Besides which, we need to consider the MANNER in which these people were equating unborn children and three-month-olds.
They’re both alive, and thus, they both deserve protection. However, no sane person would treat them in exactly the same way – just as no sane person would treat a newborn child as though he were a senior citizen.
We could argue about this all day long and not get anywhere. I don’t consider the fetus a child (which is pretty much what I meant by my first comment.)
Well, I can tell you that my reasons for considering a fetus not human were dashed in this very thread. What are your reasons for seperating a fetus from a human child; ie-where do you draw the line?
Some of the Nazis didn’t consider the Jews to be human. That didn’t make their actions right. Also, various slaveowners didn’t consider blacks to be human. Should we exonerate them for that viewpoint?
We’ve already posted various medical and scientific reasons why the fetus is a child. Some people may disagree, but that doesn’t make them equally right.
Well…no :rolleyes:
Hello again. My kids were sick over the weekend, or I would have popped in sooner.
Agreed. As far as I’m concerned, rights may exist without government, but they do not exist without society. In other words, if I’m the only person in existance, I have every right imaginable (whether I can exercise those rights is another question). If there are two people in existence, the rights of both will be determined by the stronger of the two, unless I’m able to survive on my own with no help from the second individual. In a multi-person society, rights are determined by governments. But I agree with your point - if one believes that some rights are “God-given”, then we’re not even on the same plane.
Your examples make no sense. From the perspective of counterveiling rights, the fetus is parasitic until the moment of viability. Determining that moment may be difficult, but certainly saying, “No abortion after viability except to save the life or health of the mother” leave it up to the physician to determine when the line is drawn, be it at 22 weeks or 26 weeks or somewhere in between. It is at that moment that the fetus can survive on its own, and it is then that its right to life does not necessarily interfere with the mother’s right to self-determination (which, although it has as a precursor the right to life, is in my view equally important). Of course (!) there are 18 year olds who can drink responsibly and 15 year olds who can drive responsibly - just as there are 22-week-old fetuses that can survive outside the womb. “Viability” is different for different individuals, and a priori takes individual differences into account.
That may be, but if the fetus can survive outside the womb from the day of conception, and IF it can be removed from the mother with a minimum of risk and disruption to her, then I see nothing wrong with this. My pro-choice stance arises from the relationship between the fetus and the mother - between parasite and host. At the time when the fetus is no longer parasitic, its right to life becomes relatively stronger compared to the woman’s right to self-determination. As the point for viability moves earlier to the pregnancy, I would expect abortions post-viability to be regulated similar to the regulations today - no abortion other than to save the life or health of the mother (or if an anomaly incompatible with life is detected).
Again, though, JTC, until the fetus can live on its own, its right to life must, in my estimation, be subordinated to the equally important right to self-determination for a fully-formed, thinking, free-will-having human being. I think we’re going to have to agree to disagree, as it seems to me that this is the crux of the matter.
beagledave, although I read the article (seemingly ironic that she said the question of when “life” begins should be determined by embryonologists and not philopophers when she seems to be a philosopher herself), I’m not convinced. In all the OB texts I’ve studied, most OB/GYNs and physicians put the beginning of “life” at about 6 weeks - that is, at the time when the fetus develops a heartbeat. This is sometimes implied from the corrolary that absence of a heartbeat = no life (obviously this argument is not the one used to say that a < 6-week-old fetus is not alive). Check out P. Stubblefield’s newest obstetrics text on the subject, or Warren Hern’s “Abortion Practice” (sorry, though - again I have no web site for you).
Got any statistics to back that up, JTC? Abortion has resulted in more child abuse? Frankly, any correlation between the two without a show of causation seems, well, not significant. 
oh, and thanks, snickers
[QUOTE]
beagledave, although I read the article (seemingly ironic that she said the question of when “life” begins should be determined by embryonologists and not philopophers when she seems to be a philosopher herself), I’m not convinced. In all the OB texts I’ve studied, most OB/GYNs and physicians put the beginning of “life” at about 6 weeks - that is, at the time when the fetus develops a heartbeat. This is sometimes implied from the corrolary that absence of a heartbeat = no life (obviously this argument is not the one used to say that a < 6-week-old fetus is not alive). Check out P. Stubblefield’s newest obstetrics text on the subject, or Warren Hern’s “Abortion Practice” (sorry, though - again I have no web site for you).
/QUOTE]
The author of the article I referenced said that the question of when “life” begins is a biological one, while the definition of “personhood” is philosophical. Is there a specific point (or points) in the article that you find trouble with? Your rebuttal is for me to instead believe the writings of founding members, past president of the National Abortion Federation (Stubblefield and Hern).
I think if the embryology cites that I referred to were from doctors affilated with the National Right to Life Organization…you might have just a wee bit of trouble applying much credence to them… :rolleyes:
Actually, you’re right. I don’t think the rolleyes was necessarily warranted, however - Stubblefield is the editor of the book, but I don’t believe he wrote more than a chapter or two. But fair enough about the Hern cite.
From a Muslim message board (I think it’s the third letter).
From the Baptists for Life site.
From the Medscape dictionary:
Main Entry: life
Pronunciation: 'lIf
Function: noun
Inflected Form(s): plural lives /'lIvz/
1 a : the quality that distinguishes a vital and functional plant or animal from a dead body b : a state of living characterized by capacity for metabolism, growth, reaction to stimuli, and reproduction
2 a : the sequence of physical and mental experiences that make up the existence of an individual b : a specific part or aspect of the process of living <sex life> <adult life>
It seems to me that a heartbeat is the minimum (and the earliest, occurring apparently at about 4 weeks rather than 6 as I first stated) requirement for a metabolism and thus for an entity to be considered “living”.
In any event, whether life begins at conception or 4 weeks later still does nothing to change my belief that a woman’s right to self-determination outweighs a fetus’s right to develop into self-sustaining life until such time as the fetus can be self-sustaining (with or without medical intervention) outside the womb.
As to whether it is a good idea (as opposed to allowable) to outlaw abortion after viability when viability can be defined as “kept alive by various mechanical and chemical means until truly self sustaining at a cost of many tens of thousands of dollars”, that’s another discussion. But although I would disagree with that law, it would not be because someone was trying to legislate their own version of morality, with which I disagree, in an infringement of my (well, my wife’s) rights.
I guess I’m a bit confused…on the one hand you’re trying to tell me that the “heartbeat” is a significant defining event in determining “life” status…yet on the other hand, you’re telling me that this “life” status doesn’t matter diddly anyway becuase of this notion of “viability”…
"The fusion of the sperm (with 23 chromosomes) and the oocyte (with 23 chromosomes) at fertilization results in a live human being, a single-cell human zygote, with 46 chromosomes—the number of chromosomes characteristic of an individual member of the human species. Quoting Moore:
"Zygote: This cell results from the union of an oocyte and a sperm. A zygote is the beginning of a new human being (i.e., an embryo). The expression fertilized ovum refers to a secondary oocyte that is impregnated by a sperm; when fertilization is complete, the oocyte becomes a zygote."10 (Emphasis added.)
This new single-cell human being immediately produces specifically human proteins and enzymes11 (not carrot or frog enzymes and proteins), and genetically directs his/her own growth and development. (In fact, this genetic growth and development has been proven not to be directed by the mother.)12 Finally, this new human being—the single-cell human zygote—is biologically an individual, a living organism—an individual member of the human species. Quoting Larsen:
At the very least, I would call the “immediate prodcution of specifically human proteins and enzymes” a sign of the “metabolism” criterium that you alluded to in the Medscape definition.
I’ve provided cites for an embryological basis for understanding when human “life” begins. So far, you have provided a Medscape definition of life that says nothing about a heartbeat.
If your point is that viability (or brain development, sentience, or personhood or whatever) should be the determining factor for abortion…then that seems to me to be a philosophical argument. Subjective philosophical arguments are difficult (if at all possible) to debate. For example, I’ve seen at least one poster (not you) say in a different thread, that mothers of live born children are under no obligation to continue the childs’ life…if the mother is the only person around to take care of the child. There is no embryological or developmental line of reasoning to use in response to that posters statement.
Anyway, as far as “life” definitions go, I’m repeating what myself and others (see Bob Cos’ posts, for a better approach than mine) have said in other threads.
BTW sorry about the rolling eyes 
Philosophical debates are no more difficult than medical ones. It merely involves finding out why a person believes a thing.
For example, “Everyone has a right to life” is an assumption based on a set of morals based on some sort of philosophy. If, for example (as a poster has said) one doesn’t feel that anyone truly has a “right to live” then the abortion issue is clearly a matter of preference; ie-what has this person done to be given status as a human being? Clearly one finds that even a highly specialized group of cells might not make the grade (be it serial killer or fetus).
Now, on some issues I am stolidly rooted in a “Right to live without coercion” but that presupposes a wide number of initial assumptions, definition, etc etc. Most things like this deal largely with ethics, and ethics are philosophical in nature.
I would tend to lean to the side that it takes more than enzymes and chromosomes to be human, but the jury is still taking hearings from both sides.
Just because something is live tissue, even live human tissue, does not make it a person. Potential to become a person is also insufficient for me. If someone can prove to me, or show enough eveidence that I believe it is highly likely, that legalized abortion has significantly increased the incidence of child abuse, I would consider that a good reason to outlaw abortions. I would then have to reassess all the other costs and benefits. It would take a fairly thorough study to convince me. I have recently been exposed to some statistics on STD’s in Baltimore as opposed to similar cities that show strangely that Baltimore has an extremely high STD rate despite arecent aggressive educational campaign. Turns out the education went hand in hand with better tracking methods, the actual rate of the other cities, e.g. Wash DC, is probably higher than Baltimore. Now to connect this back to the thread, I suspect that tracking of child abuse has increased steadily for a while. I don’t think the abuse has increased significantly, if at all.
beagledave, no problem - I probably would have done the same if you quoted, I dunno, Frank Boehm.
That said, the issue of life = heartbeat is a sidetrack. I was making the point (well, I was trying to make the point) that even medically, there are different points at which one could say, “OK, the fetus is sufficiently a ‘person’ so as to protect its right to life.” It seems to me that there is no overriding medical reason to choose one of “life” (defined as the joining of sperm and ovum), heartbeat (about 4 weeks) or viability (about 22 weeks) over either of the others, or over any other medical milestone during the fetus’s development.
Abortion has to do with “personhood” rather than “life” - when is the fetus enough of a person that its rights may outweigh the rights of its mother? Medicine can’t answer that question. It can offer guides, however. In other words, if I accept that by a medical definition “life” begins at conception (and based on your cites I have no reason not to), I still believe that the appropriate medical milestone for determining “life with rights sufficient to outweigh the mother’s” is viability. I mean, just because the fetus has “life” doesn’t necessarily mean that its rights trump those of its mother. (And please don’t ever confuse me with that other poster you allude to. :: shudder :: )
You’re right that this is a philosophical argument, but I think when you talk about rights, even the right to life, if you’re not going to use a religious underpinning, you’re going to end up having a philosophical discussion.
Cantrip, could you do me a favor? I’m having a little difficulty understanding your position. Could you compare and contrast a fetus with a baby for me? You refer to the former as a “parasite,” but I can see the case being made that a baby could also be viewed as a parasite. I mean, even after birth, the baby is a tremendous drain on a woman’s (or family’s) financial resources. There is certainly a repression of self-determination… a mother can’t just neglect her child; that’s patently illegal. By your standard of “the fetus is a parasite, infringing on the mother’s rights, etc.,” infanticide should be legal, it seems to me. And not just infanticide… a parent should be able to kill any child that is dependent.
After all, what child is TRULY viable, i.e., can support itself? If you’re establishing viability as a standard, and not life, then you need to decide what you mean by viability. Is a premie that cannot survive without an artificial respirator “viable”? What about a baby so severely mentally retarded that interaction with the outside world is near impossible? What about the differences in “viability” between nations? A premature baby in the United States is much more likely to survive, I’d wager, than one born in Chad. [No, I don’t have stats or cites to support that claim, but it seems self-evident to me.]
I don’t mean to sound scathing, or sarcastic, or anything like that. I just don’t understand how viability is a useful standard, when it’s so dependent on any number of variables. Not that using “life” as a standard is any better… not everyone agrees with beagledave’s cites. Heartbeat, fertilization, 3rd month, birth… there is no Ultimate answer; it’s somewhat subjective. I personally tend to favor “uniqueness.” It’s not a religious belief, as I’m an atheist; I just wonder what right I have to eradicate something that will never again be seen in the Universe, especially in the name of convenience. Uniqueness is achieved when sperm meets egg, and you get a diploid cell that has never, ever been formed before, and never ever will be formed again if it’s destroyed.
Quix
Quix, I’ll do my best.
I start from the premise that the fetus is potentially, but not yet actually, a “person” in the sense that it is only potentially a separate individual from its mother. It cannot exist without her - she is literally its sine qua non. A fetus is “parasitic” (probably not the best term, btw) only in this . A newborn, by contrast, can live for an extended period of time without its mother, needing “only” food and water to survive.
Each person has rights, including the right to life and the right to self-determination. The right to life is often, but not always, a prerequisite for the others (for example, we have decided that the dead still enjoy the privilege of conversations they had with their lawyers and doctors while they were alive. Also, in Chicago, they have the right to vote.)
Rights are relative. How to determine which rights take precedence over others is a societal exercise. We have decided, for example, that property rights trump rights to travel unimpeded (I have to go around your land to get to my destination, or suffer the consequences for not doing so).
The question at hand is, “When does personhood begin?” At a minimum, it seems to me that you need an entity that can survive as a separate individual (please don’t bring up conjoined twins) before personhood can attach so that the right to that person’s life trumps the otherwise dominant right of the woman to determine what she does with her body and all its dependant parts. That is, until the fetus can survive on its own, it is a dependant part subject to the whim of the woman. Otherwise you are curtailing the woman’s right to determine what happens to her person, and what it means to her to be a person, in favor of an entity that is not a separate entity, but is in very real fact subordinate. Once the entity is viable, the calculation changes accordingly.
As to whether “viability” means with machines or without, for purposes of this discussion assume it means with. Assume further that “survival” means more than physical survival, that technology would allow a 10-week-old fetus to survive relatively unscathed (i.e., no or mild cerebral palsy, no major systemic malfunctions or malformations, etc.) At some point, that point will move back close to conception. When it does, philosophically I see nothing wrong with saying, “You may not have an abortion because the fetus can survive outside you.” I think that the woman should at that time have the option to say, “OK, if you want this fetus to survive, take it out of me and support it until it can truly live on its own”. While I don’t think this would be practical, it is logically consistent.
I’m curious, for beagledave and JTC and others who believe life begins at conception: do you agree with South Carolina’s program of arresting and prosecuting for “homicide by child abuse” pregnant women who drink or take drugs during pregnancy? See, for example, this site, which is the cert petition in Whitner. If not, why not? I am opposed to it, for the reasons stated in this thread and elsewhere. While I find Whitner’s conduct to be abhorrent, and there are other cases of this, I still think South Carolina has gone too far.
Quix, I hope that helped. If not, it may be because my position is not that well-thought-out or well-expressed. Any defects in the presentation and position are my own.
So if we leave a newborn by itself in a room with running water and filled bottles of formula…it’ll do OK? It’s not dependent on anyone?
Aaarrrrgghh. This is frustrating. I know you’re not doing it on purpose - I’m not being clear, or using the right words to describe the concepts.
The fetus cannot exist without its mother - one individual. Therefore, its right to life impinges directly on her right to self-determination.
The infant cannot exist without some adult intervention, but not necessarily that of its mother. It needs someone to feed it, etc. That someone can be anyone who is capable of performing certain simple tasks.
Whether it will be the mother is different from whether it has to be the mother.
What I’m trying (unsuccessfully, it seems) to differentiate are two kinds of dependence - intrinsic dependence (fetus) and “extrinsic” dependence (not a real phrase, I’m afraid, but trying to describe the infant or post-viability fetus). Or absolute and relative dependance. sigh I should have paid better attention in those philosophy classes.
beagledave, while I certainly can’t fault you for putting me to my proof (or at least explaining a coherent theory), I have the sense that you know what I mean.
I do think I have somewhat of an idea where your coming from (I’m really not trying to play semantical games here…I’m stuck at home in a blizzard, so too much keyboard time )
You seem to be saying that the issue is whether a being is dependent soley on ONE person (the mother)…and that a newborn is distinguished from a fetus in that “any” one could care for it. I had posed the following question to someone who seemed to have a similar position to yours…
If (unfortunately) a woman gives birth to a healthy baby in an isolated area of the world…The birth goes well (as well as one could hope for by yourself I guess). Both mom and newborn are healthy…BUT there is no one else around for the near future (I dunno, say a few weeks or so). Is the mother obligated to care for the newborn in your ethical system?
Why don’t we play with this instead…
A non-viable fetus is different in that it needs to be within the physical bounds of the woman’s body and derives food, oxygen and other things needed for life directly from the mother. In other words, food to feed a baby goes into baby’s mouth. Food feeding a fetus goes into the mother’s mouth. Because the fetus is deriving it’s nutrition etc. from the mother’s body, it is a parasite (an admittedly ugly word to use). It’s status as a parasite puts it under the purvue of the woman.
I’d like to throw in a question that I have always wondered. You are walking through a lab, and accidently spill a couple test tubes of human sperm and eggs. The two mix up on the counter and theoretically you know have a bunch of fertilized eggs dividing away (Please ignore that it really wouldn’t work this way) Now, are you morally obligated to make all of the fertilized eggs test tube babies, find surrogate mothers, and raise or put them up for adoption? Or is it okay to wipe up the spill and get on with your life?
beagledave, as I reread my last post, I realize again that I wasn’t clear.
We agree that abortion is killing. I have even been convinced that it is the taking of a “life”. What I am wrestling with is when that killing is justified - that is, when it is acceptable for the mother unilaterally to determine to end the life of the fetus.
Once more, the reason I think viability works is that prior to viability, the fetus’s right to life directly infringes on the woman’s right to self-determination. I’m not going to get into the reasoning again, although I think even sven also hit on it in the post above.
In your example, beagledave, the infant is a living person. It can exist on its own, and needs relatively minimal care (feeding, clothing) to survive. Concommitantly, the infringement on the mother’s rights are minimal - she has to be available to feed it every few hours. Other than that, she can smoke, drink, dance, sumo wrestle, whatever. In that circumstance, I think it would be wrong for the mother to neglect to care for the child, and thus she would be subject to punishment if she did neglect it.
I mis-expressed myself in the last post (and actually I’m thinking about this a lot and trying to explain it to myself as well as we go along, so bear with me ). It is not because responsibility can be distributed (as the earlier post implied) that it is wrong not to feed the baby; rather, it is because the relative importance of the right to life, once it can exist on its own, outweighs the relatively small infringement on the caregiver’s right to self-determination. Once it can survive, the baby’s right to life generally outweighs any right other than the mother’s right to life (in the case that the pregnancy post-viability threatens the mother’s life and the doctors can’t save both).
Any response to the question about South Carolina’s laws?
I appreciate the clarification. The other poster who I posed the question to in another thread, (I think it was Badtz Maru)…essentially said that he did not feel that the mother had an ethical duty to sustain the life of the newborn in the scenario I posed…
I tried the link you listed about the South Carolina case several times…with no success. I think that the general notion of what you’re asking was asked (and responded to) in previous threads
try http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=40437
and
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=38445
Not trying to cop out…just have been around this block a few times already, and quite honestly others have done a better job than me at this particular angle of the debate