# Conception and Humanity: A Modest Proposal **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [February 24, 2006, 7:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conception-and-humanity-a-modest-proposal/345967 "2006-02-24T19:53:39Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Waverly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/57b2e6/32.png) [@Waverly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Waverly)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2006, 9:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conception-and-humanity-a-modest-proposal/345967/21 "2006-02-24T21:29:45Z")
> [@Gladstone](#): > > Does that mean every miscarriage and failure of a fertilized egg to implant along the uterine lining results in the death of a “full human”? Therefore, all birth control pills and various other kinds of pills which have even the slightest risk of interfering with fertilized egg implantation would be outlawed? Welcome to the SDMB. Are you playing along, or whooshing in the wind? ---
**Author:** ![Syntropy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/65b543/32.png) [@Syntropy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Syntropy)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2006, 9:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conception-and-humanity-a-modest-proposal/345967/22 "2006-02-24T21:35:46Z")
> [@elucidator](#): > > …we should hate to think that Republican women might be reading, swoon and pitch forward, face down onto their keyboards in a shocked faint, pristine innocence forever tainted. So long as they don’t fall face first onto their husbands’ penises, their innocence is protected. ---
**Author:** ![rayh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e79b87/32.png) [@rayh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rayh)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2006, 9:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conception-and-humanity-a-modest-proposal/345967/23 "2006-02-24T21:40:55Z")
> [@Maureen](#): > > So long as they don’t fall face first onto their husbands’ penises, their innocence is protected. What were their husbands penises doing on the keyboard in the first place? ---
**Author:** ![black\_rabbit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/f19dbf/32.png) [@black\_rabbit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/black_rabbit)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2006, 9:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conception-and-humanity-a-modest-proposal/345967/24 "2006-02-24T21:45:13Z")
Brilliant. But how would we punish the onanist deviants? I propose flogging. ---
**Author:** ![Jpeg\_Jones](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/4bbf92/32.png) [@Jpeg\_Jones](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jpeg_Jones)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2006, 9:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conception-and-humanity-a-modest-proposal/345967/25 "2006-02-24T21:53:15Z")
So, it was wrong of me to be touching my cat’s butthole while reading this? ---
**Author:** ![Syntropy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/65b543/32.png) [@Syntropy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Syntropy)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2006, 10:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conception-and-humanity-a-modest-proposal/345967/26 "2006-02-24T22:02:40Z")
> [@rayh](#): > > What were their husbands penises doing on the keyboard in the first place? Hey. It is not my place to judge other people’s sexual practices. What they look at on their computers in the privacy of their own homes is their business. ---
**Author:** ![Gladstone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/90db22/32.png) [@Gladstone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gladstone)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2006, 10:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conception-and-humanity-a-modest-proposal/345967/27 "2006-02-24T22:05:17Z")
> [@Waverly](#): > > Welcome to the SDMB. > > Are you playing along, or whooshing in the wind? Completely whooshing. ---
**Author:** ![marshmallow](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/df705f/32.png) [@marshmallow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/marshmallow)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2006, 10:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conception-and-humanity-a-modest-proposal/345967/28 "2006-02-24T22:12:46Z")
Entire civilizations have perished in my waste basket. Heaven must be quite a sticky place. ---
**Author:** ![zoo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/71c47a/32.png) [@zoo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/zoo)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2006, 10:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conception-and-humanity-a-modest-proposal/345967/29 "2006-02-24T22:14:17Z")
**elucidator** , you were truly missed. Thank you for coming back. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Satchmo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/satchmo/32/4223_2.png) [@Satchmo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Satchmo)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2006, 10:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conception-and-humanity-a-modest-proposal/345967/30 "2006-02-24T22:16:06Z")
What do you mean, “ **adolescent** males”? ---
**Author:** ![The\_Hamster\_King](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/8edcca/32.png) [@The\_Hamster\_King](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Hamster_King)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2006, 10:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conception-and-humanity-a-modest-proposal/345967/31 "2006-02-24T22:26:30Z")
> [@Gladstone](#): > > Does that mean every miscarriage and failure of a fertilized egg to implant along the uterine lining results in the death of a “full human”? Therefore, all birth control pills and various other kinds of pills which have even the slightest risk of interfering with fertilized egg implantation would be outlawed? That’s not enough. In the United States alone millions of eggs “naturally” fail to implant every year. Failure to implant is actually the leading cause of premature death in America. We should immediately cut research funding into such minor killers as cancer and heart disease (which largely affect adults, after all, not innocent BABIES) and instead devote the bulk of our medical research dollars to guaranteeing that ALL fertilized eggs are carried to term. If there’s a fire in an in-vitro fertilization clinic, who do you carry to safety? The two-year-old who got separated from her mom? Or the petri dish with the five fertilized ova? ---
**Author:** ![Jackmannii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jackmannii/32/311_2.png) [@Jackmannii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackmannii)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2006, 10:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conception-and-humanity-a-modest-proposal/345967/32 "2006-02-24T22:34:24Z")
The OP is not only an abomination, but a festering, fermenting heap of swill. Glad to see you’ve still got it. ---
**Author:** ![Waverly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/57b2e6/32.png) [@Waverly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Waverly)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2006, 10:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conception-and-humanity-a-modest-proposal/345967/33 "2006-02-24T22:41:19Z")
> [@Pochacco](#): > > That’s not enough. In the United States alone millions of eggs “naturally” fail to implant every year. Failure to implant is actually the leading cause of premature death in America. We should immediately cut research funding into such minor killers as cancer and heart disease (which largely affect adults, after all, not innocent BABIES) and instead devote the bulk of our medical research dollars to guaranteeing that ALL fertilized eggs are carried to term. I’ll see your conundrum and raise you a dilemma. Fertilized eggs aren’t the only lives being lost. From the age of 12 or 13 young girls begin murdering children by allowing living eggs to die and pass out of their bodies. The only truly ethical behavior is for these girls to make a good faith effort each month to fertilize these eggs and allow as many of them to bear life as possible. ---
**Author:** ![yBeayf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/e274bd/32.png) [@yBeayf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yBeayf)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2006, 11:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conception-and-humanity-a-modest-proposal/345967/34 "2006-02-24T23:01:06Z")
> [@](#): > > From the age of 12 or 13 young girls begin murdering children by allowing living eggs to die and pass out of their bodies. Well, no. Unfertilized eggs aren’t individual humans. Allowing unfertilized eggs to pass out of the body and die is no more murder than letting epithelial cells be lost while brushing one’s teeth. ---
**Author:** ![Just1Lurk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/c0e974/32.png) [@Just1Lurk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Just1Lurk)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2006, 11:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conception-and-humanity-a-modest-proposal/345967/35 "2006-02-24T23:13:44Z")
> [@](#): > > Originally posted by **ybeafy** : > Well, no. Unfertilized eggs aren’t individual humans. Allowing unfertilized eggs to pass out of the body and die is no more murder than letting epithelial cells be lost while brushing one’s teeth. But they have the potential of \*becoming \* individual humans. > [@](#): > > Originally posted by **Pochacco** : > That’s not enough. In the United States alone millions of eggs “naturally” fail to implant every year. Failure to implant is actually the leading cause of premature death in America. That’s not the worst of it. Even when conception occurs, one sperm is used and millions wasted - millions of people denied the chance for life. The OP doesn’t go far enough. It’s the potential for life that’s important, and so we must bring toegether every egg with every sperm. Otherwise, we’re all godless murderers. ---
**Author:** ![yBeayf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/e274bd/32.png) [@yBeayf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yBeayf)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2006, 11:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conception-and-humanity-a-modest-proposal/345967/36 "2006-02-24T23:18:20Z")
> [@](#): > > But they have the potential of becoming individual humans. But they’re not, yet, while a fertilized egg _is_ an individual human. ---
**Author:** ![Just1Lurk](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/c0e974/32.png) [@Just1Lurk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Just1Lurk)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2006, 11:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conception-and-humanity-a-modest-proposal/345967/37 "2006-02-24T23:21:50Z")
But it’s just as important to protect the potential as it is an actual human, you know. ---
**Author:** ![begbert2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/begbert2/32/3357_2.png) [@begbert2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/begbert2)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2006, 11:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conception-and-humanity-a-modest-proposal/345967/38 "2006-02-24T23:25:37Z")
> [@yBeayf](#): > > Well, no. Unfertilized eggs aren’t individual humans. Allowing unfertilized eggs to pass out of the body and die is no more murder than letting epithelial cells be lost while brushing one’s teeth. Wrong, and I can _prove_ it! For if one form of preconceptive matter is not a baby, would not it then follow that the other form was similarly non-sacrosanct? But, we know that to be false, as is deftly argued in the OP. Therefore, by modus tolens, lost eggs are murdered babies. (Or at least, any pair of them is.) Truly, here lies the first step down the sticky path of onanist justification. Next they’ll be telling us that nocturnal emissions are healthy and normal, when in truth you are commiting grave sin for not putting the innocent baby-halves into their proper receptacle! ---
**Author:** ![Neidhart](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/bbe5ce/32.png) [@Neidhart](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Neidhart)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2006, 11:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conception-and-humanity-a-modest-proposal/345967/39 "2006-02-24T23:37:14Z")
> [@John Mace](#): > > Elsworth would be proud. Ellsworth Toohey? ---
**Author:** ![John\_Mace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/john_mace/32/185_2.png) [@John\_Mace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/John_Mace)\ **Post date:** [February 24, 2006, 11:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conception-and-humanity-a-modest-proposal/345967/40 "2006-02-24T23:38:37Z")
> [@Neidhart](#): > > Ellsworth Toohey? None other. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conception-and-humanity-a-modest-proposal/345967.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/conception-and-humanity-a-modest-proposal/345967.md?page=3)