Yes. Yes. No. It might be - I dont know about the mental function of new born birds. We are talking about human fetuses - that I do know about. No that would be medical science. "It is well recognized that infants have no awareness of their own state, emotions and motivations." http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=when-does-consciousness-arise
Morality comes from logic? Logic can operate in different ways for different people. So one act can seem ok to one person and not to another.
Yes, the definition of morality is the ability to recognize what is right which implies some societal agreement and not logic or 1 person's set of moral principles. Jim Jones was thought to be the arbiter of morality to his flock. They abandoned basic moral principles and, at his behest, drank kool-aid laced with cyanide. This is analogous to liberal-leftist-socialist types who decide to abandon social morays and drink the leftist kool-aid so that they can be 'free' to kill developing human life for their fun and pleasure.
Some people do not have this ability. And different cultures think different about some moral issues. And society can change. If our society say in 100 years says rape is ok ..then you would agree because society said it it would be ok? BEcause society said up until 1972 that abortion was immoral and look what happened. Our government all of a sudden said .no abortion is moral. Moral immoral, moral ... So this could happen to just about anything.
Traditionally moral definitions were seen by society as coming from God. This took the human equation of want and need out of morality and also brought folks together in a basic understanding of what is right and what is wrong. When a society loses its agreed upon moral values what is 'right' becomes relative to individual wants and desires. Laws, once based on moral principles, break down and the written word of the law is bent and twisted to mean anything that is desired. Here in the U.S. we are entering that phase as the secular humanists are going about changing the very lexicon by redefining even what has been written down to each word. We see this right here on the Forum where word meanings are misunderstood at best and words are made up at worst. Example: 'homophobe' 'zef' and the utter lack of some folks ability to discern correct meanings of words. Even the word 'homosexual' is an oxymoron. 'Sex' requires 2 people of the opposite sex. Homosexuals just play with each other.
Why does it matter where life begins? The beginning isn't important, just the outcome. And the outcome is a baby. If you remove that "lifeless" thing, then the baby that WOULD have exists ceases to exist.
But there is not god which would give us the morality. Religious moral definitions also came from people - priests, prophets, writers of the holy books and traditions. They only used the idea of god to give their moral opinions more credibility in the eyes of ordinary people. The so called "god-given" morality is as subjective as any other moral system.
If the potential is regarded as actuality, then why stop at conception? If you use contraception or even refuse sex, then the baby that WOULD have exists ceases to exist. Should we ban contraception and refusing sex?
Maybe, maybe not. Prove it. Of course it is, it's meant to be subjective but the 'subject' is an all knowing, all caring, all good, omnipotence. A very stable subject at that. An all-seeing, all-knowing vast intelligence that we are all a part of. Morality based on mercurial-like human emotions is clannish and SOOOOO 'BC' The concept of something greater than ourselves in itself has served mankind pretty well even to get folks thinking about the universe. So, I would not abandon "God-given" morality for some 'Jim Jones kool-aid pusher' telling me he has figured out the universe.
You just made an absolute statement of fact. "There is no god" .which by the way you can not prove. You believe this then by faith in things not seen not provable.
"All the people for abortion have already been born." This is the whole and total truth. It came from a great man not me. But it gives the argument and answers the question.
I did not made a statement that there is no god. I made a statement that there is no god of any human organised religion, which make many claims about such god. The philosophic idea of god is unfalsifiable and unprovable. Human religion gods on the other hand, are much more rich statements about the world that can be disproven with reasonable certainty, just like the existence of Santa Claus can be disproven, even tough you cannot disprove non-existence of similar methaphysic entity with 100% certainty. OK - assume there is a god. How do you prove which of the hundreds of human religions speaks about his morality? How do you prove he even spoke to any human person in the first place? For all we know, he may not even care about human matters, just like we do not care about insects in the ground.
"All the people against abortion have already been born!" That is the whole and total truth which came from me. Just so you know, stating the obvious doesn't make one a great person.
Ronald Reagan said that ..and he was right .everyone here who condones abortion was lucky that their mother gave them life and did not kill them.
Did you work that out all by yourself? People who haven't been born have said nothing at all about anything. It's nothing to do with luck.
What a snippy little attitude that remark brings with it. So full of internet pride and snark. Oh if I could harness that into a month's worth of general conversation, the friends I would lose and the people I would (*)(*)(*)(*) off... I guess that's one of the reasons why the internet exists eh? No real life consequences for posting with attitude on here What's your point? Luck - Dictionary.com All definitions seem to point toward a common denominator and that is good fortune, reasonable outcome, etc. (when discussing good luck ie being "lucky." Would you disagree with the statement that "current pro choice advocates have met with good fortune or a reasonable outcome seeing as they are indeed alive and were not terminated?" And if you actually agree with that statement, would it be safe then to assume that your position is that most consider life to be a good thing?
Chances are that these narcissistic pro-aborters think only THEIR life as special. To them a developing human life is expendable.
While may be true .. it has nothing to do with the debate. First off .. the statement is a fallacy as worded. It should read "lucky that their mother did not terminate the process that would result in their creation" There is no "existing person" in the early stages of pregnancy ... so "you" did not exist. Only a process that would result in "you" existing. Reagan was not a stupid fellow but not sharp enough to figure out the flaw in his logic.
My point is, Reagan's so called brilliant observation is totally meaningless. A child should be able to see that. No, I wouldn't say that at all. The luck was my mother's in not miscarrying me. You might as well say my non existent sister was unlucky not to be born.
I think it's quite droll how you remark that "a child should be able to see that" after posting a very unnecessary and childish attack against another person's post for simply clarifying something or making an observation, resulting in your response attempting to drag them down just because they're on the opposition or because you don't agree with their ideas. Being a quote, it's not meaningless, but it doesn't necessarily prove anyone's point either. It's no different from quoting any other random historical figure. Sure it might sound cool or inspiring or what not, but it does not have much affect on a debate. So are you saying that you do not perceive your life to be a good thing for you? That's a terrible analogy. False analogy logical fallacy as a matter of fact. There has never been a sister of yours to call lucky or unlucky. As by your post's own admission, your non-existent sister has never existed, therefore no attributes (good or bad) can logically be applied to her. She hasn't existed. She is nothing. It's not even really appropriate to call her "she" as it's simply never happened. It's an entirely different case with people who DO exist or have existed and grew and developed and especially those who enjoyed life. My personal opinion and guess is that those people who enjoy their time on this Earth consider themselves lucky to have been born.