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Originally posted by DJ Shibby Men really have no place deciding these sorts of things, unless you're in a relationship with someone looking at it as an option. It's amusing how America has a tendency to make non-issues of issues, and issues of non-issues. Besides, last I checked, every time a male ejaculates, millions of potential "life" cells are left to compete and die. Only one survives. What's the deal when religious nutheads are trying to use science as their defense for their bullshittery non-issues?

Where has religion ever entered my argument? Are you saying that if I believe something even remotely analogous to that of an established religion I'm using religion to defend my position? Most religions are against rape and murder, so I guess if I'm against rape and murder I must be a religious nuthead. Further, if we aren't supposed to use religion to defend our arguments, which I agree with to a certain extent, and we're not allowed to use science either, exactly what are we supposed to use?

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Originally posted by DJ Shibby Men really have no place deciding these sorts of things, unless you're in a relationship with someone looking at it as an option. It's amusing how America has a tendency to make non-issues of issues, and issues of non-issues. Besides, last I checked, every time a male ejaculates, millions of potential "life" cells are left to compete and die. Only one survives. What's the deal when religious nutheads are trying to use science as their defense for their bullshittery non-issues?

You should read this http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Ship_of_Fools

___________________
http://www.myspace.com/topix101

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Originally posted by NeoPhono I'll say it yet again, I'm discussing certain pro-choice arguments, which in this case is the idea that abortion is simply the "woman having control over her own body." The genetic uniqueness has a role because abortion is not simply a woman altering her own body, but also that of another entirely unique human. I completely agree once a life has begun, whatever process that brought it there is completely irrelevant to whether its death is morally acceptable. One more time; uniqueness does have importance, because it makes the pro-choice argument I just stated completely inaccurate.

Are you suggesting that if the fetus were genetically identical to the woman, then it would be part of her body? I don't see the relevance there, either. Even if a woman somehow conceived a 'clone' of herself, it wouldn't make it part of her body, would it?

Moreover, a "woman having control over her own body" would include a woman being able to determine whether or not things that are not part of her body may remain inside her body, would it not? So unless you disagree that a woman should have control over her own body in the first place, in which case, your "genetic uniqueness" argument is even less relevant, then you must agree that she ought not to be forced to keep a fetus in her body against her will.

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I've further refined my definition of "capacity" with terms like "natural," "spontaneous," "intrinsic," because my initial statement was obviously too succinct and to prone to be torn apart. I have no problem with people dissecting what I've said, but I'm simply better defining my position, not appending any more requirements than I initially felt was appropriate. If you must, simply replace "capacity" with "intrinsic ability." That's probably more accurate anyway.

Very well; that certainly does solve the apparent problem.

It's really not relevant to the discussion anyway, since we both agree that the thing being aborted is, in fact, human, but, purely out of curiosity, suppose that someone did not consider either of two things being killed to be human. Further suppose that they agreed that one of them had the intrinsic ability to become a human, and the other, while it was capable of becoming a human, required considerable scientific intervention in order to do so.

On what basis would you suggest to them that they should consider the killing of the former wrong, and be unconcerned with the killing of the latter?

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Without fertilization an egg and sperm do not have the ability to become a new human on their own and without lots of test tubes and money, somatic cells also lack that ability. I don't get upset with the death of either.

Most of that explanation was unnecessary given your prior adjustment of your verbiage, but I must take issue with this particular statement because it implies that a fetus has the ability to become a new human "on its own." A fetus' ability to become a new human is entirely dependent on the woman carrying it, at least for the majority of pregnancy. If that woman were to die, for instance, the fetus would not develop into a new human "on its own."

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It's still wrong, but it's also wrong to remove someone's right at no fault of their own. I'm not fan of abortion, regardless of the circumstance, but I'm also no fan of unjustly revoking someone of their personal rights and freedoms.

If the fetus is a person and has a right to life, then you are revoking someone of their personal rights and freedoms either way -- why, in this case and only this case, should it be the fetus? Do you believe the right to life is less important than the woman's rights which would be removed if she were forced to carry the child to term?

Why should the fetus of an involuntary conception be condemned to death while the fetus of a conception that resulted from a voluntary act be protected above and beyond the rights of the woman carrying it?

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What exactly is your definition of "natural?" I'm getting the feeling that you're going down the line that anything humans develop "by their biological nature" is natural? Pesticides, antibiotics, tattoos, plastic surgery, doping in sports are all natural because they're things we've developed and decided to do occasionally? Is there anything that is not natural then? I'm not looking for super-natural forces, simply external ones. And I do consider surgical abortions or those caused by chemical means to be by external forces. If you remove the surgeon or the drugs, the abortion does not occur "naturally."

Anything which follows from nature is, in my view, natural. If not, then what distinguishes the natural from that which is not natural? How does that which is not natural follow only from that which is natural?

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We are constantly trying to reduce miscarriages. In most cases miscarriages occur due to genetic defects that make the developing fetus non-viable. If we can cure these, we should. Just like we should be looking for a cure for cystic fibrosis, muscular dystrophy, inborn errors of metabolism...the list goes on and on. However, in all these cases of death by genetic error, there was no conscious decision by another individual to kill that person. Death through abortion is a preventable death; death through spontaneous abortion is not.

It may be preventable if sufficient research were devoted to it -- but I doubt you would claim that the amount of research devoted to preventing spontaneous abortion is commensurate to the proportion of human fatalities it causes. Given the apparent disparity, that billions die while we devote our energy to solving problems that affect fewer than 1% as many human beings, don't you object? If you believe all human lives have equal value, then it seems to me that you would have to agree that our research efforts are, at the very least, misplaced.

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Classy. Is that your opinion?

I prefer to call it a "reasoned judgment."

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Well, that's quite troubling in my opinion. We're now at the point where you're stating it's only wrong to kill a human if they're deemed a "person," and that definition is based only on the beliefs of other "persons."

Are you suggesting that it would be less troubling if we were at the point where you're stating that it's ok to kill a human if someone deems there to be a "valid reason" based only on the belief of another human?

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So if someone doesn't fit your definition of "person," there's no harm in killing them or revoking their rights. Premature infants, those in comas, with severe mental or physical retardation may not meet someone's definition of "person" and therefore no longer have what in the past we called "human rights." Is that what you believe?

I must refer you back to my own words:

"There may be other reasons why it would be wrong to kill a human, including one who is not a person, but they would have to be justified by more than an appeal to an inherent 'wrongness' in killing human beings."

I do not propose that "personhood" is the be-all, end-all measure of what human beings are okay to kill and what human beings are not. I do propose that it limits what human beings may be afforded rights.

Given that those fetuses which have not reached personhood have neither presently or in the past had meaningful interactions with other human beings in society, have never possesed desires, dreams, ambitions, et cetera, are of little utilitarian value to society (under present circumstances, at least), and so on, I fail to see any justification for prohibiting their killing that outweighs the limitation that such a prohibition would definitively place upon the rights of the women required to carry them.

In the case of a premature infant, for example, there is no conflict created by protecting the infant's life -- no one's rights may be impinged upon in order for that infant to live. Consequently, a prohibition against anyone killing that infant requires considerably less justification.

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Contemptible? I've stated that I believe all humans have the right to life. You're stating that only humans deemed worthy of the title "person" have the right to live.

Yes, it is absolutely contemptible as far as I can see. The notion that the life of a zygote, incapable of the most basic precursors of human thought, deserves the same protection as do the lives of my friends and family is a grave insult to those people and it is one that I positively have nothing but the most extreme contempt for.

How can one even operate sensibly under such a premise? If the lives of embryos and actual people are of equal value, all manner of implausible things follow. For example, if we extrapolate upon the birth rate and spontaneous abortion rate, then, by a conservative estimate, over 200 million "humans" are spontaneously aborted each year. If two-thirds of the population of the U.S. died of some widespread plague in a single year, then it might be as many "people." Would you seriously suggest that I consider those 200 million deaths to be of no greater significance than a year's worth of spontaneous abortions which effectively no one cares one whit about?

I can't even begin to understand where you're coming from; the premises which are apparently fundamental to your opinion appear so unconscionable to me that to see someone who reasons from them preach morality is one of the most outrageously ludicrous things I have ever observed in my entire life, and that is saying something. And in spite of all that, I still believe that your life deserves a level of protection that an embryo simply does not -- a dignity that you apparently refuse to even extend to those people closest to you.

I really, truly hope that I am right in my belief that the beliefs that underlie your opinion in this matter are not beliefs that you actually hold, but merely post hoc rationalizations for a position decided upon intuitively which take the form of canned arguments with premises never meant to be considered in a context outside of the issue for which they were adopted. If that's not the case -- scratch that. It is the case. It has to be.

good points