# I think I may be changing to an anti abortion (pro life) stance **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [August 8, 2015, 5:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-think-i-may-be-changing-to-an-anti-abortion-pro-life-stance/727326 "2015-08-08T17:32:07Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 13
**Author:** ![Hiker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/3be4f8/32.png) [@Hiker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hiker)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2015, 5:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-think-i-may-be-changing-to-an-anti-abortion-pro-life-stance/727326/241 "2015-08-10T17:53:08Z")
> [@nate](#): > > So if you’re forced to give an answer for the moment “human life” begins, what is it? To me, the most logical answer is when the sperm fertilizes the egg as that is the absolute beginning, genetically speaking, of what this organism will be: a human. Those that have seriously thought about this and have chosen a later time at which the organism becomes “human” are probably just trying to justify killing it without guilt. It only takes you one sentence to go from explaining what seems logical to you to flatly accusing all those who disagree with you of dishonesty. Now that is a very self-righteous stance to take. To answer your initial question: I believe that human life begins at the moment when the fetus develops a level of consciousness that surpasses that of a braindead person. It happens at some point during pregnancy and since we do not exactly know when, I am all for erring on the side of caution. Putting the date at conception is too early, because at that point a brain does not even exist. So I obviously fit your definition of a person who is “just trying to justify killing it without guilt.” (instead of honestly trying to advocate what I believe to be right). Out of curiosity: What motives do you think I have for that? Do I simply enjoy killing? ---
**Author:** ![Terr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/839c29/32.png) [@Terr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terr)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2015, 6:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-think-i-may-be-changing-to-an-anti-abortion-pro-life-stance/727326/242 "2015-08-10T18:19:27Z")
> [@Hiker](#): > > To answer your initial question: I believe that human life begins at the moment when the fetus develops a level of consciousness that surpasses that of a braindead person. Let’s run with that. If you have a human, in the hospital, who currently has no brain activity (“braindead”), but the doctors assure you, with a high degree of certainty, that the activity will resume and in fact the patient will fully recover, in a few months’ time. Is it ok to kill the patient (since he is currently “braindead”)? ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2015, 6:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-think-i-may-be-changing-to-an-anti-abortion-pro-life-stance/727326/243 "2015-08-10T18:23:56Z")
> [@Terr](#): > > Let’s run with that. If you have a human, in the hospital, who currently has no brain activity (“braindead”), but the doctors assure you, with a high degree of certainty, that the activity will resume and in fact the patient will fully recover, in a few months’ time. Is it ok to kill the patient (since he is currently “braindead”)? This is the first reasonable question you’ve asked. And the answer is, no, it’s not okay. The human who is brain dead is nonetheless a human with a history of wants and desires, of memories and plans, of interests and fears. This is a distinct person. Absent a living will specifying the desire to be removed from life support under these conditions, it’s totally reasonable to assume that the person **prior to** the precipitating accident would have desired to continue her life. There’s a difference between a person-on-hiatus, as you described, and a person who’s never existed, as an embryo is. ---
**Author:** ![Revenant\_Threshold](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f1d935/32.png) [@Revenant\_Threshold](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revenant_Threshold)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2015, 6:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-think-i-may-be-changing-to-an-anti-abortion-pro-life-stance/727326/244 "2015-08-10T18:24:14Z")
> [@Terr](#): > > Let’s run with that. If you have a human, in the hospital, who currently has no brain activity (“braindead”), but the doctors assure you, with a high degree of certainty, that the activity will resume and in fact the patient will fully recover, in a few months’ time. Is it ok to kill the patient (since he is currently “braindead”)? Those doctors would equally assure you, but with a perfect degree of certainty, that all activity will at some point stop completely. Why are we picking one future over the other, and why are we picking the uncertain future over the certain one when we pick? ---
**Author:** ![nate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/nate/32/13085_2.png) [@nate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nate)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2015, 6:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-think-i-may-be-changing-to-an-anti-abortion-pro-life-stance/727326/245 "2015-08-10T18:30:28Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > This is nonsense based on the fallacy of the mountain. > > I drop a grain of sand on the ground. Is it a mountain? > I drop another on the ground. Is it a mountain? > I keep doing this until there’s a pile of sand 20,000 feet tall. Is it a mountain? > > After the first grain, it’s clearly not a mountain. When it’s 20,000 feet tall, it’s clearly a mountain. Agreed? > > So I want you to identify the exact moment–the exact grain of sand–that I drop that changes the pile from being simply a pile of sand into being a mountain. > > If we apply the same logic to this problem that you applied to the question of when life begins, the only acceptable answer is that it’s a mountain as soon as the first grain of sand is dropped. That’s a terrible analogy, but let’s assume one can build a mountain by pouring sand, and barring some intervention, a mountain (and everyone agrees on this term for it) will exist at the end of the process. Then you can say that yes, this little pile of sand will become a mountian eventually. A single grain of sand is not a mountain anymore than a single cell is not human. But at this end of the process you will have a mountain and that mountain started with a single grain of sand. So you could ask, when did the creation of the mountain start? And you would correctly answer “when I dropped the first grain of sand”. What’s wrong with that? ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2015, 6:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-think-i-may-be-changing-to-an-anti-abortion-pro-life-stance/727326/246 "2015-08-10T18:35:17Z")
> [@nate](#): > > So you could ask, when did the creation of the mountain start? And you would correctly answer “when I dropped the first grain of sand”. What’s wrong with that? There’s nothing wrong with saying that, of course. The problem comes when you show up with a bunch of climbing gear, ready to scale Mt. Single Grain of Sand. That first grain may be where the mountain started, but it’s still a long way away from actually being a mountain, and treating it as if it were already a mountain is clearly absurd. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2015, 6:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-think-i-may-be-changing-to-an-anti-abortion-pro-life-stance/727326/247 "2015-08-10T18:37:53Z")
> [@Hiker](#): > > Out of curiosity: What motives do you think I have for that? Do I simply enjoy killing? Are you heavily invested in stem cell research? ---
**Author:** ![Terr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/839c29/32.png) [@Terr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terr)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2015, 6:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-think-i-may-be-changing-to-an-anti-abortion-pro-life-stance/727326/248 "2015-08-10T18:38:29Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > This is the first reasonable question you’ve asked. And the answer is, no, it’s not okay. The human who is brain dead is nonetheless a human with a history of wants and desires, of memories and plans, of interests and fears. This is a distinct person. Absent a living will specifying the desire to be removed from life support under these conditions, it’s totally reasonable to assume that the person **prior to** the precipitating accident would have desired to continue her life. It is quite as reasonable to assume that if you could ask the fetus (or if you asked it later in the future) you would get the same response. > [@](#): > > There’s a difference between a person-on-hiatus, as you described, and a person who’s never existed, as an embryo is. Distinction without a difference. Both are human life. Both have potential, without specific action to terminate them, to be normal adult humans. In fact, the fetus has _more_ potential, in terms of length of life. ---
**Author:** ![Terr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/839c29/32.png) [@Terr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terr)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2015, 6:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-think-i-may-be-changing-to-an-anti-abortion-pro-life-stance/727326/249 "2015-08-10T18:40:01Z")
> [@Revenant\_Threshold](#): > > Those doctors would equally assure you, but with a perfect degree of certainty, that all activity will at some point stop completely. > > Why are we picking one future over the other, and why are we picking the uncertain future over the certain one when we pick? Because if you act because of the certainty of eventual death, you get to the conclusion that it is ok to kill anyone, any time. And that’s not the conclusion you want to reach. Well, not the conclusion that I want to reach. Don’t know about you. ---
**Author:** ![Terr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/839c29/32.png) [@Terr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terr)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2015, 6:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-think-i-may-be-changing-to-an-anti-abortion-pro-life-stance/727326/250 "2015-08-10T18:42:49Z")
> [@nate](#): > > That’s a terrible analogy, but let’s assume one can build a mountain by pouring sand, and barring some intervention, a mountain (and everyone agrees on this term for it) will exist at the end of the process. Then you can say that yes, this little pile of sand will become a mountian eventually. A single grain of sand is not a mountain anymore than a single cell is not human. But at this end of the process you will have a mountain and that mountain started with a single grain of sand. So you could ask, when did the creation of the mountain start? And you would correctly answer “when I dropped the first grain of sand”. What’s wrong with that? To enhance that mountain analogy, add to it the fact that you don’t have to take any action to build the mountain other than drop that first grain of sand. Once that is done, unless you actively intervene to stop the process, the sand will be dropped and the mountain will be built. So yes, in that case the mountain exists at the moment the first grain is dropped. ---
**Author:** ![Hiker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/3be4f8/32.png) [@Hiker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hiker)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2015, 6:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-think-i-may-be-changing-to-an-anti-abortion-pro-life-stance/727326/251 "2015-08-10T18:47:36Z")
> [@Terr](#): > > Let’s run with that. If you have a human, in the hospital, who currently has no brain activity (“braindead”), but the doctors assure you, with a high degree of certainty, that the activity will resume and in fact the patient will fully recover, in a few months’ time. Is it ok to kill the patient (since he is currently “braindead”)? I would probably try to get in touch with the real doctors. (Those who know that [brain death](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brain_death) is an irreversible condition.) I believe that a minimal level of brain activity is an essential condition of life. As such, what you are asking me is a hypothetical construct: What if life somehow could be interrupted and then resumed? In that case I would have to change my definition of what “human life” entails to include the state of “suspended life”. Its an interesting concept - can someone be killed while s(he) is temporarily not alive? Strikes me as a topic for a separate debate though. ---
**Author:** ![Terr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/839c29/32.png) [@Terr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terr)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2015, 6:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-think-i-may-be-changing-to-an-anti-abortion-pro-life-stance/727326/252 "2015-08-10T18:48:45Z")
> [@Hiker](#): > > I would probably try to get in touch with the real doctors. (Those who know that [brain death](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brain_death) is an irreversible condition.) > > I believe that a minimal level of brain activity is an essential condition of life. As such, what you are asking me is a hypothetical construct: What if life somehow could be interrupted and then resumed? In that case I would have to change my definition of what “human life” entails to include the state of “suspended life”. Its an interesting concept - can someone be killed while s(he) is temporarily not alive? Strikes me as a topic for a separate debate though. Weaseling again. ---
**Author:** ![Revenant\_Threshold](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f1d935/32.png) [@Revenant\_Threshold](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revenant_Threshold)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2015, 6:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-think-i-may-be-changing-to-an-anti-abortion-pro-life-stance/727326/253 "2015-08-10T18:52:38Z")
> [@Terr](#): > > Because if you act because of the certainty of eventual death, you get to the conclusion that it is ok to kill anyone, any time. And that’s not the conclusion you want to reach. Well, not the conclusion that I want to reach. Don’t know about you. So the applicability of the argument depends on the conclusion being the correct one? I could equally argue, “You should not kill people because people are filled with man-eating crocodiles that burst out upon death and go on the rampage”, which would get to the conclusion that killing people is generally not a good idea. Does that mean that the argument has some kind of virtue or validity? Judging the worth of an argument by how well it results in a conclusion you’ve already come to is a terrible way of evaluating an argument. ---
**Author:** ![Hiker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/3be4f8/32.png) [@Hiker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hiker)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2015, 6:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-think-i-may-be-changing-to-an-anti-abortion-pro-life-stance/727326/254 "2015-08-10T18:56:34Z")
> [@Terr](#): > > Weaseling again. Then I will make it more clear to you: That is a bullshit question. You are asking me what I would do, if something happens that cannot happen. Get back to reality and I’ll stop “weaseling”. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2015, 6:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-think-i-may-be-changing-to-an-anti-abortion-pro-life-stance/727326/255 "2015-08-10T18:57:25Z")
> [@nate](#): > > That’s a terrible analogy, but let’s assume one can build a mountain by pouring sand, and barring some intervention, a mountain (and everyone agrees on this term for it) will exist at the end of the process. Then you can say that yes, this little pile of sand will become a mountian eventually. A single grain of sand is not a mountain anymore than a single cell is not human. But at this end of the process you will have a mountain and that mountain started with a single grain of sand. So you could ask, when did the creation of the mountain start? And you would correctly answer “when I dropped the first grain of sand”. What’s wrong with that? It’s not an analogy, it’s [the paradox of the heap](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sorites_paradox#Paradox_of_the_heap). (I explain it to my third-graders as “mountain” because they understand that better, IME). Claiming that, because it ends up a mountain, it starts off as a mountain, is a fallacy. I’m not curious about when the process starts, and I think starting it at “when I dropped the first grain of sand” is incorrect anyway; the correct answer is “at the Big Bang.” I’m curious about when it’s actually a mountain (or a person). > [@Terr](#): > > It is quite as reasonable to assume that if you could ask the fetus (or if you asked it later in the future) you would get the same response. There’s literally nothing that could have been asked before. If we’re going to play that game, then we get into “every sperm is sacred” territory, where every hypothetical child that could be born by matching every hypothetical sperm to every hypothetical egg would request birth. > [@](#): > > Distinction without a difference. Both are human life. Both have potential, without specific action to terminate them, to be normal adult humans. In fact, the fetus has _more_ potential, in terms of length of life. Incorrect. Both are human life, only in the sense that my pinky’s skin cells are human life. The person is a person, a moral subject; the embryo is not. The embryo has potential to have a personality; the person has an actual personality with desires etc. The length of life remaining to either is not a matter of ethical concern. ---
**Author:** ![Terr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/839c29/32.png) [@Terr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terr)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2015, 6:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-think-i-may-be-changing-to-an-anti-abortion-pro-life-stance/727326/256 "2015-08-10T18:59:17Z")
> [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](#): > > Incorrect. Both are human life, only in the sense that my pinky’s skin cells are human life. If your pinky’s skin cells can, without any interference from you or someone else, grow into a human being, that would be pretty surprising. ---
**Author:** ![Hiker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/3be4f8/32.png) [@Hiker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hiker)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2015, 7:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-think-i-may-be-changing-to-an-anti-abortion-pro-life-stance/727326/257 "2015-08-10T19:03:51Z")
> [@Terr](#): > > If your pinky’s skin cells can, without any interference from you or someone else, grow into a human being, that would be pretty surprising. Are you saying that something that cannot grow into a human being is not human? Or is it not alive? ---
**Author:** ![Terr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/839c29/32.png) [@Terr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Terr)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2015, 7:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-think-i-may-be-changing-to-an-anti-abortion-pro-life-stance/727326/258 "2015-08-10T19:11:05Z")
> [@Hiker](#): > > Are you saying that something that cannot grow into a human being is not human? Or is it not alive? It is not “a human”, no. It is “human” as an adjective. But it is not “human” as a noun. And it is not a “human life”. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2015, 7:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-think-i-may-be-changing-to-an-anti-abortion-pro-life-stance/727326/259 "2015-08-10T19:11:26Z")
> [@Terr](#): > > If your pinky’s skin cells can, without any interference from you or someone else, grow into a human being, that would be pretty surprising. If an embryo can do the same thing, I’ll say more power to it. If it’s embedded in a woman’s belly relying on her body’s complete support, changing her hormonal levels and causing nausea and sleeplessness and so on, it has nothing to do with your question. But this issue of “interference” is irrelevant anyway. Neither my pinky’s skin cells nor an embryo is a moral subject, so what it might turn into eventually is a non-issue. ---
**Author:** ![Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/left_hand_of_dorkness/32/7156_2.png) [@Left\_Hand\_of\_Dorkness](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Left_Hand_of_Dorkness)\ **Post date:** [August 10, 2015, 7:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-think-i-may-be-changing-to-an-anti-abortion-pro-life-stance/727326/260 "2015-08-10T19:13:49Z")
You like your hypotheticals, don’t you, **Terr**? I’ve just built a cloning robot/lab suite. My robot chases people down, chops off their pinkies, takes them back to the lab and grows a new person from them for my clone army. It’s fully automated; now that I’ve hit the “on” switch, the only thing that can stop a new clone from being grown from your pinky is your doing somethign to interfere, like fighting back maybe. You see my robot coming. I assume you stand there passively, let it harvest your pinkies? (The harvesting is painful, I should mention). Because if you interfere, that’s apparently murder. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-think-i-may-be-changing-to-an-anti-abortion-pro-life-stance/727326.md?page=12) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-think-i-may-be-changing-to-an-anti-abortion-pro-life-stance/727326.md?page=14)