Sperm and eggs during sex are special cells that will develop into a complete human being if not precluded from doing so with contraception. Should we ban contraception? Potential is irrelevant and subjective. Only actual persons should be protected. Systems that have only potential to develop into a person in the future should not be protected as if they were an actual person.
When you say moral, we need it in detail please. Because I'm pretty sure killing a living being inside a woman is not very moral. I would like to here you're reasons as to why it is though. -Jesus is my savior-
It seems like you are failing to point out what human life is. All this "science" about cells is really making itself ridiculous. I could stab a knife through your chest and guess what? Oops I killed a few more cells then I meant to. So are we going to have court cases where they actually try to estimate the amount of cells it takes to killed a human human? EXACTLY! Its ridiculous. You must define what LIFE is. Every human being has the absolute right to three things owned completely by them and no one else. These are inalienable. It matters not what someone else does, will do, is doing they cannot rightfully take these thing away. One of these things is life. We cannot define for sure when exactly human life is present and so to be sure I say (and many others do) "at conception". Because cells and codes don't matter one bit if human life is present. Human life is different from that of an animal in the fact that we are intelligent, have morals, and I believe have a soul. These rights are important above most all things. A woman's right to her body does not override and cannot override the rights which the human in the womb has. One persons right cannot override another persons. Now one person can forfeit there rights (killing another human) but that is irrelevant as its not part of this topic.
This whole debate is subjective. The reason no side ever actually "wins" is because there are people on both sides with strong subjective opinions of what should and should not be and they will not budge, nor will they recognize other views as valid. Abortion is an issue of morality. Pro-choice advocates believe subjectively that a woman's right to choose to kill the life she created is more important than preserving the life she created. Pro-life advocates believe subjectively that a woman's choice to kill the life she created is less important than preserving the life she created. Neither of these two beliefs can be adequately supported by science, they are moral beliefs. Pro-choice advocates claim they're supporting women's rights. That's fine, but a woman's right to kill an unborn she created is entirely subjective when it boils down to morality. Just as pro-life advocates' desire to instill personal accountability and responsibility into future generations and prevent the irresponsible genocide of the unborn boils down to a different morality and is also subjective. So the whole "that's subjective" argument just doesn't really work. Not only that, but your argument discusses personhood as if it's been objectively defined by science. Newsflash: it hasn't been. Personhood is still being debated and probably will continue to be debated for a very long time. It's not something science can determine. You don't believe a developing human in the womb is a person. That's fine, but your argument incorrectly asserts as fact that your belief is correct by saying "only actual persons should be protected." It's only your belief and the belief of some others that the developing life is not a person. Some others believe that it is a person, and there is no amount of scientific evidence anywhere which will ever be able to establish the fact of the matter one way or another. So while we're discussing subjective arguments, your argument saying that "only 'actual' persons should be protected" is incredibly subjective.
Good post. That is the reason I stress some kind of belief system, such as all life is sacred, and make your decisions from there. You may take life, but it will hopefully be limited by the belief system. You will also do the least amount of damage to life.
Irrelevant, the discussion is about post-conception. Classic case of moving the goal-posts to set up a straw-man defense. Epic fail. Neither a sperm or an egg is directly related to an active, developing unique human life. Each, if left by themselves, will NEVER develop into a human being. If a sperm, for instance, could develop into a human being all by itself, the world would be a much different place. The PROCESS of conception starts the development of a human being which cannot be replicated by any other cell.
The discussion uses potential arguments. As soon as you start to use those, ANY system capable of turning into a person in the future, including sperm and eggs, becomes relevant. Cherry-picking embryos and leaving out gametes is that, cherry-picking. If you dont like it, I suggest you stop using future potential arguments ("embryo is valuable because it has a potential to turn into a human person in the future"), and focus on actuality. Embryo is not directly related to an active, developing unique human person. If left by themselves, it will NEVER develop into a human person. If needs the woman, continuos influx of nutrition, oxygen, and other external things to continue developing. Why should we dismiss the potential of sperm (egg) because it needs additional external input - egg (sperm), but not dismiss the potential of embryo, even tough it also needs many external inputs co fulfill the potential? You seem to forget that EVERY human person was once a sperm and egg. Besides, during sex, gametes left to themselves (with no contraception) WILL result in continuation of the potential, and contraception is ACTIVE termination of it. So you cannot use the omission bias argument from action/inaction that abortion is active termination of the potential of future person appearing, as opposed to just passively letting the potential develop, since contraception is also active termination of the potential of future person appearing, which would otherwise continue. Unless you also want to ban contraception.
He's probable never heard of gametes before in his life. He's frantically messaging his fellow "lifer" friends right now:
This post was perhaps the most worthless, childish, least contributing bit of drivel I've ever had the misfortune of reading. Let's stick to the discussion and each others' arguments and not make this personal, shall we?
That there in RED is a quote you are attributing to me that I never wrote in this thread. A gamete has 0 potential to turn into a human person. Try an experiment, place some male ejaculate in a glass container, observe it for 9 months. At the end of that time, will you have a fully formed human being? You want to take only part of my post and make up your own argument that leaves out conception, mitosis, etc. You are being disingenuous at best and lying at worst. The discussion was NEVER about an embryo 'left by themselves' the discussion was ALWAYS about conception, the traveling of the zygote up the fallopian tube as it changes from zygote to blastocyst, to embryo, to fetus, to human baby. It is an ongoing progression to a human being. The sperm/egg union is accomplished by PROCREATIONAL sex between 2 SEPARATE entities. Neither of which is going to create a human life on their own. Once the sperm/egg union is made (conception) a new, developing, human life is created. As I said, a sperm or an egg by itself has 0 potential to create a new human being. And you seem to forget that a human person is created ONLY by the joining of sperm and egg. An abortion cannot be done on a zygote because it is not available as yet. Only in the case of a fairly rare tubal pregnancy is a zygote turned blastocyst turned embryo removed or 'aborted.' Contraception may or may not be equal to abortion depending on the method used. In either case, that is not what I am discussing. You are again moving the goal posts and creating your own straw men. The fact remains that a zygote is a developing human life from the point of conception. The zygote will travel up the fallopian tube as it replicates cells within and is classified then as a blastocyst which attaches itself to the endometrium and then continues to develop into an embryo then fetus then human baby. Any interruption of this process by definition ends that developing human life.
LOL! Exaggeration much? You clearly haven't read anything in the conspiracy subsection... BTW: that right-wing authoritarian shaming thing doesn't work on anyone outside of right-wing politics. If you don't want to be mocked, learn some actual science, not "lifer" talking points. Or expect to be mocked again.
Try another experiment, place a zygote in a glass container, observe it for 9 months. At the end of that time, will you have a fully formed human being? Try another: place an embryo in a glass container, observe it for 9 months. At the end of that time, will you have a fully formed human being? From your example, RPA1, we must conclude embryos have 0 potential to turn into a human person. WARNING: TERMINAL ANALOGY FAILURE IMMINENT NO U
Take an infant and grasp it around its neck and squeeze tightly and hold for 5 minutes. Will that infant grow into a toddler or adolescent? We are not debating what should happen to a fetus in a petrey dish are we? An abortion is basically the same as choking the life out of an infant! You are correct. your analogy analysis encountered terminal failure.
I was discussing the potential argument with danboy9787 when you responded to me. He indeed used such argument: If you do not justify the protection of embryos with their potential to turn into persons in the future, then my arguments do not apply to you. This does not apply to gamete during sex. In such case, it has a potential to eventually turn into a person, if contraception is not used. Yes, speaking about contraception, sex is automatically assumed. You dont use contraception if there is no sex. A person would be eventually created by developing embryo, therefore preventing further development of embryos by abortion is wrong. A person would be eventually created by joining of sperm and egg, therefore preventing the joining of sperm and egg by contraception is wrong.
RPA1 apparently is, so go confront him about it. You realize the original analogy was RPA1's, right? I just demonstrated how ludicrous is was by extension.
You haven't mocked me, I was referring to a post of yours which was poorly attempting to mock someone else. And I certainly don't feel mocked or threatened by you. Quite the opposite. Your posts bolster my confidence because of how ridiculous and non-contributory they are. You burst into arguments with these little "yes man" tirades, completely agreeing with someone on your side who actually took the time to make a valid argument, while attempting to mock someone on the opposition. I haven't actually seen a clear, well thought out or supported argument in a post of yours yet, though. Surprise, surprise... Your position's presence in this thread is basically to interject every once in a while and scream "Yeah, right on, [insert pro-choice arguer's name here]! That other guy doesn't know anything." Which is nothing short of schoolyard foolishness. It's really terribly pathetic. Also, your immediate knee-jerk reaction to my defense of someone else as "right wing authoritarian shaming" is just absurd. It shows how unbelievably partisan your position is and that's unfortunate. It was neither authoritarian, nor was it really "right-wing." I was simply making an accurate assessment based on observation, which is what this "science" you speak of entails. How ironically droll.
It wasn't the defense per se; it was the heavy handed attempt at belittlement and shaming all out of proportion to the comment: It's so over the top it's in orbit. Also, didn't work.
Sure it was slightly exaggerated--slightly. I have read more worthless less contributory posts. Just not many. But then again, the post it was in response to was an exaggerated failure of an attempt to mock someone else. So I guess exaggerated mockery begets itself. Despite the exaggeration, however, the post was still indeed worthless and non-contributory, so the message still stands. I wasn't attempting to belittle you, believe me. I was simply making an observation and a suggestion--the latter of which you have clearly ignored. Now let's get back on topic, shall we? *side note in case you don't visit my profile again to leave a comment--that's not Batman, it's a picture of the vigilante Big Daddy from the movie Kick Ass.
There is no comparison to a zygote/embryo being placed in a petri dish versus in-vitro which was the discussion. Straw man argument. I would say it is YOU who have a "TERMINAL ANALOGY FAILURE" Epic failure in fact.
I am going to begin critiquing entire pages when the material from all members are generally similar and redundant. I have been guilty of the same thing when a debate turns into an nonproductive contest of wills. This abstract is for page # 23. Subject; 'Morality' Morality is subjective if one is an atheist, if one is a spiritual person morality is not subjective. Its that simple. Who is right and who is wrong is impossible to determine with any kind of accuracy because one would have to determine if God* exists. Personally I chose to believe that God exists which means that I must choose what is right and wrong in the stark terms of absolutism more than the impossibly gray area of an atheist based systems. So is abortion wrong? Is murder wrong? You betcha' in most cases, especially when used for convenience. i.e. as birth control. However, our laws and the laws of most nations provide different punishments so should abortion have different guidelines to fit the circumstances IMO. reva
No .. what is rediculous is your argument. Obviously if the human dies then the person is charged with murder .. if not then it is a lesser charge. The important comment you make is that we need to define what "human life is" Unfortunately you do not address this point. The first thing you need to do is clarify what type of "human life" you are talking about. A heart cell is "human life" I take it you mean "a living human" Killing life is what you do every day in order to survive as a human. We must define what "a living human" is. Agreed first we need to define the term "living human" all human life is not intelligent .. a single living human cell such as a heart cell or a zygote is not more intelligent than a dolphin .. or a bug for that matter. Neither has morals. The soul is an interesting question which I addressed a few posts back. These rights are are accorded to "living humans" which we have yet to define. I think you are right on the money that we need to define what constitutes a living human such that it should have the same rights as a women. I agree as you mentioned earlier that having morals, and intelligence are important traits. Memories, feelings, and so on are others.
You are still speaking of cells as "human life" it is not. The cells may be alive but as a whole they are not human. I said that we must define what "human life" is. A human life is not contained within a single heart cell. Neither is it contained in any of the cells. These cells may be alive but alone they are not human. I may be killing a portion of my self when writing this message but not all of me. My life isn't contained in a heart cell. I probably lose one of those every time my heart beats, so no this cell dieing would not end my life. While a small babies life is in those few tiny cells. The killing of those cells would end its life. I also would like to point out you agreed that no matter what someone "has done or is doing" they cannot take human life or earn the right to take human life, this would include a mothers child in the womb.
I agree that a human cell is not "a human" 100% A zygote is a cell .. and it is not a human 100% There is no small baby in the early stages of pregnancy .. there is no life of a small baby. There is no human period. There is only the potential for a small baby to be created. You were on the right track earlier .. define "a living human" ? Notice the difference in sentence structure .. " a living human" human is the noun " a human life" human is an adjective describing the type of life. Or if you wish .. state what it is that a person values about his/her own humanity. Either way you will not be able to fit a zygote into the definition and have that definition pass the giggle test.
If there had never been Roe vs Wade; we would have 50 million more democrats in this country. Somethings work themselves out.
Sorry, nothing slight about these exaggerations lol: "This post was perhaps the most worthless, childish, least contributing bit of drivel I've ever had the misfortune of reading. " If you'd just said it without the exaggeration: "This post was worthless, childish, drivel" I probably wouldn't have bothered saying anything. Over the top and out of orbit always gets attention, ya know? A lesson there for "lifer rhetoric" I think... See? We're back on topic. Didn't see that one. Still cool.
