Strange.
But the other minor issue is that you felt the need to split your quote of my sentence at a point that made me appear to be saying the same thing. I wasn't. It was a comment disagreeing with your continuum of increasing harm with termination.
You split it right before the qualifying phrase that the continuum has increasing harm with termination.
Yes, I did that deliberately to show the two parts to the argument, the bit we agree on and the bit we don't. That way we can avoid doing what we're doing now - arguing about things we agree on.
Everybody agrees on "the bit we agree on." We also agree that objects fall and water is wet.
Harm is also a legal principle and it *is* applied to animals regardless of vet's bills. You can not torture your own dog. It's another subjective moral position.
You're confusing what is legal with what can be shown true and what is right. Laws about abusing dogs (Michael Vick is the poster boy for dog abuse) are because of our emotional attachment to dogs. There are no laws about abusing animals to which we have no emotional attachment, such as wounding a deer who flees until collapsing from loss of blood to die a painful death. Every fall thousands of duck hunters throw hundreds of thousands of rounds of shotgun pellets into the air to randomly wound ducks, many of whom are never retrieved and die a painful death. So much for our vaunted moral position. What is actually subjective is that there is anything moral about our position.
I said I don't know.
And I'm trying to understand why you don't know.
I'm trying to understand why you don't realize you don't know, either. You can't just take a count of how many people share a certain feeling and then declare how they feel to be something we know.
I doubt that there are many people in the world that wouldn't simply know that it would be wrong to arbitrarily kill a baby immediately before birth. Most I suspect would assume that it was first degree murder. This isn't a fine decision to my mind, and I suspect to everyone else's here, it's unthinkable.
The number of people who falsely believe they know something is not a measure of truth. If facts were on your side you'd be talking about facts, but you're instead claiming that many people feel the same way you do. Years ago many people felt differently. You think it progress, I think it change.
You conclusion about a moral duty to protect the fetus is your own view and is nowhere found in Roe v. Wade.
When I typed that I knew you'd jump at this tiny little escape route. I doesn't say moral or ethical and it also says that there's no legal precedent, but still it made a decision in favour of the baby. On what possible grounds other than moral or ethical could that decision have been made?
I think they left it open so that people could read into what they will, which is what you're doing.
You are correct that it is "simply declared that the State a 'compelling interest'", but that isn't equivalent to declaring it a moral position.
What word would you prefer and why on earth do you think it matters? The state says that it is wrong to kill a baby after x weeks. It was compelling. Why has it said that?
They said that because they feel it is wrong, not because they can prove it is wrong.
No, I don't agree with this.
You bloodywell did!
Percy writes:
I think my position is summed up pretty well in the Supreme Court's Roe v. Wade decision quoted in the same Abortion in the United States artcil you cited in your Message 369
But you've invented your own Roe v. Wade interpretation, which I don't agree with. I agree with the actual language of the ruling, not all the things you claim they implied.
--Percy

This message is a reply to:
 Message 391 by Tangle, posted 08-14-2018 12:08 PM Tangle has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 414 by Tangle, posted 08-15-2018 7:44 AM Percy has replied

  
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