The "Abortion is murder" position

[ImaginalDisc]

While I support the position that abortion should be legal I personally abhor abortion. There are other ways to handle an unwanted pregnancy including giving an unwanted infant up for adoption. In situations where the sex was consentual and a pregnancy results then i can't understand why the woman can't take responsibility for her actions and just have the baby. In cases of rape I can understand but not in situations where the baby is the result of recreational sex.

That's a rather cavalier attitude towards pregnancy, considering pregnancy can be rather risky and many women, and teenage girls who get pregnant, can suffer serious medical risks from pregnancy. The decision of whether or not a woman should go through a pregnancy is a decision to be made by her with the consultation of her doctor.

Your opinion doesn't enter into it.

 

[King of the Americas]

Unfortunately, "external viability" is just as slippery an eel as most other hypotheses are in this matter. It has been said before that sometimes arbitrary lines must be drawn simply to be able to establish a rule or law in the first place (i.e. age of consent, drinking age, voting...), however, this particular line dictates whether you are ending a human life or ending the existence of "human life-to-be". With such a line, it seems prudent to be certain we are correct one way or the other.

Back to the slippery eel of "external viability". As technological advances grow, so also grows the borders medical science. 100 years ago, a baby born 3 months early was likely doomed. Today, a 3 month premature baby stands a likely chance of survival. Does that mean a fetus in the womb at six months 100 years ago was not a human life, but one today is? Based upon the theory of "external viability", a fetus at 3 months would certainly not be a human life, does that change in the future if medical technology can help it survive beyond the womb?

Personally, I have waffled with my opinion of abortion. I have difficulty with stating an entity is not a human life one day then suddenly, within seconds, it is. I truly do not believe the issue of abortion is one of woman's rights. The real issue is whether an unborn child deserves the same protection of life we all get from the moment it is conceived. If everyone truly believed and science could show that a fetus is a human life and abortion is murder, this type of discussion would cease.

My two cents,

Santa

A fetus and zigots are both "human life", but neither is an 'individual'...

Individuals have rights, enumerated in the Constitution. In my humble opinion "external viability" is the ONLY determinate, in deciding whether or not someone has rights.

And indeed, with the increase in technology, the 'line' persay would be moved.

What is and is not "human" should have nothing to do with this debate. My finger is human, as is my blood, and the rest of my organs...but they are not in an of themselves "individual human life".

 

[King of the Americas]

A tick attached to your leg is an individual animal, not part of your body. If you take the parasite rhetoric seriously, then you should automatically conclude that a fetus is an individual, separate from a mother.

A tick does NOT require a specific host. A tick could be moved from one host to another, UNLIKE a fetus.

Children under 5 years cannot exist for very long without their parents specific care and attention, therefore they are not individuals with legal protections. My mother cannot survive without an oxygen pump, therefore she's not externally viable and has no legal protections. Lets not go down that road..

Neither your mother, nor a 5 year old child requires a 'specific' parent, or oxygen pump as it were, to exist.

In any case, I see no reason at all to choose viability over all the other alternatives, like birth or conception, to draw the line of legal protection, except of course because it retrofits nicely into the status quo..

This isn't about 'choosing' anything over another thing. It is about who or what deserving legal protections under the law.

A pro-lifer would reply that being have NO rights before they're concieved (how does a non-existent person have rights at all?), and that governments oblige people to act paternalistically toward people who can't take care of themselves.

Pro-lifers argue that ALL "life" deserves protection under the law. And that since a fetus has a heart beat, that is is alive. While I don't refute this point, I simply argue that while it is 'life', it is not an 'individual'.

Until the point of external viability, the "life" exists only in a willing and able host. If for some reason the host is stressed, the body's natural response is to abort the pregnancy. something as simple as a lack of nutrition or an unsafe/stressful environment could be enough to trigger a miscarriage. My point? That this fetus is part of the woman's body, and NOT separate from it.

Until the point of external viability, it is sincerely the woman's body, and thus HER decision as to its possible future.

 

[Santa666]

So our argument here is "X is a potential Y, therefore X has all the same rights as Y". Let's take that principle to its logical ends:
- If I'm a potential senior citizen, do I have the same rights as a senior citizen?
- If you're a potential corpse, is it ok for me to bury you?
- If infants are potential moral agents, should they be treated like moral agents?

No on all counts. Although a lot of people like to throw potential person arguments in the fray, they're just bad philosophy. Potential people have potential rights. If infants are valuable, its because of some characteristics they have right now, such as their capacity to feel pain, pleasure, satisfaction suffering, etc.

Now, of course, this doesn't deny that fetus is a human, it just denies that being a member of our species has any intrinsic value. Species membership is irrelevant, and the fact that something is a human communicates nothing to make a moral decision by.



No it wouldn't. I, for example, will argue forcefully that human life has zero intrinsic value. It only has conditional value. Abortion has NOTHING to do with whether the fetus is a human or not, only whether it has some morally relevant characteristics. To make sense of the abortion debate, we only need to state what morally relevant characteristics make people valuable in general, and then determine whether a fetus has those characteristics.

One person pointed out desire utilitarianism, which more or less insists that a being who has no desires will not be harmed by any concievable action (namely, because having desires is a prerequisite to being harmed at all), so they don't exist in the moral community. Human beings have an interest in their continued existence, and the satisfaction of their desires depends necessarily on their continued existence; fetuses, on the other hand, have no mental life, and therefore no desires to speak of, so they are not members of the moral community. We have a very basic, yet sound basis for making moral distinctions between adult and embryo life.

Sorry for the long delay.

This line of reasoning simply does not make sense. Basically, you have condemned not only the unborn, but even babies newly born as well. The same lack of "desires" apply to newborns as much as they apply to a fetus. This is just the "viability outside the womb" argument dressed up in more elaborate clothing. If a newly born child deserves to live, then why not the child only moments before while it was in the womb? Of course, I can back this argument up and ask them same thing. Traveling backward in time along a woman gestation period, at what point exactly do you say, WHOA!!!! Now, this fetus can be killed, it is not deserving of life? Some will say as soon as you reach the 1st trimester, however, I still have a problem with this arbitrary line, especially if ultimately, the decision is the end of a human life.

Of course human life has intrinsic value. Stating that human life only has conditional value opens a pandora's box of unanswerable questions. Who decides which conditions are valuable? What are these conditions? What happens if someone no longer meets these conditons? What happens if someone no longer meets only one condition?....I can go on.

I believe, if you choose to place inherent value on human life, then you do so for ALL human life. This means if a fetus is a human life, then it needs to protected as such. There will always be questions of rape/incest and what to do in cases where the mother's life is in jeopardy, but that changes none of the assertions that if a fetus = human life, then it should be allowed to live.


Santa

 

[Santa666]

A fetus and zigots are both "human life", but neither is an 'individual'...

Individuals have rights, enumerated in the Constitution. In my humble opinion "external viability" is the ONLY determinate, in deciding whether or not someone has rights.

And indeed, with the increase in technology, the 'line' persay would be moved.

This is why you cannot use the viability argument. Medical technology should not determine life or death in this way. A hypothetical for you...

2 hospitals, 2 pregnant women. One hospital as a new cutting edge technology that can extract the fetus at 3 months with near 100% survival rate, the other hospital has no such technology yet. Both fetuses are the exact same age, are you implying that one has rights or will soon have rights and the other, does not?

What is and is not "human" should have nothing to do with this debate. My finger is human, as is my blood, and the rest of my organs...but they are not in an of themselves "individual human life".

Your finger is a body part OF a human. Your blood is a method of helping you stay alive. Neither of these are "human" in ANY way except by description. Do you also argue that your hair or fingernails are "human"? It is simply silly to assert such a thing.

 

[King of the Americas]

Sorry for the long delay.

This line of reasoning simply does not make sense. Basically, you have condemned not only the unborn, but even babies newly born as well. The same lack of "desires" apply to newborns as much as they apply to a fetus. This is just the "viability outside the womb" argument dressed up in more elaborate clothing. If a newly born child deserves to live, then why not the child only moments before while it was in the womb? Of course, I can back this argument up and ask them same thing. Traveling backward in time along a woman gestation period, at what point exactly do you say, WHOA!!!! Now, this fetus can be killed, it is not deserving of life? Some will say as soon as you reach the 1st trimester, however, I still have a problem with this arbitrary line, especially if ultimately, the decision is the end of a human life.

Of course human life has intrinsic value. Stating that human life only has conditional value opens a pandora's box of unanswerable questions. Who decides which conditions are valuable? What are these conditions? What happens if someone no longer meets these conditons? What happens if someone no longer meets only one condition?....I can go on.

I believe, if you choose to place inherent value on human life, then you do so for ALL human life. This means if a fetus is a human life, then it needs to protected as such. There will always be questions of rape/incest and what to do in cases where the mother's life is in jeopardy, but that changes none of the assertions that if a fetus = human life, then it should be allowed to live.


Santa

There is no inherent value on human life, period.

We KILL people, when they are proven to be a danger to other people. So there is human life, that we-as a society, do NOT 'value'.

A fetus, before the point of external viability, is NOT an individual and thus is NOT deserving of legal protection.

Fertilized, but not-yet-implanted eggs ARE human life, but I have heard no one suggest we criminalize discarding such unused material. Although there are some who'd preferthat we indeed discard them, rather than use them in other scientific pursuits. That seems to me an odd conclusion.

Sperm+Egg=Human life...?

Talk about a slippery slope, how long before a mis-carriage is considered murder?

"If the mother would have just eaten enough fruit and vegtables, she would have killed her unborn child!"

My point? What is and is not "human life" is moot.

"Individuals" have consitutionally protected rights...

Until the point of external viability, you aren't an individual, and you have no rights.

 

[King of the Americas]

This is why you cannot use the viability argument. Medical technology should not determine life or death in this way. A hypothetical for you...

2 hospitals, 2 pregnant women. One hospital as a new cutting edge technology that can extract the fetus at 3 months with near 100% survival rate, the other hospital has no such technology yet. Both fetuses are the exact same age, are you implying that one has rights or will soon have rights and the other, does not?

That is EXACTLY what I am suggesting.

Your finger is a body part OF a human. Your blood is a method of helping you stay alive. Neither of these are "human" in ANY way except by description. Do you also argue that your hair or fingernails are "human"? It is simply silly to assert such a thing.

And a fetus at the point of inviability, is merely 'part' of a woman's body. If she dies, so does it.

My finger LIVES, so long as I do, as does my blood.

Fingernails & hair are both quite dead.

(*At what point does 'part' of a human become human? I mean, if I get cut in half, which part is indeed 'part' of a person? I could cut off my legs and arms, I am still a person right? I mena if you cut someone's head off, and managed to keep them alive using a bypass machine, would the head be the person, while the body, just remained 'part' of a human?)

 

[sthomson]

That's a rather cavalier attitude towards pregnancy, considering pregnancy can be rather risky and many women, and teenage girls who get pregnant, can suffer serious medical risks from pregnancy. The decision of whether or not a woman should go through a pregnancy is a decision to be made by her with the consultation of her doctor.

Your opinion doesn't enter into it.

Thank you for bringing this up! It angers me when people (especially people who oppose abortion or abortion rights) have such a cavalier attitude towards pregnancy. Carrying a child to term can have serious effects on the physical, mental, and economic well-being of the mother.

I don't care about viability. The question in my mind is, "Does a fetus have rights that supersede a woman's right to bodily autonomy?" The only civilized answer to this question is, "No."

 

[Princess]

Santa666,

No it wouldn't. I, for example, will argue forcefully that human life has zero intrinsic value. It only has conditional value. Abortion has NOTHING to do with whether the fetus is a human or not, only whether it has some morally relevant characteristics. To make sense of the abortion debate, we only need to state what morally relevant characteristics make people valuable in general, and then determine whether a fetus has those characteristics.

This line of reasoning simply does not make sense. Basically, you have condemned not only the unborn, but even babies newly born as well. The same lack of "desires" apply to newborns as much as they apply to a fetus.

There's a fascinating book on this topic, Rethinking Life and Death: The Collapse of Traditional Morality by Peter Singer.

Santa, I don't know a better way to put this, but newborns aren't rational, aren't aware of their own existence, can't see themselves over time, etc. If you think about it, there are not really many reasons why newborn life is valuable. Although most people believe that infant life has value, 99% of people I've met aren't capable of explaining why newborn life has any value.

If you are asking for my opinion in particular, I have a very utilitarian ethic: newborn infants are feeling beings with an experiential welfare, they can feel pain, pleasure, satisfaction, suffering, etc. They have that much, and we can take those characteristics into consideration when we make decisions about how to treat infants. As utilitarians, we can maximize their welfare without much cost. Now, if an infant has a terminal illness, or if there is no genuine way to care for it, then I believe we can make a strong argument for euthanasia -- yes, you can read this as a justification for infanticide in certain cases.

With respect to unborn fetuses, they have no mental lives whatsoever; they aren't feeling beings and they have no experiential welfare. From a utilitarian point of view, nothing is lost for having an abortion, or at least not in comparable way to destroying the life of a feeling being. There's nothing to weigh against a mother's interest in having an abortion.

Of course human life has intrinsic value. Stating that human life only has conditional value opens a pandora's box of unanswerable questions. Who decides which conditions are valuable? What are these conditions? What happens if someone no longer meets these conditons? What happens if someone no longer meets only one condition?....I can go on.

And I can answer your questions if you really want me to, just start a new thread on the topic.

I believe, if you choose to place inherent value on human life, then you do so for ALL human life. This means if a fetus is a human life, then it needs to protected as such. There will always be questions of rape/incest and what to do in cases where the mother's life is in jeopardy, but that changes none of the assertions that if a fetus = human life, then it should be allowed to live.

Santa, I'm afraid that asserting "human life has inherent value" without argument is meaningless. If you destroy animal life or human life without thinking that it has moral consequence, then we know that life in and of itself does not have inherent value; so, what is the moral distinction between taking animal life and the lives of mentally similar humans? Animals, as far as they are concerned, have the same mental and feeling capacities and children, yet you probably believe its morally acceptable to take their lives.

Presumably then, human life has inherent value in a special way that prevents animals from having the same claim to inherent value. With that in mind, could you please state in clear terms what gives human life inherent value?

 

[Princess]

A tick attached to your leg is an individual animal, not part of your body. If you take the parasite rhetoric seriously, then you should automatically conclude that a fetus is an individual, separate from a mother.

A tick does NOT require a specific host. A tick could be moved from one host to another, UNLIKE a fetus.

Neither your mother, nor a 5 year old child requires a 'specific' parent, or oxygen pump as it were, to exist.

This doesn't seem like a well-thought out or even morally relevant restriction. We can fertilize eggs outside of a womb and implant it in any woman, there's no requirement to implant it in a particular woman, so those embryos are individuals based on your own argument. Taking this even further, there is nothing in principle that prevents us from transplanting fetuses to different wombs or even test tubes, which reinforces the point that they are individuals.

And still, some humans are born inseperably connected to another human, like these two little girls. In what sense are these two girls individuals? That's easy, they have seperate mental lives, memories, and experiences, but your own argument would insist that these two little girls are not individuals and therefore justifies grinding them into hamburger.

As a final point, individuality is not the point when abortion becomes unethical. I'll take a stab in the dark and assume that you enthusiastically support animal slaughter for food, even if those animals are individuals in the same sense newborn infants. Clearly, individuality, in and of itself, is not a prerequisite to have a claim to moral value, and therefore its not a valid moral distinction between born humans and unborn humans.

Let me put this bluntly: you're argument that "individual" depends on "external viablity" is naive and has no semblance of internal consistency. Please stop hammering on the "fetus = parasite / fetus != individual" argument because its just bad philosophy.

In any case, I see no reason at all to choose viability over all the other alternatives, like birth or conception, to draw the line of legal protection, except of course because it retrofits nicely into the status quo.

This isn't about 'choosing' anything over another thing. It is about who or what deserving legal protections under the law.

That's a really weird reply, I'm not sure you understood my point. Let me restate myself in the form of a question: why does a person deserve legal protection at external viability instead of birth?

 

[elipse]

You know, this gets me every time...
Anyone who says abortion is murder and that abortion doctors are murderers and that life begins at conception must then take the stance that fertility treatments are murder and that fertility doctors are murderers. I wonder if the people who claim this realize this.

Hey, anyone out there: if you think abortion is murder, and that abortion doctors are murderers, and you support making abortion illegal, do you feel the same way about the fertility industry? Do you support making it illegal? If not, why not? You're aware it results in destroying already fertilized eggs, right? So, if you don't want it to be illegal, why not? How do you justify the double standard?

 

[King of the Americas]

This doesn't seem like a well-thought out or even morally relevant restriction. We can fertilize eggs outside of a womb and implant it in any woman, there's no requirement to implant it in a particular woman, so those embryos are individuals based on your own argument. Taking this even further, there is nothing in principle that prevents us from transplanting fetuses to different wombs or even test tubes, which reinforces the point that they are individuals.

And still, some humans are born inseperably connected to another human, like these two little girls. In what sense are these two girls individuals? That's easy, they have seperate mental lives, memories, and experiences, but your own argument would insist that these two little girls are not individuals and therefore justifies grinding them into hamburger.

As a final point, individuality is not the point when abortion becomes unethical. I'll take a stab in the dark and assume that you enthusiastically support animal slaughter for food, even if those animals are individuals in the same sense newborn infants. Clearly, individuality, in and of itself, is not a prerequisite to have a claim to moral value, and therefore its not a valid moral distinction between born humans and unborn humans.

Let me put this bluntly: you're argument that "individual" depends on "external viablity" is naive and has no semblance of internal consistency. Please stop hammering on the "fetus = parasite / fetus != individual" argument because its just bad philosophy.


That's a really weird reply, I'm not sure you understood my point. Let me restate myself in the form of a question: why does a person deserve legal protection at external viability instead of birth?

A fertilized egg is NOT viable, nor an individual, without the proper place to incubate. Test tube babies don't turn into actual people. A fertilized egg is merely that, and certainly NOT a person of any kind.

Siamese twins ARE individuals, in that they don't require one specific host for ALL of their life functions. While some are in fact greatly connected to each other, I have not seen a pair yet, that didn't demonstrat 'individual' actions, like eating or sleeping. IF for example a pair of twins were born 'together' and one was connected in such a way that they didn't have a mouth from which to consume nutrients, nor a mouth and nose from which to breathe. I would then argue that the entity was more close akin to a parasite than an actual individual.

Animals are not people. If it tastes good, I'd have no problem whatsoever in killing and eating it, even if it was a doe carrying a young'en, or a dog about to have puppies. Hell I have killed 3 dove in one shot before, and even bundled them together into one bacon bound entity. Whether they were once individual birds, flying in a flock, or bundled up into a nice tasty treat, is of no concern to me.

To answer your question: Because at the point of external viability, you become an 'individual'. Before that, you are merely an extension of the host's body.

Is it okay to feed cocain to a 1 month old?

If not, why would it be okay for a woman carrying a baby for 7 months to do cocain herself?

In my opinion, both are an example of child abuse, which is why I believe that both sides of this issue are wrong.

At the point of external viability, you cease to NEED to be a part of something.

Our whole society is based on people needing help/supervision, for a time. Then once they have demonstrated that they no longer 'need' this supervision, you get more rights.

13 year olds don't get to drive. 16 year olds dont get to vote, and until you are 21 you don't get to drink.

WHY?

Because in each of these circumstances, there is a supposed ability inheritated by age/development. Why shouldn't we apply the same standards to the unborn?

 

[Neally]

Animals are not people. If it tastes good, I'd have no problem whatsoever in killing and eating it, even if it was a doe carrying a young'en, or a dog about to have puppies.

What if you don't eat it? Presumably you would have no problem randomly killing dogs, cats, horses, just for fun?

 

[ImaginalDisc]

Thank you for bringing this up! It angers me when people (especially people who oppose abortion or abortion rights) have such a cavalier attitude towards pregnancy. Carrying a child to term can have serious effects on the physical, mental, and economic well-being of the mother.

I don't care about viability. The question in my mind is, "Does a fetus have rights that supersede a woman's right to bodily autonomy?" The only civilized answer to this question is, "No."

I'm just stunned by the double standard. If abortion is murder, isn't forcing a woman to go through a pregancy that is medically risky also murder? If one says "Yes" and tries to take a more "middle ground" position then one is conceding that in at least some cases abortion is acceptable. If one says "No" and forces women who are young, sick, or have other problems to go through pregnancy then they are unquestionably murderers.

I don't believe it's a false dilemma. Either abortion is acceptable in at least some cases, in which case it isn't murder and the debate becomes one about who gets to decide when and how to abort, or it's never acceptable and people who take such a position are willing to kill adult and teenage women, and they're psychotic.

 

[King of the Americas]

What if you don't eat it? Presumably you would have no problem randomly killing dogs, cats, horses, just for fun?

Nah, I have to have a 'reason' to kill...like to protect my property or to provide nutrition.

If I had chickens that were being harrassed by a raccoon or a coyote, I'd have no problem putting a few rounds in the predator.

Personally, I don't kill things just for the fun of it.

(Sarah Palin shoots wolves from helicopters, and while I 'hope' that this was an effort to control the local population, I can't help but wonder if she wasn't doing it for the mere 'sport' of it. MY point is that there should be justification for killing anything.)

 

[Princess]

King of the Americas,

To answer your question: Because at the point of external viability, you become an 'individual'. Before that, you are merely an extension of the host's body.

Nonsense. I shouldn't even have to respond to this argument; a fetus is obviously a foreign organism because its composted of different DNA that was implanted into the mothers body. You yourself called the fetus a parasite; its true that a parasite (like a tapeworm) cannot survive for long without a host, but that's not the same as being an extension of the hosts body.

And in any case, you _still_ have no explained why external viability makes a person an individual; you've only stated its the time when a fetus does not necessarily depend on another body for its survival (I'd argue that people under 7-years depend on other bodies for their survival, but that's another story). Yes, fetuses can depend on other bodies, but theres nothing inconsistent about referring to a being as an individual even when it depends on the existence of another -- this is exactly what a parasite is, and how you described a fetus in the beginning. For that reason, theres no reason to limit a right to life at viability rather than at more obvious milestones like an infants first breath, when their heart begins to beat, when the umbilical cord is cut, or conception.

Our whole society is based on people needing help/supervision, for a time. Then once they have demonstrated that they no longer 'need' this supervision, you get more rights.

13 year olds don't get to drive. 16 year olds dont get to vote, and until you are 21 you don't get to drink.

WHY?

Because in each of these circumstances, there is a supposed ability inheritated by age/development. Why shouldn't we apply the same standards to the unborn?

You haven't even come close to refuting the pro-lifers argument. You've only demonstrated that circumstantial rights exist, you have no shown that all rights are circumstantial. People have different rights/privileges based on different abilities and competencies, but pro-lifers will also insist that some rights are inherent.


So, just to recap our discussion:
- You stated that fetus = parasite, therefore its not an individual. I commented that parasites are, by definition, a different organism from the host, and therefore an individual.

- You changed your definition so that fetus = dependent on another, therefore its not an individual. I pointed out that people depend others people or technology to survive everyday.

- You changed your definition again so that fetus = depending on a particular womb. I pointed out there is no intrinsic dependency on a particular wombs, its a circumstantial dependency at best. After all, zygotes can implant in any womb, just like parasites can attach to any host.

- You changed your definition again so that fetus = extension of the mothers body. You've been trying to make this argument all along, but you've never shown it to be the case; I've pointed out that a fetus is obviously a different organism because it has different DNA, and I've reiterated that there's nothing intrinsically inconsistent with the idea that one individual depends on another to survive.



KotA, let me put it this way: I get the impression that you genuinely have no idea why you approve of abortion, and that you're not critically aware of many of your own moral principles. If you were, then you'd be able to state why you approve of abortion in clear, persuasive terms, and you wouldn't have conceded to each and every one of my arguments by redefining your terms.

I apologize ahead of time for condescending down to you, but you should not preach to people about things you don't understand very well, its just not constructive and it discredits pro-choicers by association.

If you don't understand what you're talking about, start asking questions. It surprises me that, after all of this time insisting that a fetus and "host" are the same entity, you have never bothered to ask someone "since you believe a fetus is an individual, how do _you_ make a distinction between mother and fetus?" Not even one time have you attempted to figure out whether the other side of your argument holds water -- you've just been on the defensive the entire time.

I've said about all I can. If it doesn't help you to make more constructive, thoughtful posts in the future, then I'm finished replying to you.

 

[King of the Americas]

King of the Americas,


Nonsense. I shouldn't even have to respond to this argument; a fetus is obviously a foreign organism because its composted of different DNA that was implanted into the mothers body. You yourself called the fetus a parasite; its true that a parasite (like a tapeworm) cannot survive for long without a host, but that's not the same as being an extension of the hosts body.

And in any case, you _still_ have no explained why external viability makes a person an individual; you've only stated its the time when a fetus does not necessarily depend on another body for its survival (I'd argue that people under 7-years depend on other bodies for their survival, but that's another story). Yes, fetuses can depend on other bodies, but theres nothing inconsistent about referring to a being as an individual even when it depends on the existence of another -- this is exactly what a parasite is, and how you described a fetus in the beginning. For that reason, theres no reason to limit a right to life at viability rather than at more obvious milestones like an infants first breath, when their heart begins to beat, when the umbilical cord is cut, or conception.


You haven't even come close to refuting the pro-lifers argument. You've only demonstrated that circumstantial rights exist, you have no shown that all rights are circumstantial. People have different rights/privileges based on different abilities and competencies, but pro-lifers will also insist that some rights are inherent.


So, just to recap our discussion:
- You stated that fetus = parasite, therefore its not an individual. I commented that parasites are, by definition, a different organism from the host, and therefore an individual.

- You changed your definition so that fetus = dependent on another, therefore its not an individual. I pointed out that people depend others people or technology to survive everyday.

- You changed your definition again so that fetus = depending on a particular womb. I pointed out there is no intrinsic dependency on a particular wombs, its a circumstantial dependency at best. After all, zygotes can implant in any womb, just like parasites can attach to any host.

- You changed your definition again so that fetus = extension of the mothers body. You've been trying to make this argument all along, but you've never shown it to be the case; I've pointed out that a fetus is obviously a different organism because it has different DNA, and I've reiterated that there's nothing intrinsically inconsistent with the idea that one individual depends on another to survive.



KotA, let me put it this way: I get the impression that you genuinely have no idea why you approve of abortion, and that you're not critically aware of many of your own moral principles. If you were, then you'd be able to state why you approve of abortion in clear, persuasive terms, and you wouldn't have conceded to each and every one of my arguments by redefining your terms.

I apologize ahead of time for condescending down to you, but you should not preach to people about things you don't understand very well, its just not constructive and it discredits pro-choicers by association.

If you don't understand what you're talking about, start asking questions. It surprises me that, after all of this time insisting that a fetus and "host" are the same entity, you have never bothered to ask someone "since you believe a fetus is an individual, how do _you_ make a distinction between mother and fetus?" Not even one time have you attempted to figure out whether the other side of your argument holds water -- you've just been on the defensive the entire time.

I've said about all I can. If it doesn't help you to make more constructive, thoughtful posts in the future, then I'm finished replying to you.

Firstly, attack my responses all you'd like, but don't attack 'me', personally by suggesting that "...I don't understand what I am talking about..."

'I' understand MY argument very well, thank you.

While you may read different things into the different terms or phrases I have used to describe my position, my argumenthas not changed.

My argument is quite simple, with 'ability' comes extended rights.

A fertilized egg/zygote/fetus, before the point of external viability is NOT an individual because it relies on a 'specific host' for ALL of its life functions- breathing, eating, and the like.

A fertilized egg REQUIRES a place to attach itself to, in order to become a zygote. Once implanted said zygote could NOT continue to exist without the placenta and THAT specific womb, thus it is a 'part of' that particular woman, in which it settled. Before implantation, said fertilized egg is NOT an individual, regardless of it origin. Parasitic life is not 'individual life'. A tapeworm is NOT an 'individual', because it can not exist without a willing and able cohort/victum.

I think the term you continuely gloss over, in my argument is "specific host". A fertilized egg REQUIRES 'one' specifc place to incubate. You can't transplant a growing fetus into another womb (yet), and until this becomes possible, that fetus is NOT an 'individual', simple because they can demonstrate NO individual ability or action, that would lend credience to the title of 'individual life'.

Secondly, I don't 'approve' of abortion. I approve of protecting an individual's rights, period. A woman IS an individual, and thus I believe it is HER right to do with HER body, as she pleases. My moral principles are my own, and I am quite certain that MY stance is very much in line with them. What you suggest is that I am contradicting my own set of internal values, which is impossible. If I say I am against murder, then I turn around and kill someone, I didn't contradict my morals, I obviously never had them to begin with. "One's actions define one's morality."

Lastly, I have no need to ask someone else how they draw a distiction between a host(mother) and a parasite (fetus), BECAUSE THERE ISN'T ONE, until they can exist 'separately'.

So in summation, the basis for my entire argument is that "ability determines one's rights". A pre-externally viable fetus is NOT an individual, because it posses NO ability to perform individual life functions.

At this point I think it is obvious, that your attacks and mis-statements about me and my stance aren't going to 'help' me make more thoughtful constructive arguements, so there is really no need for you to respond. That said, I hope that my argument and the basis for it "sinks in" this time. Clearly, you are quite 'thick'.

(*I'd like to apoligise for that snide personal attack. It really isn't like me to resort to such things, then again, as I stated above- "One's actions define one's morality.", so maybe I am just as petty as the next man, when provoked.)

 

[Safe-Keeper]

Let's compare a human being to Chinese dumplings. In order to make dumplings, you need to put flour and water in a bowl, mix them together, and finally put the dough on a table and form it into dumplings. What the strong pro-lifers are essentially stating when they say life begins at conception is that the second the flour and water are thrown into the bowl, they are dumplings.

Patent nonsense. The ingredients need mixing and shaping, and you don't call them dumplings until this is done. If I throw unmixed flour and water out of a bowl, I'm not throwing away dumplings, I'm throwing away flour and water. That simple.