"A Right to Know" pro-life brochure

pharphis said:
I figured I'd give it a chance to see what they had to say, though ofc I realized it was unlikely to convince me that elective abortion is always wrong.


Oh I understand. It just doesn't seem to be justified at all. It's an assumption.

Agreed entirely and I also think this is most people's stance, though I haven't looked at an opinion poll or anything in awhile.
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I think you could argue that it's an assumption either way. I think you can logic your way in either direction and all points between, depending on which assumptions make.

Which is why I find it an uncomfortable subject.
 
Caper said:
Ok. But I've saw you go down this road before... bacteria are just little people or what ever it is. Or we can kill anyone we want because we also kill chickens.
None of that works for me as an argument for or against abortion. I think it is ridiculous. A bit crazy even.
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I don't think it's crazy to state that the sanctity of human life is neither obvious nor uncontroversial, and I don't think it's ridiculous to ask people who support that view to defend it.

Seriously, if there isn't a persuasive argument explaining why human life is sacred (why one very specific taxonomic group is sacred and all the others aren't), their isn't much room left to argue against abortion. Morally speaking, fetuses just don't have a lot going for them; they aren't rational, they don't have a mental life to speak of, they aren't moral agents, they can't see themselves over time, they don't a preference to born rather than aborted, they have no concept of moral reciprocity, etc. What's left to argue against abortion?

You seem content to fall back on species membership, but morally speaking, speciesism is not exactly uncontroversial. I don't recall you having particularly strong religious beliefs (correct me if I'm wrong), so I don't think you believe in souls or divine laws. I'm sort of left wondering how you rationally arrived at the view that one specific category of DNA is uniquely sacred?
 
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Dessi: Abortion is ok because... Carrots.
 
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Personally think the whole thing has basically turned into some kind of moral viewpoint as to right or wrong.

I think the mothers moral views should take precedence for abortions when done under what the law says.

The anti people are welcome to picket and criticise, but they have no idea of the person carrying the foetus rounds situation
 
Dessi said:
Seriously, if there isn't a persuasive argument explaining why human life is sacred (why one very specific taxonomic group is sacred and all the others aren't), their isn't much room left to argue against abortion. Morally speaking, fetuses just don't have a lot going for them; they aren't rational, they don't have a mental life to speak of, they aren't moral agents, they can't see themselves over time, they don't a preference to born rather than aborted, etc.
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But neither does a 1 day old. A 1 day old and a -1 day old are basically the same thing.

According to you a hunter should be able to maybe hunt small babies like say they would a deer. Or at least if they do only get the same punishment as you would say killing a neighbors dog because you can't stand the barking. After all a dog is much smarter then a baby... So the punishment should actually be much, much more.

2nd I completely disagree a fetus has no mental life to speak of, I wouldn't be for some fetal rights if I didn't think so. Surely maybe very early on that is the case, but not latter on in development.

What does your argument in for me, more then anything is everything you apply to a fetus can be applied to a 1 day old and older. I don't know what you mean by a fetus has no preference to be born rather then aborted. Does a week old have a preference to not be shot in the face? Do you ask them? If they don't answer can we assume it's ok to shoot them in the face? I can only assume that if you were to hold a hot knife to the neck of a 1 day it would give you an indication what it's preference might be. And I think the same for a -1 day old.

So then your in this weird territory, where you treat infant murder the same as say killing someone's cow... and you would have to in your world, because everything is judged by it's moral agentness (not a word) or intelligence, because we can't give any special status to species membership.

It just isn't an argument I buy at all.
 
Dessi said:
I'm sort of left wondering how you rationally arrived at the view that one specific category of DNA is uniquely sacred?
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Because that's MY DNA. That's why it's sacred. That's how I arrived there. If I was a turkey, turkey's would be the species I based all my laws around.
 
Caper said:
Because that's MY DNA. That's why it's sacred. That's how I arrived there. If I was a turkey, turkey's would be the species I based all my laws around.
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So is the shed skin covering your keyboard

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Caper said:
Because that's MY DNA. That's why it's sacred. That's how I arrived there. If I was a turkey, turkey's would be the species I based all my laws around.
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Why do you care about DNA? Isn't personhood, which is a concept independent of DNA, what is actually important?
 
Caper said:
But neither does a 1 day old. A 1 day old and a -1 day old are basically the same thing.
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I agree with this.

According to you a hunter should be able to maybe hunt small babies like say they would a deer. Or at least if they do only get the same punishment as you would say killing a neighbors dog because you can't stand the barking. After all a dog is much smarter then a baby... So the punishment should actually be much, much more.
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Not quite: I think a hunter should be able to hunt deer in all instances where it would be acceptable to hunt small babies. That's a striking comment out of context, but it follows a straightforward consequence of rejecting the sanctity of human life: it implies that infants lives are reduced to the status of animals, or animals lives are raised to the status of infants. I'm personally inclined toward the latter, on the basis that it's not rational to increase suffering when it can be easily avoided.

This view has some interesting implications on abortion, namely that early term fetal life has the same claim to moral value as any other organism which has no mental life to speak of.

2nd I completely disagree a fetus has no mental life to speak of, I wouldn't be for some fetal rights if I didn't think so. Surely maybe very early on that is the case, but not latter on in development.
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Out of curiosity, do you think abortions are more permissible if they occur very early in development, prior to a certain degree of mental development?

Dessi said:
Morally speaking, fetuses just don't have a lot going for them; they aren't rational, they don't have a mental life to speak of, they aren't moral agents, they can't see themselves over time, they don't a preference to born rather than aborted, etc.
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I don't know what you mean by a fetus has no preference to be born rather then aborted.
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You may have misunderstood me. I'm explaining that most theories of human rights are not inclusive to fetuses, as most theories require some important attributes to account for value at all. To spell it out in excruciating detail:

Fetuses aren't rational. This means they are not included in the sphere of moral consideration in any ethic that requires some minimal level of rationality. Social contractarianism, for example, is based on mutual informed agreements between self-interested people; fetuses, unfortunately, lack the rationality to consent to social contracts.

Fetus below a certain level of development have no mental life to speak of. This means their moral value isn't account for in ethical systems which require certain mental capacity, such as a capacity to feel pain in most flavors of consequentialism and rational egoism.

Fetuses aren't moral agents. Think about the implications this has in most interpretations of Kantianism, which assert that people only have direct duties to moral agents.

Fetuses can't see themselves over time. Many ethical theories are concerned with the fate of organisms who see themselves as a distinct entity existing and continuing over time, which is a long-hand way of saying "self awareness".

Fetuses don't have preferences of any sort. This, of course, refers to preference utlitarianism, one of the more popular flavors of consequentialism in recent decades.

Contrary to intuition, many contemporary theories of human rights aren't actually inclusive to fetuses (or, as you noted, very young infants). This is a problem, because it makes arguments against abortion difficult to frame in the context of human rights. If abortion is wrong, is because the fetus has some inherent moral value, we need to account for that value to make the argument persuasive. All other things being equal, it's easier to account for the value of non-rational humans who can suffer (like very young infants and late term fetuses), than those who cannot (all other fetuses).

So then your in this weird territory, where you treat infant murder the same as say killing someone's cow... and you would have to in your world, because everything is judged by it's moral agentness (not a word) or intelligence, because we can't give any special status to species membership.
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I don't see how you actually avoid that "weird territory". The argument for the sanctity of human life is, at best, wishful thinking. It logically follows that, if human life isn't sacred, then human life and non-human life at a similar mental level are moral equals, and hurting one or the other has the same consequence regardless of their species membership.
 
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Dessi said:
I don't see how you actually avoid that "weird territory". The argument for the sanctity of human life is, at best, wishful thinking. It logically follows that, if human life isn't sacred, then human life and non-human life at a similar mental level are moral equals, and hurting one or the other has the same consequence regardless of their species membership.
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Sacred is the wrong word, that brings divinity and religion into it. Special? Human life is special in the debate, because it is what we are. That's the reason... that's a great reason.

If a house is burning down and I can save my parrot, who can count, identify shapes and reason about as much as a 3 year old (I'm making a point, I don't know if they get that smart) or I can save my 1 year old.... or anyones one year old. I'm going to save the 1 year old, despite being the lesser intelligent being. Why? Because the baby is a baby and a parrot is a bird. If the parrots in the jungle want to save their young over mine, good for them, let them look out for them. Being human is important in my world.

Now, does animal life deserve protection, yes, how much is up for debate. But it's a different debate.
 
Emotive but irrelevant when talking embryos

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I didn't go any further than this statement from the linked site:
It is our firm conviction, backed by every manner of scientific and philosophical evidence, that the act of abortion kills an innocent human being.
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That is just plain wrong. Science has not a jot to say about human beings being innocent or when a fetus becomes human. Philosophically, there is much debate on when a fetus is an "innocent human being" so the assertion that it is clear is wrong. They can hold their conviction all they want but their erroneous argument should sway nobody.

In addition, what does including the word "innocent" add to the argument? Innocent of what? What does innocent add to the argument? I think it is just used to be inflammatory for their position.

Caper said:
That's because they think the unborn have a right to life. Is that really that hard to understand?
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Yes. Who empowered them to speak for the unborn?
 
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SezMe said:
I didn't go any further than this statement from the linked site:

That is just plain wrong. Science has not a jot to say about human beings being innocent or when a fetus becomes human. Philosophically, there is much debate on when a fetus is an "innocent human being" so the assertion that it is clear is wrong. They can hold their conviction all they want but their erroneous argument should sway nobody.

In addition, what does including the word "innocent" add to the argument? Innocent of what? What does innocent add to the argument? I think it is just used to be inflammatory for their position.
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At least they aren't using "murder" which I've seen

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