Abortion

mixed_biscuits · Aug 29, 2007

swears said:
This argument is flawed because if you followed it to a logical conclusion you'd be getting into "every sperm is sacred" territory, and everybody would be having as many children as possible, because otherwise you are not allowing people to exist. Which is absurd.

If you leave a sperm on its own for a year, you won't find some gurgling babe there one morning. I'm referring to the fertilised egg and its (barring natural disaster) inevitable progression to adulthood.

swears said:
'consciousness in the womb debate'

Well, it's an interesting debate but it's ultimately undecidable, so of little use in the matter at hand. The inner life of a foetus is inaccessible to us, just as the inner world of the bat is (per Thomas Nagel).

Furthermore, 'feeling pain' must not the sole criterion of a 'valid existence,' for obvious reasons.

mixed_biscuits · Aug 29, 2007

john eden said:
However, in my experience, many women have had abortions because they believe they won't be able to love and/or care for the child. That doesn't seem like a good option for either the mother or the child.

It's all so beautifully altruistic: 'I can't care for the child, so I will kill it.' Nice.

If the 'collective' is worth its salt, it can do its best to step into the breach: for instance, through adoption.

martin · Aug 29, 2007

Can't we make these foetuses do a means test or something?

swears · Aug 29, 2007

mixed_biscuits said:
If you leave a sperm on its own for a year, you won't find some gurgling babe there one morning. I'm referring to the fertilised egg and its (barring natural disaster) inevitable progression to adulthood.

But at an early stage the embryo is little more than a tiny cluster of cells, conception isn't some magical process that suddenly makes it sacred. That embryo might develop into a human being, but a sperm might as well.

mixed_biscuits · Aug 29, 2007

swears said:
That embryo might develop into a human being, but a sperm might as well.

Only if it hooks up with an egg. It's doomed if goes it alone - I've seen many a brave sperm try and fail.

I'm 'little more' than a big cluster of cells.

The embryo *is* the human being, just as the tadpole is the frog.

john eden · Aug 29, 2007

mixed_biscuits said:
It's all so beautifully altruistic: 'I can't care for the child, so I will kill it.' Nice.

If the 'collective' is worth its salt, it can do its best to step into the breach: for instance, through adoption.

"I can't care for a child, so I will ensure I don't have one."

IdleRich · Aug 29, 2007

"But at an early stage the embryo is little more than a tiny cluster of cells, conception isn't some magical process that suddenly makes it sacred."

Well, maybe not but as it starts off as a cluster of cells that may morally be killed and finishes off as a human which may not then presumably there must be some "magical process" that makes it sacred somewhere along the line right?

john eden · Aug 29, 2007

mixed_biscuits said:
Only if it hooks up with an egg.

I thinik "the collective" should step in and ensure that all sperm have a decent chance of hooking up with an egg.

It's only fair.

swears · Aug 29, 2007

mixed_biscuits said:
Only if it hooks up with an egg. It's doomed if goes it alone - I've seen many a brave sperm try and fail.

I'm 'little more' than a big cluster of cells. The embryo *is* the human being, just as the tadpole is the frog.

I meant that a sperm may well inseminate an embryo and develop into a human being given the chance, that doesn't make it sacred.

Yes but what makes you more than a big cluster of cells? Simply the fact that you were conceived? Doesn't it also require you to develop some form of consiousness and form relationships with other humans?

mixed_biscuits · Aug 29, 2007

john eden said:
"I can't care for a child, so I will ensure I don't have one."

Yes, by not making one in the first place like family-planning n00bs.

swears · Aug 29, 2007

IdleRich said:
...there must be some "magical process" that makes it sacred somewhere along the line right?

This is the grey area the debate should focus on in scientific and ethical terms.

mixed_biscuits · Aug 29, 2007

swears said:
I meant that a sperm may well inseminate an embryo and develop into a human being given the chance, that doesn't make it sacred.

Yes but what makes you more than a big cluster of cells? Simply the fact that you were conceived? Doesn't it also require you to develop some form of consiousness and form relationships with other humans?

Once again, the consciousness question is undecidable and thus irrelevant. If you can explain how science could actually definitively convey 'what a foetus feels' then it could be brought back into the equation. I don't think it ever could (for Nagel's reasons).

'Forming relationships with humans' hmm...would you do away with the irritating little brats that are occasionally found incompetently raised by wolves?

john eden · Aug 29, 2007

mixed_biscuits said:
Yes, by not making one in the first place like family-planning n00bs.

Well we've already agreed that there should be improvements to contraception and sex education I think.

But accidents can happen in the heat of the moment, nonetheless.

mixed_biscuits · Aug 29, 2007

john eden said:
But accidents can happen in the heat of the moment, nonetheless.

True, but in this case you are not justified in walking away from the wreckage, Lee Hughes-style.

john eden · Aug 29, 2007

mixed_biscuits said:
True, but in this case you are not justified in walking away from the wreckage, Lee Hughes-style.

I don't think the process you describe is that simple.

mixed_biscuits · Aug 29, 2007

john eden said:
I don't think the process you describe is that simple.

The long and short of it is that foetus => child => man/foetus = child = man and that terminating one is finishing with all.

However many practical difficulties that might come about in attempting to provide for a human being do not justify killing it. That much is clear.

john eden · Aug 29, 2007

I meant "walking away".

Nobody I know has taken that decision lightly.

mixed_biscuits · Aug 29, 2007

john eden said:
I meant "walking away".

Nobody I know has taken that decision lightly.

Yeah, I do appreciate that.

I am effectively arguing that it should be a decision that is taken for them, which is harsh but, ultimately, fair (only given that the alternative is manifestly unfair).

john eden · Aug 29, 2007

mixed_biscuits said:
Yeah, I do appreciate that.

I am effectively arguing that it should be a decision that is taken for them, which is harsh but, ultimately, fair (only given that the alternative is manifestly unfair).

What you are proposing is that the state forces people to have babies that they don't want. Which also seems unfair.

mixed_biscuits · Aug 29, 2007

john eden said:
What you are proposing is that the state forces people to have babies that they don't want. Which also seems unfair.

Well, only in the same way that the state forces adults to not do away with other adults who they don't want. Which I find equally unfair.

Abortion

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