Thread: False Abortion Presumptions

Originally Posted by diamond lil

That is a disgusting point of view.

Not more disgusting than supporting or defending the killing of newborn children.

It is far more disgusting.

You want to take away a woman's right to be a person and turn her into an incubator. A thing.

I believe there may be a good reason why doctors would kill a foetus, even during labour.

Originally Posted by diamond lil

It is far more disgusting.

You want to take away a woman's right to be a person and turn her into an incubator. A thing.

Turning woman into an incubator wont take away her personhood, which is based on the presence of mind, not external liberty.
It temporarily restricts her liberty, but for a good cause - saving another person with mind. Nothing wrong with that.
If she really did not want the child, she had a lot of time for abortion in the first 5 months of pregnancy when the fetus does not have a mind.

I believe there may be a good reason why doctors would kill a foetus, even during labour.

Yes, as I have said, if there is a good medical reason (saving life or health of the mother), then abortion should be always allowed. Its not really important whether the baby is a person or not then, since you are allowed to kill even adult persons when you do it to save yourself from health threats they pose.

Originally Posted by Blasphemer

Turning woman into an incubator wont take away her personhood, which is based on the presence of mind, not external liberty.
It temporarily restricts her liberty, but for a good cause - saving another person with mind. Nothing wrong with that.
If she really did not want the child, she had a lot of time for abortion in the first 5 months of pregnancy when the fetus does not have a mind.



Yes, as I have said, if there is a good medical reason (saving life or health of the mother), then abortion should be always allowed. Its not really important whether the baby is a person or not then, since you are allowed to kill even adult persons when you do it to save yourself from health threats they pose.

I have no idea what you mean when you talk about mind. It has absolutely nothing to do with whether a human entity is a person or not.

It never will, either, because it doesn't make sense.

Originally Posted by Blasphemer

Turning woman into an incubator wont take away her personhood, which is based on the presence of mind, not external liberty.

Problem is, what if she disagrees with you? Whose opinion about her decisions should matter more, yours or hers?

It temporarily restricts her liberty, but for a good cause - saving another person with mind. Nothing wrong with that.

Correct, nothing wrong with it. But beware of the temptation to take what looks like there's nothing wrong with it, and making it mandatory on everyone. Others may disagree with you, and you would not like THEM forcing THEIR opinions on you, would you?

If she really did not want the child, she had a lot of time for abortion in the first 5 months of pregnancy when the fetus does not have a mind.

And taking advantage of that timing would have had many advantages. One might then wonder why this opportunity was not taken, and perhaps there are reasons sufficiently compelling for those we (hopefully) allow to MAKE such decisions. After all, it's their body, not yours.

At any rate, the goal here is something socially workable. Which means the ultimate appeal isn't really to religion, or to liberty, but rather to the pragmatic goal of minimizing social conflict and potential damage. If we discover that some social policy is being roundly violated and ignored, then we have a bad policy, whatever the nominal justifications.

Yes, as I have said, if there is a good medical reason (saving life or health of the mother), then abortion should be always allowed. Its not really important whether the baby is a person or not then, since you are allowed to kill even adult persons when you do it to save yourself from health threats they pose.

We allow for these things because if we prohibited them, we would do nothing to alter what people do. Kind of like the war on drugs - despite wholesale imprisonment and exorbitantly expensive law enforcement, consumption of illegal drugs hasn't budged, remaining as common as it ever was. We have (hopefully) learned, if only by trial and many errors, that prohibiting something people will do regardless invariably makes a bad situation worse. The best social solution is to recognize this and attempt to manage the conditions so as to minimize the fallout.

The worst possible "solution" is to create a social environment where sex and contraception are discouraged, then outlaw the very results that are being facilitated. And yet, perversely, there are some "social conservatives" who think their religious faith requires them to ice up the sidewalks while making it illegal to fall down!

Originally Posted by MegadethFan

I said the term human being should be applied in the sense of the fetus being part of the species of humans. It is a being that is human, thus a human being.


Could you give a medical source for that?


I wasnt trying to tilt it.

A human fetus is no more a "human being" than a human liver is a "human being."

To say otherwise is to say a caterpillar, cocoon, and butterfly are the same and whether that is your intent or not the result is to tilt the conversation.

If you want a link I suggest you look up human and fetal physiology. Till then
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fetus

A human fetus is no more a "human being" than a human liver is a "human being."

I think this misses the point. Whether a fetus is alive or whether it's human are well-defined issues suitable to empirical test. And sure enough a fetus is both.

Whether a fetus is a PERSON is categorically different. Instead of being a matter of observation and test, this is a matter of social construction and protocol. For pragmatic reasons of social convenience, to minimize conflict and damage, we select essentially arbitrary ages and POOF at the stroke of midnight someone is eligible to drive, to vote, to drink, to be drafted, to receive medicare or Social Security, to lose a child discount or gain a senior discount, etc. There is nothing inherent in the person to establish such designated ages, except insofar as they seem to work because people agree that they are workable.

So designating a "magic age of personhood" doesn't really depend on anything biological, like conception or "quickening" or even birth. It relies on social agreement, which in turn generally relies on what minimizes conflict and damages to society at large.

What makes abortion so difficult is the intractable, even fanatical, desire on the part of those who SHOULD be disinterested and uninvolved, to force undesired consequences on others. Effective social constructs and protocols require some minimum level of tolerance for the concerns of others. Those unable to find any tolerance inside themselves thus undermine the principles any society needs in order to work well.

Originally Posted by MegadethFan

In the abortion debate, there are a number of significant assumptions made on the part of lifers and advocates of choice.

Here are some of the most fundamental flawed premises that many arguments are based on that I believe should be challenged and where possible, diffused:


1. That a fetus is not a human being.
This is an argument used by some advocates of choice, but it is a fallacy. Clearly a zygote is a human being, that is, a member of the species of homo-sapiens. This fact does not change after birth. It is true however, that in stressing the "being" or the idea of "personhood" that there is a difference. But it must be said that this is an argument of personhood - not that a fetus is not a human being. It falls on the responsibility of pro-choice people to use the term personhood rather than 'human being' to avoid confusion. The fact remains that a fetus is a human being before and after birth. But it is not a person, in the line of the idea of personhood (of a self-conscious and aware being).


2. That life begins at an arbitrary moment.
This is an argument used by some pro-choice people, and its totally nonsensical. Clearly the fetus is alive as much in the womb as after. On what grounds can it be said a human is not alive at the moment before birth?


3. Human life is untouchable.
The lifer position rests on this syllogism:
It is wrong to kill an innocent human being.
A human fetus is an innocent human being.
Therefore it is wrong to kill a human fetus.
But, why is it wrong to kill an innocent human being? This is something lifers fail to explain or rationalize.


4. Humans are all the same, with equal liberty.
This is a fallacy that sits underneath the lifer position as an underlying theme. Its the idea that all humans are equal to an entitlement that bestows a right to live. This nonsense, however. A fetus does not value its existence like a young baby and humans of older age do. This is what renders the lifer position invalid. We owe nothing to beings that dont even comprehend, let alone value, their existence, which includes a fetus.

You can add to that list

Making it illegal will reduce the number of abortions with the corollary that "All you have to do to stop abortions is make it illegal"

People who believe this seem to get upset for some reason when I point out that I live in a state where abortion is illegal and our abortion rates rival the USA

It is a simple straightforward issue

BaaaaaarrrrrPPP! No! Wrong answer!

It is anything BUT straightforward. Each case is individual with complex multiple issues impacting it. Even the issue of health of the woman is NOT straight forward

Exceptions can be made in law for life threatening conditions

Okay then Who decides? Who decides when a woman's life is under "enough threat" to allow an abortion

Women who get abortions should be punished

Ummm - yeah! So the poor woman who has been told she has terminal cancer, and the pregnancy will accelerate her death, so she has an abortion - SHE is going to face the same legal nightmare as the 14 year old runaway who is pregnant by her "stepfather"?

I could go on...........

But, why is it wrong to kill an innocent human being? This is something lifers fail to explain or rationalize.

cause it's a BABY, INNOCENT by our standards? Precious life that has the right to LIFE?

Originally Posted by Blasphemer

Late term abortion (and the whole third trimester abortion) should be banned. The only exception is saving life or health of the mother, which should be based on the decision of a doctor, NOT the mother.

No, that is not how it happens

Mostly at that stage the woman WANTS that baby so we go all out to save her and the baby. Having said that we have bloody near lost both in the past and will get to that point again in the future.

The overwhelming reason for late term abortion is this

[ame="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6hQHLJTGdTU"]Anencephaly - YouTube[/ame]

It is actually a "pro-life" site so do not feel afraid to link in but I warn you the pictures are upsetting for a lot of people

Conditions incompatible with life - and until you have studied embryology you do not really understand what the term "mother nature can be a (*)(*)(*)(*)(*)" really means