# Medical ethicists: sure, it's ok to kill babies. "After-birth abortions". **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [March 2, 2012, 6:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medical-ethicists-sure-its-ok-to-kill-babies-after-birth-abortions/614527 "2012-03-02T06:57:48Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**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:** [March 5, 2012, 6:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medical-ethicists-sure-its-ok-to-kill-babies-after-birth-abortions/614527/81 "2012-03-05T06:30:52Z")
> [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](#): > > Perhaps you would think differently if your mother or father had been allowed to murder you while in infancy Yeah, that’d show you! ---
**Author:** ![Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/q/f04885/32.png) [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Qin_Shi_Huangdi)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2012, 6:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medical-ethicists-sure-its-ok-to-kill-babies-after-birth-abortions/614527/82 "2012-03-05T06:51:32Z")
> [@florez](#): > > Hey Qin, I thought that one of the commandments was to honor your father and mother, so how could a good christian question the decision of honored parents ? How could you not let them be “allowed” to make this decision? Would you just not honor them in this case, so then the commandment cannot work in this case? That’s bullshit. The authority of parents is not absolute nor is any other human authority-if they behave immorally they should not be obeyed or honoured. For comparison look at many Christians in the Bible disobeying the state’s orders to stop preaching. Some people delibrately read the Bible overliterally as if they had Asperger’s or something. ---
**Author:** ![florez](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/b9e5f3/32.png) [@florez](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/florez)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2012, 7:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medical-ethicists-sure-its-ok-to-kill-babies-after-birth-abortions/614527/83 "2012-03-05T07:10:23Z")
> [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](#): > > That’s bullshit. The authority of parents is not absolute nor is any other human authority-if they behave immorally they should not be obeyed or honoured. For comparison look at many Christians in the Bible disobeying the state’s orders to stop preaching. Some people delibrately read the Bible overliterally as if they had Asperger’s or something. I did not notice- thou shall not preach- as one of the commandments. So, since I can disobey the commandment “thou shall honor thy father and mother”, then why take any of the commandments seriously? Who wrote those commandments anyway? Maybe they should have added not to take them overliterally, so as not to appear to have aspergers or something. ---
**Author:** ![Stratocaster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stratocaster/32/16393_2.png) [@Stratocaster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stratocaster)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2012, 11:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medical-ethicists-sure-its-ok-to-kill-babies-after-birth-abortions/614527/84 "2012-03-05T11:21:12Z")
> [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](#): > > Because infants are independent beings. While I argue personal morality should not the business of the State, when immoral actions harm others, it is the business of the State and society and any decent human being to prevent or stop such actions. If you think banning or preventing infanticide is an example of religious fanatacism you’ve done more for religious morality than all the religious apologists around today. Perhaps you would think differently if your mother or father had been allowed to murder you while in infancy or Dr. Singer’s parents had been. Qin, to clarify, I’m pro-life. I don’t think Singer’s position can be justified, and I have no qualms about imposing my perspective on people who think like him. I am curious how certain pro-choice people could do the same and still remain consistent in their abortion beliefs. ---
**Author:** ![Stratocaster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stratocaster/32/16393_2.png) [@Stratocaster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stratocaster)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2012, 11:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medical-ethicists-sure-its-ok-to-kill-babies-after-birth-abortions/614527/85 "2012-03-05T11:23:45Z")
> [@Grumman](#): > > Because a decent person considers it a desirable goal to protect the weak from those who would unjustly persecute them. Whether or not it’s okay to murder innocent children is _not_ an area where we can agree to disagree. I agree completely. So, you and I agree then, that Singer’s beliefs can be dismissed no matter how strongly he holds them because it’s axiomatic to us that what he supports is morally wrong. It matters not that he can justify it to himself, right? Some things are just wrong, correct? ---
**Author:** ![jjimm](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba8739/32.png) [@jjimm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jjimm)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2012, 12:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medical-ethicists-sure-its-ok-to-kill-babies-after-birth-abortions/614527/86 "2012-03-05T12:08:41Z")
> [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](#): > > Some people delibrately read the Bible overliterally as if they had Asperger’s or something. :dubious: ---
**Author:** ![SticksAndString](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/3bc359/32.png) [@SticksAndString](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SticksAndString)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2012, 12:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medical-ethicists-sure-its-ok-to-kill-babies-after-birth-abortions/614527/87 "2012-03-05T12:25:57Z")
Is it wrong that I find it mildly amusing that the ads at the bottom of my page are for: 1. Baby Adoption 2. A jeweler and 3. A place for pregnant teens? ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [March 5, 2012, 1:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medical-ethicists-sure-its-ok-to-kill-babies-after-birth-abortions/614527/88 "2012-03-05T13:07:25Z")
> [@jtgain](#): > > Do we really need to form a syllogism to show why murder is evil? > > It’s one of the first laws humans enacted thousands of years ago. Many of those same people from thousands of years ago were just cool with infanticide. By exposure for being weak, deformed - or female. Or as human sacrifice. Or killing conquered people. Or stoning disobedient children. Or because they were twins… The fact that there might have been a law against it doesn’t mean a) it wasn’t done; or b) some situations (like infanticide) wasn’t considered an exception to the murder laws. And often the logic was the same - infants weren’t considered people, it was OK to kill them for the right reasons, in the right way (for the Romans and Greeks, this was exposure, because it technically wasn’t active killing, it was the will of the gods - reinforced by how many of their myths feature an exposed hero being rescued by someone/something) So you can’t point to the laws of the past as an absolute basis for the axiomatic nature of this - yes, you do have to construct that syllogism. ---
**Author:** ![Irishman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/b487fb/32.png) [@Irishman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Irishman)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2012, 9:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medical-ethicists-sure-its-ok-to-kill-babies-after-birth-abortions/614527/89 "2012-03-06T21:30:42Z")
> [@Crown\_Prince\_of\_Irony](#): > > Perhaps one can argue that it is not the job of a peer-reviewed journal to filter out content, but rather let the cream rise to the top, so to speak - but the fact is that papers get rejected by journals all the time. At the end of the day, any respectable peer-reviewed journal needs to exercise some editorial rigor in the decision to publish a paper - this reads like an amateurish piece of community-college-philosophy-class agitprop. My point had nothing to do with the right and duty of peer reviewed journals to excercise editorial rigor. Rather, I was addressing the question of if a journal of medical ethics should be devoted purely to concrete current policy applications, or if it is within the scope of this journal to address broader scoped ethical questions of a medical nature, such as the moral justification of termination of life of humans, whether that is zygotes, fetuses, newborns, toddlers, teenagers, college students, professors, retirees, nursing-home residents, cancer patients, terminal illness victims, or even psychopathic murderers. It seems to me the issue of abortion is a medical topic, one fraught with controversy, which means it is in dire need of exploration of the moral positions that people hold and which of those moral grounds are valid and which invalid. Exploring the topic through the idea of extending the rationale currently accepted by many for abortion by arguing an equivalent condition that most people find morally objectionable and reject those same arguments leads to a more thorough discussion of the distinctions, and thus a fuller examination of those moral arguments. (Crap, those are some long sentences. I think I need a rewrite!) > [@jjimm](#): > > I want to clarify why I think that they’re being disingenuous:Why did they make this choice? They could easily have said “early life infanticide”, which merely clarifies the pre-existing term that they acknowledge. Instead, they created an unnecessary neologism that not only alters the primary meaning of the cardinal word, but happens to include one of the most hot-button topics in recent political debate (in the US, anyway). Because, as they stated, the whole point is to shift the focus away from the pejorative term “infanticide” which carries a huge stigma, and in turn rely on a term that they are overtly stating as part of their proposition is morally justified to many people. They are using the morally acceptable position of “abortion” as a bridge to exemplify their point - that the basis for decisions for allowing 9th month abortions is directly applicable to newborns. If you are willing to argue for 9th month abortions, why is it suddenly off limits to do the same thing 1 day after birth? Or one hour after birth? There’s no sudden change in the condition of the “child” from one state to the other, except removal from the womb and transition to air-breathing. The infant does not magically become more aware of surroundings, more interactive or more cognizant. That is their point, and so they choose to emphasize it by the term they use. Just like abortion opponents style themselves “Pro-Life” and abortion supporters style themselves “Pro-Choice”. Each crowd has a specific argument for choosing the label they use, and the reason they choose the label they use is to emphasize their perspective. Abortion supporters do not consider themselves “Anti-Life”, any more than abortion oppenents feel “Choice” is a valid argument. > [@JoelUpchurch](#): > > I tend to lean toward the position that they are trolling. Especially the part where where they argue that killing a newborn infant may be less traumatic for the mother than putting the baby up for adoption. I didn’t read the paper, so this is hard to comment on. I find that position difficult to support. (I looked, but the linky no worky. I get “No Content” when I try.) > [@jtgain](#): > > Do we really need to construct an argument as to why murdering newborn babies is wrong? That is exactly the position that Pro Life arguers take. By their definition, there is no moral distinction between a newborn and a zygote. Do we really need to construct an argument why murdering zygotes is wrong? Sometimes looking at the cases that everyone agrees are morally wrong allows us to examine borderline cases that are in heated dispute more closely. > [@jtgain](#): > > I’m saying that we all know why murdering newborn babies is wrong and that an argument for such is unnecessary. Why? Because that’s what we’ve been taught? Is there an actual ethical justification, or is it just a case of “How can you kill a baby, you evil pig?” Are you running on emotion, or are you actually finding a justification? > [@jtgain](#): > > Sometimes I’m pretty dense at these things, but is this just a slap at the pro-choice point of view basically saying that if you believe that abortion is okay, then killing newborns must be okay, because we are just drawing a different arbitrary line? > > And once we give reasons why murdering newborns is Very Bad, then we will magically see that those same arguments apply to a fetus? It doesn’t have to be a slap on pro-choicers necessarily. It does put the question into contrast, thus allowing us to scrutinize our moral justifications more closely. Of course, the easy answer is to state that birth, while being an arbitrary line from the infant’s perspective, is nevertheless a clear line, one that occurs early enough that there is no question of the implications. Whereas if you allow “post-birth abortions”, at what point do you then draw the line? 1 day? 10 days? 1 year? Certainly before 2 years, right? Or is it morally justified up until 18 years? Suddenly you move from an arbitrary but clean, clear line to a more subjective and difficult to establish point. Not that I agree with their argument about the “value of life to the infant” that forms their justification, or that I think birth is that point that is before there are implications. > [@Grumman](#): > > Because he says it’s morally A-OK to treat infants as animals, and that it’s A-OK to have sex with animals that cannot give consent as long as you don’t hurt them. It’s a defense of pedophilia in two parts, on top of everything else. > [@Stratocaster](#): > > I don’t know about the guys who wrote this paper, but there are people like Peter Singer who really and truly believe that infants are inferior even to a pig or a chimpanzee. While I am not very familiar with Peter Singer’s arguments as a whole, from what I have seen of them this sounds like a vast distortion and slander. I don’t think his argument is that it is okay to treat infants as animals. Rather, his arguments concerning animals being more developed than infants is an argument to justify better treatment of animals. He is strongly vegetarian precisely over the morality of treatment of animals. He argues against the use of animals in medical testing, and argues for treating Great Apes like persons. Not that I necessarily agree with him, but I have a hard time seeing the man making these arguments sound anything like you describe him. > [@](#): > > Because a decent person considers it a desirable goal to protect the weak from those who would unjustly persecute them. Whether or not it’s okay to murder innocent children is _not_ an area where we can agree to disagree. As pointed out, that is exactly the argument by the Pro-Life crowd. By their definition, life begins at conception, there is no moral distinction between killing a newborn and taking a chemical that keeps a fertilized egg from implanting in the uterus. Both is murdering innocent children, and our desire to protect the weak from those who would unjustly persecute them forces us to oppose any and all forms of abortion, including the “day-after pill”. Do you agree that this is an argument where there is a lot of disagreement? > [@Qin\_Shi\_Huangdi](#): > > Because infants are independent beings. Are cows independent beings? Is it okay to eat beef? > [@Stratocaster](#): > > Qin, to clarify, I’m pro-life. I don’t think Singer’s position can be justified, and I have no qualms about imposing my perspective on people who think like him. I am curious how certain pro-choice people could do the same and still remain consistent in their abortion beliefs. I don’t know Singer’s position. While I do characterize myself as Pro-choice, I find myself in a bit of a moral dilemma because my moral justification for allowing abortion is based upon mental development. I find myself somewhat swayed for the arguments of the woman’s right to her own body up until birth, but ultimately this is not a question I’ve every really had to deal with at a personal level. My line by mental development would fall somewhere during the second trimester, with the justification of the woman’s autonomy justifying at least through potential viability. Certainly examining the question of “post-birth abortion” can’t hurt. We will either dismiss the argument as poorly founded, or we will find something about our assumptions with regards to the moral status of infants that might help us scrutinize our moral foundations regarding abortion. I find it highly unlikely that we will find a rationale that makes us change our opinion on the status of infanticide. ---
**Author:** ![UltraVires](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ecccb3/32.png) [@UltraVires](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UltraVires)\ **Post date:** [March 6, 2012, 9:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medical-ethicists-sure-its-ok-to-kill-babies-after-birth-abortions/614527/90 "2012-03-06T21:36:48Z")
> [@MrDibble](#): > > So you can’t point to the laws of the past as an absolute basis for the axiomatic nature of this - yes, you do have to construct that syllogism. Okay. Do I also need to prove that rape, thievery, battery, and trespass are wrong as well? I understand the “think outside the box” mentality, but I’m really not seeing the point of the exercise. Let’s say that I research for a few days, come back here, and say, “Damn, you are right. I really can’t distinguish between a newborn baby and a 16 week old fetus.” What next? Do we have to distinguish between a 6 month old baby and a newborn? … Then a 7 year old and a 6 year old, etc.? ---
**Author:** ![Stratocaster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stratocaster/32/16393_2.png) [@Stratocaster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stratocaster)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2012, 12:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medical-ethicists-sure-its-ok-to-kill-babies-after-birth-abortions/614527/91 "2012-03-07T00:16:51Z")
> [@Irishman](#): > > While I am not very familiar with Peter Singer’s arguments as a whole, from what I have seen of them this sounds like a vast distortion and slander. I don’t think his argument is that it is okay to treat infants as animals. Rather, his arguments concerning animals being more developed than infants is an argument to justify better treatment of animals. And excerpt from the [master himself](http://www.utilitarian.net/singer/by/1993----.htm): > [@](#): > > In Chapter 4 we saw that the fact that a being is a human being, in the sense of a member of the species Homo sapiens, is not relevant to the wrongness of killing it; it is, rather, characteristics like rationality, autonomy, and self-consciousness that make a difference. Infants lack these characteristics. Killing them, therefore, cannot be equated with killing normal human beings, or any other self-conscious beings. This conclusion is not limited to infants who, because of irreversible intellectual disabilities, will never be rational, self-conscious beings. We saw in our discussion of abortion that the potential of a fetus to become a rational, self-conscious being cannot count against killing it at a stage when it lacks these characteristics - not, that is, unless we are also prepared to count the value of rational self-conscious life as a reason against contraception and celibacy. No infant - disabled or not - has as strong a claim to life as beings capable of seeing themselves as distinct entities, existing over time. > > The difference between killing disabled and normal infants lies not in any supposed right to life that the latter has and the former lacks, but in other considerations about killing…The total view treats infants as replaceable, in much the same way as it treats non-self-conscious animals (as we saw in Chapter 5). Many will think that the replaceability argument cannot be applied to human infants. The direct killing of even the most hopelessly disabled infant is still officially regarded as murder; how then could the killing of infants with far less serious problems, like haernophilia, be accepted? Yet on further reflection, the implications of the replaceability argument do not seem quite so bizarre. ---
**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:** [March 7, 2012, 2:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medical-ethicists-sure-its-ok-to-kill-babies-after-birth-abortions/614527/92 "2012-03-07T02:02:20Z")
**Stratocaster** , I went and had a look at the cite after you linked it, and i’m honestly surprised to find that I take issue with how you’ve presented it. You present it as though it were one, continuous passage; it isn’t, and the parts that you’ve cut out with no indication that you have done so do, to my eyes, considerably change the meaning behind the words that I gleaned solely from reading your post. I don’t know if i’d go with “slander”, but at the very least cutting out such a significant portion of text without being clear about it does seem to distort. I don’t know if i’m alone in that, but i’d strongly suggest reading through the link to anyone else. ---
**Author:** ![Stratocaster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stratocaster/32/16393_2.png) [@Stratocaster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stratocaster)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2012, 11:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medical-ethicists-sure-its-ok-to-kill-babies-after-birth-abortions/614527/93 "2012-03-07T11:08:18Z")
Was not my intention. You are familiar with ellipses? I usually add a “snip” but was in a hurry posting it, but this is pretty standard punctuation. Regardless, if that somehow gave a meaning to Singer’s words out of context of the paper, I don’t see how. But I too invite anyone to read the cite and take their own heartwarming impression of Singer’s perspective on an infant’s personhood. ---
**Author:** ![Stratocaster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stratocaster/32/16393_2.png) [@Stratocaster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stratocaster)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2012, 11:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medical-ethicists-sure-its-ok-to-kill-babies-after-birth-abortions/614527/94 "2012-03-07T11:48:15Z")
And let me clarify, lest someone be misled by this exchange. Singer’s unambiguous belief is that infants lack the mental capacity to have any meaningful rights, including the right to live. They are lesser than many animals. If we afford them any protection, it is in deference to the parents’ feelings (for example), not because they have any rights. Infanticide is justifiable to him. I don’t know what is misleading about what I provided, and I don’t want the casual reader of this thread to get the impression that his position in this regard is softer, or that it was some kind of thought experiment or something. It was not. My point stands, which was made in response to the incredulity expressed in this thread that we’re even talking about this topic, since no one really believes infanticide can be justified. Yes, there are people who do. ---
**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:** [March 7, 2012, 1:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medical-ethicists-sure-its-ok-to-kill-babies-after-birth-abortions/614527/95 "2012-03-07T13:11:16Z")
> [@Stratocaster](#): > > Was not my intention. You are familiar with ellipses? I usually add a “snip” but was in a hurry posting it, but this is pretty standard punctuation. I am. There’s nothing between your two paragraphs, though - certainly nothing to indicate that there’s a pretty massive section of text missing there. But I do accept it wasn’t your intention. That’s why I was so suprised; I tend to disagree with you almost entirely on these things, but I really wouldn’t ascribe intellectual dishonesty to you at all. As to the actual differences; > [@](#): > > I don’t know what is misleading about what I provided, and I don’t want the casual reader of this thread to get the impression that his position in this regard is softer, or that it was some kind of thought experiment or something. It was not. My point stands, which was made in response to the incredulity expressed in this thread that we’re even talking about this topic, since no one really believes infanticide can be justified. Yes, there are people who do. Well, the first thing that springs to my mind is that Singer considers himself to be justifying _euthanasia_, not infanticide. Which overlap, but aren’t the same. ---
**Author:** ![Irishman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/b487fb/32.png) [@Irishman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Irishman)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2012, 4:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medical-ethicists-sure-its-ok-to-kill-babies-after-birth-abortions/614527/96 "2012-03-07T16:01:43Z")
**Stratocaster** , thank you for that link. While you have excepted from the page, I do agree it makes the point you claim. With regards to that article, while I do not fully agree with his position, I do think he makes a strong case regarding his moral position. However, I don’t see how he proposes to find the line between the states that don’t have the awareness and when children begin to have that awareness. He appears to be trying to justify termination of infants for euthanasia purposes, rather than more broad grounds. However, his justification seems to leave room for newborn infanticide for any reason - even whimsy, or change of mind, or a funny birthmark. Reading deep in that article, he seems to limit those cases on other grounds that do not base upon the cognizance of the infant. To his credit, he is trying to found a thorough moral case that addresses situations in the moral gray areas around infancy (as a subset of his greater discussion of euthanasia). The leeway for infanticide is he trying to carve out is a moral comfort zone for termination of substantially ill or deformed children (a situation that is a moral gray area that already has some support) while providing some defense against complete devaluation of infants. I’m not sure he goes far enough in that article with that defense, but he makes reference to previous chapters of the book which that article is an excerpt, and discussion of “utilitarian” theory of morality. Further reading there might make that understanding better, but I’m not inclined to dig for it now. For the purposes of the discussion in this thread, you have adequately provided an example of someone using a similar justification of the mental status of infants as grounds for the moral acceptance of infanticide in at least some cases. [**jtgain**](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=14842248&postcount=90) > [@](#): > > Okay. Do I also need to prove that rape, thievery, battery, and trespass are wrong as well? For a thorough grounding of moral theory, yes. For us to have a functioning society that treats them as wrong, no. ---
**Author:** ![MrDibble](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mrdibble/32/114_2.png) [@MrDibble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrDibble)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2012, 4:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medical-ethicists-sure-its-ok-to-kill-babies-after-birth-abortions/614527/97 "2012-03-07T16:02:21Z")
> [@jtgain](#): > > Okay. Do I also need to prove that rape, thievery, battery, and trespass are wrong as well? If the morality of rape, theft, battery or trespass were the topic of discussion, yes, you would. You can’t just wave it away as given if it’s the thing that’s actually under discussion. Yes, infanticide is wrong - but _why_ do we think this? “Because Ur-Nammu!” is not an answer, _especially_ given the fact that infanticide was frequently condoned _after_ the first laws against murder were set in clay. > [@](#): > > I understand the “think outside the box” mentality, but I’m really not seeing the point of the exercise. Personally? I like talking shit about shit. No other reason. > [@](#): > > Let’s say that I research for a few days, come back here, and say, “Damn, you are right. I really can’t distinguish between a newborn baby and a 16 week old fetus.” > > What next? Do we have to distinguish between a 6 month old baby and a newborn? > > … > > Then a 7 year old and a 6 year old, etc.? For philosophical discussions, yes, you _do_ have to examine why you draw the divisions you do. As a practical matter, no, we can draw our bright lines wherever we want, or decide _ad hoc_ if we prefer. But this thread wasn’t about legislation or even social behaviour, it was about the philosophical implications of that paper. And most philosophy’s always had little to do with real life. ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2012, 4:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medical-ethicists-sure-its-ok-to-kill-babies-after-birth-abortions/614527/98 "2012-03-07T16:37:07Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > Because it can be used to portray people who support the right to an abortion as evil baby killers, of course. And what is the moral difference between a near term fetus and a newborn baby? ---
**Author:** ![Stratocaster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stratocaster/32/16393_2.png) [@Stratocaster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stratocaster)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2012, 11:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medical-ethicists-sure-its-ok-to-kill-babies-after-birth-abortions/614527/99 "2012-03-07T23:08:42Z")
> [@Revenant\_Threshold](#): > > But I do accept it wasn’t your intention. That’s why I was so suprised; I tend to disagree with you almost entirely on these things, but I really wouldn’t ascribe intellectual dishonesty to you at all. I appreciate that. Again, was not my intention to obscure his position. > [@](#): > > As to the actual differences; Well, the first thing that springs to my mind is that Singer considers himself to be justifying _euthanasia_, not infanticide. Which overlap, but aren’t the same. Well, he has a heading “JUSTIFYING INFANTICIDE AND NON-VOLUNTARY EUTHANASIA.” I think he’s covering both, in particular the parts I excerpted. He’s certainly unambiguous that he thinks infants possess zero rights, including the right to live. ---
**Author:** ![Stratocaster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/stratocaster/32/16393_2.png) [@Stratocaster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stratocaster)\ **Post date:** [March 7, 2012, 11:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medical-ethicists-sure-its-ok-to-kill-babies-after-birth-abortions/614527/100 "2012-03-07T23:25:37Z")
> [@Irishman](#): > > **Stratocaster** , thank you for that link. While you have excepted from the page, I do agree it makes the point you claim. Thanks for acknowledging. That’s appreciated as well. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medical-ethicists-sure-its-ok-to-kill-babies-after-birth-abortions/614527.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/medical-ethicists-sure-its-ok-to-kill-babies-after-birth-abortions/614527.md?page=6)