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Hmm...
Well, I think you can't completely rule out abortion. For one, if the parent or woman specifically doesn't want to have a baby, how can you even expect them to raise a child properly? But I would argue that before abortion is done/pursued, a psych eval would be in order to ensure that the woman has at least thought it through properly.
You would argue that she can opt to put the baby up for adoption in the case above but again who are we to decide whether she carry the FETUS to term and goes through childbirth (normal or c-section plus the recovery). Again you can not simply force a no-choice.
Lastly, Isn't it a baby once it comes out and breathes air in but only a fetus when it doesn't survive or is still in the womb? A fetus isn't a person yet for me.
I am for establishing a line as to when abortion can be pursued. I mean seriously, if the woman doesn't know she's pregnant at 5 months, then it is on the woman. Plus, there are cases where there is risk where the child or mother will not survive childbirth should the parents pursue it. So you also have to consider them in the equation.
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On June 16 2013 09:51 Luepert wrote:
There is nothing inherently different about fetuses conceived in incest and rape. There should be no special laws that apply to only them. Anything that applies to them should also be applied to all fetuses.
holy shit - someone who is on topic, intelligent AND concise. god bless you.
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On June 16 2013 13:22 MadProbe wrote:Show nested quote +On June 16 2013 09:51 Luepert wrote:
There is nothing inherently different about fetuses conceived in incest and rape. There should be no special laws that apply to only them. Anything that applies to them should also be applied to all fetuses. holy shit - someone who is on topic, intelligent AND concise. god bless you.
Except they're also wrong. They ignore that the mother also has rights. In the situation of rape, the mother never consented to bear the intense stress of having a child. Why are we forcing that mother to put up with that when there's not even any guarantee that baby will have a good life, knowing that he or she was forced upon his or her mother? Why don't either of you care about the person who will be bearing that child in the slightest? Is the fully formed mother less human than the barely formed embryo?
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After 20 weeks...what happen before the 20 weeks? How on earth did the incestive birth and rape not justified the abortion before hand? The two condition are appalling but I serious question why it took the woman THAT long to decide an abortion.
The only justifiable abortion post 20 weeks IMO are those that the child carry SEVERE health condition that l will place heavy influence the child development and future life. If the woman does not wish to raise the child, there is always adoption.
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On June 16 2013 13:28 Acritter wrote:Show nested quote +On June 16 2013 13:22 MadProbe wrote:On June 16 2013 09:51 Luepert wrote:
There is nothing inherently different about fetuses conceived in incest and rape. There should be no special laws that apply to only them. Anything that applies to them should also be applied to all fetuses. holy shit - someone who is on topic, intelligent AND concise. god bless you. Except they're also wrong. They ignore that the mother also has rights. In the situation of rape, the mother never consented to bear the intense stress of having a child. Why are we forcing that mother to put up with that when there's not even any guarantee that baby will have a good life, knowing that he or she was forced upon his or her mother? Why don't either of you care about the person who will be bearing that child in the slightest? Is the fully formed mother less human than the barely formed embryo?
I was going to reply to his post and bring up these points, but you put it much better than I would have. Thanks.
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Northern Ireland25875 Posts
As somebody who is pro-choice, I can understand the other side of the coin on this issue. If all life is sacrosanct within your belief system, and that belief system purports that foetuses are within that remit, you're kind of duty bound to apply that across the board.
I'm not in agreement with the central premise regarding foetal life, but if that's your central premise then it's inconsistent application to not apply that even in the unfortunate cases of rape and incest.
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I don't see the problem with abortion =P. Sure if we make abortion a social norm then it might get a little sketchy when sexually active women just pull out fetuses like a monthly period. But I don't think the right way to avoid that situation is through over exaggerating the value of life . Hundreds of millions of people are starving while we have more than enough food to support the world population. Along with countless other people dying for the invisible man in the sky. The LEAST of our worries should be killing a fetus. It's like a fat ugly chick spending hours debating her nail color.
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On June 16 2013 12:52 danl9rm wrote:
There's a saying I think pertinent: two wrongs don't make a right.
No one has the right to kill a baby by any determination of future well-being, in the case of incest. And, the mother's trauma, intensely horrible as it may have been, or may be in the future, cannot possibly justify the murdering of another innocent.
No, in both cases.
So the mother should be forced to endure more trauma because of her previous trauma. A lot of people seem to forget that pregnancy and childbirth is not exactly a walk in the park. How about instead, they implant all pro-lifers with an artificial womb and just transplant the babies into you. That way the rape victim doesn't suffer more and you can protect the fetus for which you proclaim such unfaltering faithfulness. When the fetus matures into a human baby, you can birth it through the vagina they'll replace your penis with. Hey I think I came up with a great idea.
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On June 16 2013 12:47 Taguchi wrote:Show nested quote +On June 16 2013 12:30 Millitron wrote:On June 16 2013 12:14 Djzapz wrote:On June 16 2013 12:09 Millitron wrote:On June 16 2013 12:08 Djzapz wrote:On June 16 2013 12:00 Millitron wrote:On June 16 2013 11:47 Ghostcom wrote:On June 16 2013 11:37 Millitron wrote:On June 16 2013 11:04 RCMDVA wrote:On June 16 2013 10:41 Millitron wrote:
The whole "Abortion is OK before this time, but not after" thing is complete nonsense. Say the limit is 30 days. A fetus at day 29 is practically identical to one at day 31. The same is true no matter when you set the deadline. Setting deadlines like this is complete arbitrary nonsense. You either have to allow abortion at any time, or forbid it at any time, or you're being irrational.
I personally don't care which wins in the end, just as long as one of them does. There isn't much I hate more than internal inconsistency.
[quote]
Well that's why you don't talk about it. You all mostly agree, there isn't much to talk about.
We in the US though, can't agree on anything. In reality, it isn't that arbitrary. Around 20 weeks is when the lungs are developed enough that a fetus has a shot at breathing air with the help of a respirator/incubator. That's the reason for it...and the reason why the SC has "viability" as the line in the sand so to speak between abortion or no abortion. Roe v Wade and the Planned Parenthood decision. Can't breathe air = not viable fetus. It will die if it leaves the womb. Chance at breathing air = viable fetus. ** With the help of mechanical assistance And that reason is also why in the last 40 years there hasn't been that much more advance in that window of 20 weeks. We can't duplicate how a fetus breathes in the womb. The kicker will be when technology advances to the point where you can keep a fetus alive in a liquid environment and it can absorb oxygen through the placenta...or you can splice an umbilical cord to some kind of device that replicates the placenta/uterine wall connection. But you don't actually know a fetus is capable of breathing air at any particular point around then. A fetus at 19 weeks and 6 days is practically identical to one at 20 weeks and 1 day. Why should one be treated any different than the other? In the real world your argument is completely null and void. It would have some merit if time of conception was known without an approximately 10 days margin of error. However it is not. Thus we have to put in a threshold where we are certain there are no (or at least extremely low) survival chance for the fetus (fetal viability does not cross the 50% threshold before week 25/26 and at week 20 it is 0). Whether or not an abortion can take place is not literally based on days. It's still arbitrary because one must still set a line, to one side of which abortion is fine, to the other it is not. The only difference is this time the line is based on viability, which is just as arbitrary as simply setting a date. Say the odds required are 80%, a fetus with 81% odds isn't much different than one with 79% odds. I don't understand why we're trying to pretend like this won't be decided arbitrarily. Any attempts to do this objectively will fail horribly because biologists will find a bunch of different "phases" to a fetus's formation, all of which are actually ballpark estimations... Even if we accept their ballparks estimation, for instance, fetus becomes "viable" on average on day X, then the debate will whip right back to the "morality" front because using viability as a basis is arbitrary too. Don't fool yourselves, this is a moral debate. Well, I can think of at least two options that aren't arbitrary. Either abortion is always OK, or its never OK are both not arbitrary. It hardly gets more arbitrary than a binary answer with no explanation actually. Especially when you're suggesting that context is irrelevant. As far as I can tell, you've somehow decided for the rest of us that the stage of development of the fetus is not worthy of considering. I just don't know what to say to that :o Sorry for not including context, I assumed I had been clear enough, my mistake. I would defend abortion right up until birth based on claims of personhood, and on potentiality. I would defend preventing all abortion by the classic "personhood occurs at conception". The fetus receives its genetic material then, and is biologically neither the mother nor father from that moment on. I don't really care which you pick, because both are internally consistent. Being the Kantian I am, I don't care for A Posteriori reasoning as far as moral issues are concerned. Really, really don't understand why 'personhood' is defined as either 'at birth' or 'at conception'. A child whose mother dies before actual birth and then survives because of great science isn't getting the 'personhood' tag out of you? Was Kant the guy that invented trolling or something? (not actually asking who Kant is mr Kantian) As a hint, to avoid the situation where a nonperson would be born we have this thing called 'viability of the fetus!!' and the rest goes as Ghostcom and others already said.
The actual birth still occurs when the doctors remove the fetus from the womb. It's just a C-section, basically.
On June 16 2013 13:06 Poffel wrote:Show nested quote +On June 16 2013 12:30 Millitron wrote:On June 16 2013 12:14 Djzapz wrote:On June 16 2013 12:09 Millitron wrote:On June 16 2013 12:08 Djzapz wrote:On June 16 2013 12:00 Millitron wrote:On June 16 2013 11:47 Ghostcom wrote:On June 16 2013 11:37 Millitron wrote:On June 16 2013 11:04 RCMDVA wrote:On June 16 2013 10:41 Millitron wrote:
The whole "Abortion is OK before this time, but not after" thing is complete nonsense. Say the limit is 30 days. A fetus at day 29 is practically identical to one at day 31. The same is true no matter when you set the deadline. Setting deadlines like this is complete arbitrary nonsense. You either have to allow abortion at any time, or forbid it at any time, or you're being irrational.
I personally don't care which wins in the end, just as long as one of them does. There isn't much I hate more than internal inconsistency.
[quote]
Well that's why you don't talk about it. You all mostly agree, there isn't much to talk about.
We in the US though, can't agree on anything. In reality, it isn't that arbitrary. Around 20 weeks is when the lungs are developed enough that a fetus has a shot at breathing air with the help of a respirator/incubator. That's the reason for it...and the reason why the SC has "viability" as the line in the sand so to speak between abortion or no abortion. Roe v Wade and the Planned Parenthood decision. Can't breathe air = not viable fetus. It will die if it leaves the womb. Chance at breathing air = viable fetus. ** With the help of mechanical assistance And that reason is also why in the last 40 years there hasn't been that much more advance in that window of 20 weeks. We can't duplicate how a fetus breathes in the womb. The kicker will be when technology advances to the point where you can keep a fetus alive in a liquid environment and it can absorb oxygen through the placenta...or you can splice an umbilical cord to some kind of device that replicates the placenta/uterine wall connection. But you don't actually know a fetus is capable of breathing air at any particular point around then. A fetus at 19 weeks and 6 days is practically identical to one at 20 weeks and 1 day. Why should one be treated any different than the other? In the real world your argument is completely null and void. It would have some merit if time of conception was known without an approximately 10 days margin of error. However it is not. Thus we have to put in a threshold where we are certain there are no (or at least extremely low) survival chance for the fetus (fetal viability does not cross the 50% threshold before week 25/26 and at week 20 it is 0). Whether or not an abortion can take place is not literally based on days. It's still arbitrary because one must still set a line, to one side of which abortion is fine, to the other it is not. The only difference is this time the line is based on viability, which is just as arbitrary as simply setting a date. Say the odds required are 80%, a fetus with 81% odds isn't much different than one with 79% odds. I don't understand why we're trying to pretend like this won't be decided arbitrarily. Any attempts to do this objectively will fail horribly because biologists will find a bunch of different "phases" to a fetus's formation, all of which are actually ballpark estimations... Even if we accept their ballparks estimation, for instance, fetus becomes "viable" on average on day X, then the debate will whip right back to the "morality" front because using viability as a basis is arbitrary too. Don't fool yourselves, this is a moral debate. Well, I can think of at least two options that aren't arbitrary. Either abortion is always OK, or its never OK are both not arbitrary. It hardly gets more arbitrary than a binary answer with no explanation actually. Especially when you're suggesting that context is irrelevant. As far as I can tell, you've somehow decided for the rest of us that the stage of development of the fetus is not worthy of considering. I just don't know what to say to that :o Sorry for not including context, I assumed I had been clear enough, my mistake. I would defend abortion right up until birth based on claims of personhood, and on potentiality. I would defend preventing all abortion by the classic "personhood occurs at conception". The fetus receives its genetic material then, and is biologically neither the mother nor father from that moment on. I don't really care which you pick, because both are internally consistent. Being the Kantian I am, I don't care for A Posteriori reasoning as far as moral issues are concerned. On June 16 2013 12:25 Poffel wrote:On June 16 2013 12:00 Millitron wrote:On June 16 2013 11:47 Ghostcom wrote:On June 16 2013 11:37 Millitron wrote:On June 16 2013 11:04 RCMDVA wrote:On June 16 2013 10:41 Millitron wrote:The whole "Abortion is OK before this time, but not after" thing is complete nonsense. Say the limit is 30 days. A fetus at day 29 is practically identical to one at day 31. The same is true no matter when you set the deadline. Setting deadlines like this is complete arbitrary nonsense. You either have to allow abortion at any time, or forbid it at any time, or you're being irrational. I personally don't care which wins in the end, just as long as one of them does. There isn't much I hate more than internal inconsistency. On June 16 2013 10:28 SonZHi wrote:
The abortion debate is mostly cultural.
In Hong Kong we don't debate it, we just treat it as medical procedure. I think we legalized it in the 80s, now nobody talks about it. Also most of us are not religious. Well that's why you don't talk about it. You all mostly agree, there isn't much to talk about. We in the US though, can't agree on anything. In reality, it isn't that arbitrary. Around 20 weeks is when the lungs are developed enough that a fetus has a shot at breathing air with the help of a respirator/incubator. That's the reason for it...and the reason why the SC has "viability" as the line in the sand so to speak between abortion or no abortion. Roe v Wade and the Planned Parenthood decision. Can't breathe air = not viable fetus. It will die if it leaves the womb. Chance at breathing air = viable fetus. ** With the help of mechanical assistance And that reason is also why in the last 40 years there hasn't been that much more advance in that window of 20 weeks. We can't duplicate how a fetus breathes in the womb. The kicker will be when technology advances to the point where you can keep a fetus alive in a liquid environment and it can absorb oxygen through the placenta...or you can splice an umbilical cord to some kind of device that replicates the placenta/uterine wall connection. But you don't actually know a fetus is capable of breathing air at any particular point around then. A fetus at 19 weeks and 6 days is practically identical to one at 20 weeks and 1 day. Why should one be treated any different than the other? In the real world your argument is completely null and void. It would have some merit if time of conception was known without an approximately 10 days margin of error. However it is not. Thus we have to put in a threshold where we are certain there are no (or at least extremely low) survival chance for the fetus (fetal viability does not cross the 50% threshold before week 25/26 and at week 20 it is 0). Whether or not an abortion can take place is not literally based on days. It's still arbitrary because one must still set a line, to one side of which abortion is fine, to the other it is not. The only difference is this time the line is based on viability, which is just as arbitrary as simply setting a date. Say the odds required are 80%, a fetus with 81% odds isn't much different than one with 79% odds. Ok, I'll bite. In towns, we have a speed limit of 50 km/h. Why isn't the speed limit 49 km/h? Why isn't it 51 km/h? Who knows? It's 50 km/h because the lethality of traffic accidents goes down remarkably somewhere around that number. We're positive that 60 km/h is sketchy and 100 km/h is way too fast... so 50 seems sensible. Surely, this must mean that speed limits are "complete nonsense"... or does it? Same for age of consent... Why is it 18 instead of 17 years and 11 months? Taxation... Why does 1 euro more change your tax bracket? Obviously, these numbers aren't arbitrary as in "we pull a random number out of our ass" but more arbitrary in the sense of "it's approximately x and we need a number so let's go with x". TL;DR: What you've discovered here isn't some inconsistency in attitudes towards abortion. What you've discovered here is integer mathematics. The speed limit and taxation not moral issues so I'm fine with A Posteriori reasoning then. Age of consent is arbitrary, hence why you get it varying between 16-18 even just in the US. It's only 14 in Japan. How about just set the ability to consent to be once you are capable of managing your own affairs, i.e. finances, health, education? You still get around the same age, and it's not arbitrary. You've shown you're able to make big decisions already. I'm interested in your explanation on how the bolded part can be considered knowledge a priori. On a sidenote, for the Kantian that you are, you're remarkably unaware of proportional (!) taxes as civic duty, and of the distinction between constitutive and regulative ideas of quantity and pure quantity ("Größe" und "Maß").
The bolded parts aren't too tough. A person has shown they can manage their own affairs when they do basically anything they must sign their name to. You start off small, like picking electives in highschool or helping manage a club or team activity, or any number of other things. That way, if they weren't able to handle it, no harm no foul. Once they've shown they can manage their finances, health, and education in similar ways as I've laid out, they're old enough to consent. They clearly understand that actions have consequences, and know they'll have to deal with them.
Kant specifically says in Doctrine of Right that coercion is only acceptable when "it is a hindrance to a hindrance to freedom". Taxation is pretty coercive, so clearly he couldn't have been too keen on taxation.
I've been wracking my brain, and scouring the internet for some way to find a book I read for an ethics class years ago. It covered the abortion debate really well from pretty much all sides. I feel like I'm not doing it justice.
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On June 16 2013 16:03 Millitron wrote:Show nested quote +On June 16 2013 12:47 Taguchi wrote:On June 16 2013 12:30 Millitron wrote:On June 16 2013 12:14 Djzapz wrote:On June 16 2013 12:09 Millitron wrote:On June 16 2013 12:08 Djzapz wrote:On June 16 2013 12:00 Millitron wrote:On June 16 2013 11:47 Ghostcom wrote:On June 16 2013 11:37 Millitron wrote:On June 16 2013 11:04 RCMDVA wrote:
[quote]
In reality, it isn't that arbitrary. Around 20 weeks is when the lungs are developed enough that a fetus has a shot at breathing air with the help of a respirator/incubator.
That's the reason for it...and the reason why the SC has "viability" as the line in the sand so to speak between abortion or no abortion. Roe v Wade and the Planned Parenthood decision.
Can't breathe air = not viable fetus. It will die if it leaves the womb.
Chance at breathing air = viable fetus. ** With the help of mechanical assistance
And that reason is also why in the last 40 years there hasn't been that much more advance in that window of 20 weeks. We can't duplicate how a fetus breathes in the womb.
The kicker will be when technology advances to the point where you can keep a fetus alive in a liquid environment and it can absorb oxygen through the placenta...or you can splice an umbilical cord to some kind of device that replicates the placenta/uterine wall connection.
But you don't actually know a fetus is capable of breathing air at any particular point around then. A fetus at 19 weeks and 6 days is practically identical to one at 20 weeks and 1 day. Why should one be treated any different than the other? In the real world your argument is completely null and void. It would have some merit if time of conception was known without an approximately 10 days margin of error. However it is not. Thus we have to put in a threshold where we are certain there are no (or at least extremely low) survival chance for the fetus (fetal viability does not cross the 50% threshold before week 25/26 and at week 20 it is 0). Whether or not an abortion can take place is not literally based on days. It's still arbitrary because one must still set a line, to one side of which abortion is fine, to the other it is not. The only difference is this time the line is based on viability, which is just as arbitrary as simply setting a date. Say the odds required are 80%, a fetus with 81% odds isn't much different than one with 79% odds. I don't understand why we're trying to pretend like this won't be decided arbitrarily. Any attempts to do this objectively will fail horribly because biologists will find a bunch of different "phases" to a fetus's formation, all of which are actually ballpark estimations... Even if we accept their ballparks estimation, for instance, fetus becomes "viable" on average on day X, then the debate will whip right back to the "morality" front because using viability as a basis is arbitrary too. Don't fool yourselves, this is a moral debate. Well, I can think of at least two options that aren't arbitrary. Either abortion is always OK, or its never OK are both not arbitrary. It hardly gets more arbitrary than a binary answer with no explanation actually. Especially when you're suggesting that context is irrelevant. As far as I can tell, you've somehow decided for the rest of us that the stage of development of the fetus is not worthy of considering. I just don't know what to say to that :o Sorry for not including context, I assumed I had been clear enough, my mistake. I would defend abortion right up until birth based on claims of personhood, and on potentiality. I would defend preventing all abortion by the classic "personhood occurs at conception". The fetus receives its genetic material then, and is biologically neither the mother nor father from that moment on. I don't really care which you pick, because both are internally consistent. Being the Kantian I am, I don't care for A Posteriori reasoning as far as moral issues are concerned. Really, really don't understand why 'personhood' is defined as either 'at birth' or 'at conception'. A child whose mother dies before actual birth and then survives because of great science isn't getting the 'personhood' tag out of you? Was Kant the guy that invented trolling or something? (not actually asking who Kant is mr Kantian) As a hint, to avoid the situation where a nonperson would be born we have this thing called 'viability of the fetus!!' and the rest goes as Ghostcom and others already said. The actual birth still occurs when the doctors remove the fetus from the womb. It's just a C-section, basically. Show nested quote +On June 16 2013 13:06 Poffel wrote:On June 16 2013 12:30 Millitron wrote:On June 16 2013 12:14 Djzapz wrote:On June 16 2013 12:09 Millitron wrote:On June 16 2013 12:08 Djzapz wrote:On June 16 2013 12:00 Millitron wrote:On June 16 2013 11:47 Ghostcom wrote:On June 16 2013 11:37 Millitron wrote:On June 16 2013 11:04 RCMDVA wrote:
[quote]
In reality, it isn't that arbitrary. Around 20 weeks is when the lungs are developed enough that a fetus has a shot at breathing air with the help of a respirator/incubator.
That's the reason for it...and the reason why the SC has "viability" as the line in the sand so to speak between abortion or no abortion. Roe v Wade and the Planned Parenthood decision.
Can't breathe air = not viable fetus. It will die if it leaves the womb.
Chance at breathing air = viable fetus. ** With the help of mechanical assistance
And that reason is also why in the last 40 years there hasn't been that much more advance in that window of 20 weeks. We can't duplicate how a fetus breathes in the womb.
The kicker will be when technology advances to the point where you can keep a fetus alive in a liquid environment and it can absorb oxygen through the placenta...or you can splice an umbilical cord to some kind of device that replicates the placenta/uterine wall connection.
But you don't actually know a fetus is capable of breathing air at any particular point around then. A fetus at 19 weeks and 6 days is practically identical to one at 20 weeks and 1 day. Why should one be treated any different than the other? In the real world your argument is completely null and void. It would have some merit if time of conception was known without an approximately 10 days margin of error. However it is not. Thus we have to put in a threshold where we are certain there are no (or at least extremely low) survival chance for the fetus (fetal viability does not cross the 50% threshold before week 25/26 and at week 20 it is 0). Whether or not an abortion can take place is not literally based on days. It's still arbitrary because one must still set a line, to one side of which abortion is fine, to the other it is not. The only difference is this time the line is based on viability, which is just as arbitrary as simply setting a date. Say the odds required are 80%, a fetus with 81% odds isn't much different than one with 79% odds. I don't understand why we're trying to pretend like this won't be decided arbitrarily. Any attempts to do this objectively will fail horribly because biologists will find a bunch of different "phases" to a fetus's formation, all of which are actually ballpark estimations... Even if we accept their ballparks estimation, for instance, fetus becomes "viable" on average on day X, then the debate will whip right back to the "morality" front because using viability as a basis is arbitrary too. Don't fool yourselves, this is a moral debate. Well, I can think of at least two options that aren't arbitrary. Either abortion is always OK, or its never OK are both not arbitrary. It hardly gets more arbitrary than a binary answer with no explanation actually. Especially when you're suggesting that context is irrelevant. As far as I can tell, you've somehow decided for the rest of us that the stage of development of the fetus is not worthy of considering. I just don't know what to say to that :o Sorry for not including context, I assumed I had been clear enough, my mistake. I would defend abortion right up until birth based on claims of personhood, and on potentiality. I would defend preventing all abortion by the classic "personhood occurs at conception". The fetus receives its genetic material then, and is biologically neither the mother nor father from that moment on. I don't really care which you pick, because both are internally consistent. Being the Kantian I am, I don't care for A Posteriori reasoning as far as moral issues are concerned. On June 16 2013 12:25 Poffel wrote:On June 16 2013 12:00 Millitron wrote:On June 16 2013 11:47 Ghostcom wrote:On June 16 2013 11:37 Millitron wrote:On June 16 2013 11:04 RCMDVA wrote:On June 16 2013 10:41 Millitron wrote:The whole "Abortion is OK before this time, but not after" thing is complete nonsense. Say the limit is 30 days. A fetus at day 29 is practically identical to one at day 31. The same is true no matter when you set the deadline. Setting deadlines like this is complete arbitrary nonsense. You either have to allow abortion at any time, or forbid it at any time, or you're being irrational. I personally don't care which wins in the end, just as long as one of them does. There isn't much I hate more than internal inconsistency. On June 16 2013 10:28 SonZHi wrote:
The abortion debate is mostly cultural.
In Hong Kong we don't debate it, we just treat it as medical procedure. I think we legalized it in the 80s, now nobody talks about it. Also most of us are not religious. Well that's why you don't talk about it. You all mostly agree, there isn't much to talk about. We in the US though, can't agree on anything. In reality, it isn't that arbitrary. Around 20 weeks is when the lungs are developed enough that a fetus has a shot at breathing air with the help of a respirator/incubator. That's the reason for it...and the reason why the SC has "viability" as the line in the sand so to speak between abortion or no abortion. Roe v Wade and the Planned Parenthood decision. Can't breathe air = not viable fetus. It will die if it leaves the womb. Chance at breathing air = viable fetus. ** With the help of mechanical assistance And that reason is also why in the last 40 years there hasn't been that much more advance in that window of 20 weeks. We can't duplicate how a fetus breathes in the womb. The kicker will be when technology advances to the point where you can keep a fetus alive in a liquid environment and it can absorb oxygen through the placenta...or you can splice an umbilical cord to some kind of device that replicates the placenta/uterine wall connection. But you don't actually know a fetus is capable of breathing air at any particular point around then. A fetus at 19 weeks and 6 days is practically identical to one at 20 weeks and 1 day. Why should one be treated any different than the other? In the real world your argument is completely null and void. It would have some merit if time of conception was known without an approximately 10 days margin of error. However it is not. Thus we have to put in a threshold where we are certain there are no (or at least extremely low) survival chance for the fetus (fetal viability does not cross the 50% threshold before week 25/26 and at week 20 it is 0). Whether or not an abortion can take place is not literally based on days. It's still arbitrary because one must still set a line, to one side of which abortion is fine, to the other it is not. The only difference is this time the line is based on viability, which is just as arbitrary as simply setting a date. Say the odds required are 80%, a fetus with 81% odds isn't much different than one with 79% odds. Ok, I'll bite. In towns, we have a speed limit of 50 km/h. Why isn't the speed limit 49 km/h? Why isn't it 51 km/h? Who knows? It's 50 km/h because the lethality of traffic accidents goes down remarkably somewhere around that number. We're positive that 60 km/h is sketchy and 100 km/h is way too fast... so 50 seems sensible. Surely, this must mean that speed limits are "complete nonsense"... or does it? Same for age of consent... Why is it 18 instead of 17 years and 11 months? Taxation... Why does 1 euro more change your tax bracket? Obviously, these numbers aren't arbitrary as in "we pull a random number out of our ass" but more arbitrary in the sense of "it's approximately x and we need a number so let's go with x". TL;DR: What you've discovered here isn't some inconsistency in attitudes towards abortion. What you've discovered here is integer mathematics. The speed limit and taxation not moral issues so I'm fine with A Posteriori reasoning then. Age of consent is arbitrary, hence why you get it varying between 16-18 even just in the US. It's only 14 in Japan. How about just set the ability to consent to be once you are capable of managing your own affairs, i.e. finances, health, education? You still get around the same age, and it's not arbitrary. You've shown you're able to make big decisions already. I'm interested in your explanation on how the bolded part can be considered knowledge a priori. On a sidenote, for the Kantian that you are, you're remarkably unaware of proportional (!) taxes as civic duty, and of the distinction between constitutive and regulative ideas of quantity and pure quantity ("Größe" und "Maß"). The bolded parts aren't too tough. A person has shown they can manage their own affairs when they do basically anything they must sign their name to. You start off small, like picking electives in highschool or helping manage a club or team activity, or any number of other things. That way, if they weren't able to handle it, no harm no foul. Once they've shown they can manage their finances, health, and education in similar ways as I've laid out, they're old enough to consent. They clearly understand that actions have consequences, and know they'll have to deal with them. Kant specifically says in Doctrine of Right that coercion is only acceptable when "it is a hindrance to a hindrance to freedom". Taxation is pretty coercive, so clearly he couldn't have been too keen on taxation. I've been wracking my brain, and scouring the internet for some way to find a book I read for an ethics class years ago. It covered the abortion debate really well from pretty much all sides. I feel like I'm not doing it justice.
Yeah, the bolded parts aren't tough, but nothing you've said in that regard can even remotely be considered knowledge a priori... that was kind of the point of my objection. That it's neither unreasonable, nor un-Kantian, nor a priori.
+ Show Spoiler +spoilered because it's rather off topic On this primarily acquired Supreme Proprietorship in the Land, rests the Right of the Sovereign, as universal Proprietor of the country, to assess the private proprietors of the Soil, and to demand Taxes, Excise, and Dues, or the performance of Service to the State such as may be required in War. But this is to be done so that it is actually the People that assess themselves, this being the only mode of proceeding according to Laws of Right. This may be effected through the medium of the Body of Deputies who represent the People. It is also permissible, in circumstances in which the State is in imminent danger, to proceed by a forced Loan, as a Right vested in the Sovereign, although this may be a divergence from the existing Law. (Kant: Metaphysics of morals. Right of the State and Constitutional Law. Constitutional and Juridical Consequences Arising From the Nature of the Civil Union, B (AA VI:318-337).)
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On June 16 2013 07:08 Shiori wrote:Show nested quote +On June 16 2013 07:06 Leporello wrote:
Show me someone who opposes abortion but feels there should be exceptions, and I'll show you a person incapable of independent thinking. It's very literally a life or death issue. Abortion is either a killing of a human being, or it isn't -- how do so many people compromise on their belief that abortion is murder? Maybe because they don't really believe, on an intellectually-validated level, that abortion is really murder at all.
We're talking about the brutal dismantling of human embryotic flesh. If you think abortion is killing a baby (I don't, btw), why does it ever make it okay for the baby to be killed if the mother was raped or was impregnated by a family member? How is that the baby's fault, that it deserves to die, only because its mother was raped? Pro-Life's position is absolute -- the fetus is a human that deserves its own choices, the mother is merely a vessel.
I like these "exceptions" to abortion, as they show that Pro-Life is an unreasonable position. It's an absolutist position built on emotional appeal, that becomes ridiculous and non-absolute when you counter it with other emotional appeals.
Best thing to do is stop looking for ways to call pregnant women murderers, and let them make their own choice on the matter. If one is raped, then abortion should certainly be permissible, because the pregnancy occurred from a non-consensual experience. Much in the same sense that you cannot kidnap someone and hook them up as a permanent blood-transfusion machine to a dying innocent adult, you cannot hold someone who was raped as in any way responsible for their pregnancy. This is not incompatible with the pro-life position. The personhood of the fetus is utterly irrelevant.
I don't want to talk about most "normal" abortion cases, but I definitely agree with what is said here.
Those of you who say that a rape victim should simply "deliver the baby and put it up for adoption" are definitely not women, nor are you able to sympathize at all. I'm a male too, but it doesn't take a genius to figure our that a woman undergoes tons and tons of stress during pregnancy. Added to the emotional and physical trauma from the rape, this should REALLY be a no brainer that they should be allowed to abort the baby.
For the record I am all for abortion: it should always be a choice.
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On June 16 2013 16:44 xAdra wrote:Show nested quote +On June 16 2013 07:08 Shiori wrote:On June 16 2013 07:06 Leporello wrote:
Show me someone who opposes abortion but feels there should be exceptions, and I'll show you a person incapable of independent thinking. It's very literally a life or death issue. Abortion is either a killing of a human being, or it isn't -- how do so many people compromise on their belief that abortion is murder? Maybe because they don't really believe, on an intellectually-validated level, that abortion is really murder at all.
We're talking about the brutal dismantling of human embryotic flesh. If you think abortion is killing a baby (I don't, btw), why does it ever make it okay for the baby to be killed if the mother was raped or was impregnated by a family member? How is that the baby's fault, that it deserves to die, only because its mother was raped? Pro-Life's position is absolute -- the fetus is a human that deserves its own choices, the mother is merely a vessel.
I like these "exceptions" to abortion, as they show that Pro-Life is an unreasonable position. It's an absolutist position built on emotional appeal, that becomes ridiculous and non-absolute when you counter it with other emotional appeals.
Best thing to do is stop looking for ways to call pregnant women murderers, and let them make their own choice on the matter. If one is raped, then abortion should certainly be permissible, because the pregnancy occurred from a non-consensual experience. Much in the same sense that you cannot kidnap someone and hook them up as a permanent blood-transfusion machine to a dying innocent adult, you cannot hold someone who was raped as in any way responsible for their pregnancy. This is not incompatible with the pro-life position. The personhood of the fetus is utterly irrelevant. I don't want to talk about most "normal" abortion cases, but I definitely agree with what is said here. Those of you who say that a rape victim should simply "deliver the baby and put it up for abortion" are definitely not women, nor are you able to sympathize at all. I'm a male too, but it doesn't take a genius to figure our that a woman undergoes tons and tons of stress during pregnancy. Added to the emotional and physical trauma from the rape, this should REALLY be a no brainer that they should be allowed to abort the baby. For the record I am all for abortion: it should always be a choice.
I think everyone here realizes how horrible it is for a raped woman to be forced to carry the child to term. But surely killing a person (which is apparently what a 20+ week foetus is) is worse than that. This is a very complex issue, and definitely not a no-brainer.
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Yes! of course! Abortion should always be allowed, who am I to force somebody else into having a child that isnt wanted? How is that not a horrible thing to do?
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On June 16 2013 17:25 NEEDZMOAR wrote:
Yes! of course! Abortion should always be allowed, who am I to force somebody else into having a child that isnt wanted? How is that not a horrible thing to do?
So killing a 9-month old foetus is fine?
I'm asking because people keep stating that abortion should always be allowed, while clearly this is not the case anywhere in the world.
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On June 16 2013 17:25 NEEDZMOAR wrote:
Yes! of course! Abortion should always be allowed, who am I to force somebody else into having a child that isnt wanted? How is that not a horrible thing to do?
Because the rights of women are less important than God, of course. An egg is not a chicken, even according to the strictest interpretations of the old testament, but of course when it comes to women, people know better than the written word of God, and can explain what "God actually meant". And remember, if you do subscribe to that kind of ideology then masturbation is an equal sin to abortion; you are killing unborn children every time you jack it.
The real basis for this is quite simple. Every type of animal has both male and female names for it. Except for God. He was a dude.
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A friend of mine who works in the child protective services once told me when we were debating this, that forcing people to have children they don't want will only lead to cases of child abuse and neglected children.
My personal opinion, which is not one I expect to be shared by many, is that we've got enough people on this planet already...
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On June 16 2013 17:41 Crushinator wrote:Show nested quote +On June 16 2013 17:25 NEEDZMOAR wrote:
Yes! of course! Abortion should always be allowed, who am I to force somebody else into having a child that isnt wanted? How is that not a horrible thing to do? So killing a 9-month old foetus is fine? I'm asking because people keep stating that abortion should always be allowed, while clearly this is not the case anywhere in the world.
Yes. It is fine. It has no emotions as of yet. Please don't bring up any "God" or "morality" bullshit with me- the mother also has rights, and if you're saying something that is still unable to develop emotions is more important than a real human being that can be rehabilitated and continue to contribute to the society, you must be joking.
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On June 16 2013 18:14 xAdra wrote:
Yes. It is fine. It has no emotions as of yet. Please don't bring up any "God" or "morality" bullshit with me- the mother also has rights, and if you're saying something that is still unable to develop emotions is more important than a real human being that can be rehabilitated and continue to contribute to the society, you must be joking.
While I disagree somewhat, as I believe if you are going to abort a child you should do it within the first two months, I do agree with you that the people who are actually able to do rational and logical thought should be the ones making the decisions and the ones deserving of our consideration. Not the lump of biological material not yet able to think, feel or even breathe by it's own devices.
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Alright this is coming from a pro choice stand point . A late term fetus is considered human and aborting it at this point because of someone else ( the rapist) isn't fair to the fetus , it wasn't the fetus's fault you were raped it was the fault of that psycho who did it if you don't want the child abort it earlier. If you are consenting to incest and you get pregnant then for one gross , secondly there is a higher chance of birth defects but usually it takes 2 or more generations i thought , and lastly you shouldn't be having sex with your siblings or family in the first place lol.
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question: how much value does being unique has in this world, evolutionary wise?.
foetuses are not people but foetuses are unique. does evolution accounts for that loss and compensates it somehow, or there is no need for that since environmental/cultural pressure would inevitably change/bend that uniqueness and make it average/common.
if one takes into account that evolution happens in (small) steps, then that also means that evolution is/will be driven by uniqueness and not by commonness.
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EPT
