That is exactly what it is. You can not rationally argue that you are not terminating life, so this bullshit criteria of what life is is used, and of course, life only includes what has not been developed in the fetal stages...how convenient.Turquoise wrote:
I suppose, but I would argue that you can rationally define a cutoff point for abortion by stages of development. I suppose you could argue that might, in and of itself, be a defense mechanism against the emotional baggage, but I would also say that it could have a logical and unemotional component.Jay wrote:
Well, my argument in this thread has simply been that whether you draw the line at 25 weeks or at conception, there's no real difference. One simply helps the person doing the terminating to sleep at night and gives them a bit of justification. If I was in that situation, it wouldn't change my decision no matter where the line might be drawn. If it's going to seriously fuck up your life to have a kid, have at it.
Like you said, I'm not the one that will have to deal with the emotional baggage that goes along with it.
Most developed nations have a cutoff point somewhere during the process as a compromise between the two extreme positions.
I never said that it wasn't terminating life. I said that a zygote is very different from a newborn.lowing wrote:
That is exactly what it is. You can not rationally argue that you are not terminating life, so this bullshit criteria of what life is is used, and of course, life only includes what has not been developed in the fetal stages...how convenient.Turquoise wrote:
I suppose, but I would argue that you can rationally define a cutoff point for abortion by stages of development. I suppose you could argue that might, in and of itself, be a defense mechanism against the emotional baggage, but I would also say that it could have a logical and unemotional component.Jay wrote:
Well, my argument in this thread has simply been that whether you draw the line at 25 weeks or at conception, there's no real difference. One simply helps the person doing the terminating to sleep at night and gives them a bit of justification. If I was in that situation, it wouldn't change my decision no matter where the line might be drawn. If it's going to seriously fuck up your life to have a kid, have at it.
Like you said, I'm not the one that will have to deal with the emotional baggage that goes along with it.
Most developed nations have a cutoff point somewhere during the process as a compromise between the two extreme positions.
There are varying levels of life.
a life is a life
No, there is only stages of HUMAN LIFE. They are not varying, they are the same for us all. To terminate in any one of those stages is terminating human life.Turquoise wrote:
I never said that it wasn't terminating life. I said that a zygote is very different from a newborn.lowing wrote:
That is exactly what it is. You can not rationally argue that you are not terminating life, so this bullshit criteria of what life is is used, and of course, life only includes what has not been developed in the fetal stages...how convenient.Turquoise wrote:
I suppose, but I would argue that you can rationally define a cutoff point for abortion by stages of development. I suppose you could argue that might, in and of itself, be a defense mechanism against the emotional baggage, but I would also say that it could have a logical and unemotional component.
Most developed nations have a cutoff point somewhere during the process as a compromise between the two extreme positions.
There are varying levels of life.
Ok then. I support the ability for people to terminate life before birth. Happy now? lollowing wrote:
No, there is only stages of HUMAN LIFE. They are not varying, they are the same for us all. To terminate in any one of those stages is terminating human life.Turquoise wrote:
I never said that it wasn't terminating life. I said that a zygote is very different from a newborn.lowing wrote:
That is exactly what it is. You can not rationally argue that you are not terminating life, so this bullshit criteria of what life is is used, and of course, life only includes what has not been developed in the fetal stages...how convenient.
There are varying levels of life.
See sig pic
"Ah, you miserable creatures! You who think that you are so great! You who judge humanity to be so small! You who wish to reform everything! Why don't you reform yourselves? That task would be sufficient enough."
-Frederick Bastiat
-Frederick Bastiat
I am happy you are honest about what it is you support.Turquoise wrote:
Ok then. I support the ability for people to terminate life before birth. Happy now? lollowing wrote:
No, there is only stages of HUMAN LIFE. They are not varying, they are the same for us all. To terminate in any one of those stages is terminating human life.Turquoise wrote:
I never said that it wasn't terminating life. I said that a zygote is very different from a newborn.
There are varying levels of life.
Now if the others would do the same, the conversation as to the rationale of it can begin.
Last edited by lowing (2011-04-02 16:10:30)
Hey man, you gotta make fetus soup somehow.lowing wrote:
I am happy you are honest about what it is you support.Turquoise wrote:
Ok then. I support the ability for people to terminate life before birth. Happy now? lollowing wrote:
No, there is only stages of HUMAN LIFE. They are not varying, they are the same for us all. To terminate in any one of those stages is terminating human life.
Now if the others would do the same, the conversation as to the rationale of it can begin.
you mean human soup.Turquoise wrote:
Hey man, you gotta make fetus soup somehow.lowing wrote:
I am happy you are honest about what it is you support.Turquoise wrote:
Ok then. I support the ability for people to terminate life before birth. Happy now? lol
Now if the others would do the same, the conversation as to the rationale of it can begin.
Depending on the garlic content, yum.lowing wrote:
you mean human soup.Turquoise wrote:
Hey man, you gotta make fetus soup somehow.lowing wrote:
I am happy you are honest about what it is you support.
Now if the others would do the same, the conversation as to the rationale of it can begin.
"Ah, you miserable creatures! You who think that you are so great! You who judge humanity to be so small! You who wish to reform everything! Why don't you reform yourselves? That task would be sufficient enough."
-Frederick Bastiat
-Frederick Bastiat
That too, but babies are easier to catch.lowing wrote:
you mean human soup.Turquoise wrote:
Hey man, you gotta make fetus soup somehow.lowing wrote:
I am happy you are honest about what it is you support.
Now if the others would do the same, the conversation as to the rationale of it can begin.
How can something possible be considered "alive" before it even has a heart beat? You don't get declared dead 10 days after your heart stops beating..
probably fall off the bone easier?Turquoise wrote:
That too, but babies are easier to catch.lowing wrote:
you mean human soup.Turquoise wrote:
Hey man, you gotta make fetus soup somehow.
The meat is more tender too. Like veal and lamb.Turquoise wrote:
That too, but babies are easier to catch.lowing wrote:
you mean human soup.Turquoise wrote:
Hey man, you gotta make fetus soup somehow.
"Ah, you miserable creatures! You who think that you are so great! You who judge humanity to be so small! You who wish to reform everything! Why don't you reform yourselves? That task would be sufficient enough."
-Frederick Bastiat
-Frederick Bastiat
heart beat starts pretty quick, as for the rest,.........huh?Poseidon wrote:
How can something possible be considered "alive" before it even has a heart beat? You don't get declared dead 10 days after your heart stops beating..
Shit, I'm hungry now. See y'all in a few.lowing wrote:
probably fall off the bone easier?Turquoise wrote:
That too, but babies are easier to catch.lowing wrote:
you mean human soup.
My gripe was with people equating abortion to murder. Yes, I can agree that if parents decide to abort their child it's disposing of a "human life" in the pure biological sense, but I really cannot agree that it has the same implications as murdering, say, an adult. Defining the fetus as being exactly the same as an adult human being would be to look almost solely at biological structure. So I guess you can say that I don't fully consider it as being another human being. The question someone asked here is when does it become so?
I would say; directly at birth. From that moment on it's leading a physiologically in dependant existence. Yes, it's still dependant on other human beings but a newborn is essentially the finished product; from that point on it will go through all future development stages on its own. I also feel the 25 weeks moment is important because at that point brain activity starts, and an entirely new personality starts to get formed, which is also why the time limit on aborting is 24 weeks and no further - which I agree with.
So would you be killing off an actual human being through legal abortion? No, can't agree to that, not in the ethical sense.
Herring's idea that the development cycle should be judged entirely because the fetus will develop itself into a baby without outside interference does have merit, but I feel it's an oversimplification of the process. The fetus doesn't do this all on its own, it's the mother's body providing all that is needed for it to grow. Just because she can't consciously control her pregnancy doesn't to me mean it's 'meant to be' that way. Would outlawing interference with that process not mean we should reconsider our interference with all unconsciously controlled processes?
Furthermore, it happens in different stages - a fertilized egg doesn't have anything in common with the final product, drawing a line from that all the way to full grown human being just doesn't make sense to me. We have designated all these phases separately, we should be able to look at and judge these phases separately.
I'm really not trying to sugar coat life, those are simply the conclusions I drew when looking at it objectively.
I would say; directly at birth. From that moment on it's leading a physiologically in dependant existence. Yes, it's still dependant on other human beings but a newborn is essentially the finished product; from that point on it will go through all future development stages on its own. I also feel the 25 weeks moment is important because at that point brain activity starts, and an entirely new personality starts to get formed, which is also why the time limit on aborting is 24 weeks and no further - which I agree with.
So would you be killing off an actual human being through legal abortion? No, can't agree to that, not in the ethical sense.
Herring's idea that the development cycle should be judged entirely because the fetus will develop itself into a baby without outside interference does have merit, but I feel it's an oversimplification of the process. The fetus doesn't do this all on its own, it's the mother's body providing all that is needed for it to grow. Just because she can't consciously control her pregnancy doesn't to me mean it's 'meant to be' that way. Would outlawing interference with that process not mean we should reconsider our interference with all unconsciously controlled processes?
Furthermore, it happens in different stages - a fertilized egg doesn't have anything in common with the final product, drawing a line from that all the way to full grown human being just doesn't make sense to me. We have designated all these phases separately, we should be able to look at and judge these phases separately.
I'm really not trying to sugar coat life, those are simply the conclusions I drew when looking at it objectively.
Last edited by Shocking (2011-04-02 16:33:26)
inane little opines
already responded to that philosophy hereShocking wrote:
My gripe was with people equating abortion to murder. Yes, I can agree that if parents decide to abort their child it's disposing of a "human life" in the pure biological sense, but I really cannot agree that it has the same implications as murdering, say, an adult. Defining the fetus as being exactly the same as an adult human being would be to look almost solely at biological structure. So I guess you can say that I don't fully consider it as being another human being. The question someone asked here is when does it become so?
I would say; directly at birth. From that moment on it's leading a physiologically in dependant existence. Yes, it's still dependant on other human beings but a newborn is essentially the finished product; from that point on it will go through all future development stages on its own. I also feel the 25 weeks moment is important because at that point brain activity starts, and an entirely new personality starts to get formed, which is also why the time limit on aborting is 24 weeks and no further - which I agree with.
So would you be killing off an actual human being through legal abortion? No, can't agree to that, not in the ethical sense.
Herring's idea that the development cycle should be judged entirely because the fetus will develop itself into a baby without outside interference does have merit, but I feel it's an oversimplification of the process. The fetus doesn't do this all on its own, it's the mother's body providing all that is needed for it to grow. Just because she can't consciously control her pregnancy doesn't to me mean it's 'meant to be' that way. Would outlawing interference with that process not mean we should reconsider our interference with all unconsciously controlled processes?
Furthermore, it happens in different stages - a fertilized egg doesn't have anything in common with the final product, drawing a line from that all the way to full grown human being just doesn't make sense to me. We have designated all these phases separately, we should be able to look at and judge these phases separately.
I'm really not trying to sugar coat life, those are simply the conclusions I drew when looking at it objectively.
http://forums.bf2s.com/viewtopic.php?pi … 8#p3498798
however you choose to rationalize it, you are terminating human life
Last edited by lowing (2011-04-02 16:38:00)
Couple minutes on I gotto say my argument wasn't that great, but in your reasoning; sentience / consciousness doesn't matter for shit then?
Uzique summed it up much better than I could here;
Uzique summed it up much better than I could here;
either 'life' for you is basic cell biology or its the man sat in the electric chair, sweating and waiting to ride the lightning.
inane little opines
consciousness as a requirement for defining life was not my argument. It was Uzi's. My counter argument was that a new born has no more consciousness than a fetus. (He did not respond.)Shocking wrote:
Couple minutes on I gotto say my argument wasn't that great, but in your reasoning; sentience / consciousness doesn't matter for shit then?
Uzique summed it up much better than I could here;either 'life' for you is basic cell biology or its the man sat in the electric chair, sweating and waiting to ride the lightning.
My philosophy is very simple. No matter what stage of human life you are in, it is still human life. It is not a question IF you are terminating human life, you are. It is a question as to how you rationalize it.
Last edited by lowing (2011-04-02 16:53:00)
of course a newborn has more consciousness than a fetus. a newborn perceives the world through sight, smell, touch and hearing. it has senses and responds to stimulii. a newborn has sapience- it can begin to take in forms in the world around it, and build up a (rudimentary) infant knowledge of the world and its new reality. a foetus cannot do any of these things: all a foetus is, essentially, is a tumor... a growth inside the host/mother that sucks up nutrients for the sole purpose of multiplying and dividing. there is a huge difference in terms of 'life' (referring to consciousness as well as biology) between a foetus and a newborn child. recording 'brain activity' and electronic impulses in a foetal 'brain' is nowhere near the same as a complete individual being perceiving and comprehending the world. you cannot argue for that, at all.
libertarian benefit collector - anti-academic super-intellectual. http://mixlr.com/the-little-phrase/
A new born has no sense of being, existence, memory, or reason. Not an ounce more than any fetus. What now, we are gunna define consciousness now?Uzique wrote:
of course a newborn has more consciousness than a fetus. a newborn perceives the world through sight, smell, touch and hearing. it has senses and responds to stimulii. a newborn has sapience- it can begin to take in forms in the world around it, and build up a (rudimentary) infant knowledge of the world and its new reality. a foetus cannot do any of these things: all a foetus is, essentially, is a tumor... a growth inside the host/mother that sucks up nutrients for the sole purpose of multiplying and dividing. there is a huge difference in terms of 'life' (referring to consciousness as well as biology) between a foetus and a newborn child. recording 'brain activity' and electronic impulses in a foetal 'brain' is nowhere near the same as a complete individual being perceiving and comprehending the world. you cannot argue for that, at all.
A rat has sight smell touch hearing, it response to stimuli etc... does this mean it has consciousness?
Last edited by lowing (2011-04-02 16:57:23)
a rat has sentience. a newborn baby has sapience. big difference. memory is secondary, here. and there is nothing to say that a newborn baby does not actually memorize some of the basic external forms around itself. a 'sense of being', by that i assume you mean a sense of existence in the ontological sense... well, the lacanian mirror phase comes pretty early. there is nothing to say that a baby is a complete braindead automaton for the first 6 months: the infant brain is processing information, albeit in a very basic and largely redundant way.
libertarian benefit collector - anti-academic super-intellectual. http://mixlr.com/the-little-phrase/
His was also arguing for independant physiological existance. A baby interacts with its surroundings, unlike a <25 week old fetus, A baby is already well on its way to developing its personality. Honestly, if a man in the streets has the same ethical value as a fetus I really want to know what you feel defines us as human beings, because the end of that argument being is simply; genes, cells. Purely biological without any value attached to it.lowing wrote:
consciousness as a requirement for life was not my argument. It was Uzi's. My counter argument was that a new born has no more consciousness than a fetus. (He did not respond.)
My philosophy is very simple. No matter what stage of human life you are in, it is still human life. It is not a question IF you are terminating human life, you are. It is a question as to how you rationalize it.
inane little opines
i find it ironic that christians and anti-abortion campaigners often totally discredit the intellectual argument... isn't the consciousness the human soul?
libertarian benefit collector - anti-academic super-intellectual. http://mixlr.com/the-little-phrase/