NationStates Jolt Archive

if you read what you quoted you will note I make no indication that I believe life is sacred, I even supported people who want to commit SUICIDE.

Indeed. Your position contradicts itself ;)
However, I apologise for not reading your earlier posts.

If anything you appear to care less about the child and more about it being a discomfort to his parents.

Almost correct. I do not care about the embryo, since it itself is incapable of caring. I do care about the mother as well as the potential child.
Lets break that apart.

Embryo: doesn't feel a thing. Wouldn't even notice if I took out a hammer and started smashing it. It is in essence no more than tissue at this time. It *could* become more, but at this moment it is not.
Mother: definately has feelings.
Future child: does not exist yet. If it gets aborted it will never come into existance. If mommy and daddy wouldn't have had sex the same is true. If a different sperm had reached the egg first, a different child would have resulted.Unless one believes kids exist in some state of limbo somewhere until a body becomes available the abortion therefor does not harm the child - since there is nothing to harm yet. If it doesn't get aborted it will be born in a family that does not want it. Great start...

So.. abortion does not harm the embryo. The embryo can not have an opinion. So the one who has to make the decision is the mother.

I at least give the child the decision to live or not. you however prempt any opinion the child might have and instead assume that he would rather be dead than ever be born.

No, I am saying it doesn't have an opinion and that one has no right to come into existence. The problem most people have with this is that they project themselves on the embryo: an embryo exists, it could become human someday, therefor the future human already exists. They forget that the embryo itself "does not view it this way".

If you gain enough power to do that to me I hope that you do it and then kill me to prevent me from reproducing later on (I am a male).

In case that you did not notice: your "might makes right" kind of reasoning could be used to justify abortion.

No, I know the difference between permissions (something that can be revoked/removed/taken away) and rights (something which can be violated/infringed upon).

You, OTOH, do not. I chalk that up to a lack of education in the philosophy of ethics and morals on your part.

I was raised in morals BAAWA. I also have ethics. These have been ingrained in me as far back as I can remember.

You though don't seem to grasp the basic knowledge of history.

Great stuff! So now frightened young women who's families threaten to disown them can go back to illegal backyard abortions, where unqualified people use coat hangers and other primitive instruments to remove the foetus in unsterilized conditions, causing it to die in way more horrific ways and put the mother's life in danger at the same time. And charge a fortune for this wonderful service that Doctors now face felony charges for performing in South Dakota.

Oh wait! I know this will increase the number of children available for adoption! - is that why so many kids age out of the system with no family and are simply left to fend for themselves?

Congrats South Dakota you got what you wanted, can't wait to see the impact this ban has on unborn babies and their mothers over the next few years.:headbang:

To me, abortion should only happen if the health of the mother is at risk or in the case of rape and incest as I stated previously.

Having an abortion because the people didn't use protection is not an excuse or if they did use protection and it failed, its still not an excuse to get one. That is why I applaud the US Congress for passing their late term abortion bill (which is what it is despite the title).

Ah, the dirty whores argument. Always good for a laugh. You pretend as if you're protecting the life of a child, but then you're willing to take it IF SOMEONE ELSE commits a crime. Appears to me that you simply want to have the right to make decisions rather than these women. If abortion is okay in some cases that don't involve the fetus then whether you agree with other people's reasons or not, you've already admitted that there are legitimate and compelling reasons for abortion. You simply do not deserve to be in a position to decide what those reasons need to be. That is for the people involved (which is of course only the woman and her doctor) to decide.

Thanks for playing.

I was raised in morals BAAWA. I also have ethics. These have been ingrained in me as far back as I can remember.

You though don't seem to grasp the basic knowledge of history.

Clearly not. You are either willing to punish a woman for having sex by not allowing her to get rid of something in her body you admit is not a life or you are willing to punish one life for the crime of another. Either way, I'd say that's pretty much to the definition of immorality.

Clearly not. You are either willing to punish a woman for having sex by not allowing her to get rid of something in her body you admit is not a life or you are willing to punish one life for the crime of another. Either way, I'd say that's pretty much to the definition of immorality.

:rolleyes:

You can believe what you will but i was raised that sex is between a man and his wife. Premarital sex is immoral.

I at least have a code of ethics which apparently alot of people do not.

:rolleyes:

You can believe what you will but i was raised that sex is between a man and his wife. Premarital sex is immoral.

I at least have a code of ethics which apparently alot of people do not.

You have *a* code of ethics. Not the only one. Nor necessarily the "best one", if there is such a thing.
Maybe, just maybe, many of those other people do have a code of ethics. Just not yours.

You have *a* code of ethics. Not the only one. Nor necessarily the "best one", if there is such a thing.
Maybe, just maybe, many of those other people do have a code of ethics. Just not yours.

I also have a moral code as well as an ethics code. As mom told me since I was little, keep it zipped.

I also have a moral code as well as an ethics code. As mom told me since I was little, keep it zipped.

Even when going to the bathroom ?

Even when going to the bathroom ?

:rolleyes:

:rolleyes:

You can believe what you will but i was raised that sex is between a man and his wife. Premarital sex is immoral.

I at least have a code of ethics which apparently alot of people do not.

Do you realize that a large portion of abortions are had by married women who simply cannot afford to care for more children? What does premarital sex have to do with it? More proof you view outlawing abortion as a mode of punishing 'whores'.

I also have a moral code as well as an ethics code. As mom told me since I was little, keep it zipped.

I noticed you ignored the post with content, choosing instead to simply spam the thread with this nonsense about how your mom sets the moral code that should be encoded in law. I have little care for what moral code your mother endowed you with particularly when I see it in practice.

Ah, the dirty whores argument. Always good for a laugh. You pretend as if you're protecting the life of a child, but then you're willing to take it IF SOMEONE ELSE commits a crime. Appears to me that you simply want to have the right to make decisions rather than these women. If abortion is okay in some cases that don't involve the fetus then whether you agree with other people's reasons or not, you've already admitted that there are legitimate and compelling reasons for abortion. You simply do not deserve to be in a position to decide what those reasons need to be. That is for the people involved (which is of course only the woman and her doctor) to decide.

Thanks for playing.

Care to make an actual reasoned reply and stop with the nonsense?

Do you realize that a large portion of abortions are had by married women who simply cannot afford to care for more children? What does premarital sex have to do with it? More proof you view outlawing abortion as a mode of punishing 'whores'.

Then why have sex to have more children? There are ways to prevent it ya know. They should've looked into that. If they did then maybe they should've looked into something other than a condom.

:rolleyes:

You can believe what you will but i was raised that sex is between a man and his wife. Premarital sex is immoral.

I at least have a code of ethics which apparently alot of people do not.

Married woman can get abortions too. Why do you deny them abortions?

Then why have sex to have more children? There are ways to prevent it ya know. They should've looked into that. If they did then maybe they should've looked into something other than a condom.

Birth control can fail. If they were actively trying to prevent pregnancy and it failed, why do you deny them abortion?

Birth control can fail. If they were actively trying to prevent pregnancy and it failed, why do you deny them abortion?

They're married.

Then why have sex to have more children? There are ways to prevent it ya know. They should've looked into that. If they did then maybe they should've looked into something other than a condom.
So it really is about controlling who has sex and for what purpose--thanks for making that clear. You want to control which women have sex and under what conditions, plain and simple. You want to apply your personal ethos to other people. So much for freedom of expression and the ability to live your own fucking life, I guess--Corny is the fucking emperor of the world now.

Then why have sex to have more children? There are ways to prevent it ya know. They should've looked into that. If they did then maybe they should've looked into something other than a condom.

They aren't having sex to have more children. They are having sex. Not all people are willing to look into permanent solutions to birth control because when their financial situation improves or their children are older they may wish for more children. Meanwhile, your judgement of them is of no consequence. You clearly just want to punish them and that is not your right nor the right of the government. People are permitted to have sex for pleasure regardless of what your 'morals' tell you. People have that right in the US. People also have the right to decide which medical procedures they undergo. Your 'morals' are not and never will be the guide I follow to be a good person. My morals require me to follow the teaching of Jesus Christ and to worry about the plank in my own eye before tell others about the speck in theirs.

They're married.

The implication is clear. Abortions are not immoral. Sex not performed under your specifications is what you view as immoral. Amusing, but not germaine to the argument. No one cares about what you think is immoral or not. Here's a tip. If you think sex other than for the purpose of procreating is immoral, don't engage in it. When you meet your maker you can tell Him how you've been a good little boy and we've all been bad, down here married and having sex without wanting children.

From google news:

Pope says embryos have rights from conception
Mon Feb 27, 2006 9:52 AM ET
By Philip Pullella

VATICAN CITY (Reuters) - Pope Benedict on Monday reaffirmed Catholic teaching that life begins at the moment of conception, saying embryos are "sacred and inviolable" even before they become implanted in a mother's uterus.

The Pope made his comments in an address to the Pontifical Academy for Life, which is hosting an international congress on scientific aspects and bioethical considerations of "The Human Embryo Before Implantation".

Speaking in Italian, the Pope said the Church had always proclaimed the "sacred and inviolable character of every human life, from its conception to its natural end."

He added: "This moral judgment is valid from the start of the life of an embryo, even before it is implanted in the maternal womb."

In natural conception, implantation of the embryo in the uterus usually begins to occur about a week after the egg is fertilised in the fallopian tube and is usually complete after about 14 days.

By making such a defense of life, the Pope appeared to be trying to cut short any debate that the period between conception and implantation could be seen as a time for legitimate experimentation or manipulation on embryos.

He did not make a distinction between embryos created naturally and those generated outside the womb through in-vitro fertilisation.

The Catholic Church holds that in-vitro fertilisation is morally wrong but scientific advances have presented it with a minefield of ethical issues regarding embryos created outside the womb for artificial implantation.

He made no reference to debates among scientists and ethicists about what to do with the growing number of "surplus" artificially generated embryos preserved in fertility clinics around the world.

Some Catholic ethicists believe that since they are human lives, the Church has a moral duty to give them the opportunity to be born.

This has led to calls within some sectors of the Church to promote so-called embryo adoption, in which embryos generated artificially are "adopted" by women willing to bring them to term.

The implication is clear. Abortions are not immoral. Sex not performed under your specifications is what you view as immoral. Amusing, but not germaine to the argument. No one cares about what you think is immoral or not. Here's a tip. If you think sex other than for the purpose of procreating is immoral, don't engage in it. When you meet your maker you can tell Him how you've been a good little boy and we've all been bad, down here married and having sex without wanting children.
Why do I feel like Corny ought to start singing "Every Sperm is Sacred" right about now?

God you really are stupid aren't you? The Brain developes during this time frame. By week 11 or 12, its synapsis forms. The baby's nerve cells are also rapidly growing as well.

And by week 14, Brain impulses gives the child's facial muscles a workout.

The brain is far from fully developed in that time frame. It isn't until the 11th or 12th week that any brain activity at all can be seen - what little movement occurs before then is random firing of spinal cord sinapses. There is little evidence for voluntary movement until even later.

Actually, there is a heart rate and an ultra sound can see the heart beating.

Heartbeat != alive. I can cut your heart out, leave it in an electrolyte solution, and it will keep beating! (I've actually done this in frogs). Would that make your heart a separate human person?

They're married.

So you lied when you said you were against it because premarital sex is bad. Got it. You're a liar AND a hypocrite.

From google news:

Pope says embryos have rights from conception


Hooray for the Pope.

So you lied when you said you were against it because premarital sex is bad. Got it. You're a liar AND a hypocrite.

No I didn't lie because premarital sex is bad.

From google news:

Pope says embryos have rights from conception
Mon Feb 27, 2006 9:52 AM ET
By Philip Pullella


good thing the pope has absolutely no significant place in my life, because i disagree with this fellow human.

Be as that may, your missing a key point. The point is, that the baby is:

1) Breathing

I hate to break it to you - but actual breathing doesn't start until birth. A fetus' lungs are bathed with amniotic fluid, but it isn't technically breathing.

All your focusing on is the brain. The brain is only one part in this entire process.

The brain is what we focus on in subjects of life and death. We can replace most any organ - and still have the same person. We cannot replace the brain. If the lungs stop, we can put you on a respirator. If the kidneys stop, a dialysis machine and an eventual transplant. The liver stops? We put you on a machine for a while and then get a transplant. The heart stops? We can generally restart it. The brain stops? You're dead. Period.

At the 16th week, the circulatory system starts to function on its own.

Actually, that starts quite a bit earlier - as the circulatory system is really the first organ system to become functional. By the time the heart starts beating, some blood vessels are already in place.

And you missed this part. At the 19th week, Hearing, Taste, Touch, smell, and sight are developing their spots in the brain. That is at the 19th week dude.

Developing != Functional.

No I didn't lie because premarital sex is bad.

Then what is your reason for denying married women abortions?

No I didn't lie because premarital sex is bad.

actually, premarital sex is pretty fucking good. its the marital sex, if there has been no premarital sex, that is pretty bad.

why is everyone so afraid of sexuality? (dont response with pregnancy and stds, because those are the excuses not the roots)

Then what is your reason for denying married women abortions?

Is their health at risk?

Is their health at risk?

No. What is your reason?

No. What is your reason?

If their health isn't at risk it goes back to what I said earlier.

The population of America would not sky rocket, only about a million abortions a year occur now. I suspect that after an initial surge birth rates might recover quickly to current rates (with better application and development of anti-ovulating medications for women and the need for anti-sperm producing male medications, the demand for such will quickly become far more requested and thus, more popular. Much more research money will then be put into it, reducing the overall 'unwanted' pregnancy occurrences).

Actually, if we declared an embryo a citizen with all the rights thereof, we couldn't have birth control pills at all. They generally block ovulation, but don't always - and when they don't, they often cause (much like the morning after pill) the fertilized egg to fail to implant. Thus, by your logic, using birth control can lead to the death of a human person - and it can therefore not be used.

If you get rid of abortion, birth control, Plan B, depo shots, etc., how many more births do you think there would be?

If their health isn't at risk it goes back to what I said earlier.

Then how does the morality of sex before marriage enter into your decision making process? If it doesn't matter if it's pre-marital or post-marital sex, why make the distinction?

In case that you did not notice: your "might makes right" kind of reasoning could be used to justify abortion.

Ive stated earlier that my opinion isnt what im using to argue against abortion. I dont feel its necessarily wrong but rather that our legal system is designed in a way that would provide for the protection of a fetus. I PERSONALLY believe in "might makes right", but it doesnt have to do with my position on this issue that abortions are illegal as long as we dont make humans that are inside another human a special case. (thus it is neccesary for me to prove that it is human and deserves as much rights as anyone else)

Then you clearly didn't read the post.

The only way to get that from the post is to have not read the post.

Hmmmm

The man is forced (against his will) to serve in the military or be jailed.

How in the world is that NOT slavery?

Look! It says: The man either has to do this or go to jail. How is that not slavery?

Yup, I could read that over and over and it would still say, "Do this or go to jail," = slavery.

Hmmmm



Look! It says: The man either has to do this or go to jail. How is that not slavery?

Yup, I could read that over and over and it would still say, "Do this or go to jail," = slavery.
It's not quite the same. You can always choose not to do it. When you're forced into the military you don't have a choice.

Then how does the morality of sex before marriage enter into your decision making process? If it doesn't matter if it's pre-marital or post-marital sex, why make the distinction?

Because he needs to judge those women as sluts and never miss an opportunity to do so. You see when he reads the Bible he skips that whole thou shalt not judge argument because those morals don't matter, only the ones his mother taught him do.

Because he needs to judge those women as sluts and never miss an opportunity to do so. You see when he reads the Bible he skips that whole thou shalt not judge argument because those morals don't matter, only the ones his mother taught him do.

:rolleyes:

The womb is the property of the mother, but you didn't say that the fetus is -- it isn't. If you think that the fetus is the property of the mother, you, unfortunately, believe in a certain form of slavery.

My house is my property. If someone is living within it - perhaps because they are cold or hungry, etc., I can throw them out. The womb is a woman's property, and she can decide whether or not it is occupied.

Recent scientific studies show that a human life begins at conception

Really? I'd like to see these studies. Please produce them.

And don't tell me that the Supreme Court in Roe v. Wade made abortion legal.

No, it didn't. It pointed out that, constitutionally, the government is unable to unreasonably restrict what medical decisions a woman can and cannot make.

:rolleyes:
The truth is hard to swallow, eh?:rolleyes:

:rolleyes:

If you don't want other people putting words in your mouth, why don't you answer my question rather than use your little smart-ass smiley faces?

Actually, if we declared an embryo a citizen with all the rights thereof, we couldn't have birth control pills at all. They generally block ovulation, but don't always - and when they don't, they often cause (much like the morning after pill) the fertilized egg to fail to implant. Thus, by your logic, using birth control can lead to the death of a human person - and it can therefore not be used.

If you get rid of abortion, birth control, Plan B, depo shots, etc., how many more births do you think there would be?

That's a strawman argument. The South Dakota bill does no such thing, it doesn’t declare the embryo to be a citizen with all the rights thereof, it doesn’t even mention anti-ovulation medication (you could argue that it makes IUD’s illegal to implant though).

It's simply a $5000 fine and or a five year prison term to the medical professional who performs the procedure in their state, the mother/patient is not charged with any crime. Anything above and beyond the actual bill is speculation and fear-mongering in ‘what if’ propaganda. The crime and punishment are already described in the bill and the article, there are no 'what ifs' as to what it means or who it indicts.

The truth is hard to swallow, eh?:rolleyes:

There is no truth in what Jocabia said.

That's a strawman argument. The South Dakota bill does no such thing, it doesn’t declare the embryo to be a citizen with all the rights thereof, it doesn’t even mention anti-ovulation medication (you could argue that it makes IUD’s illegal to implant though).

It's simply a $5000 fine and or a five year prison term to the medical professional who performs the procedure in their state, the mother/patient is not charged with any crime. Anything above and beyond the actual bill is speculation and fear-mongering in ‘what if’ propaganda. The crime and punishment are already described in the bill and the article, there are no 'what ifs' as to what it means or who it indicts.

You are the one who brought up the idea that anti-abortion types declare personhood at conception.

Indeed. Your position contradicts itself ;)
However, I apologise for not reading your earlier posts.



Almost correct. I do not care about the embryo, since it itself is incapable of caring. I do care about the mother as well as the potential child.
Lets break that apart.

Embryo: doesn't feel a thing. Wouldn't even notice if I took out a hammer and started smashing it. It is in essence no more than tissue at this time. It *could* become more, but at this moment it is not.
Mother: definately has feelings.
Future child: does not exist yet. If it gets aborted it will never come into existance. If mommy and daddy wouldn't have had sex the same is true. If a different sperm had reached the egg first, a different child would have resulted.Unless one believes kids exist in some state of limbo somewhere until a body becomes available the abortion therefor does not harm the child - since there is nothing to harm yet. If it doesn't get aborted it will be born in a family that does not want it. Great start...

So.. abortion does not harm the embryo. The embryo can not have an opinion. So the one who has to make the decision is the mother.



No, I am saying it doesn't have an opinion and that one has no right to come into existence. The problem most people have with this is that they project themselves on the embryo: an embryo exists, it could become human someday, therefor the future human already exists. They forget that the embryo itself "does not view it this way".

I never said it has an opinion, simply that we know it will have one later and we should respect that, in fact I'd agree that it probably doesnt have any capacity to think on that level. Youve stated that it wouldnt notice if you smashed it with a hammer. Perhaps true, however you wouldnt notice if I smashed you with a hammer while you were sleeping, causing you to instantly die. Youre concept of "harm" is flawed, it might not feel pain but certainly can be harmed(however this is just semantics and I know what you mean). At the least you would concede that once a fetus is old enough to feel anything or to be supported by technology it shouldnt be aborted, by your argument its necessary that it not have feeling or thought. Dont bring up oh it WILL have a bad upbringing, you cant know that for sure and you assuming a child would rather die than have to live through a bad upbringing is somewhat silly, if that were the case there would be alot more suicides.

There is no truth in what Jocabia said.

Really?

1. Do you think that women who have premarital sex are sluts?
2. Do you think that women who get pregnant from premarital sex deserve to have their rights subjugated simply because they were willing to have premarital sex?
3. If the answer is no to 2, why do you even mention premarital sex being wrong when we're not talking about premarital sex, but abortion?
4. If the answer is no to 2, then why should women not be allowed to have abortions?
5. Should we deny medical procedures to those that get in car accidents because they accepted their fate when they chose to get in the car?

That's a strawman argument. The South Dakota bill does no such thing, it doesn’t declare the embryo to be a citizen with all the rights thereof, it doesn’t even mention anti-ovulation medication (you could argue that it makes IUD’s illegal to implant though).

It's simply a $5000 fine and or a five year prison term to the medical professional who performs the procedure in their state, the mother/patient is not charged with any crime. Anything above and beyond the actual bill is speculation and fear-mongering in ‘what if’ propaganda. The crime and punishment are already described in the bill and the article, there are no 'what ifs' as to what it means or who it indicts.
True, but the partial-birth abortion law that SCOTUS is going to look at does define a child as being from conception to adulthood. There's the problem with looking at any one of these laws in a vacuum--they all necessarily speak to each other.

If my heart beat were to stop I would be considered dead so why not have the same standard for something that is hardly as much as a clump of cells?

This is incorrect. A loss of a heartbeat does not equate to death. If your heart stops, they try to restart it because you are not dead until irreparable damage has been done to your *brain* such that you are brain dead.

Thus, to "have the same standard", we cannot declare a fetus alive until it has brain function.

A clump of cells with personalities who can think. If your brain is not formed enough to tell the heart to beat then you are basically dead.

The brain doesn't have to tell the heart to beat. The heart starts beating at 6-7 weeks. The brain isn't formed until much, much later. Basic cardiac biology - the heart keeps itself beating. Any signals from the brain are simply to regulate the rate at which it does so.

This thread has, more than anything else, made my initial position more concrete.

EVERYONE SHOULD BE ABORTED. The Unborn. The born. Young. Old. Middle-aged. Everyone.

People are obviously defective. Let's do the right thing, and go ahead with this. We need to stop fucking around and take this up another notch. This, what I like to refer to as 'the Human Problem'.

Enjoy.

-Pants

Really?

1. Do you think that women who have premarital sex are sluts?

Nope

You are the one who brought up the idea that anti-abortion types declare personhood at conception.

We can also see what type of laws and punishments the anti-abortion types write up in their bills.

This thread has, more than anything else, made my initial position more concrete.

EVERYONE SHOULD BE ABORTED. The Unborn. The born. Young. Old. Middle-aged. Everyone.

People are obviously defective. Let's do the right thing, and go ahead with this. We need to stop fucking around and take this up another notch. This, what I like to refer to as 'the Human Problem'.

Enjoy.

-Pants

I would agree with you, however few others would(including the US govt) humans are a scourge to the planet and should all be murdered in the most horrific way possible.

(yes, me too!)

Nope

Are you even trying to have a discussion here or just act silly? You answered the only question that wasn't really serious and avoided all of the questions that are on-topic? What's the matter? Not willing to actually verbalize your answers to those questions because it will nail you down to a position and you can't get away with the derailing of the topic by twisting everything as you've been doing?

Why is it that there's always one in these threads that tries everything to stay off-topic? It's as if conservatives know they can't win on a discussion of the points.

I'll ask again.

2. Do you think that women who get pregnant from premarital sex deserve to have their rights subjugated simply because they were willing to have premarital sex?
3. If the answer is no to 2, why do you even mention premarital sex being wrong when we're not talking about premarital sex, but abortion?
4. If the answer is no to 2, then why should women not be allowed to have abortions?
5. Should we deny medical procedures to those that get in car accidents because they accepted their fate when they chose to get in the car?

Are you even trying to have a discussion here or just act silly? You answered the only question that wasn't really serious and avoided all of the questions that are on-topic?

Because question number 1 proved tat i do not consider those who have premarital sex sluts. That was the jist of your arguement. That is why i only answered that one and nothing else.

The supporting evidence for your argument is correct, but I just disagree with your conclusion. Whether or not humans have to use logic to figure out anything, I still simply think the fetus, or the embryo, or the zygote, has a soul. I don't make any distinction between a blob of cells with 46 human chromosomes or a human-shaped "thing," be it in or out of the womb.

I have a blob of cells in the lab that have 46 human chromosomes. There are a lot of cells there. Does it have a soul and is it a person?

What do you think about partial-birth abortions? If we don't agree about conception, I'm sure even pro-choice people can understand that sucking the brains out of a baby is an idea so grotesque that I want to faint right now so that I don't have to think about it anymore.

Liver transplants are pretty grotesque too. I enjoyed watching one, but some people faint when they try. But both are done for medical reasons - because lives are in danger. In quite a few cases, D&X is performed when the fetus is already dead.

Because question number 1 proved tat i do not consider those who have premarital sex sluts. That was the jist of your arguement. That is why i only answered that one and nothing else.

Um, no. That wasn't the gist of my argument. I wanted to know why you advocated premarital sex as a reason why women should be denied abortions. Answer the questions. I asked them to make the point you are trying to make clearer so we can remain on topic rather than talking about your mother's morality or whether or not you said something. Wouldn't you prefer to actually discuss the point of the thread?

2. Do you think that women who get pregnant from premarital sex deserve to have their rights subjugated simply because they were willing to have premarital sex?
3. If the answer is no to 2, why do you even mention premarital sex being wrong when we're not talking about premarital sex, but abortion?
4. If the answer is no to 2, then why should women not be allowed to have abortions?
5. Should we deny medical procedures to those that get in car accidents because they accepted their fate when they chose to get in the car?
Today 12:07 PM

True, but the partial-birth abortion law that SCOTUS is going to look at does define a child as being from conception to adulthood. There's the problem with looking at any one of these laws in a vacuum--they all necessarily speak to each other.

So does the South Dakota bill. I haven't read the partial-birth law, what does it define for punishment and to whom?

A fetus is not a part of your body. It is a developing organism depending on your body, just as parasites and bacteria.

Actually, it cannot be said to be an organism until it meets all the biological requirements of life - including a mechanism with which to sense and respond to stimuli as an entity - something that is not met until the rudimentary nervous system is developed.

The rest of your argument is dependent upon it being an organism from the start, which it is not. Thus, "it is either alive or dead," is incorrect. At the point of most abortions, it is neither.

I cant help but feel that a fetus is human(I only noted twins because they happen to have identical dna structures, and do not mean to say they are non-human).

...then "unique DNA" cannot possibly be a requirement for humanity.

Cancer does have different DNA, however it can never exist outside of it's host and thereby certainly is not human.

Of course it can. We have cancer cells that have been growing for decades.

However if you agree that a fetus isnt your body or property how can you say that a mother should have domain over it?

She has domain over her own body. Thus, she can remove an unwanted presence from it.

Once again youre puting words into people's mouths read what you quoted I never said anything about women being weak or whores or anything else of that nature, I simply wanted to express my opinion that if people are weak that they deserve to be defeated by those that are strong- if the result of that is rape then so be it. I also didnt say anything about right concerning women and was only stating my opinion on that. I would however like to stick to laws when dicussing this and not opinions.

You're contradicting yourself. "I didn't say anything about being weak," "I just anted to point out that if people are weak..."

Week 1-4 After conception, the embryo will begin to "search" for a place to attach to the woman's uterus. When it finds one and plants itself there, the connections between the mother and the embryo will begin to form, including the umbilical cord.

Week 5-8 Chemicals produced by the embryo stop the mother's menstruational cycle. The brain begins to develop, and the heart will begin to beat. Stubs begin to be visible where arms and legs will grow later. All the main organs begin to grow. The embryo's blood type becomes apparent. Embryo is capable of motion, and the eyes begin to form. Most organs have developed or have begun developing. At the end of the 8th week, the embryoic stage is over, and the fetal stage begins.

Week 1-4 After conception, the embryo will begin to "search" for a place to attach to the woman's uterus. When it finds one and plants itself there, the connections between the mother and the embryo will begin to form, including the umbilical cord.

Week 5-8 Chemicals produced by the embryo stop the mother's menstruational cycle. The brain begins to develop, and the heart will begin to beat. Stubs begin to be visible where arms and legs will grow later. All the main organs begin to grow. The embryo's blood type becomes apparent. Embryo is capable of motion, and the eyes begin to form. Most organs have developed or have begun developing. At the end of the 8th week, the embryoic stage is over, and the fetal stage begins.

Well, then they need to correct wikipedia because while it is almost correct it is misleading. The eighth week is when the first synapses of the brain begin to form. The way it is placed in the paragraph sounds like all of these things begin at week five which is wholly false. The fetus barely has just developed a spinal cord at week eight which begins to cause reflexive motion. The brain is not formed at all and is just beginning to create the first synapses which are of course required to transfer signals.

Looks like the legislature of South Dakota has their act together. Its about time someone challenges judicial activisim and puts the power back into the hands of the people and their elected representatives. Looks like South Dakota is going to gain 800 new children per year. Good for them.

...then "unique DNA" cannot possibly be a requirement for humanity.



Of course it can. We have cancer cells that have been growing for decades.



She has domain over her own body. Thus, she can remove an unwanted presence from it.



You're contradicting yourself. "I didn't say anything about being weak," "I just anted to point out that if people are weak..."

Youre again misquoteing me right after you have properly done so... what I said in ym post was not "I didnt say anything about being weak" rather "I never said anything about women being weak". I would like to point out that my opinions on right and wrong do not enter into my argument regarding anti-abortion legislation.

It's not quite the same. You can always choose not to do it. When you're forced into the military you don't have a choice.

Actually, you do. The choice is "go into the military or go to jail (or skip town)". The same is true of anything that we must legally do. For instance, "pay your taxes or go to jail (or get the hell out of dodge)."

Like I said, conscription is much more extreme and more of a problem because of what being in the military entails - but the post in question didn't bring that in. It just said, "Do it or you go to jail" = slavery.

That's a strawman argument. The South Dakota bill does no such thing, it doesn’t declare the embryo to be a citizen with all the rights thereof, it doesn’t even mention anti-ovulation medication (you could argue that it makes IUD’s illegal to implant though).

I never said that the SD bill did any such thing. If you would like to go back and read the posts - the conversation at the time related to making such a declaration - a declaration you said you support.

Looks like the legislature of South Dakota has their act together. Its about time someone challenges judicial activisim and puts the power back into the hands of the people and their elected representatives. Looks like South Dakota is going to gain 800 new children per year. Good for them.

Yeah, I can't wait until someone challenges judicial activism and makes it legal to pass laws to keep blacks from voting again. I also can't wait until the states are free to put all blacks in different, less funded schools again. Won't that be fun?

...
I never said that the SD bill did any such thing. If you would like to go back and read the posts - the conversation at the time related to making such a declaration - a declaration you said you support.

This whole thread is about the South Dakota anti-abortion legislation, and the fact that they wrote a bill to do just such a thing. Perhaps we can look and see what they say instead of 'speculating' what they might say.

And I do, cautiously, support it, but that's irrelevant to the fact that it says what it says so we don’t have to speculate about worse case scenarios.

Yeah, I can't wait until someone challenges judicial activism and makes it legal to pass laws to keep blacks from voting again. I also can't wait until the states are free to put all blacks in different, less funded schools again. Won't that be fun?

Won't happen

Bible belt states may be stupid but not even the worst hick states Mississippi and Alabama are going to go back that far.

This whole thread is about the South Dakota anti-abortion legislation,

Hardly. That is how the thread began. The topics of discussion have ranged quite a bit from such a narrow discussion.

and the fact that they wrote a bill to do just such a thing.

Actually, the purpose of the bill is to ban abortion, not to declare zygotes/embryos legal persons with all the rights thereof. However, since there is an aside that seems to declare that, we must worry about the legal consequences of such actions.

Perhaps we can look and see what they say instead of 'speculating' what they might say.

You and others have stated that you would be in favor of declaring zygotes/embryos to be legal persons. There are certain logical consequences that come along with that, whether you explicitly state support for them or not.


Won't happen

Bible belt states may be stupid but not even the worst hick states Mississippi and Alabama are going to go back that far.

But those damn "judicial activists" wanting to actually make sure that the rights of the citizens of this country are protected need to be stopped!! How dare they interpret the Constitution and make sure it is upheld?!?! It isn't like that's the purpose of the court or anything like that!

This whole thread is about the South Dakota anti-abortion legislation, and the fact that they wrote a bill to do just such a thing. Perhaps we can look and see what they say instead of 'speculating' what they might say.

And I do, cautiously, support it, but that's irrelevant to the fact that it says what it says so we don’t have to speculate about worse case scenarios.

It declares the fertalized egg to be a human life, a person. This does two things, it endows it with rights and ignores science though it claims to be a scientific conclusion. It lies and says that scientific advances have given us information that proves it is a life.

http://legis.state.sd.us/sessions/2006/bills/HB1215p.htm

Section 1. The Legislature accepts and concurs with the conclusion of the South Dakota Task Force to Study Abortion, based upon written materials, scientific studies, and testimony of witnesses presented to the task force, that life begins at the time of conception, a conclusion confirmed by scientific advances since the 1973 decision of Roe v. Wade, including the fact that each human being is totally unique immediately at fertilization. Moreover, the Legislature finds, based upon the conclusions of the South Dakota Task Force to Study Abortion, and in recognition of the technological advances and medical experience and body of knowledge about abortions produced and made available since the 1973 decision of Roe v. Wade, that to fully protect the rights, interests, and health of the pregnant mother, the rights, interest, and life of her unborn child, and the mother's fundamental natural intrinsic right to a relationship with her child, abortions in South Dakota should be prohibited.

They also try to pretend that they outlaw abortion to protect the rights of the mother with the ridiculous phrase "the mother's fundamental natural intrinsic right to a relationship with her child" as if it is a right, but she is not allowed to decide whether that right is invoked.

The entire foundation of the 'law' is to either outright lie and/or subjugate the truth. Is this the tactics that the religious right is willing to take? Are we to accept that these people are bearing false witness against their neighbor? It's clear they are not trying to be honest in this legislation nor will they be honest in the Supreme Court fight they are trying to start. They know it's not a scientific basis they are using for this law. They know it's not the right of the mother they are concerned about. The hypocrisy of this law is so unbelievable to me.

I am sorry if Im taking you out of context, I hadnt realized, if my assumption that you were saying because an embryo doesnt have all the functions of a fully grown human(or even newly born) it is not human was wrong I truly am sorry. However...

Does it matter that you werent talking to me, here I thought it was a forum, not a personal message from you to him.
No it doesn't matter and your free to respond to anything I do infact post but you have to make sure its in context otherwise your completely twisting someone elses words and it makes you look bad.


Your idea was (as far as I could tell) that if someone doesnt physically resemble what you consider to be human, then they are not, I was only trying to point out that its a very inaccurate description of human vs. non-human, and the problems that arise from having such a description.
There is a general set of characteristics used to describe what a human being is and a fetus does not meet them. If anything your description of what a human being is seems to be overly simplified and doesn't take into account numerous factors. To just say a human is something that can reproduce another human at some point in time is very basic, doesn't take into account other factors, and due to the reproduce at some time in the future clause instead of just can reproduce you can include a fetus.

As for your cells, they cant produce whole new humans on thier own, if you read closely I said that a human is an organism that can produce a human AT SOME POINT IN THE FUTURE. Your cells are not humans since they cannot produce a human by cellular division(thier only method of reproduction). this would make it seem that by my definition an egg or sperm cell is human. I would point out that a sperm or egg cell is not a seperate organism, rather small pieces of a human that when two merge form a human, furthermore even if you think they are thier own organisms, they certainly dont reproduce themselves. Sperm and egg cells are not organisms, however, zygotes are.
So if a baby is born sterile is it not a human? If I suddenly at some point lose my ability to reproduce am I no longer a human being because at some point in the future I can no longer produce another human being?

If I am wrong on what you were saying please, give me your definition of what a human is, such that an embryo is not it. Your overall argument here is that since they're not humans they dont have a right to live, correct?
One arguement for abortion is that the fetus is not a human/person yet so they don't have the right to life. Its not the only arguement I espouse but thats the one I have been using right now. Definition wise I think there are two categories to look at. You have the biological and psychological bases for being human.

Biologically, humans are classified as the species Homo sapiens (Latin for "wise man"): a bipedal primate of the superfamily Hominoidea, together with the other apes—chimpanzees, gorillas, orangutans, and gibbons.

Humans have an erect body carriage that frees their upper limbs for manipulating objects, and a highly developed brain capable of abstract reasoning, speech, language, and introspection.-Wikipedia

and I think Oxford has a pretty good definition of it as well.

Human
A. adj.

1. Of, belonging to, or characteristic of mankind, distinguished from animals by superior mental development, power of articulate speech, and upright posture.

Hardly. That is how the thread began. The topics of discussion have ranged quite a bit from such a narrow discussion.

Actually, the purpose of the bill is to ban abortion, not to declare zygotes/embryos legal persons with all the rights thereof. However, since there is an aside that seems to declare that, we must worry about the legal consequences of such actions.

You and others have stated that you would be in favor of declaring zygotes/embryos to be legal persons. There are certain logical consequences that come along with that, whether you explicitly state support for them or not.
...

The South Dakota bill DOES say that life begins at conception, with the right to life, the same as the statements made earlier. But the Bill does NOT produce the over-reaction you predict as far as crime definition and punishment are involved in this regard.

BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF SOUTH DAKOTA:
Section 1. The Legislature accepts and concurs with the conclusion of the South Dakota Task Force to Study Abortion, based upon written materials, scientific studies, and testimony of witnesses presented to the task force, that life begins at the time of conception, a conclusion confirmed by scientific advances since the 1973 decision of Roe v. Wade, including the fact that each human being is totally unique immediately at fertilization. Moreover, the Legislature finds, based upon the conclusions of the South Dakota Task Force to Study Abortion, and in recognition of the technological advances and medical experience and body of knowledge about abortions produced and made available since the 1973 decision of Roe v. Wade, that to fully protect the rights, interests, and health of the pregnant mother, the rights, interest, and life of her unborn child, and the mother's fundamental natural intrinsic right to a relationship with her child, abortions in South Dakota should be prohibited. Moreover, the Legislature finds that the guarantee of due process of law under the Constitution of South Dakota applies equally to born and unborn human beings, and that under the Constitution of South Dakota, a pregnant mother and her unborn child, each possess a natural and inalienable right to life.

http://legis.state.sd.us/sessions/2006/bills/HB1215SST.htm

*bolding by me

The South Dakota bill DOES say that life begins at conception, with the right to life, the same as the statements made earlier. But the Bill does NOT produce the over-reaction you predict as far as crime definition and punishment are involved in this regard.

BE IT ENACTED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF SOUTH DAKOTA:
Section 1. The Legislature accepts and concurs with the conclusion of the South Dakota Task Force to Study Abortion, based upon written materials, scientific studies, and testimony of witnesses presented to the task force, that life begins at the time of conception, a conclusion confirmed by scientific advances since the 1973 decision of Roe v. Wade, including the fact that each human being is totally unique immediately at fertilization. Moreover, the Legislature finds, based upon the conclusions of the South Dakota Task Force to Study Abortion, and in recognition of the technological advances and medical experience and body of knowledge about abortions produced and made available since the 1973 decision of Roe v. Wade, that to fully protect the rights, interests, and health of the pregnant mother, the rights, interest, and life of her unborn child, and the mother's fundamental natural intrinsic right to a relationship with her child, abortions in South Dakota should be prohibited. Moreover, the Legislature finds that the guarantee of due process of law under the Constitution of South Dakota applies equally to born and unborn human beings, and that under the Constitution of South Dakota, a pregnant mother and her unborn child, each possess a natural and inalienable right to life.

http://legis.state.sd.us/sessions/2006/bills/HB1215SST.htm

*bolding by me

You're late.

The South Dakota bill DOES say that life begins at conception, with the right to life, the same as the statements made earlier. But the Bill does NOT produce the over-reaction you predict as far as crime definition and punishment are involved in this regard.

Does logic escape you? Regardless of what the bill says, if the embryo is a human person with all the rights thereof, it gets, you guessed it, all the rights thereof. The bill doesn't have to say, "So now we're going to have to investigate women who have miscarriages for possible manslaughter or ban birth control," for that to be the logical conclusion of it.

It's like saying, "Trees are human persons." The bill doesn't say, "So now you can't cut them down for your firewood," but that is the logical conclusion, since we don't burn human beings in our fireplaces.

Introduction

I'm going to use this post to bring together the key arguments made by various people over the course of the debate to prove that pro-choice is the only logical position. I will attempt to justify each stage of argument using links to impartial websites.

The three most common pro-life arguments have been:

1. The foetus is a person.
2. The foetus has potential for life.
3. The Bible says so.

The Foetus is a person

Simply not true.

1. Personhood requires consciousness.
2. Consciousness requires a working brain and synapses.
3. A foetus has no Thalamic brain connections until about week 27 (at the earlist), and the brain doesn't function properly until most of the way into the third trimester.
4. Therefore a foetus is not a person until that point.

Evidence:

Weeks 27 to 31 (29th to 33rd week of pregnancy)
The fetus reaches a length of about 38-43 cm (15-17 inches).
The fetus weighs about 2 kg (4 lb 6 oz).
The amount of body fat rapidly increases.
Rhythmic breathing movements occur, but lungs are not fully mature.
Thalamic brain connections, which mediate sensory input, form.
Bones are fully developed, but are still soft and pliable.
The fetus begins storing iron, calcium, and phosphorus
link (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fetal_development#Fetal_Development)

So we now know that the foetus isn't a person until around the 29th week of pregnancy. The Cat-Tribes posted a link showing that 90% of abortions are carried out before the first fourteen weeks:

Its all very special that you are focusing on events beyond the 14th week of pregnancy. Fewer than 10% of all abortion occur at that late a stage.

Centers for Disease Control Abortion Surveillance (http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/ss5309a1.htm):

59% of reported legal induced abortions were known to have been obtained at <8 weeks' gestation and 87% at <13 weeks (Table 6). Overall (40 reporting areas), 25% of abortions were known to have been performed at <6 weeks' gestation, 18% at 7 weeks, and 16% at 8 weeks (Table 7). Few reported abortions occurred after 15 weeks' gestation: 4.2% at 16--20 weeks and 1.4% at >21 weeks.

Those few abortions that occur in the later weeks are due to medical necessity.

So, thank Corny, for proving that the object of almost all abortions is not a person.

So clearly it is not a 'person' who is being terminated except where exceptions are made for the mother's health.

Grave n idle struck the finishing blow to this particular line of argument with this source:

"Anencephaly is a defect in the closure of the neural tube during fetal development. The neural tube is a narrow channel that folds and closes between the 3rd and 4th weeks of pregnancy to form the brain and spinal cord of the embryo. Anencephaly occurs when the "cephalic" or head end of the neural tube fails to close, resulting in the absence of a major portion of the brain, skull, and scalp. Infants with this disorder are born without a forebrain (the front part of the brain) and a cerebrum (the thinking and coordinating part of the brain). The remaining brain tissue is often exposed--not covered by bone or skin. A baby born with anencephaly is usually blind, deaf, unconscious, and unable to feel pain. Although some individuals with anencephaly may be born with a rudimentary brain stem, the lack of a functioning cerebrum permanently rules out the possibility of ever gaining consciousness. Reflex actions such as breathing and responses to sound or touch may occur...

..If the infant is not stillborn, then he or she will usually die within a few hours or days after birth"
link (http://www.ninds.nih.gov/disorders/anencephaly/anencephaly.htm)

This is a particularly important point as it shows that personality and consciousness are dependant on the brain, ergo the development of the brain is the measuring point of 'personhood'.

So in other words, the foetus isn't a person. Therefore it has no rights.

The foetus has potential for life

While the first objection was medical in nature the second is philosophical.

Several people have offered eloquent rebuttals of the argument from potentiality but I'm going to let a dedicated medical ethics website put a stop to this line of inquiry:

There is another criterion that is normally taken to put the point of moral status at conception. This is the argument from potentiality. This argument goes as follows. It is wrong to kill a child. If you kill an embryo or fetus, at any stage, you are carrying out an act that will have the effect that the potential future child will not exist. You are in effect killing a potential child. This argument differs from the argument from human identity (above) in that it does not accord fetuses and embryos moral status for what they are but because of what they have the potential to become. According to the argument from human identity killing the fetus is wrong because you are killing something that has the right to live. According to the argument from potential, killing the fetus is wrong because it involves carrying out an act that will have the effect of preventing a future person from existing.

The argument from potentiality has two main problems. The first is that potential X's do not have the same rights as X's. A medical student (potential doctor) does not have the same rights as a doctor; nor a prince the same rights as a king. The second problem is that the argument is likely to prove too much. A single sperm about to be injected into an egg constitutes a potential person. But it seems absurd to object to the disposal of either the egg or the sperm on the grounds that they constitute a potential person. Furthermore each couple could give birth to many potential people. Contraception and sexual abstinence both prevent some of these potential persons from coming into existence. Are they therefore morally wrong?

Cloning raises new problems for the appeal to potentiality. Somatic cells, such as those that can be scraped from the inside of the cheek, have the potential to give rise to people through cloning. Such cells (indeed all somatic human cells) are potential people. It would be absurd to suggest that destroying such cells, and therefore destroying potential people, would be (a serious) wrong.
link (http://www.ethox.org.uk/education/teach/pregnancy/pregnancy1.htm)

There have also been several posters (although I can't find the quotes at the moment) who have pointed out that vast numbers of pregnancies fail naturally when the egg is rejected by the mother.

Need I say more?

The Bible says so

No it doesn't (with groveling apologies to the 'If abortion is a sin...' thread):

With all the religious controversy surrounding abortion, many people are surprised to learn that the Bible never mentions abortion at all. The very same Bible that candidly discusses sexual relations and having children does not forbid, allow, or require abortion. Read the Scripture in the original Hebrew. Read the New Testament in Greek or Aramaic. On abortion, the Bible is silent.

The first five books of the Bible have a great deal to say about sexuality and reproduction. For instance, Adam and Eve are expected to cling together, as though becoming one body (Genesis 2:24). In describing the first birth, the book of Genesis, though speaking euphemistically, wants us all to know that Adam and Eve actually had sex (Genesis 4:1)! In Egypt, Hebrew midwives report that the women of Israel recover quickly from their deliveries (Exodus 1). And the book of Leviticus (18) devotes many verses to its view of permissible intimate relations. This Jewish Bible that has so very much to say about sex is, nevertheless, totally silent about abortion.

If the Bible thought abortion was a sin, it would have named it a sin.
Some contend that the Bible approaches the subject of abortion in Exodus
(22) when two brawling men accidentally strike a pregnant woman. If the woman is injured, the inadvertent assailant gets punished, receiving the very same wound he caused the woman: an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. If the woman dies, then it is a life for a life and the man who caused the injury dies. But if the woman miscarries, then the assailant just pays a fine.

So, an injury caused to the woman is one thing. The injury to her fetus is not viewed the same way. This same biblical passage does not say that the fetus is a human being like the injured women or like you or me. If the fetus were considered human, the punishment for injuring the fetus would be the same punishment as that for injuring the pregnant woman.

The book of Exodus warns us to take care around a pregnant woman. Cause her to miscarry, it costs money. Cause her to die, and the penalty is death. The Bible extends a full measure of legal protection to a pregnant woman, a fullness of rights and protection that is not extended to the fetus.

But these verses simply discuss the fetus; they are not about abortion. They do not permit, proscribe, or prohibit abortion. They consider an accidental miscarriage but do not describe the willful termination of a pregnancy. And what if a woman wants to end her pregnancy? Let's say the fetus endangers her life or her physical or mental health. If she decides on abortion, the Bible is silent.

People who want to make abortion illegal may attempt to use the Bible to justify their arguments. However, nothing in the Hebrew Scriptures and nothing in the New Testament supports their attempts, regardless of the passages they cite or how hard they argue. Scripture does not consider the fetus to be a human being. The Bible does not consider the destruction of a fetus to be the equivalent of murder. If the Bible thought abortion was a sin, it would have named it a sin. Instead, when it comes to abortion, the Bible says not a word.

A stand against abortion cannot be substantiated by the Hebrew Bible, the New Testament, the 10 Commandments, or any other of the Bible's stories or statutes. When it comes to abortion, the Bible cannot be used to justify an anti-abortion position because the Bible is silent on the issue.

Different faiths reach differing, and sometimes conflicting, biblical interpretations and conclusions. In our America, a free, pluralistic, and strong country, we leave people to come to their own religious conclusions and let the people live as they decide.



Rabbi Dennis S. Ross is a member of the PPFA Clergy Advisory Board, a group made up of several religious leaders from various denominations. He is also director, Concerned Clergy for Choice, Family Planning Advocates of New York State.
link (http://www.plannedparenthood.com/pp2/portal/files/portal/webzine/artsculture/art-060224-bible-abortion.xml)

Pay particular attention to the identity of the author, this is a guy who knows more than a little about Biblical law.

Somebody countered this claim by saying: "But the OT condones slavery as well." In response:

1. That's irrelevant, the Bible never condemns abortion and so it cannot be used to support a ban.
2. The slavery laws are repealed by Jesus and the New Covenant, generally speaking Christians say that unless Jesus actually changed the law then the old law stands (which is why Christians still use the Ten Commandments). Jesus failed to rewrite this law and so apparently it still stands.

Conclusion

There is no logical or moral grounding for a ban on abortion. We have shown that abortion is not murder as the foetus isn't a person, we have shown that its potential for life doesn't give it a right to life, and we have shown that it can't even be opposed on religous grounds.

Please note that there are several very eloquent debaters supporting choice (Ashmoria, Free Soviets, The Nazz, and Sdaeriji to name but a few) who I haven't included in the quotes. This isn't because your arguments didn't work, I just couldn't find the quotes I wanted in the 55 pages of this thread. Nothing personal. :)

Does logic escape you? Regardless of what the bill says, if the embryo is a human person with all the rights thereof, it gets, you guessed it, all the rights thereof. The bill doesn't have to say, "So now we're going to have to investigate women who have miscarriages for possible manslaughter or ban birth control," for that to be the logical conclusion of it.

It's like saying, "Trees are human persons." The bill doesn't say, "So now you can't cut them down for your firewood," but that is the logical conclusion, since we don't burn human beings in our fireplaces.

It also specifically says in the bill that rights are given to the unborn child without specifying which ones. It absolutely does have the effect you predict.

Does logic escape you? Regardless of what the bill says, if the embryo is a human person with all the rights thereof, it gets, you guessed it, all the rights thereof. The bill doesn't have to say, "So now we're going to have to investigate women who have miscarriages for possible manslaughter or ban birth control," for that to be the logical conclusion of it.

It's like saying, "Trees are human persons." The bill doesn't say, "So now you can't cut them down for your firewood," but that is the logical conclusion, since we don't burn human beings in our fireplaces.

Your logic gets ahead of you. It is determined by the law when and how much rights you get, with age...

BTW, here is some of the report witness they claim:

The South Dakota Task Force to Study Abortion.
Dr. David Fu-Chi Mark, a distinguished molecular biologist who has patented certain
polymerase chain reaction technologies, provided a declaration (or affidavit) and explained that the new recombinant DNA technologies that have developed over the past twenty years provide scientific evidence about the unborn child's existence and early development and its ability to react to the environment and feel pain prior to birth.
Dr. Mark stated that:
"[U]ntil the development of molecular biology and modern molecular biological techniques first began in the 1970's and exploding throughout the 1980's and 1990's, most scientific knowledge concerning human identity and human development prior to birth was based solely upon gross morphological observations and biochemical studies....The new techniques developed through the exploding revolution over the past ten to eighteen years permits scientists to observe human existence and development at a molecular level, which is applicable in determining genetic uniqueness, genetic diseases and related information through the analysis of human genes well in advance of the old gross, anatomical observation." (Mark Declaration, P. 5, Par.6.)
Link (http://www.dakotavoice.com/Docs/South%20Dakota%20Abortion%20Task%20Force%20Report.pdf#search='South%20Dakota%20Task%20Force%20to%20S tudy%20Abortion') (WARNING 71 page .pdf file)

I've noticed that many of the folks that were jumping with glee over the near-fatal hunting accident involving our Vice President are the same folks that categorically reject any attempts to limit the scope of abortions. I guess it's funny when someone is shot, but not funny when a duly elected state legislature exercises its right to choose to restrain its citizenry in matters of public health. There are sure to be some parallels to be drawn between hunting and abortion. They may even help to close that great gender divide that I always hear pro-abortionists squawking about.

First, we who hunt in Georgia are only allowed to harvest animals during a particular season. Our deer season runs from the end of October until the middle of January. Let's establish an Abortion season. Maybe 6 months a year would be okay. We can run the season from January to July. Surely that can accomodate the pro and anti abortion positions.

Second, we need to implement a bag limit. Maybe three lifetime abortions? That would certainly help human conservation efforts, while still maintaining the population that will be required to beat back the hordes of Islamists from our shores. We want to prevent the same thing from happening here as has happened in Europe.

Third, we need to implement some sort of responsibility. As we have found out, a hunter that doesn't know what is in the line of fire may be subject to a citation for negigence. A similar provision should be made for women that can't explain their position on whether or not the object of their procedure is or is not a person.

Last, all hunters in Georgia take a safety class. Nothing less should be required of a woman about to have an abortion. The class would be shown films of a fetus at three months. This should test their confidence in the assertion that the fetus is "just a clump of cells". They should also be warned about the likelyhood of miscarriages that they may suffer after having an abortion. Finally, the women that complete the course should be given an orange cap and vest in order to warn men that their child may be aborted in they get one of these women pregnant.

Clearly, without some major compromise on both sides, no one will ever sucessfully decide this question to the satisfaction of either side. It has always been all or nothing. It doesn't need to be like that, though. Some simple rules that have served the conservation of animals should also be suited to serving the conservation of humans.

Your logic gets ahead of you. It is determined by the law when and how much rights you get, with age...

And if the law says, "This is a human being," it is saying, "This gets all the rights accorded to human beings." Thus, "A tree is a human," equates to, "You cannot cut down the tree and use it for firewood," because there are already laws in place about what rights a human being gets - and the right to not be killed and burned against your will is one of them.

BTW, here is some of the report witness they claim:

There isn't a single thing in that entire quote to suggest that a zygote/embryo is a human person. All it says is that all of the molecular tools to form a life are there. Well, duh, we already knew that. Of course, all of those tools are in my skin cells as well. The biological requirements for life are a bit more than "genetic uniqueness," not to mention that using "genetic uniqueness" as a determinant of life would mean that twins are one person and chimeras are at least two.

Your logic gets ahead of you. It is determined by the law when and how much rights you get, with age...

Um, at least she's employing logic. Life endows us with rights, not the law. The law abridges our rights. That's its function. In the absense of an age of consent there is no age of consent and the right applies to all people. In the absense of an age of consumption of alcohol a 16-year-old is allowed to drink. There doesn't have to be law endowing a person with rights. As such, a fetus under South Dakota law has the exact same rights as a 12-year-old.

I've noticed that many of the folks that were jumping with glee over the near-fatal hunting accident involving our Vice President are the same folks that categorically reject any attempts to limit the scope of abortions. I guess it's funny when someone is shot, but not funny when a duly elected state legislature exercises its right to choose to restrain its citizenry in matters of public health. There are sure to be some parallels to be drawn between hunting and abortion. They may even help to close that great gender divide that I always hear pro-abortionists squawking about.

First, we who hunt in Georgia are only allowed to harvest animals during a particular season. Our deer season runs from the end of October until the middle of January. Let's establish an Abortion season. Maybe 6 months a year would be okay. We can run the season from January to July. Surely that can accomodate the pro and anti abortion positions.

Second, we need to implement a bag limit. Maybe three lifetime abortions? That would certainly help human conservation efforts, while still maintaining the population that will be required to beat back the hordes of Islamists from our shores. We want to prevent the same thing from happening here as has happened in Europe.

Third, we need to implement some sort of responsibility. As we have found out, a hunter that doesn't know what is in the line of fire may be subject to a citation for negigence. A similar provision should be made for women that can't explain their position on whether or not the object of their procedure is or is not a person.

Last, all hunters in Georgia take a safety class. Nothing less should be required of a woman about to have an abortion. The class would be shown films of a fetus at three months. This should test their confidence in the assertion that the fetus is "just a clump of cells". They should also be warned about the likelyhood of miscarriages that they may suffer after having an abortion. Finally, the women that complete the course should be given an orange cap and vest in order to warn men that their child may be aborted in they get one of these women pregnant.

Clearly, without some major compromise on both sides, no one will ever sucessfully decide this question to the satisfaction of either side. It has always been all or nothing. It doesn't need to be like that, though. Some simple rules that have served the conservation of animals should also be suited to serving the conservation of humans.

There's so much stupidity and bigotry in this post I don't know where to start. :rolleyes:

I've noticed that many of the folks that were jumping with glee over the near-fatal hunting accident involving our Vice President are the same folks that categorically reject any attempts to limit the scope of abortions. I guess it's funny when someone is shot, but not funny when a duly elected state legislature exercises its right to choose to restrain its citizenry in matters of public health. There are sure to be some parallels to be drawn between hunting and abortion. They may even help to close that great gender divide that I always hear pro-abortionists squawking about.

I don't know anyone that is pro-abortion. Could you please point them out? I also don't know of anyone here who was jumping for glee over a near-fatal shooting. Could you please point them out? This isn't a limit to the scope of abortions. This is endowing a zygote with the same rights as a twelve-year-old.

The rest of your point isn't worth reading let alone replying to.

And if the law says, "This is a human being," it is saying, "This gets all the rights accorded to human beings." Thus, "A tree is a human," equates to, "You cannot cut down the tree and use it for firewood," because there are already laws in place about what rights a human being gets - and the right to not be killed and burned against your will is one of them.

They defined a new penalty for this ‘crime,’ they did not refer to previously existing homicide or even manslaughter laws. Thus, they do attempt to bestow a ‘new’ right, not grant a previously existing right on a new group.


There isn't a single thing in that entire quote to suggest that a zygote/embryo is a human person. All it says is that all of the molecular tools to form a life are there. Well, duh, we already knew that. Of course, all of those tools are in my skin cells as well. The biological requirements for life are a bit more than "genetic uniqueness," not to mention that using "genetic uniqueness" as a determinant of life would mean that twins are one person and chimeras are at least two.

Then the two of you must look and the same evidence and come to two different conclusion. It happens all the time, in every field.

There's so much stupidity and bigotry in this post I don't know where to start. :rolleyes:

I kind of stopped reading at the "hunters in Georgia part," since my experience with people who regularly hunt in Georgia has been with people whose idea of hunting "safely" is to sit up on a platform and get drunk while waiting for a deer to walk by so they can shoot it. Some use dogs, and then just leave them out there to die when they can't be immediately found. I've seen so many starving hunting dogs on the side of the road who won't come to any human beings other than their owner - who has abandoned them there. Every year, someone tries to push through a law stating that hunters who use dogs should have to register their animals so that abandoned animals can be tracked back to the hunter in question. Every year, lots of hunters show up at the Capitol to block said law. Doesn't sound like "hunters in Georgia" are exactly the model of what we should consider responsible to me.

They defined a new penalty for this ‘crime,’ they did not refer to previously existing homicide or even manslaughter laws. Thus, they do attempt to bestow a ‘new’ right, not grant a previously existing right on a new group.

In that case, the law fails on its face, because, if the embryo/zygote really is a human being, it is covered by the 14th Amendment. Killing it can legally be no different than killing a born child. Thus, the zygote/embryo/fetus is either not actually a human being, or the law is unconstitutional as per the 14th amendment.

Then the two of you must look and the same evidence and come to two different conclusion. It happens all the time, in every field.

There was no conclusion stated about abortion. All he said was, "We can look at genetic uniqueness." He's right, we can. That particular quote didn't take it to the, "Therefore life begins at conception," point - that was something the legislators of SD were apparently tacking on. Of course, we already have requirements for life in biology, and "genetic uniqueness" doesn't cut it. Thus, anything the guy says to that effect is not scientific.

In that case, the law fails on its face, because, if the embryo/zygote really is a human being, it is covered by the 14th Amendment. Killing it can legally be no different than killing a born child. Thus, the zygote/embryo/fetus is either not actually a human being, or the law is unconstitutional as per the 14th amendment.



There was no conclusion stated about abortion. All he said was, "We can look at genetic uniqueness." He's right, we can. That particular quote didn't take it to the, "Therefore life begins at conception," point - that was something the legislators of SD were apparently tacking on. Of course, we already have requirements for life in biology, and "genetic uniqueness" doesn't cut it. Thus, anything the guy says to that effect is not scientific.

Yes, that's a good point, and the mother must be complicit if she consented and thus it's also a brand of inequality. No other 'person' can be killed and the request of someone and that someone not go to prison. It's looks like they don't even believe their own brand of bullshit.

They defined a new penalty for this ‘crime,’ they did not refer to previously existing homicide or even manslaughter laws. Thus, they do attempt to bestow a ‘new’ right, not grant a previously existing right on a new group.



Then the two of you must look and the same evidence and come to two different conclusion. It happens all the time, in every field.

You don't get it. There are requirements for life and he is talking about a requirement that does not exist. He doesn't even mention the biological requirements for life, ALL life, and he doesn't mention the medical requirements for life, viable brain function, either. He simply makes up a definition for life that leads to a spurious conclusion as his definition is based on no observable or testable science nor any previous scientific tenets.

No it doesn't matter and your free to respond to anything I do infact post but you have to make sure its in context otherwise your completely twisting someone elses words and it makes you look bad.



There is a general set of characteristics used to describe what a human being is and a fetus does not meet them. If anything your description of what a human being is seems to be overly simplified and doesn't take into account numerous factors. To just say a human is something that can reproduce another human at some point in time is very basic, doesn't take into account other factors, and due to the reproduce at some time in the future clause instead of just can reproduce you can include a fetus.


So if a baby is born sterile is it not a human? If I suddenly at some point lose my ability to reproduce am I no longer a human being because at some point in the future I can no longer produce another human being?


One arguement for abortion is that the fetus is not a human/person yet so they don't have the right to life. Its not the only arguement I espouse but thats the one I have been using right now. Definition wise I think there are two categories to look at. You have the biological and psychological bases for being human.

Biologically, humans are classified as the species Homo sapiens (Latin for "wise man"): a bipedal primate of the superfamily Hominoidea, together with the other apes—chimpanzees, gorillas, orangutans, and gibbons.

Humans have an erect body carriage that frees their upper limbs for manipulating objects, and a highly developed brain capable of abstract reasoning, speech, language, and introspection.-Wikipedia

and I think Oxford has a pretty good definition of it as well.

Human
A. adj.

1. Of, belonging to, or characteristic of mankind, distinguished from animals by superior mental development, power of articulate speech, and upright posture.

Both those definitions would exclude cripples and the mentally challenged from being humans, I was making an attempt at describing what a human is without excluding persons whom we would certainly consider human, I agree that my definition is fairly poor, however youre no closer.

Both those definitions would exclude cripples and the mentally challenged from being humans, I was making an attempt at describing what a human is without excluding persons whom we would certainly consider human, I agree that my definition is fairly poor, however youre no closer.

Well I think that may be because both definitions mix the biological and psychological aspects of being a human and being a human being together. If we simply look in biological terms a human being is

Homo sapiens (Latin for "wise man"): a bipedal primate of the superfamily Hominoidea, together with the other apes—chimpanzees, gorillas, orangutans, and gibbons.

Now the psychological apsect is much more complex then that and as you brought up gets into plenty of issues involving mentally handicaped or even babies.

Well I think that may be because both definitions mix the biological and psychological aspects of being a human and being a human being together. If we simply look in biological terms a human being is

Homo sapiens (Latin for "wise man"): a bipedal primate of the superfamily Hominoidea, together with the other apes—chimpanzees, gorillas, orangutans, and gibbons.

Now the psychological apsect is much more complex then that and as you brought up gets into plenty of issues involving mentally handicaped or even babies.

In that sense then once a fetus has two legs it counts as human, I could live with that, however from your definitions I liked the portion "1. Of, belonging to, or characteristic of mankind,[...]". My point here is, as youve alluded to, is that impossible to characterize humans by brain capability.

In that sense then once a fetus has two legs it counts as human, I could live with that, however from your definitions I liked the portion "1. Of, belonging to, or characteristic of mankind,[...]". My point here is, as youve alluded to, is that impossible to characterize humans by brain capability.

Not really. We do characterize humans by brain capability. A brain-dead person - one who has lost brain activity - is considered to be dead. A person who has lost all higher order brain function is considered to be in a "persistent vegetative state" and her caretakers can decide to let her body die.

When someone mentions the mental capacity of an embryo/early fetus, they aren't talking about a comparison to the mentally handicapped. A more apt comparison would either be to a bacteria or a brain-dead person.

In that sense then once a fetus has two legs it counts as human, I could live with that, however from your definitions I liked the portion "1. Of, belonging to, or characteristic of mankind,[...]". My point here is, as youve alluded to, is that impossible to characterize humans by brain capability.

Actually, bipedal means the species not the individual.

Meanwhile, it doesn't matter. One requirement to be consider any kind of animal is meeting the biological definition of life and the embryo does not meet it.

As far as brain function, there is already an association between brain function and life. I assured you that if you had the same level of brain function as an embryo or early fetus you would absolutely be considered dead. Embryos are not considered dead, obviously, because life is a requirement for death and they have not yet met the requirements for life.

Not really. We do characterize humans by brain capability. A brain-dead person - one who has lost brain activity - is considered to be dead. A person who has lost all higher order brain function is considered to be in a "persistent vegetative state" and her caretakers can decide to let her body die. Does that mean they're not human? No. They are still human, even if they're dead. Same with emryos and fetuses.
When someone mentions the mental capacity of an embryo/early fetus, they aren't talking about a comparison to the mentally handicapped. A more apt comparison would either be to a bacteria or a brain-dead person.Same argument with the brain-dead person. They're still a person, whether they look like a useless blob of slime or a severely handicapped person.
It' not fair to judge something based on their mental capacity or overall functioning ability- how about trees? Are you gonna say a tree isn't really a tree if its trunk isn't functional? It just doesn't make sense.

For clarification I meant both the handicapped and fetuses when I said "they" at the beginning of my second argument

Does that mean they're not human? No. They are still human, even if they're dead. Same with emryos and fetuses.

They are human in much the same way that my excrement is human - they contain human DNA. But they are not human persons, which is what really matters in this discussion.

Same argument with the brain-dead person. They're still a person, whether they look like a useless blob of slime or a severely handicapped person.

No, they aren't. A person who is brain-dead is dead. Period. They cease being a person and become a dead body.

It' not fair to judge something based on their mental capacity or overall functioning ability- how about trees? Are you gonna say a tree isn't really a tree if its trunk isn't functional? It just doesn't make sense.

Yes, if it has a non-functional trunk, it will be dead, and thus no longer a living tree.

Do you think a dead person has the right to vote? To make medical decisions? To own property? Once a person is dead (ie. non-functional), we cease to afford them the rights of human beings. Why then should we afford those rights to something that is not yet functional?

They are human in much the same way that my excrement is human - they contain human DNA. But they are not human persons, which is what really matters in this discussion.
I didn't say anything about DNA. No your excrement is not human. Fetuses are the prodcut of reproduction, not waste. That's the difference- that's what makes them human.
No, they aren't. A person who is brain-dead is dead. Period. They cease being a person and become a dead body.
My point and question was, are they human? Just because they don't function, whether they are dead or alive, are they human? The answer is yes.
You could call them human remains if you want to, but that doesn't make a difference.
Yes, if it has a non-functional trunk, it will be dead, and thus no longer a living tree.Key words: will be dead. Still alive though. Even after it dies, however, would it still be a tree? Yes; a non-functioning tree is what it would be. But still a tree. In the same way, a non-functioning (even not deleloped) brain in a fetus does not make the fetus not human. It's simply a soon-to-be-functioning human.
Do you think a dead person has the right to vote? To make medical decisions? To own property? Once a person is dead (ie. non-functional), we cease to afford them the rights of human beings. Why then should we afford those rights to something that is not yet functional?I think you can guess my response to this one. My answer is no, obviously, to all the yes/no questions. To the last question, I would say your comparison isn't quite worthwhile for you- as I showed above it doesn't really help your case much.

My point and question was, are they human? Just because they don't function, whether they are dead or alive, are they human? The answer is yes.
You could call them human remains if you want to, but that doesn't make a difference.
You keep on switching between the issues of whether something is human or not, and whether it is a human or not. There is, if we accept your arguments about what is human, a difference.
Key words: will be dead. Still alive though. Evn after it dies, however, would it still be a tree? Yes; a non-functioning tree is what it would be. But still a tree. In the same way, a non-functioning (even not deleloped) brain in a fetus does not make the fetus not human. It's simply a soon-to-be-functioning human.
Sure, it is a soon-to-be-functioning human. That does not make it a person, in the same way that a non-functioning tree is not regarded in the same way as a functioning tree. Only a functioning human is a person.

I didn't say anything about DNA. No your excrement is not human.

Of course it is. It simply isn't *a* human. (Meanwhile, human DNA is the only thing that can be said to make an embryo human, in any sense).

Fetuses are the prodcut of reproduction, not waste. That's the difference- that's what makes them human.

Cancer is the product of cell reproduction. And it is human. But is isn't *a* human.

My point and question was, are they human?

That question is useless. My fingernails are human. My heart is human. My liver is human. None of them are a human person, and thus none of them have rights.

Just because they don't function, whether they are dead or alive, are they human? The answer is yes.

But they are not a human person unless they are alive and functioning.

Key words: will be dead. Still alive though.

Wrong. If it has a non-functioning trunk, it is *already* dead.

Even after it dies, however, would it still be a tree? Yes; a non-functioning tree is what it would be. But still a tree. In the same way, a non-functioning (even not deleloped) brain in a fetus does not make the fetus not human. It's simply a soon-to-be-functioning human.

You need to drop the strawman. I never said it wasn't human. I said it isn't a human person. There is a rather large difference there.

I think you can guess my response to this one. My answer is no, obviously, to all the yes/no questions. To the last question, I would say your comparison isn't quite worthwhile for you- as I showed above it doesn't really help your case much.

Actually, it absolutely does. If a brain-dead person does not get all of these rights, there is no reason that a zygote/embryo/early fetus should be afforded them either. If you will not give a dead person rights, then there is no reason to give them to an entity with all the capability of a dead person.

Does that mean they're not human? No. They are still human, even if they're dead. Same with emryos and fetuses.
Same argument with the brain-dead person. They're still a person, whether they look like a useless blob of slime or a severely handicapped person.
It' not fair to judge something based on their mental capacity or overall functioning ability- how about trees? Are you gonna say a tree isn't really a tree if its trunk isn't functional? It just doesn't make sense.

According to law you are still considered a person after you die (which is why certain rights still apply like the right to privacy and contractual obligations to you/your estate, it's complicated by your personhood is not revoked only amended), but you have to die. You are not considered a person before you live. It's that simple.

You fail to see that if you consider personhood based on potential then all birth control should be illegal as well as turning someone down for sex since it has the potential to result in a child.

No, they aren't. A person who is brain-dead is dead. Period. They cease being a person and become a dead body.
Actually, some levels are personhood are still considered. Someone cannot have sex with your body. Your body cannot be used for science without your permission or the permission of a surrogate. Your estate is handled by your direction. Contractual obligations must still be met by you and to you (in the form of your estate). You can still be slandered. If you look it up in legal circles it requires you to have at one point been alive, however. A one-day old infant who dies can have an estate but a stillborn cannot.

Actually, some levels are personhood are still considered. Someone cannot have sex with your body. Your body cannot be used for science without your permission or the permission of a surrogate. Your estate is handled by your direction. Contractual obligations must still be met by you and to you (in the form of your estate). You can still be slandered. If you look it up in legal circles it requires you to have at one point been alive, however. A one-day old infant who dies can have an estate but a stillborn cannot.

Most of those are not really considerations of the deceased, but of the deceased's family (or, in the case of necrophilia - public health). The contractual obligations are made before you die - with the unwritten understanding that the responsibilities (well, it depends on the exact contract, but generally) therein will pass to your next-of-kin. It isn't that "levels of personhood" are ascribed to a dead body so much as the fact that the rights of the *living* must be taken into account - and a dead person has left a legacy of sorts.

The point remains, however, that a dead person is not a human person with all the rights therein. Dead people can't vote. They have no say in what is done to their bodies (although they may have had a say before death). They do not decide whether or not to remove life support (in the case of brain death), and so on....

In that case, the law fails on its face, because, if the embryo/zygote really is a human being, it is covered by the 14th Amendment. Killing it can legally be no different than killing a born child. Thus, the zygote/embryo/fetus is either not actually a human being, or the law is unconstitutional as per the 14th amendment.

Sure there are differences. There is manslaughter, there is unintentional manslaughter, there is pre-meditated murder, there is legal Euthanasia, there is the starvation of brain dead bodies. There are lots of ways of dying and or being killed that the law recognizes differently. Abortion, legal or otherwise, simply being yet another one.

...
There was no conclusion stated about abortion. All he said was, "We can look at genetic uniqueness." He's right, we can. That particular quote didn't take it to the, "Therefore life begins at conception," point - that was something the legislators of SD were apparently tacking on. Of course, we already have requirements for life in biology, and "genetic uniqueness" doesn't cut it. Thus, anything the guy says to that effect is not scientific.

From another page of the report:
There can no longer be any doubt that each human being is totally unique from the very beginning of his or her life at fertilization. (Mark, P. 19-21.)

The significance of methylation of cytosine was unknown until 1985. It has a profound significance in understanding the wholeness or completeness of a human being immediately following conception. Cytosine is one of the four base components of DNA. Methylation of cytosine, just as other methods of gene regulation, is a natural method by which genetic information is periodically silenced or activated for purposes of human development.
Understanding how the genetic information contained in each human being's DNA is activated and how that information is programmed for life is essential to understanding that the human being is whole and complete at fertilization.

A human being at an embryonic age and that human being at an adult age are naturally the same, the biological differences are due only to the differences in maturity. Changes in methylation of cytosine demonstrate that the human being is fully programmed for human growth and development for his or her entire life at the one cell age. (Mark, P. 21-25.)
Page 25 (http://www.dakotavoice.com/Docs/South%20Dakota%20Abortion%20Task%20Force%20Report.pdf#search='South%20Dakota%20Task%20Force%20to%20S tudy%20Abortion') (WARNING 71 page .pdf file)

Sure there are differences. There is manslaughter, there is unintentional manslaughter, there is pre-meditated murder, there is legal Euthanasia, there is the starvation of brain dead bodies. There are lots of ways of dying and or being killed that the law recognizes differently. Abortion, legal or otherwise, simply being yet another one.



There can no longer be any doubt that each human being is totally unique from the very beginning of his or her life at fertilization. (Mark, P. 19-21.)

The significance of methylation of cytosine was unknown until 1985. It has a profound significance in understanding the wholeness or completeness of a human being immediately following conception. Cytosine is one of the four base components of DNA. Methylation of cytosine, just as other methods of gene regulation, is a natural method by which genetic information is periodically silenced or activated for purposes of human development.
Understanding how the genetic information contained in each human being's DNA is activated and how that information is programmed for life is essential to understanding that the human being is whole and complete at fertilization.

A human being at an embryonic age and that human being at an adult age are naturally the same, the biological differences are due only to the differences in maturity. Changes in methylation of cytosine demonstrate that the human being is fully programmed for human growth and development for his or her entire life at the one cell age. (Mark, P. 21-25.)
Page 25 (http://www.dakotavoice.com/Docs/South%20Dakota%20Abortion%20Task%20Force%20Report.pdf#search='South%20Dakota%20Task%20Force%20to%20S tudy%20Abortion') (WARNING 71 page .pdf file)

The person you are quoting obviously does not understand the biological requirements for life nor the medical requirements. Glad you pointed that out. Now I can fully dismiss him as ignorant of basic science.

Most of those are not really considerations of the deceased, but of the deceased's family (or, in the case of necrophilia - public health). The contractual obligations are made before you die - with the unwritten understanding that the responsibilities (well, it depends on the exact contract, but generally) therein will pass to your next-of-kin. It isn't that "levels of personhood" are ascribed to a dead body so much as the fact that the rights of the *living* must be taken into account - and a dead person has left a legacy of sorts.

The point remains, however, that a dead person is not a human person with all the rights therein. Dead people can't vote. They have no say in what is done to their bodies (although they may have had a say before death). They do not decide whether or not to remove life support (in the case of brain death), and so on....

These are the same rights that are denied you when you are comatose. However, you cannot do whatever you like with the body, not even the family can. I can state my wishes before death, or before I lose consciousness, and they have equal weight. Death is almost a side matter. The understanding however is that once I am dead that the rights that are denied me due to unconsciousness will never be restored.

Sure there are differences. There is manslaughter, there is unintentional manslaughter, there is pre-meditated murder, there is legal Euthanasia, there is the starvation of brain dead bodies. There are lots of ways of dying and or being killed that the law recognizes differently. Abortion, legal or otherwise, simply being yet another one.

But those are applied equally to all human persons. If I took a born human person and performed an abortion-type procedure on them (as a for instance, the procedure involved in a D&X, or a curretage abortion, etc.), would it be treated this way? In other words, if I caused the same bodily damage to a born human being as is caused to a fetus during abortion, would I get the light sentence advocated in the bill?

*snip*

Once again, an entirely unscientific argument. All of those things are present in cancer too, but we don't consider it a life, now do we? It simply isn't enough to say, "IT'S GOT TEH DNA AND METHYLATION! THEREFORE IT IS TEH HUMAN BEING!"


These are the same rights that are denied you when you are comatose.

They aren't really denied to you, anymore than the right to run is denied to a paraplegic. You are simply incapable of taking advantage of them - hence the reason that a comotose person cannot be taken off a feeding tube or something of that sort, no matter what the family says. No one can deny you those rights.

However, if you are, instead, brain-dead or in a persistent vegetative state, those decisions can be made by your caretaker, unless you, as a live person, made a contract for the eventuality of your death. The contract that binds them was made with a live human being, not with a dead one.

They aren't really denied to you, anymore than the right to run is denied to a paraplegic. You are simply incapable of taking advantage of them - hence the reason that a comotose person cannot be taken off a feeding tube or something of that sort, no matter what the family says. No one can deny you those rights.

However, if you are, instead, brain-dead or in a persistent vegetative state, those decisions can be made by your caretaker, unless you, as a live person, made a contract for the eventuality of your death. The contract that binds them was made with a live human being, not with a dead one.

You mentioned them and I was point out they are equally denied anyone who has the inability to excercise those rights. The point is that legally personhood does not really end with death. Legally a person is defined as anyone who was ever alive. However, legally the dead have different rights than the living. The other difference being that others excercise those rights for you when you are unable to excercise them for yourself.

Because what you think I said I didn't say.... you have no idea what you're talking about.

Sorry, my friend... but I am bored with:

The fact that you never actually address any points;

The fact that you have yet to provide any evidence for any of your claims;

The fact that you constantly ignore what I write, in favour of what you WISH I'd written;

The short one-liners that don't appear to have been thought through;

The refusal to accept that others might have different opinions;

The fact that you just, REALLY are not trying.


So. I'm done. If you ever get your act together, bring something to the table, and actually TRY to 'debate', I might bother responding... but for the moment, this is what you get.

And, I notice I'm not the only person who feels this way, so I don't think it's just me.

No, it's not.

That's the thing about debate: you actually have to show that the rights are taken away. Odd that no one has been able to, if, as has been said, they can be.

As I stated, until you actually start carrying YOUR side of the debate, you'll get nothing from me.

I'm tired of typing half a page of explanation to get some nonsensical one-liner.

Sure there are differences. There is manslaughter, there is unintentional manslaughter, there is pre-meditated murder, there is legal Euthanasia, there is the starvation of brain dead bodies. There are lots of ways of dying and or being killed that the law recognizes differently. Abortion, legal or otherwise, simply being yet another one.

Can you reference for me a kind of killing where we do not hold the person who requested the killing responsible? If the fetus is a person then why is the mother not guilty of conspiracy to commit murder?

No I didn't lie because premarital sex is bad.

Perhaps you just aren't doing it right.

If certain young ladies are to be believed, when I did premarital sex, it was pretty damn good.

Of course it is. It simply isn't *a* human. (Meanwhile, human DNA is the only thing that can be said to make an embryo human, in any sense).
What do you mean it's the only thing? What about what a fetus looks like 9 months after starting out as a little blob? What about what happens during those 9 months? The circulatory system becomes active, perhaps some of the nervous system becomes active, and even the brain (however little the activities might be) becomes active. DNA just isn't the only way to define *a* human being.
Cancer is the product of cell reproduction. And it is human. But is isn't *a* human.
Cancer is a disase and the cells growing too fast are not human. They're part of *a* human. Also, cancer is not reproduction of a being. And guess what a fetus is.
That question is useless. My fingernails are human. My heart is human. My liver is human. None of them are a human person, and thus none of them have rights.
The parts of your body are part of *a* human person. Your heart is a human heart and your liver a human liver, but they are niether human nor *a* human. I would agree when you say they have no rights.
But they are not a human person unless they are alive and functioning.
Well, I think fetuses function just fine. Their cells actively reproduce themselves and differentiate into the various structures of the human body. I think that makes them alive as well.
Wrong. If it has a non-functioning trunk, it is *already* dead.
Fine. Let's call it dead. Still a tree though.
You need to drop the strawman. I never said it wasn't human. I said it isn't a human person. There is a rather large difference there.

All right, fine. There's a difference. But I don't see what was wrong with my example if it's related, which it is.
Actually, it absolutely does. If a brain-dead person does not get all of these rights, there is no reason that a zygote/embryo/early fetus should be afforded them either. If you will not give a dead person rights, then there is no reason to give them to an entity with all the capability of a dead person.
There's an enormous reason why that would make a difference. Some rights, as was mentioned before, still apply to dead bodies. But the ones you originally mentioned (property, whatever) could never matter to them. It would almost be comical (not really) to give them those rights just because they'd do nothing with them. But to take the life of a fetus is to not only mutilate their right to life, but to also take and shred all other rights they would receive after leaving the womb. Whether they know it or not you deprive them of the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, which, if I remember right, has a little something to do with the constitution.

Perhaps you just aren't doing it right.

If certain young ladies are to be believed, when I did premarital sex, it was pretty damn good.
He's just frustrated he can't get any and is venting his anger here;)

But those are applied equally to all human persons. If I took a born human person and performed an abortion-type procedure on them (as a for instance, the procedure involved in a D&X, or a curretage abortion, etc.), would it be treated this way? In other words, if I caused the same bodily damage to a born human being as is caused to a fetus during abortion, would I get the light sentence advocated in the bill?

No, they are not applied equally. If you tried to starve and dehydrate a non-brain dead person you would be charged with murder. If you prescribed medication to euthanasize a person that didn't meet the Oregon legal requirements (where it is currently legal), you would be held for murder. Circumstances determine the results, the parameters of a legal scenario do not determine all outcomes.

Once again, an entirely unscientific argument. All of those things are present in cancer too, but we don't consider it a life, now do we? It simply isn't enough to say, "IT'S GOT TEH DNA AND METHYLATION! THEREFORE IT IS TEH HUMAN BEING!" ...

Despite the fact that you don't agree with the conclusion quoted, you know as well as everyone else does that human excrement (an example of yours in an earlier post I was quite frankly disappointed to see you try and make) and a cancer cell in a human organ, are not in anyway 'building' a human entity. It's a silly objection to raise because it's irrelevant that they too might have some trace DNA elements in them.

Introduction

I'm going to use this post to bring together the key arguments made by various people over the course of the debate to prove that pro-choice is the only logical position. I will attempt to justify each stage of argument using links to impartial websites.

The three most common pro-life arguments have been:

1. The foetus is a person.
2. The foetus has potential for life.
3. The Bible says so.

The Foetus is a person

Simply not true.

1. Personhood requires consciousness.
2. Consciousness requires a working brain and synapses.
3. A foetus has no Thalamic brain connections until about week 27 (at the earlist), and the brain doesn't function properly until most of the way into the third trimester.
4. Therefore a foetus is not a person until that point.

Evidence:


link (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fetal_development#Fetal_Development)

So we now know that the foetus isn't a person until around the 29th week of pregnancy. The Cat-Tribes posted a link showing that 90% of abortions are carried out before the first fourteen weeks:



So clearly it is not a 'person' who is being terminated except where exceptions are made for the mother's health.

Grave n idle struck the finishing blow to this particular line of argument with this source:


link (http://www.ninds.nih.gov/disorders/anencephaly/anencephaly.htm)

This is a particularly important point as it shows that personality and consciousness are dependant on the brain, ergo the development of the brain is the measuring point of 'personhood'.

So in other words, the foetus isn't a person. Therefore it has no rights.

The foetus has potential for life

While the first objection was medical in nature the second is philosophical.

Several people have offered eloquent rebuttals of the argument from potentiality but I'm going to let a dedicated medical ethics website put a stop to this line of inquiry:


link (http://www.ethox.org.uk/education/teach/pregnancy/pregnancy1.htm)

There have also been several posters (although I can't find the quotes at the moment) who have pointed out that vast numbers of pregnancies fail naturally when the egg is rejected by the mother.

Need I say more?

The Bible says so

No it doesn't (with groveling apologies to the 'If abortion is a sin...' thread):


link (http://www.plannedparenthood.com/pp2/portal/files/portal/webzine/artsculture/art-060224-bible-abortion.xml)

Pay particular attention to the identity of the author, this is a guy who knows more than a little about Biblical law.

Somebody countered this claim by saying: "But the OT condones slavery as well." In response:

1. That's irrelevant, the Bible never condemns abortion and so it cannot be used to support a ban.
2. The slavery laws are repealed by Jesus and the New Covenant, generally speaking Christians say that unless Jesus actually changed the law then the old law stands (which is why Christians still use the Ten Commandments). Jesus failed to rewrite this law and so apparently it still stands.

Conclusion

There is no logical or moral grounding for a ban on abortion. We have shown that abortion is not murder as the foetus isn't a person, we have shown that its potential for life doesn't give it a right to life, and we have shown that it can't even be opposed on religous grounds.

Please note that there are several very eloquent debaters supporting choice (Ashmoria, Free Soviets, The Nazz, and Sdaeriji to name but a few) who I haven't included in the quotes. This isn't because your arguments didn't work, I just couldn't find the quotes I wanted in the 55 pages of this thread. Nothing personal. :)

I thought this an excellent piece of work, and WORTH repeating in it's entirety, in order to show how strongly I support your efforts.

A human being at an embryonic age and that human being at an adult age are naturally the same, the biological differences are due only to the differences in maturity.

I wonder if the originator of this document realises what he or she has done?

They have claimed that maturity is effectively unimportant... that a thing which will be the 'law' for an entity in it's 'mature' state, should, in law, be equal to the 'law' for the same entity in it's 'less mature' state.

I wonder if anyone reviewing the document has yet realised, this legitimizes paedophilia....?

Cancer is a disase and the cells growing too fast are not human. They're part of *a* human. Also, cancer is not reproduction of a being. And guess what a fetus is.


Wrong. The cells growing too fast ARE human. It's ridiculous to assume they are anything else. If they aren't human, where did they come from?

They are 'human', but a cancer is not 'A human'. And hence, the abortion debate... because, simply being 'human' isn't enough.... you'd have to prove a foetus to be 'A human', before any agreement could be made on what 'rights' if any, it should have.


The parts of your body are part of *a* human person. Your heart is a human heart and your liver a human liver, but they are niether human nor *a* human. I would agree when you say they have no rights.


Actually... your heart could be a pig's heart... the biology is functionally close. However, in general, the average person is going to have a 'human' heart.... the tissue IS 'human'... but, again... not 'A human'.


Well, I think fetuses function just fine. Their cells actively reproduce themselves and differentiate into the various structures of the human body. I think that makes them alive as well.


You can think that... and, I would agree... the foetus is both 'alive' AND 'human'. However, it is not 'A human'... and THAT is the crux of the debate.


Whether they know it or not you deprive them of the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, which, if I remember right, has a little something to do with the constitution.

Actually.. if you look at the constitution... it says very little about the 'rights' allowed to entities that are NOT people. It's a little specific like that.

What do you mean it's the only thing? What about what a fetus looks like 9 months after starting out as a little blob? What about what happens during those 9 months? The circulatory system becomes active, perhaps some of the nervous system becomes active, and even the brain (however little the activities might be) becomes active. DNA just isn't the only way to define *a* human being.

No, DNA isn't the only way to define a human being, but it is the only human characteristic that a fertilized egg has.

Meanwhile, what an embryo *will* be is irrelevant to what it *is*. I will one day be an elderly person (barring any untimely death). Does that mean I am an elderly person and can get social security?

Cancer is a disase and the cells growing too fast are not human.

Of course they are human. They just aren't *a* human.

They're part of *a* human.

They would have to be human to be part of a human.

Also, cancer is not reproduction of a being. And guess what a fetus is.

So?

The parts of your body are part of *a* human person. Your heart is a human heart and your liver a human liver, but they are niether human nor *a* human. I would agree when you say they have no rights.

You are contradicting yourself. For something to be a "human liver", it must be human. It simply isn't *a* human. An embryo has no more (actually even less) characteristics of a human than my liver, however.

Well, I think fetuses function just fine. Their cells actively reproduce themselves and differentiate into the various structures of the human body. I think that makes them alive as well.

So we should all bow to your definition of life instead of going by the one defined by biology such that it applies to all living things?

There's an enormous reason why that would make a difference. Some rights, as was mentioned before, still apply to dead bodies. But the ones you originally mentioned (property, whatever) could never matter to them. It would almost be comical (not really) to give them those rights just because they'd do nothing with them. But to take the life of a fetus is to not only mutilate their right to life, but to also take and shred all other rights they would receive after leaving the womb. Whether they know it or not you deprive them of the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, which, if I remember right, has a little something to do with the constitution.

(a) Only live human persons have actual rights. The "rights" applied to a dead person and their family are applied to the person that was alive, not to the body.

(b) There is nothing at all in the Constitution about the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Sorry.

No, they are not applied equally.

If they aren't, it is a violation of the 14th Amendment.

If you tried to starve and dehydrate a non-brain dead person you would be charged with murder.

A brain-dead person is already dead.

If you prescribed medication to euthanasize a person that didn't meet the Oregon legal requirements (where it is currently legal), you would be held for murder.

...no matter who you did it to or who you were.

Despite the fact that you don't agree with the conclusion quoted, you know as well as everyone else does that human excrement (an example of yours in an earlier post I was quite frankly disappointed to see you try and make) and a cancer cell in a human organ, are not in anyway 'building' a human entity.

Argument from potential. I will be an old person one day, does that mean I can currently get social security?

Meanwhile, it has nothing to do with whether or not I agree with the conclusion. The conclusion itself is completely and entirely illogical. It is, "This has all the DNA it takes to be a human one day, therefore it is a human now. Never mind that every single human cell has all the DNA it takes to create an entire human being."

[quote

They have [i]ALL of the DNA elements in them. There are living cells in human excrement and cancer. They contain all the same genetic information as an embryo.

Wrong. The cells growing too fast ARE human. It's ridiculous to assume they are anything else. If they aren't human, where did they come from?
You completely missed what I said, which was that they are part of a human, not a human.
They are 'human', but a cancer is not 'A human'. And hence, the abortion debate... because, simply being 'human' isn't enough.... you'd have to prove a foetus to be 'A human', before any agreement could be made on what 'rights' if any, it should have.
I didn't say cancer was a human. Don't put words in my mouth. And, using your definition of being "human," I fully agree that that is not enough to make abortion matter morally. And it seems you have completely ignored all the arguments I did have for fetuses being a human person. So thanks for that. Except not.
Actually... your heart could be a pig's heart... the biology is functionally close. However, in general, the average person is going to have a 'human' heart.... the tissue IS 'human'... but, again... not 'A human'.That's exactly what I said- it's not a human person. I would agree the tissue is human tissue, but not "human" (unless you consider those two words to be exact synonyms, in which case I would agree). Either way, I never said they were a human person. Don't put words in my mouth.
You can think that... and, I would agree... the foetus is both 'alive' AND 'human'. However, it is not 'A human'... and THAT is the crux of the debate.
Indeed it is. If only you would read the arguments I've given specifically about that.
Actually.. if you look at the constitution... it says very little about the 'rights' allowed to entities that are NOT people. It's a little specific like that.
Again, look at my arguments about why they're people. That "very little" part of the constitution does apply to the unborn.

I just realized the life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness phrase is in the Declaration of Independence. My apologies

You completely missed what I said, which was that they are part of a human, not a human.


Actually - let us look at what you did say?


"Cancer is a disase and the cells growing too fast are not human"


I didn't 'miss' anything. You said they were not human.


I didn't say cancer was a human. Don't put words in my mouth. And, using your definition of being "human," I fully agree that that is not enough to make abortion matter morally. And it seems you have completely ignored all the arguments I did have for fetuses being a human person. So thanks for that. Except not.


I'm not putting words into your mouth, I am pointing out that being 'human' (i.e. being material of the human design) is not the equivalent of being A human (that is, one of the creatures of the kind we would normally term 'people').

You take offense to my apparently not paying enough attention to your posts about why a foetus is a person?

Let me just point out two things...

1) We are 800+ posts into this thread so far... you, yourself, have replied to relatively few of the posts I have made, all throughout the thread.

2) I can honestly not tell you if I've read your arguments. I haven't made a point of responding to your posts, previously. However, throughout the thread, I have shown several very good reasons why a foetus is NOT automatically a person.... If you want a quick recap of the debate so far, in brief... try reading Post #826.


That's exactly what I said- it's not a human person. I would agree the tissue is human tissue, but not "human" (unless you consider those two words to be exact synonyms, in which case I would agree). Either way, I never said they were a human person. Don't put words in my mouth.


I consider 'human' to be a term that describes things 'of' humans. I consider 'A human to be an entity of the human type.

If you look at what I was responding to, I am not 'putting words in your mouth', I am quibbling the definitions you made.

Let's look (again) at exactly what you wrote:


but they are niether human nor *a* human


Again... you deny a thing as 'human'. I quibble. I AGREE that a heart is not 'A human'... but my heart (for example) IS a 'human heart'.


Indeed it is. If only you would read the arguments I've given specifically about that.


And, if you would only read mine.

Rather than bitching about how I haven't addressed your points, how about either linking to them or restating them?


Again, look at my arguments about why they're people. That "very little" part of the constitution does apply to the unborn.

Show me. I'm looking for language here that describes the rights of the unborn.

Dang it I hate bad timing. I'll be back around 9:00 west coast time

...
Argument from potential. I will be an old person one day, does that mean I can currently get social security?

Meanwhile, it has nothing to do with whether or not I agree with the conclusion. The conclusion itself is completely and entirely illogical. It is, "This has all the DNA it takes to be a human one day, therefore it is a human now. Never mind that every single human cell has all the DNA it takes to create an entire human being."

They have ALL of the DNA elements in them. There are living cells in human excrement and cancer. They contain all the same genetic information as an embryo.

No. They have the mark of someone's DNA on or in them. They are not 'functioning' either at all or correctly. It's absurd and this is the last time I'll reference your attempt to equate a fetus with excrement. A moderately skilled high-school student with a lab book and a microscope could identify the differences between human cancer cells, human excrement and an zygote. DNA samples are not required. It's a ridiculous and incorrect example, you simply use it for shock value and it doesn't further the discussion in any meaningful way.

Other experts lead us to other answers…

Dr. Carlson is widely recognized as one of the leading experts in the nation in the field of human embryology. He taught human embryology and anatomy continuously from 1966 to 2004 at the University of Michigan Medical School. He is the author of a text on human embryology (Human Embryology and Developmental Biology) that is used in medical schools throughout the United States and many other parts of the world. He has conducted embryology research over the years in different parts of the world including periods in Moscow, Russia, Czechoslovakia, The Netherlands, and Helsinki, Finland.

Dr. Carlson set forth facts about what can be observed about the unborn child from fertilization to 12 weeks post-conception. He testified that it is a scientific fact that an abortion at any age of gestation terminates the life of a living human being.

He stated: "The post implantation human embryo is a distinct human being, a complete separate member of the species Homo sapiens, and is recognizable as such." (Carlson, P. 3, Par. 5.) He stated that this statement of biological fact is indisputable, and cautioned that this biological fact should not be confused with moral or philosophical considerations. Dr. Marie Peeters-Ney, an accomplished human geneticist, Dr. Saugstad, and Dr. Mark, also cautioned against this confusion. The Task Force also received the official report of the U.S. Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Separation of Power after hearing testimony from 24 prominent scientists. That report stated that: "Those witnesses who testified that science cannot say whether unborn children are human beings were speaking in every instance to the value question rather than the scientific question." (Report to the Committee on the Judiciary, United States Senate, made by its Subcommittee on Separation of Power, U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, D.C. 1981, P. 11.)

Dr. Carlson submitted with his declaration a nine page attachment that sets forth a list of structures from three systems found in the adult human being, the nervous, circulatory, and digestive/respiratory systems, as they have been observed and described in 10 millimeter human embryos, the size of the unborn child at five weeks post-conception. Dr. Carlson's attachment lists approximately 106 components of the nervous system, 63 components of the circulatory system, and about 40 components of the digestive and respiratory systems.

It is noted that the unborn child's heart is beating at three weeks old. The 2003 South Dakota Vital Statistics Report published by the Department of Health reports that in 2003 and 2002, 92% and 95% of all abortions performed in South Dakota were from 5 weeks to fourteen weeks post-conception. That means that in each of these abortions, the unborn child had 210 components of these three systems visibly in place.
Page 30-31 (http://www.dakotavoice.com/Docs/South%20Dakota%20Abortion%20Task%20Force%20Report.pdf#search='South%20Dakota%20Task%20Force%20to%20S tudy%20Abortion') (WARNING 71 page .pdf file)

No. They have the mark of someone's DNA on or in them. They are not 'functioning' either at all or correctly. It's absurd and this is the last time I'll reference your attempt to equate a fetus with excrement. A moderately skilled high-school student with a lab book and a microscope could identify the differences between human cancer cells, human excrement and an zygote. DNA samples are not required. It's a ridiculous and incorrect example, you simply use it for shock value and it doesn't further the discussion in any meaningful way.


Whereas, of course, the Pro-life platform uses terms like 'baby' and 'murder' for their scientific accuracy?

If you chose to admit defeat because Dempublicents cites 'excrement' that is your choice.

However - excrement IS relevent, because 'human DNA' (flawed concept though that is) is one of a 'canon' of demands usually made, as to what 'constitutes' the 'human life' of a foetus.

If 'human DNA' is the 'defining characteristic' that makes the foetus 'a person', then logically, human excrement is 'a person also.


Other experts lead us to other answers…

Dr. Carlson is widely recognized as one of the leading experts in the nation in the field of human embryology. He taught human embryology and anatomy continuously from 1966 to 2004 at the University of Michigan Medical School. He is the author of a text on human embryology (Human Embryology and Developmental Biology) that is used in medical schools throughout the United States and many other parts of the world. He has conducted embryology research over the years in different parts of the world including periods in Moscow, Russia, Czechoslovakia, The Netherlands, and Helsinki, Finland.

Dr. Carlson set forth facts about what can be observed about the unborn child from fertilization to 12 weeks post-conception. He testified that it is a scientific fact that an abortion at any age of gestation terminates the life of a living human being.

He stated: "The post implantation human embryo is a distinct human being, a complete separate member of the species Homo sapiens, and is recognizable as such." (Carlson, P. 3, Par. 5.) He stated that this statement of biological fact is indisputable, and cautioned that this biological fact should not be confused with moral or philosophical considerations. Dr. Marie Peeters-Ney, an accomplished human geneticist, Dr. Saugstad, and Dr. Mark, also cautioned against this confusion. The Task Force also received the official report of the U.S. Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Separation of Power after hearing testimony from 24 prominent scientists. That report stated that: "Those witnesses who testified that science cannot say whether unborn children are human beings were speaking in every instance to the value question rather than the scientific question." (Report to the Committee on the Judiciary, United States Senate, made by its Subcommittee on Separation of Power, U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, D.C. 1981, P. 11.)

Dr. Carlson submitted with his declaration a nine page attachment that sets forth a list of structures from three systems found in the adult human being, the nervous, circulatory, and digestive/respiratory systems, as they have been observed and described in 10 millimeter human embryos, the size of the unborn child at five weeks post-conception. Dr. Carlson's attachment lists approximately 106 components of the nervous system, 63 components of the circulatory system, and about 40 components of the digestive and respiratory systems.

It is noted that the unborn child's heart is beating at three weeks old. The 2003 South Dakota Vital Statistics Report published by the Department of Health reports that in 2003 and 2002, 92% and 95% of all abortions performed in South Dakota were from 5 weeks to fourteen weeks post-conception. That means that in each of these abortions, the unborn child had 210 components of these three systems visibly in place.
Page 30-31 (http://www.dakotavoice.com/Docs/South%20Dakota%20Abortion%20Task%20Force%20Report.pdf#search='South%20Dakota%20Task%20Force%20to%20S tudy%20Abortion') (WARNING 71 page .pdf file)

These particular 'experts' are welcome to their opinions. However, that doesn't make their opinions 'valid'. It is worth noting that the 'number of components' is NOT the criterion we use for life at any other point. These 'experts' plead special exception.

I'd argue with many of the other points made, also... maybe that's why this document is only supported by a handful of 'experts'?

If you chose to admit defeat because Dempublicents cites 'excrement' that is your choice...

What is this? This is not a position, a rebuttal nor an argument. Bad form. Must we knock the stone off of someones shoulder next? Perhaps cross a line drawn in the sand by the heel of someone’s boot? Tsk, tsk.

However - excrement IS relevent, because 'human DNA' (flawed concept though that is) is one of a 'canon' of demands usually made, as to what 'constitutes' the 'human life' of a foetus.

If 'human DNA' is the 'defining characteristic' that makes the foetus 'a person', then logically, human excrement is 'a person also.

They are marked by someone else’s DNA. A living healthy human will produce one and a cancer stricken human will produce both. But contrariwise, neither the cancer cell nor the waste will ever produce a human. You might think the comparison is cute, but it is not useful in any real way, only used as cannon fodder in a non-effective yelling match...

What is this? This is not a position, a rebuttal nor an argument. Bad form. Must we knock the stone off of someones shoulder next? Perhaps cross a line drawn in the sand by the heel of someone’s boot? Tsk, tsk.


Just a reference to what you said, You don't like a certain angle of debate, so you think you can just 'close it off', for no reason other (apparently) than your dislike.

Let's see what you wrote:


this is the last time I'll reference your attempt to equate a fetus with excrement


I don't think I'm assessing this unfairly. Unfortunately, debate doesn't 'work' like that.


They are marked by someone else’s DNA. A living healthy human will produce one and a cancer stricken human will produce both. But contrariwise, neither the cancer cell nor the waste will ever produce a human. You might think the comparison is cute, but it is not useful in any real way, only used as cannon fodder in a non-effective yelling match...

One could argue, of course, that the very ESSENCE of sexual reproduction is that the offspring is "marked by someone else’s DNA".

A cancer cell is unlikely to ever become a separate human being (although, I can't utterly rule it out)... and human excrement is unlikely to generate another human life. However, if you remove a foetus from the 'artificial environment' of the uterus, it will not do much, either.

And, the argument of 'someone else's DNA' has it's own problems. If you accept that 'separate' DNA arrangements make individual entities... 'lives' even... you have to admit that one person COULD actually be two or more separate people (in the case of chimerae).

This is incorrect. A loss of a heartbeat does not equate to death. If your heart stops, they try to restart it because you are not dead until irreparable damage has been done to your *brain* such that you are brain dead.
Thus, to "have the same standard", we cannot declare a fetus alive until it has brain function.
The brain doesn't have to tell the heart to beat. The heart starts beating at 6-7 weeks. The brain isn't formed until much, much later. Basic cardiac biology - the heart keeps itself beating. Any signals from the brain are simply to regulate the rate at which it does so.

I was waiting for someone to pick apart the heart stop= dead statement I made. If my heart stopped and would not start I would be dead, the fetus has no heart beat for quite a while, once it has a heart beat and a functional brain I think it is alive. And from what you said with my same standard thing, a fetus if we have the ''same standard'' is dead until it has a functioning brain which is when I view it as alive.

If the heart gets no signal from the brain, from what I have learned in school anyways feel free to correct me, then it would stop because if you are brain dead basically, you're heart doesn't get told what to do therefore you die. The brain tells everything what to do.

Just because its not illegal doesnt mean its not murder, I was using murder in a non-legal sense there to mean "killing of a living organism".
Murder is a LEGAL-ONLY term.

Don't tell me you think you're murdering a mosquito when you smack it off your arm.

I dont understand the owning all contents within her body part,
Not my problem.


blood is part of your body already, not a seperate piece completely disjoint, as a fetus is.
Irrelevant.


I also didnt know that people had a right of self ownership, and even if they do nothing says we should/have to allow people to do whatever they want to themselves.
Yes, it does.

I was raised in morals BAAWA. I also have ethics. These have been ingrained in me as far back as I can remember.
No, you have no idea what morality truly is.


You though don't seem to grasp the basic knowledge of history.
I certainly do. You don't grasp the distinction between permission and rights. You claim to, but your posts betray your misunderstanding. I have helped you to understand, but you refuse to grasp it.

Says something about you.

:rolleyes:

You can believe what you will but i was raised that sex is between a man and his wife.
You were raised very narrowly.


Premarital sex is immoral.
Can't be. It doesn't violate anyone's rights. Therefore, it cannot be immoral. And you don't have a code of ethics. You have a list of commands that you follow. That isn't morality.

Look! It says: The man either has to do this or go to jail. How is that not slavery?

Yup, I could read that over and over and it would still say, "Do this or go to jail," = slavery.
No, it wouldn't. Please quote the whole post and stop quote-mining, you dishonest ass.

Actually, you do.
Yes, you can either sumbit to slavery or go to jail.

Doesn't sound like much of a choice.

Conscription: The FORCED induction of a person into the military AGAINST THE PERSON'S WILL (or not, but even if not, it's still forced), with the consequence of going to jail if not obeyed and caught.

I'm still wondering how in the world that is not slavery. You must have some very very warped definition of slavery.

Sorry, my friend... but I am bored with:
I'm bored with your utter inability to actually put forth an argument. I'm not the only one.

So please: put forth some argument for me to address or fuck off. Don't try to play the victim here, because it just won't work. You offered exactly NOTHING for me to address, and then you complain about it. Talk about the height of stupidity.

As I stated, until you actually start carrying YOUR side of the debate, you'll get nothing from me.
I have been.

Until you show me that rights can be taken away, you have no standing with me.

Yes, you can either sumbit to slavery or go to jail.

Doesn't sound like much of a choice.

Conscription: The FORCED induction of a person into the military AGAINST THE PERSON'S WILL (or not, but even if not, it's still forced), with the consequence of going to jail if not obeyed and caught.

I'm still wondering how in the world that is not slavery. You must have some very very warped definition of slavery.

Because conscription is temporary, for a set period of time, most commonly two, three or four years. A person is usually born into slavery or captrued and taken into slavery for an indefinite amount of time, typically till death relieves them of their suffering.

slavery: The state of one bound in servitude as the property of a slaveholder or household.

conscription: Compulsory enrollment, especially for the armed forces; draft.

Slavery is for profit, conscription is for the survival of a nation (ie Israel). That is the key difference, other than that...



Wow, sixty pages in four days, that's got to be a record, right? Anyone want to start crunching the numbers on this one to find out if it is or not?

Oh, and I don't know if I have said this or not, but the title of this topic is quite misleading, at the time the topic was started the bill had just passed the Senate and had to be voted on by the House of Representatives and to my knowledge Rounds has not yet signed it into law and does not intend to do so until wednesday at the earliest. But whatever, everyone knows that Bush will increase the amount of money congress gives us in 2007 from $956 million to $3.7 billion. Where will he get this money you ask? He will increase the budget deficit by a further $79 billion, where will the other $74.3 billion go? Well, three words, hot dog stands. That's all you need to know.

where will the other $74.3 billion go? Well, three words, hot dog stands. That's all you need to know.Hot dog stands? I think I'm missing something...

Yeah, except a child =/= fetus either. There's a reason they don't do abortions later on in the prengnancy, it's all about development. Abortions that take place before the fetus is self-contious or able to move can't be placed in the exact same category, it's not the same thing.


I am not for Abortion and I am not for taking a womans right to choose..I myself would NEVER abort, My thing is with women who have 6 kids already on welfare,have drug dealers for babys daddys.......can't pay the rent, but can all of a sudden get at least $300 for an abortion (even though they can't feed the kids they have)..I think it's bullshit ohh I can go get an abortion and everything will be okay????????? I have an idea.....Stop laying down with people?? Ever heard of trojan? Or getting your tubes tied? I'm sure that welfare insurance you have will pay for that! This issue just pisses everyone off, I feel that if you have a valid reason like a rape god forbid or something like that then it should be an option, otherwise, I think a woman who visits the abortion clinic more thatn her gyno should be sterilized! You think ONE TIME would teach you, or is it just that easy? I think it shouldn't be as easy as it is...They are human beings whether they are the size of a peanut or a pumpkin.

I guess you weren't here for this part of the discussion (after all it was 15 pages ago or so ago) but what I was saying then was that one can always set them up for adoption- since you're against abortion I kinda hope you would agree... do you? Where do you stand?

No. They have the mark of someone's DNA on or in them. They are not 'functioning' either at all or correctly. It's absurd and this is the last time I'll reference your attempt to equate a fetus with excrement. A moderately skilled high-school student with a lab book and a microscope could identify the differences between human cancer cells, human excrement and an zygote. DNA samples are not required. It's a ridiculous and incorrect example, you simply use it for shock value and it doesn't further the discussion in any meaningful way.

Other experts lead us to other answers…

Dr. Carlson is widely recognized as one of the leading experts in the nation in the field of human embryology. He taught human embryology and anatomy continuously from 1966 to 2004 at the University of Michigan Medical School. He is the author of a text on human embryology (Human Embryology and Developmental Biology) that is used in medical schools throughout the United States and many other parts of the world. He has conducted embryology research over the years in different parts of the world including periods in Moscow, Russia, Czechoslovakia, The Netherlands, and Helsinki, Finland.

Dr. Carlson set forth facts about what can be observed about the unborn child from fertilization to 12 weeks post-conception. He testified that it is a scientific fact that an abortion at any age of gestation terminates the life of a living human being.

He stated: "The post implantation human embryo is a distinct human being, a complete separate member of the species Homo sapiens, and is recognizable as such." (Carlson, P. 3, Par. 5.) He stated that this statement of biological fact is indisputable, and cautioned that this biological fact should not be confused with moral or philosophical considerations. Dr. Marie Peeters-Ney, an accomplished human geneticist, Dr. Saugstad, and Dr. Mark, also cautioned against this confusion. The Task Force also received the official report of the U.S. Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Separation of Power after hearing testimony from 24 prominent scientists. That report stated that: "Those witnesses who testified that science cannot say whether unborn children are human beings were speaking in every instance to the value question rather than the scientific question." (Report to the Committee on the Judiciary, United States Senate, made by its Subcommittee on Separation of Power, U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, D.C. 1981, P. 11.)

Dr. Carlson submitted with his declaration a nine page attachment that sets forth a list of structures from three systems found in the adult human being, the nervous, circulatory, and digestive/respiratory systems, as they have been observed and described in 10 millimeter human embryos, the size of the unborn child at five weeks post-conception. Dr. Carlson's attachment lists approximately 106 components of the nervous system, 63 components of the circulatory system, and about 40 components of the digestive and respiratory systems.

It is noted that the unborn child's heart is beating at three weeks old. The 2003 South Dakota Vital Statistics Report published by the Department of Health reports that in 2003 and 2002, 92% and 95% of all abortions performed in South Dakota were from 5 weeks to fourteen weeks post-conception. That means that in each of these abortions, the unborn child had 210 components of these three systems visibly in place.
Page 30-31 (http://www.dakotavoice.com/Docs/South%20Dakota%20Abortion%20Task%20Force%20Report.pdf#search='South%20Dakota%20Task%20Force%20to%20S tudy%20Abortion') (WARNING 71 page .pdf file)

And you can quote that all day long and you only prove that he doesn't know what the hell he is talking about. First of all NOTHING is indisputable. Only religious people make such claims. Second of all, at conception their is no living organism and THAT is a biological 'fact'. There is no question about this. It is incapable of reacting as an organism and while it is questioned there is currently no valid scientific reason to claim that a zygote is an organism let alone a human being.

Your 'scientist' is a liar. Here I'll educate you with some unbiased information.

http://www.ucsf.edu/synapse/content/111005/study.html
The fetus cannot likely feel pain before the third trimester.

Now for your edification, most references to time are from the time of the last period which is approximately two weeks more than the time from conception. This is how abortive procedures are measured when it says that majority of those procedures occur before the eighth week. The following link is from time of conception.

http://www.zerotothree.org/brainwonders/FAQ-body.html#begin

You'll notice the link discusses the development of fetus in the first stage with reflexive movements that are not coordinated by a brain just as the heart rate is not (it is controlled by hormones from the mother at this point).

You'll also notice this -

The second trimester marks the onset of other critical reflexes: continuous breathing movements (that is, rhythmic contractions of the diaphragm and chest muscles) and coordinated sucking and swallowing reflexes. These abilities are controlled by the brainstem, which sits above the spinal cord but below the higher, more recently-evolved cerebral cortex. The brainstem is responsible for many of our body's most vital functions--heart rate, breathing, and blood pressure. It is largely mature by the end of the second trimester, which is when babies first become able to survive outside the womb.

Still the movement of the fetus is not controlled by the brain but by the brainstem. This is important to note.

Last of all to mature is the cerebral cortex, which is responsible for most of what we think of as mental life--conscious experience, voluntary actions, thinking, remembering, and feeling. It has only begun to function around the time gestation comes to an end. Premature babies show very basic electrical activity in the primary sensory regions of the cerebral cortex--those areas that perceive touch, vision, and hearing--as well as in primary motor regions of the cerebral cortex. In the last trimester, fetuses are capable of simple forms of learning, like habituating (decreasing their startle response) to a repeated auditory stimulus, such as a loud clap just outside the mother's abdomen. Late-term fetuses also seem to learn about the sensory qualities of the womb, since several studies have shown that newborn babies respond to familiar odors (such as their own amniotic fluid) and sounds (such as a maternal heartbeat or their own mother's voice). In spite of these rather sophisticated abilities, babies enter the world with a still-primitive cerebral cortex, and it is the gradual maturation of this complex part of the brain that explains much of their emotional and cognitive maturation in the first few years of life.

Even after birth the brain activity does not match an adult's but it's important to note that in medical and biological circles they refer to activity in the cerebral cortex as the measurement for life, which is why brain death is more important than a stoppage of the heart, which you'll notice isn't called heart death.

Now, you'll notice that this site is completely deviod of references to abortion. This is not their purpose so that have no interest in choosing an arbitrary line that is made up simply for the purpose lying about when a person becomes a person.

DNA uniqueness has nothing to do with the biological measure of life no matter how many times someone repeats it. Find me a single biological text that claims otherwise.

I would also like to point out that Dr. Carlson makes the argument that it is a distinct human from conception and then he mentions things that happen much later in pregnancy as evidence of it's humanness. Given that he's an 'expert' and all, he appears to just be a liar.

I guess you weren't here for this part of the discussion (after all it was 15 pages ago or so ago) but what I was saying then was that one can always set them up for adoption- since you're against abortion I kinda hope you would agree... do you? Where do you stand?
Pardon me for jumping in here, but I and several other pro-choicers have brought up problems with this adoption-is-the-answer fable which you and other anti-choicers have ignored. So here they are again, squarely on the table:

1. If adoption is such a panacea, why are there millions of children worldwide currently languishing in orphanages and foster care systems, unadopted, with little chance of ever being adopted, and suffering poverty, neglect and abuse, plus all the long-term personal damage that goes with that? There are too many parentless children and not enough adoptive families. Accept the reality of this situation.

2. Adoption is only partially relevant to the abortion issue. Even if there was a 100% adoption rate -- which there is not -- adoption is NOT a solution to an unwanted pregnancy. It may be a solution to an unwanted child, but the woman still has to go through the pregnancy, and if she can't do that or doesn't want to do that, then an abortion is the only solution. So, if a woman is considering an abortion only because she cannot support a child, then adoption may be a solution -- IF she can find adopters who will help defray costs of her pregnancy. But if her problem is that she is not physically or mentally fit to carry a pregnancy to term or she has some other reason to avoid pregnancy, then adoption is irrelevant. The problem is the current pregnancy, not a future child.

3. The adoption argument demands that a woman must care about a child's life enough to submit her body to pregnancy for 9 months, carry the costs of that and run all the physical risks attached to it, and give birth (the most dangerous part of the process). It then requires that same woman to immediately cease caring about the child's life enough to just hand it over to strangers and never think about it again. I really don't see how that can make any sense, even to an anti-choicer.

4. For those (not you but I'm addressing this to everyone) who push adoption as an option but also argue that pregnancy is the price women pay for having sex -- how do you reconcile that? The woman either has to wear her scarlet letter or she doesn't. By declaring both arguments you seem to be saying that pregnancy is a woman's punishment but parenthood isn't. Are you arguing that, once she's paid the price of pregnancy and birth, the woman is off the hook and doesn't have to go on to be a mother to the child she birthed? That seems to me to be a pretty clear indication that either you don't really care about children at all, or you have not thought out your arguments properly.

What is this? This is not a position, a rebuttal nor an argument. Bad form. Must we knock the stone off of someones shoulder next? Perhaps cross a line drawn in the sand by the heel of someone’s boot? Tsk, tsk.
This is not a position, a rebuttal nor an argument. Bad form. It is, of course, a response to what GnI said, just as his was a response to what you said. Interesting that you hold your opponents in a debate to different rules than yourself.

Now, let's talk about 'world-reknowned' Dr. Bruce Carlson. Do you know what he did at Michigan?

http://www.iog.umich.edu/faculty/carlson.html

After a long career of research on limb and muscle regeneration, Bruce Carlson has stepped down as Director of the Institute of Gerontology, has closed his laboratory and has entered a phased retirement process. He presently heads a large multi-project grant from the Michigan Life Sciences Corridor on the effects of slow and fast repetition exercise in the elderly. The study is being carried out at levels from individual muscle fiber physiology to whole body biomechanics. He is presently writing two books – “Fundamentals of Regeneration Biology” and “The Biography of a North Country Lake.”

If you look at his list of publications, he publishes two books that have nothing to do with the work he's doing. Hmmmm... one wonders why. Perhaps so he can advocate his spurious notions on the beginning of life? Why is a professor that spent his career on limb and muscle regeneration and GERONTOLOGY suddenly an expert on embryology? Nice unbiased 'expert' they chose there.

The other two scientists are experts on DNA, which has balls to do with the definition of an organism.

I am not for Abortion and I am not for taking a womans right to choose..I myself would NEVER abort, My thing is with women who have 6 kids already on welfare,have drug dealers for babys daddys.......can't pay the rent, but can all of a sudden get at least $300 for an abortion (even though they can't feed the kids they have)..I think it's bullshit ohh I can go get an abortion and everything will be okay????????? I have an idea.....Stop laying down with people?? Ever heard of trojan? Or getting your tubes tied? I'm sure that welfare insurance you have will pay for that! This issue just pisses everyone off, I feel that if you have a valid reason like a rape god forbid or something like that then it should be an option, otherwise, I think a woman who visits the abortion clinic more thatn her gyno should be sterilized! You think ONE TIME would teach you, or is it just that easy? I think it shouldn't be as easy as it is...They are human beings whether they are the size of a peanut or a pumpkin.

Do you realize what an infinitely small percentage of abortions your referring to? Do you realize how bigotted the comments you made are? Among the more significant populations of abortion patients is married women. Kind of throws a wrench in the works of your ridiculous strawman, doesn't it?

What if you get pregnant by divine intervention like Mary the mother of Jesus did? Shouldn't you have the right to abort that pregnancy?

I was waiting for someone to pick apart the heart stop= dead statement I made. If my heart stopped and would not start I would be dead, the fetus has no heart beat for quite a while, once it has a heart beat and a functional brain I think it is alive. And from what you said with my same standard thing, a fetus if we have the ''same standard'' is dead until it has a functioning brain which is when I view it as alive.

If the heart gets no signal from the brain, from what I have learned in school anyways feel free to correct me, then it would stop because if you are brain dead basically, you're heart doesn't get told what to do therefore you die. The brain tells everything what to do.

You were taught something completely and absolutely wrong -and I think your biology teacher should be fired if she actually told you that the heart will stop without a signal from the brain. As long as the heart still has the proper levels of electrolytes, it will continue to beat. I have personally taken a beating heart out of an animal, and kept it beating in an electrolyte solution for well over an hour without doing anything to it - because it still had the proper electrolytes.

The sinoatrial node - part of the heart - controls the heart's beat. It does so with or without signal from other parts of the body. At approximately 5 weeks, the heart begins to beat spontaneously. The very first synapses in the spinal cord are just then beginning to develop, and there isn't a single synapse in what will eventually be the brain.

I was waiting for someone to pick apart the heart stop= dead statement I made. If my heart stopped and would not start I would be dead, the fetus has no heart beat for quite a while, once it has a heart beat and a functional brain I think it is alive. And from what you said with my same standard thing, a fetus if we have the ''same standard'' is dead until it has a functioning brain which is when I view it as alive.

If the heart gets no signal from the brain, from what I have learned in school anyways feel free to correct me, then it would stop because if you are brain dead basically, you're heart doesn't get told what to do therefore you die. The brain tells everything what to do.

Hormones tell your heart to beat, not signals from the brain. The heart regulates itself. A heart can beat in a petri dish if it is doused in the right chemicals. The heart of a fetus is regulated by the mother, not the fetus, until quite late in the pregnancy. At the time of the first heart beat there is no brain.

You were taught something completely and absolutely wrong -and I think your biology teacher should be fired if she actually told you that the heart will stop without a signal from the brain. As long as the heart still has the proper levels of electrolytes, it will continue to beat. I have personally taken a beating heart out of an animal, and kept it beating in an electrolyte solution for well over an hour without doing anything to it - because it still had the proper electrolytes.

The sinoatrial node - part of the heart - controls the heart's beat. It does so with or without signal from other parts of the body. At approximately 5 weeks, the heart begins to beat spontaneously. The very first synapses in the spinal cord are just then beginning to develop, and there isn't a single synapse in what will eventually be the brain.

Ha. You beat me by like 10 seconds.

No. They have the mark of someone's DNA on or in them.

What the hell is "the mark of" someone's DNA? Living cells have a complete set of DNA in them. Both human excrement and cancer contain lliving cells. Thus, they have a complete set of DNA.

They are not 'functioning' either at all or correctly.

How could they be living if they aren't functioning at all? Wouldn't "not functioning at all" equate to dead cells?

It's absurd and this is the last time I'll reference your attempt to equate a fetus with excrement.

I'm not equating them. I am pointing out that the idiotic idea of saying, "It's got all its DNA, therefore it is alive," means that both excrement and cancer are alive, as they both also have all their DNA - and all the processes that go along with it.

A moderately skilled high-school student with a lab book and a microscope could identify the differences between human cancer cells, human excrement and an zygote.

Not so much on the cancer cells - unless you knew exactly what tissue you were supposed to be looking at, but you are basically correct. That point is completely irrelevant, however. I can tell the difference between a liver cell and a skin cell - but it doesn't make either a human person.

DNA samples are not required. It's a ridiculous and incorrect example, you simply use it for shock value and it doesn't further the discussion in any meaningful way.

My dear, you are the one trying to say that human DNA is the only requirement for life. You've posted many things trying to prove it, including the quotes below. You simply fail to acknowledge that, logically, if human DNA = human person, all of these things are also persons, because they have human DNA.

Other experts lead us to other answers…

There is no support here. I'm not going to requote most of it it in the interest of space, but all it says is, "So and so says this is a scientific fact, therefore it is." Where is the actual support?

I am a scientist. If I say, "It is a scientific fact that the sun exploded yesterday and we are actually all dead," would that make it true?

Dr. Carlson submitted with his declaration a nine page attachment that sets forth a list of structures from three systems found in the adult human being, the nervous, circulatory, and digestive/respiratory systems, as they have been observed and described in 10 millimeter human embryos, the size of the unborn child at five weeks post-conception. Dr. Carlson's attachment lists approximately 106 components of the nervous system, 63 components of the circulatory system, and about 40 components of the digestive and respiratory systems.

At this point, none of the nervous system components are at all functional. in fact, the very first synapses in the spinal cord are just beginning to develop and not a single one has developed in the brain. Nor are the components of the digestive and respiratory systems functional. This is exactly like me saying, "That structure over there has 100 components of a complete house, therefore it is a complete house."

No, it wouldn't. Please quote the whole post and stop quote-mining, you dishonest ass.

I did quote the entire post. Perhaps you should pay more attention to what you write.

Yes, you can either sumbit to slavery or go to jail.

Ah, now you change what you say.

I'm still wondering how in the world that is not slavery. You must have some very very warped definition of slavery.

I didn't say that conscription couldn't be viewed as slavery (Edit: Well, I did, much earlier, but dropped the issue because it really falls into a grey area), but that's not what the post in question said. It said that it was slavery *because* it was a choice between either doing something or going to jail. Obviously, "Do this or go to jail," does not equate to slavery, or most laws would equate to slavery.

I guess you weren't here for this part of the discussion (after all it was 15 pages ago or so ago) but what I was saying then was that one can always set them up for adoption- since you're against abortion I kinda hope you would agree... do you? Where do you stand?

I'm really iffy on the abortion vs. adoption issue. Obviously, it is better for everyone if there is never an unwanted pregnancy in the first place. I don't agree with abortion in most cases, but I don't think having a child with the express purpose of giving up responsibility for it is really a more responsible choice. In my personal opinion, someone who becomes pregnant *should* have the child and take care of it - no matter what personal wishes they have to give up to do so - because the child becomes the most important in that case.

Your 'scientist' is a liar. Here I'll educate you with some unbiased information.

http://www.ucsf.edu/synapse/content/111005/study.html
The fetus cannot likely feel pain before the third trimester.

Now for your edification, most references to time are from the time of the last period which is approximately two weeks more than the time from conception. This is how abortive procedures are measured when it says that majority of those procedures occur before the eighth week. The following link is from time of conception.

http://www.zerotothree.org/brainwonders/FAQ-body.html#begin

You'll notice the link discusses the development of fetus in the first stage with reflexive movements that are not coordinated by a brain just as the heart rate is not (it is controlled by hormones from the mother at this point).

You'll also notice this -



Still the movement of the fetus is not controlled by the brain but by the brainstem. This is important to note.



Even after birth the brain activity does not match an adult's but it's important to note that in medical and biological circles they refer to activity in the cerebral cortex as the measurement for life, which is why brain death is more important than a stoppage of the heart, which you'll notice isn't called heart death.

Now, you'll notice that this site is completely deviod of references to abortion. This is not their purpose so that have no interest in choosing an arbitrary line that is made up simply for the purpose lying about when a person becomes a person.

DNA uniqueness has nothing to do with the biological measure of life no matter how many times someone repeats it. Find me a single biological text that claims otherwise.

I would also like to point out that Dr. Carlson makes the argument that it is a distinct human from conception and then he mentions things that happen much later in pregnancy as evidence of it's humanness. Given that he's an 'expert' and all, he appears to just be a liar.

Well, there you go. Ban third trimester abortions, but keep it legal for the first and second. That should be fair, yes?

Well, there you go. Ban third trimester abortions, but keep it legal for the first and second. That should be fair, yes?
Unless there are serious complications to either the mother or the fetus.

Well, there you go. Ban third trimester abortions, but keep it legal for the first and second. That should be fair, yes?

Um, I don't know what you think happens but third trimester abortions are not elective. They are only used to preserve the health of the mother or when the fetus is dead or dying. No, I will not advocate an all-out ban. They are adequately restricted already.

I'm really iffy on the abortion vs. adoption issue. Obviously, it is better for everyone if there is never an unwanted pregnancy in the first place. I don't agree with abortion in most cases, but I don't think having a child with the express purpose of giving up responsibility for it is really a more responsible choice. In my personal opinion, someone who becomes pregnant *should* have the child and take care of it - no matter what personal wishes they have to give up to do so - because the child becomes the most important in that case.I totally agree keeping them is usually better than adoption, but financially that's not always possible. They're free to decide for themselves but yeah I would say keeping the baby would be worthwhile. Although I'm not a parent so I can only say that from a speculative viewpoint...

Well, yes, with obvious exemptions for the health of the mother-to-be (or not-to-be, as it were).

Well, yes, with obvious exemptions for the health of the mother-to-be (or not-to-be, as it were).
well there, we are in complete agreement. the law will continue exactly as it is.

thanks for playing.

What the hell is "the mark of" someone's DNA? Living cells have a complete set of DNA in them. Both human excrement and cancer contain lliving cells. Thus, they have a complete set of DNA.

How could they be living if they aren't functioning at all? Wouldn't "not functioning at all" equate to dead cells?

I’m arguing that the cancer cells are not functioning correctly and that the refuse cells are detached and dying or are already dead…yes, not functioning at all equates to dead. Whereas neither of those two conditions matches the condition of the cells in the womb. Thus, the analogy is not accurate and is in fact flawed.

I'm not equating them. I am pointing out that the idiotic idea of saying, "It's got all its DNA, therefore it is alive," means that both excrement and cancer are alive, as they both also have all their DNA - and all the processes that go along with it.

But you are equating them. You are arguing that the cell formations and processes taking place within in the three examples are all equivalent or are the same in all three, because they all share the fact that DNA can be found on them. But you are wrong in your conclusion (I’m confident that you already know your posit is in error, but you use it anyway as a strawman argument. Instead of attacking the real embryonic condition, you make up something else to attack instead of the womb scenario.). Positive DNA testing from all three or not, the rest of the world can tell the differences between the contents of the large intestine, a cancer riddled organ and the contents of the womb of an expecting mother. In fact, none of them even similar. Your posit is disingenuous because you don’t believe it yourself.

You are essentially saying that if the anti-choice side wins that all DNA markers (dead skin cells and spilt blood, for example) will somehow become protected under the proposed anti-abortion laws, as if they would somehow take on human characteristics and people would champion such causes. But the anti-choice legislations brought forward do not say what you say and no one would argue for the application you posit in a court of law, thus this entire spectrum of ‘what-ifs’ is moot and void.

Not so much on the cancer cells - unless you knew exactly what tissue you were supposed to be looking at, but you are basically correct. That point is completely irrelevant, however. I can tell the difference between a liver cell and a skin cell - but it doesn't make either a human person.

And nobody but you is arguing that they are somehow made human persons by the fact that since embryonic humans have DNA and organs have DNA, they are somehow the same. It’s the failure of your bad analogy, not the failure of the DNA as an identifying tool.

My dear, you are the one trying to say that human DNA is the only requirement for life. You've posted many things trying to prove it, including the quotes below. You simply fail to acknowledge that, logically, if human DNA = human person, all of these things are also persons, because they have human DNA.

Human life produces cells with DNA, yes it does.
Both Dr. Carlson and Dr. Calhoun explained how the child functions and interacts with his or her environment in utero. The child's heart typically starts to beat at 21 to 22 days old. Soon the baby's heart starts to fold into a structure in preparation of its subdivision into the familiar four chambers of the mature heart. At this age of 22 days, the major blood vessels that enter and leave the heart are visualized. The gut tract is visible by the end of the fourth week, and a recognizable mouth is visible. The brain is forming at a rapid rate. In the fourth week cells of the neural crest migrate throughout the body and form an astounding array of structures, including the sensory and autonomic nerves, pigment cells, and most of the bones and connective tissue of the face and neck. In the head, the earliest recognizable traces of the future eyes and inner ear are readily distinguishable. (Carlson, P. 10-11.)

By the end of the fourth week the unborn child has a highly functional circulation with three sets of blood vessels. The fifth week is characterized by profound changes in almost all organ systems of the human being. The brain becomes subdivided in 5 parts, corresponding to the major divisions of the adult brain, and nerve cells are forming. The eyes have formed a lens, and the nerves in the retina are taking shape. An olfactory placode, the precursor of the organ of smell in the nose is prominent. By the end of the fifth week, the 210 components of the three systems of the human body are observable.

At this point, none of the nervous system components are at all functional. in fact, the very first synapses in the spinal cord are just beginning to develop and not a single one has developed in the brain. Nor are the components of the digestive and respiratory systems functional. This is exactly like me saying, "That structure over there has 100 components of a complete house, therefore it is a complete house."


More testimony by which the SD legislature wrote the abortion ban bill:

The Task Force also reviewed a declaration from Dr. Bernard Nathanson, a board certified obstetrician and gynecologist, a Diplomat of the American Board of Obstetrics and Gynecology, and a Fellow of the American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology.

Dr. Nathanson practiced medicine in New York for many decades and was personally responsible for approximately 75,000 abortions. Dr. Nathanson was also one of the founders of the National Association for the Repeal of the Abortion Laws (NARAL) in the United States in 1969. He stated that: "I was active among the pro-abortion community for a number of years, and I was actively involved in attempting, along with
other abortion providers, to win public support for all forms of abortion." (Nathanson Declaration, Par. 1 to Par. 5.)

Dr. Nathanson testified that the fact an abortion terminates the life of a living human being is generally known among obstetricians and scientists. However, Dr. Nathanson stated that abortion doctors and operators of abortion clinics often deny this fact for strategic reasons. He testified that he and other strategists for NARAL, for instance, adopted certain tactics to win the public perception that all forms of abortion should be and remain legal. Dr. Nathans on stated that one tactic was to suppress and denigrate all scientific evidence that supported the conclusions that a human embryo or fetus was a separate human being. He stated that he and others denied what they knew was true: "The abortion industry would routinely deny the undeniable, that is, that the human embryo and fetus is, as a matter of biological fact, a human being." (Nathanson Declaration, Par. 14.) Dr. Byron Calhoun, a specialist in internal fetal medicine, also testified that it cannot be denied that the unborn child is a separate human being.

Specifically, Dr. Nathanson stated that:
“The abortion procedure is an extraordinary one because in it the physician is proposing to terminate the life of one of his patients to whom the physician owes a legal and professional duty. The doctor has no legal authority to do so. Under normal circumstances, if he terminated the life of the unborn child, he would be guilty of a battery upon the mother, and, in fetal homicide states, such as South Dakota, he would be guilty of a homicide. The physician is given his authority to terminate the life of one of his patients only if he receives authority in the form of consent from the pregnant mother. In order for such a consent to be informed, at a minimum, the physician must be satisfied that the patient understood that the second patient was in existence, and that the procedure would terminate the life of her unborn child. These facts go directly to the risks, and effect the procedure would have on the second patient, but they also explain the nature of the procedure. The nature of the procedure is to terminate the life of the unborn child. Withholding these facts from the pregnant mother deprives her of the ability to make an informed decision for herself. Such informed written consent fails to meet the reasonable patient standard of disclosure and deprives the mother of her rights of self determination." (Nathanson Declaration Par. 10 and 11.)

No credible evidence was presented that challenged these scientific facts. In fact, when witnesses supporting abortion were asked when life begins, not one would answer the question, stating that it would only be their personal opinion.
Report Link (http://www.dakotavoice.com/Docs/South%20Dakota%20Abortion%20Task%20Force%20Report.pdf#search='South%20Dakota%20Task%20Force%20to%20S tudy%20Abortion') (WARNING 71 page .pdf file)

Human life produces cells with DNA, yes it does.
Both Dr. Carlson and Dr. Calhoun explained how the child functions and interacts with his or her environment in utero. The child's heart typically starts to beat at 21 to 22 days old. Soon the baby's heart starts to fold into a structure in preparation of its subdivision into the familiar four chambers of the mature heart. At this age of 22 days, the major blood vessels that enter and leave the heart are visualized. The gut tract is visible by the end of the fourth week, and a recognizable mouth is visible. The brain is forming at a rapid rate. In the fourth week cells of the neural crest migrate throughout the body and form an astounding array of structures, including the sensory and autonomic nerves, pigment cells, and most of the bones and connective tissue of the face and neck. In the head, the earliest recognizable traces of the future eyes and inner ear are readily distinguishable. (Carlson, P. 10-11.)

By the end of the fourth week the unborn child has a highly functional circulation with three sets of blood vessels. The fifth week is characterized by profound changes in almost all organ systems of the human being. The brain becomes subdivided in 5 parts, corresponding to the major divisions of the adult brain, and nerve cells are forming. The eyes have formed a lens, and the nerves in the retina are taking shape. An olfactory placode, the precursor of the organ of smell in the nose is prominent. By the end of the fifth week, the 210 components of the three systems of the human body are observable.

Interesting. This is an excellent argument for why it is not a child at conception. If he is arguing conception is the being of life why is he talking about development that occurs weeks and months later as if they are the marks of life? I know the answer. Because he like ourselves is aware that anyone arguing the beginning of life is going to mention the ACTUAL markers of life of which genetic uniqueness is not one.

More testimony by which the SD legislature wrote the abortion ban bill:

The Task Force also reviewed a declaration from Dr. Bernard Nathanson, a board certified obstetrician and gynecologist, a Diplomat of the American Board of Obstetrics and Gynecology, and a Fellow of the American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology.

Dr. Nathanson practiced medicine in New York for many decades and was personally responsible for approximately 75,000 abortions. Dr. Nathanson was also one of the founders of the National Association for the Repeal of the Abortion Laws (NARAL) in the United States in 1969. He stated that: "I was active among the pro-abortion community for a number of years, and I was actively involved in attempting, along with
other abortion providers, to win public support for all forms of abortion." (Nathanson Declaration, Par. 1 to Par. 5.)

Dr. Nathanson testified that the fact an abortion terminates the life of a living human being is generally known among obstetricians and scientists. However, Dr. Nathanson stated that abortion doctors and operators of abortion clinics often deny this fact for strategic reasons. He testified that he and other strategists for NARAL, for instance, adopted certain tactics to win the public perception that all forms of abortion should be and remain legal. Dr. Nathans on stated that one tactic was to suppress and denigrate all scientific evidence that supported the conclusions that a human embryo or fetus was a separate human being. He stated that he and others denied what they knew was true: "The abortion industry would routinely deny the undeniable, that is, that the human embryo and fetus is, as a matter of biological fact, a human being." (Nathanson Declaration, Par. 14.) Dr. Byron Calhoun, a specialist in internal fetal medicine, also testified that it cannot be denied that the unborn child is a separate human being.

Specifically, Dr. Nathanson stated that:
“The abortion procedure is an extraordinary one because in it the physician is proposing to terminate the life of one of his patients to whom the physician owes a legal and professional duty. The doctor has no legal authority to do so. Under normal circumstances, if he terminated the life of the unborn child, he would be guilty of a battery upon the mother, and, in fetal homicide states, such as South Dakota, he would be guilty of a homicide. The physician is given his authority to terminate the life of one of his patients only if he receives authority in the form of consent from the pregnant mother. In order for such a consent to be informed, at a minimum, the physician must be satisfied that the patient understood that the second patient was in existence, and that the procedure would terminate the life of her unborn child. These facts go directly to the risks, and effect the procedure would have on the second patient, but they also explain the nature of the procedure. The nature of the procedure is to terminate the life of the unborn child. Withholding these facts from the pregnant mother deprives her of the ability to make an informed decision for herself. Such informed written consent fails to meet the reasonable patient standard of disclosure and deprives the mother of her rights of self determination." (Nathanson Declaration Par. 10 and 11.)

No credible evidence was presented that challenged these scientific facts. In fact, when witnesses supporting abortion were asked when life begins, not one would answer the question, stating that it would only be their personal opinion.

Evidence they were unwilling to lie since they are well aware that there is much disagreement among the scientific community. This is because some would argue that even when it become life that we hold human life to a higher standard (which is why we don't medically consider the brain dead to be living). Because there is medical and scientific disagreement they would only be presenting their personal position on the matter.

In contrast, your 'expert' witness is willing to lie - "Dr. Nathanson testified that the fact an abortion terminates the life of a living human being is generally known among obstetricians and scientists." That is a blatant lie. I promise you that majority of abortion providers would not engage in the practice where this true. They have moral or spiritual questions about the practice, but you cannot argue that doctors and scientists generally consider abortion to the killing of a human being. It's just a plain and utter lie.

Interestingly, the anti-choice community is overwhelmingly religious people, why are they so willing to promote lies? There is no scientific basis for considering an embryo a human life. None. Doesn't stop the anti-choice people from lying. In fact, isn't it the same people who spread lies about evolution. Thou shalt not bear false witness.

People are entitled to believe what they believe, but the science is clear. The disagreement among the community is on exactly when life begins, but there is no question it is well into the fetal stage.

Lying. What a low tactic for a group claiming to be doing God's work.

And nobody but you is arguing that they are somehow made human persons by the fact that since embryonic humans have DNA and organs have DNA, they are somehow the same. It’s the failure of your bad analogy, not the failure of the DNA as an identifying tool.


This makes no sense. As far as I can see, no one has tried to argue that organs (for example) are persons... indeed, the exact opposite has been argued.

It comes down to the fact that one of the arguments for a foetus being 'a human life', is the argument that it has 'human DNA' (which is a flawed assumption, anyway). The point that has been made is that human excrement, or a liver, has 'human DNA' (flaw accepted), and yet is not considered 'a human life'.

Both Dr. Carlson and Dr. Calhoun explained how the child functions and interacts with his or her environment in utero. The child's heart typically starts to beat at 21 to 22 days old. Soon the baby's heart starts to fold into a structure in preparation of its subdivision into the familiar four chambers of the mature heart. At this age of 22 days, the major blood vessels that enter and leave the heart are visualized. The gut tract is visible by the end of the fourth week, and a recognizable mouth is visible. The brain is forming at a rapid rate. In the fourth week cells of the neural crest migrate throughout the body and form an astounding array of structures, including the sensory and autonomic nerves, pigment cells, and most of the bones and connective tissue of the face and neck. In the head, the earliest recognizable traces of the future eyes and inner ear are readily distinguishable. (Carlson, P. 10-11.)

By the end of the fourth week the unborn child has a highly functional circulation with three sets of blood vessels. The fifth week is characterized by profound changes in almost all organ systems of the human being. The brain becomes subdivided in 5 parts, corresponding to the major divisions of the adult brain, and nerve cells are forming. The eyes have formed a lens, and the nerves in the retina are taking shape. An olfactory placode, the precursor of the organ of smell in the nose is prominent. By the end of the fifth week, the 210 components of the three systems of the human body are observable.


This is all very nice... but you'll notice it is also fairly dishonest. In one sentence it claims "The child's heart typically starts to beat at 21 to 22 days old", and then, in the very next sentence, it makes another claim "Soon the baby's heart starts to fold into a structure in preparation of its subdivision into the familiar four chambers of the mature heart". There is a conflict here... since the first claim is about the heart beginning to beat, and the second (chronologically later claim) describes the heart being formed. If you looked at the 'heart' of a 21-day foetus, you wouldn't see a recognisable heart, you'd (basically) see a tube of muscle... so claim of a 'heartbeat' is little more than an appeal to emotion. Kind of like me claiming a heap of manure IS a bed of roses...

But, the fact remains that all of this 'constructionist' argument ignores the real truth of the issue. You can describe all the organs at various stages of development... and you can say how 'similar' to those of a human adult they are... but that really means nothing. The foetus of a fish is remarkably similar to various stages of human development... but we don't claim that the fish foetus is 'a human life'. The point is SIMILARITY to adult forms is NOT 'life'.

So - what we need, is a marker of development that can ABSOLUTELY be linked to being 'a human life'... which is why SO MANY people in the sciences, have decided that the formation of COHERENT neural activity and COHERENT brain activity are a 'valid' point to discuss life.



The Task Force also reviewed a declaration from Dr. Bernard Nathanson, a board certified obstetrician and gynecologist, a Diplomat of the American Board of Obstetrics and Gynecology, and a Fellow of the American College of Obstetrics and Gynecology.

Dr. Nathanson practiced medicine in New York for many decades and was personally responsible for approximately 75,000 abortions. Dr. Nathanson was also one of the founders of the National Association for the Repeal of the Abortion Laws (NARAL) in the United States in 1969. He stated that: "I was active among the pro-abortion community for a number of years, and I was actively involved in attempting, along with
other abortion providers, to win public support for all forms of abortion." (Nathanson Declaration, Par. 1 to Par. 5.)

Dr. Nathanson testified that the fact an abortion terminates the life of a living human being is generally known among obstetricians and scientists. However, Dr. Nathanson stated that abortion doctors and operators of abortion clinics often deny this fact for strategic reasons. He testified that he and other strategists for NARAL, for instance, adopted certain tactics to win the public perception that all forms of abortion should be and remain legal. Dr. Nathans on stated that one tactic was to suppress and denigrate all scientific evidence that supported the conclusions that a human embryo or fetus was a separate human being. He stated that he and others denied what they knew was true: "The abortion industry would routinely deny the undeniable, that is, that the human embryo and fetus is, as a matter of biological fact, a human being." (Nathanson Declaration, Par. 14.) Dr. Byron Calhoun, a specialist in internal fetal medicine, also testified that it cannot be denied that the unborn child is a separate human being.


Isn't it curious that this doctor must have taken his Hipocratic oath, and yet claims that he knew he was 'killing' human lives? Does this not mean that, for so many years, and tens of thousands of abortions... he must have been 'lying'?

I'm finding it hard to justify taking the testimony of a person who admits lying... indeed, who's WHOLE testimony RELIES on the fact that he is a liar... as a valid argument.

It smacks of ulterior motive on the part of those who SELECTED such 'evidence'.

I thought this an excellent piece of work, and WORTH repeating in it's entirety, in order to show how strongly I support your efforts.

Thanks, it's just a shame that nobody's tried to refute it yet. Many of the pro-lifers on this thread debate like jackals: they'll pick on an isolated argument but when the arguments are collected together in a mutually supporting way they leave well alone.

Thanks, it's just a shame that nobody's tried to refute it yet. Many of the pro-lifers on this thread debate like jackals: they'll pick on an isolated argument but when the arguments are collected together in a mutually supporting way they leave well alone.

To be honest.... I'm a little more cynical. I think there are very few people that actually oppose abortion for NON-religious reasons.... so most of the anti-choice arguments are either minimal-tech, or are based on nebulous 'spiritualistic' concepts like 'souls'.

Consequently, when you assembled what is basically a fairly definitive technical manifesto for choice, they have LITERALLY no way to tackle it.... without admitting that there motivations are either "It's icky" or "I don't think God would like it".

And, you'll notice, most of the same people who oppose abortion choice, ALSO (tend to) oppose freedom to follow an 'alternative' sexuality... and they use those same two arguments there, as well.

Thanks, it's just a shame that nobody's tried to refute it yet. Many of the pro-lifers on this thread debate like jackals: they'll pick on an isolated argument but when the arguments are collected together in a mutually supporting way they leave well alone.

It's called dropping arguments and they're quite good at it. I notice that all of their points get numerous similar responses, but many of our points are ignored because they simply don't have the ability to refute them. We put typical and reasonable arguments out there that get ignored. However, I promise you if someone comes in that's pro-choice but has a completely ridiculous argument or shows a shameful lack of understanding of the subject or science, they are going to be all over that. It's really not a very useful way to debate the points.

I’m arguing that the cancer cells are not functioning correctly

That all depends on what you mean by functioning correctly. The processes of DNA transcription and use (the entire basis upon which SD calls an embryo a life) in a cancer cell are the same as those in any other cell. The only difference is that certain genes have been mutated - something that certainly can and does happen in embryos.

But you are equating them. You are arguing that the cell formations and processes taking place within in the three examples are all equivalent or are the same in all three, because they all share the fact that DNA can be found on them.

I'm not making any such argument. I am taking the argument made by your "experts", that having an entire DNA code and the mechanisms to use it is equivalent to life, and showing that, if that is the requirement for life, it applies to all cells. The exact cell formation and processes taking place in my liver are not the same as in my blood vessels, but the principles on which the entire SD argument is b ased are the same in both. They both contain all of the DNA necessary to create an entire human being, they both are transcribing genes to RNA, which is then being translated into protein. These are the processes that your so-called experts say make an embryo a human life.

But you are wrong in your conclusion (I’m confident that you already know your posit is in error, but you use it anyway as a strawman argument. Instead of attacking the real embryonic condition, you make up something else to attack instead of the womb scenario.).

It isn't a strawman - it is the *exact* argument throughout the SD law. They have some biochemists who say, "All of the DNA necessary to make a human being is present and the processes of transcription and translation have begun, therefore it is an individual human being." All I am doing is showing the problems with the argument. I don't have to "attack the real embryonic condition," because the argument itself is inherently flawed - all I have to do is attack the argument.

Positive DNA testing from all three or not, the rest of the world can tell the differences between the contents of the large intestine, a cancer riddled organ and the contents of the womb of an expecting mother. In fact, none of them even similar. Your posit is disingenuous because you don’t believe it yourself.

I never said they couldn't. However, the SD argument hinges on nothing more than, "It's got all its DNA and it's using it, therefore it is a human." Read the law - that is all they have to say.

You are essentially saying that if the anti-choice side wins that all DNA markers (dead skin cells and spilt blood, for example) will somehow become protected under the proposed anti-abortion laws, as if they would somehow take on human characteristics and people would champion such causes. But the anti-choice legislations brought forward do not say what you say and no one would argue for the application you posit in a court of law, thus this entire spectrum of ‘what-ifs’ is moot and void.

The problem is using such an idioitic definition of human life. It is completely illogical to say, "Because the embryo has all its DNA and is using it, it is a human being. Oh, but wait, um......other things that have all their DNA and are using it aren't human beings, k?"

And nobody but you is arguing that they are somehow made human persons by the fact that since embryonic humans have DNA and organs have DNA, they are somehow the same. It’s the failure of your bad analogy, not the failure of the DNA as an identifying tool.

Wrong. It is the failure of the definition itself. If the definition of "human being" is "An entity that has all its DNA and is using it," as is posited in the SD law, then by logical extension, everything that meets those requirements is a human being. In other words, their entire argument for it being a human being in the first place is flawed, because they place requirements that don't work for everything.

More testimony by which the SD legislature wrote the abortion ban bill:

Considering that most of this is nothing more than "I think it is true but have no logical support for it, so I'm just going to say, 'It is a scientific fact,' and that'll fly because the people I'm talking to are idiots," not to mention that a great deal of it is misleading - with one "expert" referring to neurons being formed but completely ignoring the fact that no synapses are yet formed so that nervous system essentially doesn't exist - I'll address the important part.

No credible evidence was presented that challenged these scientific facts. In fact, when witnesses supporting abortion were asked when life begins, not one would answer the question, stating that it would only be their personal opinion.

Now, here's the problem - NO CREDIBLE EVIDENCE WAS PRESENTED THAT SUPPORTED these "scientific facts." It was nothing more than a few people saying, "It is a scientific fact that it is a human being because it has human DNA and is using it." It was nothing more than a few people giving their opinions - and then trying to state that they were scientific fact. It was logically no different than if one of the actual honest people (aka the people described above) had said, 'It is a scientific fact that the embryo is not a person and that abortion does not destroy a human person." Leaving it at that would be the same level of support given to the other viewpoint.

So, in other words, the SD legislature made up their mind ahead of time, and then decided that someone presenting their personal opinion as scientific fact was equivalent to support.

It's called dropping arguments and they're quite good at it. I notice that all of their points get numerous similar responses, but many of our points are ignored because they simply don't have the ability to refute them. We put typical and reasonable arguments out there that get ignored. However, I promise you if someone comes in that's pro-choice but has a completely ridiculous argument or shows a shameful lack of understanding of the subject or science, they are going to be all over that. It's really not a very useful way to debate the points.What arguments have been ignored? I will do my best to respond specifically to them.

What arguments have been ignored? I will do my best to respond specifically to them.

How about this (http://forums.jolt.co.uk/showpost.php?p=10504539&postcount=826) one.

Thanks, it's just a shame that nobody's tried to refute it yet. Many of the pro-lifers on this thread debate like jackals: they'll pick on an isolated argument but when the arguments are collected together in a mutually supporting way they leave well alone.

Your very first posit was: "1. Personhood requires consciousness" and then you went on to prove what is not denied. The main flaw was that you failed to prove that personhood requires consciousness in the first place. It was over before it began, there was no point in countering the rest of it because it was based on bad premise.

As to the “2. The foetus has potential for life” premise. It’s simple enough to say that no, it is life. I didn’t convince you, you didn’t convince me. You say a sperm and an egg have the ‘potential to be life’ and I agree. Once the sperm and the egg have already been combine, then the potential is achieved.

And, “3. The Bible says so” premise. Irrelevant to this thread. Start a different thread for religious arguments regarding abortion. However, most people don’t go to “Planned Parenthood” for their biblical and theological research. Hardly convincing or worth responding to. I simularly saw an article written by a lady Muslim hypno-therapist for the commentary/editorial pages of the local newspaper the other day, calling on other Muslims to become more secular in their outlooks. Regardless to whether or not I agree with it, I doubt she will have much of an impact in a community based on a religion that doesn’t endorse hypno-therapy. Not worth refuting, and wrong thread.

Your very first posit was: "1. Personhood requires consciousness" and then you went on to prove what is not denied. The main flaw was that you failed to prove that personhood requires consciousness in the first place. It was over before it began, there was no point in countering the rest of it because it was based on bad premise.

As to the “2. The foetus has potential for life” premise. It’s simple enough to say that no, it is life. I didn’t convince you, you didn’t convince me. You say a sperm and an egg have the ‘potential to be life’ and I agree. Once the sperm and the egg have already been combine, then the potential is achieved.

And, “3. The Bible says so” premise. Irrelevant to this thread. Start a different thread for religious arguments regarding abortion. However, most people don’t go to “Planned Parenthood” for their biblical and theological research. Hardly convincing or worth responding to. I also so a Muslim hypno-therapist write a commentary for the editorial pages of the local newspaper the other day, calling on other Muslims to become more secular in their outlooks. Regardless to whether or not I agree with it, I doubt she will have much of an impact in a community based on a religion that doesn’t endorse hypno-therapy. Not worth refuting, and wrong thread.

So when does life end? You use the same rules, no? Wouldn't want to be thought of as, oh, I don't know, arbitrary. As long as there are living cells with unique DNA then life continues, no? Apparently, I cremated my grandfather while he was still alive.

Your very first posit was: "1. Personhood requires consciousness" and then you went on to prove what is not denied. The main flaw was that you failed to prove that personhood requires consciousness in the first place. It was over before it began, there was no point in countering the rest of it because it was based on bad premise.

As to the “2. The foetus has potential for life” premise. It’s simple enough to say that no, it is life. I didn’t convince you, you didn’t convince me. You say a sperm and an egg have the ‘potential to be life’ and I agree. Once the sperm and the egg have already been combine, then the potential is achieved.

And, “3. The Bible says so” premise. Irrelevant to this thread. Start a different thread for religious arguments regarding abortion. However, most people don’t go to “Planned Parenthood” for their biblical and theological research. Hardly convincing or worth responding to. I simularly saw an article written by a lady Muslim hypno-therapist for the commentary/editorial pages of the local newspaper the other day, calling on other Muslims to become more secular in their outlooks. Regardless to whether or not I agree with it, I doubt she will have much of an impact in a community based on a religion that doesn’t endorse hypno-therapy. Not worth refuting, and wrong thread.

It may not have been you, but others have brought forward the points Randomlittleislands refuted in his post and failed to adress his points in return.

Your very first posit was: "1. Personhood requires consciousness" and then you went on to prove what is not denied. The main flaw was that you failed to prove that personhood requires consciousness in the first place. It was over before it began, there was no point in countering the rest of it because it was based on bad premise.


Actually, since we define the end of personhood as death, and we (largely) delineate that as the permanant lack of consciousness... there is a certain logic to assuming that personhood DOES require consciousness.

If you want to refute that basic assumption, how about you present an argument for it? At the moment it is logically extrapolated from the ways we DO determine 'personhood' in 'people'... so, come on. Offer an argument.


As to the “2. The foetus has potential for life” premise. It’s simple enough to say that no, it is life. I didn’t convince you, you didn’t convince me. You say a sperm and an egg have the ‘potential to be life’ and I agree. Once the sperm and the egg have already been combine, then the potential is achieved.


Not true... the 'potential' is not 'achieved' if the fertilised egg fails to implant. Or implants but fails to engage. Or engages but fails to grow. Or grows but fails to go full term...


And, “3. The Bible says so” premise. Irrelevant to this thread. Start a different thread for religious arguments regarding abortion. However, most people don’t go to “Planned Parenthood” for their biblical and theological research. Hardly convincing or worth responding to. I also so a Muslim hypno-therapist write a commentary for the editorial pages of the local newspaper the other day, calling on other Muslims to become more secular in their outlooks. Regardless to whether or not I agree with it, I doubt she will have much of an impact in a community based on a religion that doesn’t endorse hypno-therapy. Not worth refuting, and wrong thread.

The point was, I believe, that MOST arguments AGAINST abortion, pretend to be based in science, but are actually matters of 'faith. I agree... religion has NO place in the debate.

The point was, I believe, that MOST arguments AGAINST abortion, pretend to be based in science, but are actually matters of 'faith. I agree... religion has NO place in the debate.
Indeed it doesn't. But why don't we discuss the fact that men should have little or no say in the matter?

Abortion is an issue about a woman's body. Therefore, women should be doing the debating and decision taking.

How is it that the most fervent and vocal anti-choice are men? Maybe it's because they can safely put the blame forward on the women without ever having to fear being in that position themselves.

Your very first posit was: "1. Personhood requires consciousness" and then you went on to prove what is not denied. The main flaw was that you failed to prove that personhood requires consciousness in the first place. It was over before it began, there was no point in countering the rest of it because it was based on bad premise.

How else is personhood defined? The precedents are there for all to see: the brain dead cease to be persons and their next of kin make decisions for them and people in permanent comas can be passively euthanised without a murder charge. In other words, society already defines the end of personhood as the end of consciousness.

If you need more precedent then look at the different legal rights of children and adults:

At 16 you can drink, smoke, ride a moped, and get married with parental permission.
At 17 you can drive a car.
At 18 you can vote, drink alcohol in pubs, go into adult websites, and get married without parental consent.
At 21 you can own a pub and stand as an MP.

See the pattern? Rights are given out on a basis of mental maturity (as is evident from the fact that the mentally ill cannot vote etc.), the more intellectually developed you become the more rights you are granted.

Legal precedent supports our claim that personhood begins with consciousness and so if you disagree the burden of proof is on you to prove a different beginning.

As to the “2. The foetus has potential for life” premise. It’s simple enough to say that no, it is life. I didn’t convince you, you didn’t convince me. You say a sperm and an egg have the ‘potential to be life’ and I agree. Once the sperm and the egg have already been combine, then the potential is achieved.

I'm glad you acknowledge the potential argument to be a bad one, this means that if you can't prove that the foetus is a person than you must accept the legitamacy of abortion.

Incidently are you arguing that life begins at conception or implantation?

And, “3. The Bible says so” premise. Irrelevant to this thread. Start a different thread for religious arguments regarding abortion. However, most people don’t go to “Planned Parenthood” for their biblical and theological research. Hardly convincing or worth responding to. I simularly saw an article written by a lady Muslim hypno-therapist for the commentary/editorial pages of the local newspaper the other day, calling on other Muslims to become more secular in their outlooks. Regardless to whether or not I agree with it, I doubt she will have much of an impact in a community based on a religion that doesn’t endorse hypno-therapy. Not worth refuting, and wrong thread.

The argument has been raised several times on this thread and so it is extremely relevant. If you accept that you can't argue on Biblical grounds then I'll be happy to drop the subject.

Your very first posit was: "1. Personhood requires consciousness" and then you went on to prove what is not denied. The main flaw was that you failed to prove that personhood requires consciousness in the first place. It was over before it began, there was no point in countering the rest of it because it was based on bad premise.

How else is personhood defined? The precedents are there for all to see: the brain dead cease to be persons and their next of kin make decisions for them. People in permanent comas can be passively euthanised without a murder charge. In other words, society already defines the end of personhood as the end of consciousness.

If you need more precedent then look at the different legal rights of children and adults:

At 16 you can drink, smoke, ride a moped, and get married with parental permission.
At 17 you can drive a car.
At 18 you can vote, drink alcohol in pubs, go into adult websites, and get married without parental consent.
At 21 you can own a pub and stand as an MP.

See the pattern? Rights are given out on a basis of mental maturity (as is evident from the fact that the mentally ill cannot vote etc.), the more intellectually developed you become the more rights you are granted. It logically follows that rights only begin to be granted when consciousness is attained.

Legal precedent supports our claim that personhood begins with consciousness and so if you disagree the burden of proof is on you to prove a different beginning.

As to the “2. The foetus has potential for life” premise. It’s simple enough to say that no, it is life. I didn’t convince you, you didn’t convince me. You say a sperm and an egg have the ‘potential to be life’ and I agree. Once the sperm and the egg have already been combine, then the potential is achieved.

I'm glad you acknowledge the potential argument to be a bad one, this means that if you can't prove that the foetus is a person than you must accept the legitamacy of abortion.

Incidently are you arguing that life begins at conception or implantation?

And, “3. The Bible says so” premise. Irrelevant to this thread. Start a different thread for religious arguments regarding abortion. However, most people don’t go to “Planned Parenthood” for their biblical and theological research. Hardly convincing or worth responding to. I simularly saw an article written by a lady Muslim hypno-therapist for the commentary/editorial pages of the local newspaper the other day, calling on other Muslims to become more secular in their outlooks. Regardless to whether or not I agree with it, I doubt she will have much of an impact in a community based on a religion that doesn’t endorse hypno-therapy. Not worth refuting, and wrong thread.

The argument has been raised several times on this thread and so it is extremely relevant. If you accept that you can't argue against abortion on Biblical grounds then I'll be happy to drop the subject.

Indeed it doesn't. But why don't we discuss the fact that men should have little or no say in the matter?

Abortion is an issue about a woman's body. Therefore, women should be doing the debating and decision taking.

How is it that the most fervent and vocal anti-choice are men? Maybe it's because they can safely put the blame forward on the women without ever having to fear being in that position themselves.

To a certain extent I agree. However:

(There is always 'however')... about half the population are women, and not all of them will support the right to have choice. Therefore, it is important for males like me, to speak out in defense of freedoms for those who DO want choice. I don't see a problem with males advocating more freedom for women... I do see a problem with males advocating limiting the freedoms of women.

I can understand the argument when you consider the later months of a pregnancy when the baby grows a brain, but what about in the early months? When the fetus is just a lump of flesh with no brain, its no alive, its like a vegetable. why not remove it? In fact, whats the difference between removing a non-brain fetus and using contraceptives, either way you end up wihtout a baby.


the tragedy of taking a human life, is that the human in question had goals, hopes, dreams, family, friends, spouses etc... it had desire to live, it loved it felt.

Fetuses (until they grow a brain, debatably) don't have hope-goals-dreams. They simply consume and grow, like a tree. They are organic machines. I can understand debating WHEN you should be allowed to have an abortion, but to say a fetus is alive from the MOMENT of conception is ludecirous. And if those are your religious beleifs, you have no right to push them on others.

Not true... the 'potential' is not 'achieved' if the fertilised egg fails to implant. Or implants but fails to engage. Or engages but fails to grow. Or grows but fails to go full term...


Not enough time for everything... But this one point.

This is not a value objection because a 1 month old might not live to be a 2 month old, and all 1 month olds will die eventually. Thus, the know-ability of 'when' death is irrelevant. Longevity is not important.

Not enough time for everything... But this one point.

This is not a value objection because a 1 month old might not live to be a 2 month old, and all 1 month olds will die eventually. Thus, the know-ability of 'when' death is irrelevant. Longevity is not important.

The difference the definition of life for a 1-month-old is not based on potential. There are no descriptions of potential or non-differentiated cells or the fact that organs have begun developing or DNA. The life of every human outside of the womb is decided by brain function both scientifically and medically. A body can be artificially 'alive' when the person has passed away that has all function except the brain (this is done in some cases for transplants). That body is not considered a living person. Medical professionals define death as the time the brain ceases function. Your heart stops. Restart it. Breathing. Restart it. Brain stops. It stops.

Tell me the difference between a living baby and a dead baby and you won't mention DNA or differentiated cells. Tell me the difference between a living adult and a dead adult and you won't mention DNA or differentiated cells. However, you want the definition of life to make a specific exception for sub-people because otherwise you can't force your views on women. Sorry, buddy, but the burden of proof is on you. Why is DNA, potential and non-differentiated cells the definition of life at conception but at no other time?

Your very first posit was: "1. Personhood requires consciousness" and then you went on to prove what is not denied. The main flaw was that you failed to prove that personhood requires consciousness in the first place. It was over before it began, there was no point in countering the rest of it because it was based on bad premise.

As to the “2. The foetus has potential for life” premise. It’s simple enough to say that no, it is life. I didn’t convince you, you didn’t convince me. You say a sperm and an egg have the ‘potential to be life’ and I agree. Once the sperm and the egg have already been combine, then the potential is achieved.

Wow. What a complete hypocrite. "The main flaw was that you failed to prove...."

"It's simple enough to say that no, it is a life...." Look what you failed to prove!!!

Personhood does require conciousness, you don't need to prove it. It's like asking someone to prove the sky is blue.

so why is neither side convinced with the excellent arguments of their opponents?

because no one is addressing anyones REAL reasons for allowing/banning abortion. not even themselves.

everyone has a feeling on whats right in this. THEN they search for reasons why they are right.

on both sides

a person is antiabortion for their own deep seated psychological reasons. they dont really care "when life begins" or what the DNA status of a fertilized egg is. they START with "abortion is killing a baby" and work their way backwards to the justifcation for their stance. the justification is meaningless, just window dressing.

the exact same thing is true of those who are proabortion. we start with the deep seated (probably psychological) feeling that a woman needs to run her own life THEN we justify in our heads that the fertilized egg/embryo/fetus is nothing. (at least not until a certain stage of gestation) but the justification is as meaningless as the justification for banning abortion. its just after-the-fact window dressing.

until you acknowlege and accomodate the true concerns of the other side, they wont hear you let alone be convinced by your argument.

so why is neither side convinced with the excellent arguments of their opponents?

because no one is addressing anyones REAL reasons for allowing/banning abortion. not even themselves.

everyone has a feeling on whats right in this. THEN they search for reasons why they are right.

on both sides

a person is antiabortion for their own deep seated psychological reasons. they dont really care "when life begins" or what the DNA status of a fertilized egg is. they START with "abortion is killing a baby" and work their way backwards to the justifcation for their stance. the justification is meaningless, just window dressing.

the exact same thing is true of those who are proabortion. we start with the deep seated (probably psychological) feeling that a woman needs to run her own life THEN we justify in our heads that the fertilized egg/embryo/fetus is nothing. (at least not until a certain stage of gestation) but the justification is as meaningless as the justification for banning abortion. its just after-the-fact window dressing.

until you acknowlege and accomodate the true concerns of the other side, they wont hear you let alone be convinced by your argument.

Except we are addressing them. You make an assumption that doesn't hold. I started out against abortion but couldn't justify it. I also draw the line for when abortion should no longer be elective based on the same way we determine life in all other persons, brain activity. That makes elective abortions in the third trimester a big no-no and before that not really my business.

Some people are going to allow abortions whether their is completely objective proof the embryo is a person. I'm not one of those people. The problem is the proof doesn't exist. I continually ask for any one on the 'life' side of the argument to show how you find life in an embryo under the same mechanisms we require for already recognized stages of being a person. They can't and in the absense of that, it makes their line fairly arbitrary.

so why is neither side convinced with the excellent arguments of their opponents?

because no one is addressing anyones REAL reasons for allowing/banning abortion. not even themselves.

everyone has a feeling on whats right in this. THEN they search for reasons why they are right.

on both sides

a person is antiabortion for their own deep seated psychological reasons. they dont really care "when life begins" or what the DNA status of a fertilized egg is. they START with "abortion is killing a baby" and work their way backwards to the justifcation for their stance. the justification is meaningless, just window dressing.

the exact same thing is true of those who are proabortion. we start with the deep seated (probably psychological) feeling that a woman needs to run her own life THEN we justify in our heads that the fertilized egg/embryo/fetus is nothing. (at least not until a certain stage of gestation) but the justification is as meaningless as the justification for banning abortion. its just after-the-fact window dressing.

until you acknowlege and accomodate the true concerns of the other side, they wont hear you let alone be convinced by your argument.

I disagree. I'm pro-choice because I see no reason why abortion should be regarded as a 'bad thing' so why not allow abortion?

I disagree. I'm pro-choice because I see no reason why abortion should be regarded as a 'bad thing' so why not allow abortion?
Because the fundies don't like it :rolleyes:

Seriously, I never was convinced that criminalizing abortion would stop it, anyway. And having legal abortions allow for some degree of control over who, when, and how it gets done. Plus, it being legal doesn't make it mandatory, far from it, so a women who finds it immoral may keep the baby.

Personally, I'm more of a "let's try to convince her to bring the baby to term, and then resort to abortion" type, but I recognize that the final decision should always be taken by the pregnant woman. It is, after all, her body, and she has the final say about it.

and yet, if you look at this thread alone, more than half the posts are about when life begins, what constitutes life, and what a fetus feels. as if thats the root of why people are pro or anti abortion rights

mabye it only comes down to "who do you identify with the 'baby' or the mother'"?

and yet, if you look at this thread alone, more than half the posts are about when life begins, what constitutes life, and what a fetus feels. as if thats the root of why people are pro or anti abortion rights

mabye it only comes down to "who do you identify with the 'baby' or the mother'"?

The reason the question is about whether there is life is because without life there is no to identify with except the mother.

so why is neither side convinced with the excellent arguments of their opponents?

because no one is addressing anyones REAL reasons for allowing/banning abortion. not even themselves.

everyone has a feeling on whats right in this. THEN they search for reasons why they are right.

on both sides

a person is antiabortion for their own deep seated psychological reasons. they dont really care "when life begins" or what the DNA status of a fertilized egg is. they START with "abortion is killing a baby" and work their way backwards to the justifcation for their stance. the justification is meaningless, just window dressing.

the exact same thing is true of those who are proabortion. we start with the deep seated (probably psychological) feeling that a woman needs to run her own life THEN we justify in our heads that the fertilized egg/embryo/fetus is nothing. (at least not until a certain stage of gestation) but the justification is as meaningless as the justification for banning abortion. its just after-the-fact window dressing.

until you acknowlege and accomodate the true concerns of the other side, they wont hear you let alone be convinced by your argument.

and yet, if you look at this thread alone, more than half the posts are about when life begins, what constitutes life, and what a fetus feels. as if thats the root of why people are pro or anti abortion rights

mabye it only comes down to "who do you identify with the 'baby' or the mother'"?


Well said, nicely written. I don’t have to agree unconditionally to be able to nod my head and consider carefully what you have said. Wise council I think.

Introduction
I'm going to use this post to bring together the key arguments made by various people over the course of the debate to prove that pro-choice is the only logical position. I will attempt to justify each stage of argument using links to impartial websites.
The three most common pro-life arguments have been:
1. The foetus is a person.
2. The foetus has potential for life.
3. The Bible says so.
The Foetus is a person
Simply not true.
1. Personhood requires consciousness.
If I agreed with #1, there's no way I could argue against the other 3 points. But it's also #1 that I have the problem with. http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=embryo defines embryo as "An organism in its early stages of development." So by definition the embryo, from conception, is a seperate organism. If it's a seperate organism, it must be of a certain species. What species must it be? Not only is it human, but it is a human because it is a seperate organism. It doesn't matter how much of its brain or body systems are up and running- just the fact that it's a homo sapiens is enough to show it is a human being and not just human as we discussed several pages back.
I got a concussion a couple years ago (embarassing story but I'll spare myself). A concussion by definition means you lose consciousness (in my case for a second or two). So for that second or two, according to your argument, I ceased to be a human being, which is completely ridiculous. I was still just as much a human being then as I am now- merely unconscious.
So "personhood" does not require consciousness, and therefore #'s 2,3, and especially 4 are incorrect.
2. Consciousness requires a working brain and synapses.
3. A foetus has no Thalamic brain connections until about week 27 (at the earlist), and the brain doesn't function properly until most of the way into the third trimester.
4. Therefore a foetus is not a person until that point.
So clearly it is not a 'person' who is being terminated except where exceptions are made for the mother's health.
Grave n idle struck the finishing blow to this particular line of argument with this source:
link (http://www.ninds.nih.gov/disorders/anencephaly/anencephaly.htm)
While unfortunate that some babies have that condition, it doesn't make a difference- they're all human beings to begin with, regardless of whether they have a functioning cerebrum (or whatever else).
This is a particularly important point as it shows that personality and consciousness are dependant on the brain, ergo the development of the brain is the measuring point of 'personhood'.
Kinda depends on what your definition of "personhood" is... I'm gonna go with www.dictionary.com again, which defines it as "The state or condition of being a person, especially having those qualities that confer distinct individuality." At first this may seem like I'm proving your point with this definition, but I'm not. Individuals with conditions like the one you mentioned have clear uniqueness- expressed by their fatal symptoms, as sad as it is- and therefore individuality, meaning they fit the description of "personhood" in its entirety.
So in other words, the foetus isn't a person. Therefore it has no rights.
Yes it is, by definition as I showed. You can't argue against the definition. If the embryo is a person, the fetus also is since being a fetus is being at a later point in development. So in other words, the fetus is a person. Therefore it does have rights.
The foetus has potential for life
While the first objection was medical in nature the second is philosophical.
Several people have offered eloquent rebuttals of the argument from potentiality but I'm going to let a dedicated medical ethics website put a stop to this line of inquiry:
link (http://www.ethox.org.uk/education/teach/pregnancy/pregnancy1.htm)
No matter what his education level or occupation is, he's missing the point that they're already persons as I believe I've proven beyond reasonable doubt. His examples of princes not having the same rights as kings are accurate, but would you say a boy or girl doesn't have the right to life because he or she isn't an adult and doesn't have the same rights? No! You'd be off your rocker if you said that. It's the same thing with embryos and fetuses- whether or not they're born, they are human beings. Now some rights it would be downright stupid to give them, but they have at least the right to live. And as for the sperm and the egg argument, that abstinence or contraception kill potential- he's totally right. However, there's nothing wrong with preventing a child to be conceived. Even biblically (as Paul talks about how it is ok to not get married, in which case being obedient would mean not having kids).
There have also been several posters (although I can't find the quotes at the moment) who have pointed out that vast numbers of pregnancies fail naturally when the egg is rejected by the mother.
What do you mean by rejected? If emotionally, then, well, she might as well have had an abortion. Otherwise, well, it's the same thing.
Need I say more?
To maintain your arguments, quite frankly, yes. Seems that way anyway.
The Bible says so
No it doesn't (with groveling apologies to the 'If abortion is a sin...' thread):
link (http://www.plannedparenthood.com/pp2/portal/files/portal/webzine/artsculture/art-060224-bible-abortion.xml)
Well, of course it's gonna be "silent" on specifically abortion. The whole procedure has only been around for a couple decades or so. And even if it doesn't mention abortion, the very reference you gave me does talk about killing the baby- the penalty isn't as high as death, but the fact that he had to pay a fine proves it was the wrong thing to do. As bad as killing an already born person? Apparently not, but still wrong. Not to mention that if embryos are human beings (which they are), abortion is murder anyway. Murder is something the Bible clearly declares wrong (Exodus 20). So yes, it does talk about killing pre-natal infants. Briefly, but yes it does. The only question I can't answer regarding that is why the penalty was different.
Pay particular attention to the identity of the author, this is a guy who knows more than a little about Biblical law.
His position doesn't matter- it's what he says and believes, and apparently he either hadn't read enough, or he forgot even the word "abortion" in terms of the medical procedure is relatively new.
Somebody countered this claim by saying: "But the OT condones slavery as well." In response:
1. That's irrelevant, the Bible never condemns abortion and so it cannot be used to support a ban.
2. The slavery laws are repealed by Jesus and the New Covenant, generally speaking Christians say that unless Jesus actually changed the law then the old law stands (which is why Christians still use the Ten Commandments). Jesus failed to rewrite this law and so apparently it still stands.
Which means the murder commandment still stands.
Conclusion
There is no logical or moral grounding for a ban on abortion. We have shown that abortion is not murder as the foetus isn't a person, we have shown that its potential for life doesn't give it a right to life, and we have shown that it can't even be opposed on religous grounds.
Hopefully what I just said will be enough for you to admit otherwise... we shall see.

Sorry the post was so long but hopefully this'll be all that's needed.

Actually, since we define the end of personhood as death, and we (largely) delineate that as the permanant lack of consciousness... there is a certain logic to assuming that personhood DOES require consciousness.

If you want to refute that basic assumption, how about you present an argument for it? At the moment it is logically extrapolated from the ways we DO determine 'personhood' in 'people'... so, come on. Offer an argument.
...

I do not believe that an argument 'against' it is required in the abortion question. Because like death, and brain death patients in particular, 'death' is determined on the basis of the medical professions assessment of the possibility of improvement/change/progress. If the condition is likely to improve, the patient is not listed as dead. If the patient cannot improve, the patient is declared dead so that the organs can be retrieved.

The operative word (question) is, 'can the patient's condition be improved with time or treatments?' this is fundamentally at odds with the condition of a fetus in a womb. The likelihood of the fetus' condition improving with time is a near certainty. A condition that would never result in a patient being declared dead by 'brain death.'

Ashmoria, I think I agree with you with your point on being open-minded by keeping in mind what opponents are thinking. We all need to understand the core of what makes the others believe what they believe.

One thing though, and this isn't to destroy the "warm, fuzzy moment of peace." Pro-life people like me do care about when life begins- that's the whole basis of our arguments. If that didn't matter then we'd have no choice but to agree with pro-choice people.

The funny thing is, this issue should of NEVER been an issue in politics AT ALL. The fact that your body decissions is a PERSONAL choice. Which means that if i decide that i dont want a certain organ i dont have to keep it, if i dont want to live anymore on a ventilator and die peacefully, OR if i find that i wont be able to take care of my child when it is born i can DECIDE if i want to have the baby. This law or legislation is no different then what China did by forcing its civilians to NOT have childern. Once the baby is outside the womb is when the government should worry about the child.

The funny thing is, this issue should of NEVER been an issue in politics AT ALL. The fact that your body decissions is a PERSONAL choice. Which means that if i decide that i dont want a certain organ i dont have to keep it, if i dont want to live anymore on a ventilator and die peacefully, OR if i find that i wont be able to take care of my child when it is born i can DECIDE if i want to have the baby. This law or legislation is no different then what China did by forcing its civilians to NOT have childern. Once the baby is outside the womb is when the government should worry about the child.With all due respect you're ignoring the argument that the fetus/embryo is not part of a pregnant woman's body! If you could prove that, then I agree with you. Otherwise, no.

If I agreed with #1, there's no way I could argue against the other 3 points. But it's also #1 that I have the problem with. http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=embryo defines embryo as "An organism in its early stages of development." So by definition the embryo, from conception, is a seperate organism. If it's a seperate organism, it must be of a certain species. What species must it be? Not only is it human, but it is a human because it is a seperate organism. It doesn't matter how much of its brain or body systems are up and running- just the fact that it's a homo sapiens is enough to show it is a human being and not just human as we discussed several pages back.

American Heritage has all kinds of flawed definitions. An embryo does not meet the qualifications for an organism. AH generally uses the layman's definition. The layman's definition of organism does not have the same requirements as the scientific definition.

http://www.m-w.com/dictionary/embryo

Mirriam-Webster is a lot more careful when using medical and scientific definitions.

Ashmoria, I think I agree with you with your point on being open-minded by keeping in mind what opponents are thinking. We all need to understand the core of what makes the others believe what they believe.

One thing though, and this isn't to destroy the "warm, fuzzy moment of peace." Pro-life people like me do care about when life begins- that's the whole basis of our arguments. If that didn't matter then we'd have no choice but to agree with pro-choice people.

See. The problem is you didn't research the science and the medicine and then land on your decision. You made your decision and will listen to nothing that doesn't agree. There is no way one can scientifically land on conception as the beginning of life. Trust me, no inventor of a birth control pill that prevents implantation ever considered it killing a person, despite the lying 'experts' in SD's claims that it's generally held by scientists and doctors that the embryo is a person.

With all due respect you're ignoring the argument that the fetus/embryo is not part of a pregnant woman's body! If you could prove that, then I agree with you. Otherwise, no.

With all due respect I DID answer the arguement. That the WOMAN DECIDES if the fetus is part of her body, sorry you like to knee jerk what i say. And you cant prove that a fetus is NOT part of the woman, at least i can, by saying it is connected to her and is in her, eh?

I do not believe that an argument 'against' it is required in the abortion question. Because like death, and brain death patients in particular, 'death' is determined on the basis of the medical professions assessment of the possibility of improvement/change/progress. If the condition is likely to improve, the patient is not listed as dead. If the patient cannot improve, the patient is declared dead so that the organs can be retrieved.

The operative word (question) is, 'can the patient's condition be improved with time or treatments?' this is fundamentally at odds with the condition of a fetus in a womb. The likelihood of the fetus' condition improving with time is a near certainty. A condition that would never result in a patient being declared dead by 'brain death.'

It's not based on improvement. It's based on the fact that they're, you know, dead. What's the difference between someone who has brain function but is unconscious and with a body that will eventually fail and someone with no brain function? One is medically alive. One is medically dead. There is no medical definition that relies on potential. The patient is declared dead for any purpose. That's what's so silly about the argument by anti-choicers. They act like science and medicine is all part of this great conspiracy. They're not. The definition of death and the declaration of death have nothing to do with purposes. They have to do with deliniating the difference between life and death.

Your gerontologist who claims to be an expert reveals himself by discussing the development of the brain. Even he considers the brain to be a important part of personhood though he fails to mention that the brain doesn't actually develop to the point of function until the beginning of the third trimester. His comparisons to adults also reveals the weakness of his argument. Because you can't argue that life begins at conception and then use arguments about the pre-born that do not apply at conception. The entirety of the argument isn't just bad science and medicine, it's a complete breakdown of logic.

With all due respect I DID answer the arguement. That the WOMAN DECIDES if the fetus is part of her body, sorry you like to knee jerk what i say. And you cant prove that a fetus is NOT part of the woman, at least i can, by saying it is connected to her and is in her, eh?What I mean is, either a fetus is part of a woman's body or it's not. This is what we're all trying to work out (among a few other things). So I'm sorry you feel I'm "knee jerking" what you said, but in all honesty you're not totally proving it. Look at the arguments I gave against that and see what you think.

For those of you who did and disagreed with my arguments based on www.dictionary.com, it seems reliable as far as I can tell- I mean, even the Merriam-Webster link shown to me pretty much says what I said.
"An animal in the early stages of growth... especially the developing human individual from the time of implantation to the end of the eighth week after conception." Right there it says it's a human individual. And as I said before, you can't mess with the official definition.

And Jocabia, of course the creators of birth control pills are gonna say that it's not killing anyone... otherwise they'd be out of business. But SD wasn't specifically mentioning the creators of birth control pills- that'd be a huge mistake. They said scientists and doctors, according to you.

What I mean is, either a fetus is part of a woman's body or it's not. This is what we're all trying to work out (among a few other things). So I'm sorry you feel I'm "knee jerking" what you said, but in all honesty you're not totally proving it. Look at the arguments I gave against that and see what you think.

For those of you who did and disagreed with my arguments based on www.dictionary.com, it seems reliable as far as I can tell- I mean, even the Merriam-Webster link shown to me pretty much says what I said.
"An animal in the early stages of growth... especially the developing human individual from the time of implantation to the end of the eighth week after conception." Right there it says it's a human individual. And as I said before, you can't mess with the official definition.

And Jocabia, of course the creators of birth control pills are gonna say that it's not killing anyone... otherwise they'd be out of business. But SD wasn't specifically mentioning the creators of birth control pills- that'd be a huge mistake. They said scientists and doctors, according to you.

No, it does not say that. It says it's developing into a human individual, which is of course, true. When it becomes a human individual instead of developing into one it will have rights. Until then, it has none.

*rofl*

More rights for a fetus!

Less rights for gays!

Yay!

:rolleyes:

so why is neither side convinced with the excellent arguments of their opponents?

because no one is addressing anyones REAL reasons for allowing/banning abortion. not even themselves.

everyone has a feeling on whats right in this. THEN they search for reasons why they are right.

on both sides

a person is antiabortion for their own deep seated psychological reasons. they dont really care "when life begins" or what the DNA status of a fertilized egg is. they START with "abortion is killing a baby" and work their way backwards to the justifcation for their stance. the justification is meaningless, just window dressing.

the exact same thing is true of those who are proabortion. we start with the deep seated (probably psychological) feeling that a woman needs to run her own life THEN we justify in our heads that the fertilized egg/embryo/fetus is nothing. (at least not until a certain stage of gestation) but the justification is as meaningless as the justification for banning abortion. its just after-the-fact window dressing.

until you acknowlege and accomodate the true concerns of the other side, they wont hear you let alone be convinced by your argument.

Jocabia has already said this, but I have to disagree as well. I started out with the position that abortion is generally wrong - the wrong choice to make. However, I could find no justification beyond my own beliefs to back that up to other people, so I will not try and force it upon others. I didn't start out with the idea that abortion was ok and therefore become pro-choice. I started out with the idea that abortion is not ok, but that my reasons for saying that are my own, and therefore became pro-choice.

If I agreed with #1, there's no way I could argue against the other 3 points. But it's also #1 that I have the problem with. http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=embryo defines embryo as "An organism in its early stages of development." So by definition the embryo, from conception, is a seperate organism. If it's a seperate organism, it must be of a certain species. What species must it be? Not only is it human, but it is a human because it is a seperate organism. It doesn't matter how much of its brain or body systems are up and running- just the fact that it's a homo sapiens is enough to show it is a human being and not just human as we discussed several pages back.
I got a concussion a couple years ago (embarassing story but I'll spare myself). A concussion by definition means you lose consciousness (in my case for a second or two). So for that second or two, according to your argument, I ceased to be a human being, which is completely ridiculous. I was still just as much a human being then as I am now- merely unconscious.
So "personhood" does not require consciousness, and therefore #'s 2,3, and especially 4 are incorrect.

While unfortunate that some babies have that condition, it doesn't make a difference- they're all human beings to begin with, regardless of whether they have a functioning cerebrum (or whatever else).

Kinda depends on what your definition of "personhood" is... I'm gonna go with www.dictionary.com again, which defines it as "The state or condition of being a person, especially having those qualities that confer distinct individuality." At first this may seem like I'm proving your point with this definition, but I'm not. Individuals with conditions like the one you mentioned have clear uniqueness- expressed by their fatal symptoms, as sad as it is- and therefore individuality, meaning they fit the description of "personhood" in its entirety.

Yes it is, by definition as I showed. You can't argue against the definition. If the embryo is a person, the fetus also is since being a fetus is being at a later point in development. So in other words, the fetus is a person. Therefore it does have rights.

No matter what his education level or occupation is, he's missing the point that they're already persons as I believe I've proven beyond reasonable doubt. His examples of princes not having the same rights as kings are accurate, but would you say a boy or girl doesn't have the right to life because he or she isn't an adult and doesn't have the same rights? No! You'd be off your rocker if you said that. It's the same thing with embryos and fetuses- whether or not they're born, they are human beings. Now some rights it would be downright stupid to give them, but they have at least the right to live. And as for the sperm and the egg argument, that abstinence or contraception kill potential- he's totally right. However, there's nothing wrong with preventing a child to be conceived. Even biblically (as Paul talks about how it is ok to not get married, in which case being obedient would mean not having kids).
What do you mean by rejected? If emotionally, then, well, she might as well have had an abortion. Otherwise, well, it's the same thing.

To maintain your arguments, quite frankly, yes. Seems that way anyway.

Well, of course it's gonna be "silent" on specifically abortion. The whole procedure has only been around for a couple decades or so. And even if it doesn't mention abortion, the very reference you gave me does talk about killing the baby- the penalty isn't as high as death, but the fact that he had to pay a fine proves it was the wrong thing to do. As bad as killing an already born person? Apparently not, but still wrong. Not to mention that if embryos are human beings (which they are), abortion is murder anyway. Murder is something the Bible clearly declares wrong (Exodus 20). So yes, it does talk about killing pre-natal infants. Briefly, but yes it does. The only question I can't answer regarding that is why the penalty was different.

His position doesn't matter- it's what he says and believes, and apparently he either hadn't read enough, or he forgot even the word "abortion" in terms of the medical procedure is relatively new.

Which means the murder commandment still stands.

Hopefully what I just said will be enough for you to admit otherwise... we shall see.

Sorry the post was so long but hopefully this'll be all that's needed.

I just spent 20 minutes typing out a long reply to this but Jolt just lost it all and I'm not going to spend 20 minutes typing it out again.

Suffice to say:

1. Your interpretations of definitions are dishonest. Being knocked unconscious and not having a brain at all are completely different. The definition of personhood is even worse, it is clearly refering to distinguishing personality traits, having a bloody great hole in your head does NOT qualify as a personality. By your logic a corpse could be said to be a person because of the distinguishing lack of a torso.:rolleyes:

2. Legal precendent supports the claim that personhood and rights are dependant on consciousness.

3. I've italicised a passage where you did nothing but attack a strawman.

4. When I said that about 60% of fertilised eggs are rejected by the mother I meant that her body prevents them from implanting, it is a natural reaction.

5.Abortion is not a modern invention and to say so is absurd:

The practice of induced abortion, according to some anthropologists, can be traced to ancient times. There is evidence to suggest that, historically, pregnancies were terminated through a number of methods, including the administration of abortifacient herbs, the use of sharpened implements, the application of abdominal pressure, and other techniques.

Soranus, a 2nd century Greek physician, suggested in his work Gynecology that women wishing to abort their pregnancies should engage in violent exercise, energetic jumping, carrying heavy objects, and riding animals. He also prescribed a number of recipes for herbal bathes, pessaries, and bloodletting, but advised against the use of sharp instruments to induce miscarriage due to the risk of organ perforation. [25] It is also known that the ancient Greeks relied upon the herb silphium as both a contraceptive and an abortifacient. The plant, as the chief export of Cyrene, was driven to extinction, but it is suggested that it might have possessed the same abortive properties as some of its closest extant relatives in the Apiaceae family.
link (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abortion#History_of_abortion)

Abortion has been around virtually forever in one form or another.

6. 'So yes, it does talk about killing pre-natal infants. Briefly, but yes it does. The only question I can't answer regarding that is why the penalty was different.'

Clearly because it isn't considered murder, it is considered to be damaging the woman's property rather than killing a person. This is why a fine is given rather than an execution order.

Jocabia has already said this, but I have to disagree as well. I started out with the position that abortion is generally wrong - the wrong choice to make. However, I could find no justification beyond my own beliefs to back that up to other people, so I will not try and force it upon others. I didn't start out with the idea that abortion was ok and therefore become pro-choice. I started out with the idea that abortion is not ok, but that my reasons for saying that are my own, and therefore became pro-choice.

The other flaw in the argument is that you have to hold the position that there are someone else's rights to consider or you simply can't be anti-choice. While there are some, her statements would suggest that the entire pro-choice movement realizes there are someone else's rights to consider a "child's", but we just don't care. It's hogwash.

I got a concussion a couple years ago (embarassing story but I'll spare myself). A concussion by definition means you lose consciousness (in my case for a second or two). So for that second or two, according to your argument, I ceased to be a human being, which is completely ridiculous. I was still just as much a human being then as I am now- merely unconscious.
So "personhood" does not require consciousness, and therefore #'s 2,3, and especially 4 are incorrect.

The use of the word consciousness in this case is not the same - and you know it.

What do you mean by rejected? If emotionally, then, well, she might as well have had an abortion. Otherwise, well, it's the same thing.

Physically rejected. Most fertilized eggs never make it to birth. A very large number never even implant and are simply expelled with the woman's monthly cycle.

Well, of course it's gonna be "silent" on specifically abortion. The whole procedure has only been around for a couple decades or so.

Abortion, in various forms, has been around for as long as human beings have been keeping histories - and possibly even before. The ancient Egyptians detailed abortion procedures and concoctions, as did several ancient civilizations. Abortions were around (and legal) in this country as per English common law - up until the "quickening" at which the woman could first feel movement - right up until the early part of the 20th century, when fairly safe medical procedures for abortion became available. As soon as they could be safely performed by a medical professional, instead of by a midwife with a stick or poison, they were made illegal in many places. Then, of course, Roe v. Wade changed that.

And even if it doesn't mention abortion, the very reference you gave me does talk about killing the baby- the penalty isn't as high as death, but the fact that he had to pay a fine proves it was the wrong thing to do.

....but not the same as killing a born person - making a very clear distinction between the value of a born person and the unborn. It obviously isn't murder to kill the unborn, or the penalty would have been death - not a fine.

His position doesn't matter- it's what he says and believes, and apparently he either hadn't read enough, or he forgot even the word "abortion" in terms of the medical procedure is relatively new.

Why must it be in terms of the medical procedure? The idea and some form of the practice has been around as long as human beings have.

What I mean is, either a fetus is part of a woman's body or it's not. This is what we're all trying to work out (among a few other things).

You're the only one focussing on that. A woman's right to do what she wants with her own body doesn't depend on whether or not everything in it is part of her. A fetus is not a part of the woman's body - but it is growing inside of her - using her body (possibly against her will). Thus, she can decide whether or not her body will be used in that way.

For those of you who did and disagreed with my arguments based on www.dictionary.com, it seems reliable as far as I can tell- I mean, even the Merriam-Webster link shown to me pretty much says what I said.
"An animal in the early stages of growth... especially the developing human individual from the time of implantation to the end of the eighth week after conception." Right there it says it's a human individual. And as I said before, you can't mess with the official definition.

Mirrian-Webster is hardly the "official definition." Lay-dictionaries are based on general usage, not on some official source. If most people in this country used the word "blank" to mean "full of spaghetti", then M-W would list a definition of blank as being "full of spaghetti." If you want an official definition, in the scientific or medical sense, you are going to have to go to a scientific or medical source.

And Jocabia, of course the creators of birth control pills are gonna say that it's not killing anyone... otherwise they'd be out of business. But SD wasn't specifically mentioning the creators of birth control pills- that'd be a huge mistake. They said scientists and doctors, according to you.

The creators of birth control pills are scientists and doctors.

For those of you who did and disagreed with my arguments based on www.dictionary.com, it seems reliable as far as I can tell- I mean, even the Merriam-Webster link shown to me pretty much says what I said.
"An animal in the early stages of growth... especially the developing human individual from the time of implantation to the end of the eighth week after conception." Right there it says it's a human individual. And as I said before, you can't mess with the official definition.
Mirrian-Webster is hardly the "official definition." Lay-dictionaries are based on general usage, not on some official source. If most people in this country used the word "blank" to mean "full of spaghetti", then M-W would list a definition of blank as being "full of spaghetti." If you want an official definition, in the scientific or medical sense, you are going to have to go to a scientific or medical source.


Organism, Human Individual … simply playing with semantics.

Definition of Embryo:
Embryo: The organism in the early stages of growth and differentiation from fertilization to, in humans, the beginning of the third month of pregnancy. After that point in time, it is termed a fetus.
http://www.medterms.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=3225

And the various dictionary definitions (some quoted above) either call it an organism and Merriam Websters definition, calls a human embryo a human individual.

From this point on, anyone trying to argue that an embryo is neither a human individual AND equally Not an organism, must be required to provide a word definition source or a medical definition source to back it up, because it has now been firmly established that an embryo is either, “a human individual (M-W)” or an Organism (Medterms) or both, but an embryo cannot be neither of the two choices above without validation or proof.

Organism, Human Individual … simply playing with semantics.

Definition of Embryo:
Embryo: The organism in the early stages of growth and differentiation from fertilization to, in humans, the beginning of the third month of pregnancy. After that point in time, it is termed a fetus.
http://www.medterms.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=3225

And the various dictionary definitions (some quoted above) either call it an organism and Merriam Websters definition, calls a human embryo a human individual.

From this point on, anyone trying to argue that an embryo is neither a human individual AND equally Not an organism, must be required to provide a word definition source or a medical definition source to back it up, because it has now been firmly established that an embryo is either, “a human individual (M-W)” or an Organism (Medterms) or both, but an embryo cannot be neither of the two choices above without validation or proof.
It just says what an embryo is. So how does this have to do with personhood?

It just says what an embryo is. So how does this have to do with personhood?

Only the most vile definition sources could describe some human individuals as persons and others as less than persons (for example).

Organism, Human Individual … simply playing with semantics.

Definition of Embryo:
Embryo: The organism in the early stages of growth and differentiation from fertilization to, in humans, the beginning of the third month of pregnancy. After that point in time, it is termed a fetus.
http://www.medterms.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=3225

And the various dictionary definitions (some quoted above) either call it an organism and Merriam Websters definition, calls a human embryo a human individual.

From this point on, anyone trying to argue that an embryo is neither a human individual AND equally Not an organism, must be required to provide a word definition source or a medical definition source to back it up, because it has now been firmly established that an embryo is either, “a human individual (M-W)” or an Organism (Medterms) or both, but an embryo cannot be neither of the two choices above without validation or proof.

You really should avoid deception. It says it is developing into an individual human. A cocoon is a developing adult butterfly, but it is not an adult butterfly. The difference is obvious when you're not trying to obscure the point. Meanwhile, if you gerontologist who's an expert on the elderly but pretending to be an expert on embryos reveals that the brain and other organs are important by using them as arguments even though they do not develop until WELL after conception.

Only the most vile definition sources could describe some human individuals as persons and others as less than persons (for example).

You keep dropping the argument, but I'll ask it again. Why is the your definition for life different pre-birth and post-birth?

Not enough time for everything... But this one point.

This is not a value objection because a 1 month old might not live to be a 2 month old, and all 1 month olds will die eventually. Thus, the know-ability of 'when' death is irrelevant. Longevity is not important.

I didn't RAISE the spectre of potential.

This is your strawman.

I say life is life. And, it IS life, when it can be seen to BE life. There IS no 'potential'.

If you want to argue 'potential life', then YOU have to deal with the multiplicity of potentialities.

so why is neither side convinced with the excellent arguments of their opponents?

because no one is addressing anyones REAL reasons for allowing/banning abortion. not even themselves.

everyone has a feeling on whats right in this. THEN they search for reasons why they are right.

on both sides

a person is antiabortion for their own deep seated psychological reasons. they dont really care "when life begins" or what the DNA status of a fertilized egg is. they START with "abortion is killing a baby" and work their way backwards to the justifcation for their stance. the justification is meaningless, just window dressing.

the exact same thing is true of those who are proabortion. we start with the deep seated (probably psychological) feeling that a woman needs to run her own life THEN we justify in our heads that the fertilized egg/embryo/fetus is nothing. (at least not until a certain stage of gestation) but the justification is as meaningless as the justification for banning abortion. its just after-the-fact window dressing.

until you acknowlege and accomodate the true concerns of the other side, they wont hear you let alone be convinced by your argument.

Except that many here have expressed dislike for abortion and STILL supported choice. Those people have not followed the logic path you suggest.

Myself, my persepctive is purely scientific. It is incapable of functioning in any rational fashion before week 20-ish, so it is not a person entity before week 20-ish. Thus, I support choice for the woman (who IS provably a person), despite the fact that my PERSONAL feelings are that abortion is not a nice thing.

I do not believe that an argument 'against' it is required in the abortion question. Because like death, and brain death patients in particular, 'death' is determined on the basis of the medical professions assessment of the possibility of improvement/change/progress. If the condition is likely to improve, the patient is not listed as dead. If the patient cannot improve, the patient is declared dead so that the organs can be retrieved.


This isn't true.

If you are declared braindead, it isn't a matter of 'might you get better' again... you are just... dead. People do not 'get better' after clinical brain death. Of COURSE the patient is not going to 'get better'... but that is not the point. You don't bury your dead aunt because you finally decided this is more than a relapse... you bury her because she's dead.

In the case of a pre-20-week foetus, there never HAS been any coherent thought process, so the thing has never been functionally 'alive'. Thus, the concept of 'alive or dead' is irrelevent. It ONLY becomes relevent ONCE the foetus shows signals that are conclusively 'alive' - if it does.

This isn't true.

If you are declared braindead, it isn't a matter of 'might you get better' again... you are just... dead. People do not 'get better' after clinical brain death. Of COURSE the patient is not going to 'get better'... but that is not the point. You don't bury your dead aunt because you finally decided this is more than a relapse... you bury her because she's dead.

In the case of a pre-20-week foetus, there never HAS been any coherent thought process, so the thing has never been functionally 'alive'. Thus, the concept of 'alive or dead' is irrelevent. It ONLY becomes relevent ONCE the foetus shows signals that are conclusively 'alive' - if it does.

I don't understand why the major flaw in this argument is elusive to the ones making it.

"It's an argument from potential."
"No, it's not. IT's a life from conception. It doesn't have a potential for life. It's alive."
"Okay, but we define death by the end of brain activity. Brain activity defines life when discussing the end, but not the beginning."
"Because at the beginning the condition will likely improve."
"So it's an argument from potential"
"No, it's not. It's a life ...."
And so on.

It's amazing that no matter how many times we point it out the same people will claim it's not there. But the fact is that they are arguing that at conception there is a potential for the things that we use to define life, not the existence of life. Again, even their gerontologist mascarading as an embryologist made the argument that organs the cenceptus does not have are major markers for life.

Okay, I'm pro-choice, but I'm sick of fighting.

This is how I figure it, something NICE AND SIMPLE and both sides are screwed and both sides win at the same time.

Make abortion illegal when the fetus CAN SURVIVE ON ITS OWN.

If the fetus is disconnected from the mother and can live (with some medical help, why not...) without her BAM, it is its own life.

If the fetus is disconnected, and no matter how much medical tech, dies immediately then the mother HAS HER OWN CHOICE.

Saying a 3 month fetus has "life" is like saying that a woman's "appendix" has life. She has the right to remove it.

"But a fetus grows!"

Tumors do too, and in the cases when a body finds out that something is "growing" in the womb the immune system destroys it (thankfully, a woman's body has certain methods to prevent this). I could make the argument about removing tumours. They have life, and they grow (in fact, they grow teeth and hair too when big enough...).

BUT when removed they die.

A fetus that is removed from the body that "dies" has no life, organs die when removed all the time.

Who can argue against this? This isn't pro choice... this isn't pro-life... its pure, unadulterated reason and logic. Neutrality.

So how about this... when the fetus can survive on its OWN you have a different story. It is its own life now and has a chance to become a person. It can be birthed.

I'm not sure when this is, but USUALLY this is the third trimester.

Pro-Choice: OMGZ! You're taking away my right to choose!!!!11one1

*slap* DUMBASS! Shut up, if you couldn't decide to have the procedure done for the first FIVE TO SIX MONTHS you probably shouldn't have this thing. If you know what you want you'd have done it while it was a packet of cells dividing.

EVERYONE WINS!

Pro-Life- Once the third trimester starts, abortion is illegal. The second that group of cells can be removed from the core body and live the ball is in your court. Congrats!

Pro-Choice- A hah! You still get to choose for TWO TRIMESTERS! You actually have a -shit- load of time to choose!

They can sleep at night knowing unborn -children- (since we've determined they're only individuals when they can survive outside the body) are nice and safe in the Law's hands, and pro-choice can rest easy knowing they can still choose.

WHY IS THIS SUCH AN ISSUE!!! I can't believe I'm like, the ONLY PERSON that has even come up with this @_____@

SPREAD THE WORD! SEND THIS TO YOUR CONGRESSMEN! STOP THE FIGHTING!!!!!!

Call yourself PRO-INDIVIDUAL! (unless you have a better term >.>)

Spread the word!!!!

Okay, I'm pro-choice, but I'm sick of fighting.

This is how I figure it, something NICE AND SIMPLE and both sides are screwed and both sides win at the same time.

Make abortion illegal when the fetus CAN SURVIVE ON ITS OWN.

The problem with this is that an infant is hardly more equipped to survive on its own than a fetus.


Call yourself PRO-INDIVIDUAL! (unless you have a better term >.>)

I call myself pro-people-shutting-the-hell-up.

It seems a bit premature to me, but it's here...

South Dakota passes abortion ban (http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/rights_abortion_dc;_ylt=Al1FjOrFAPMotOt7MCedHx6s0NUE;_ylu=X3oDMTA2Z2szazkxBHNlYwN0bQ--)




Perhaps the case keeps coming back because the argument has been heard and found wanting before, and it still doesn't quite work?

Consider the pro-choice argument:

The whole difficulty is manufactured by a small religiously based minority trying to impose its morality on everybody else. The Evangelical congregation’s preachers draw huge crowds with their anti-choice sermons and propaganda, but theirs is not the only Christian view.

In the other camp, different denominations strongly support a person's right to freedom of choice. Who are the anti-choicers and their fanatic minions to impose their own views on so many other unwilling citizens?

The law does not say that a person must get an abortion. It is a matter of choice. Those who believe abortion is wrong need not participate in it, but they have no right to prevent others from doing so.

The anti-choice forces say that a fetus is a full human being with all the rights of everyone else. The Supreme Court says otherwise. In the (Roe vs. Wade) decision, the court clearly stated that fetus are not equal and that the unborn are not entitled to full civil rights. If the anti-choice forces are allowed to alter the Constitution or the courts to change, will any of our rights be safe? If they can take away the right to get an abortion, they can take away any right. It is a Pandora's box to change the Constitution or overturn established legal precedent.

Now consider the pro-choice argument from it’s original content (circa 1859):

The whole slavery question is just a matter of a small religiously based minority trying to impose its morality on everybody. The northern Congregationalist, Unitarian and Quaker preachers draw huge crowds with their anti-choice sermons, but theirs is not the only Christian view.

In the south, the Baptist, Presbyterian and Methodist denominations strongly support a person's right to own slaves. Who are Henry Ward Beecher and his fellow agitators to impose their own views on so many other unwilling Christians?

The law does not say that a person must own slaves. It is a matter of choice. Those who believe slavery is wrong need not participate in it, but they have no right to prevent others from doing so.

The anti-choice forces say that a slave is a full human being with all the rights of white people. The Supreme Court says otherwise. In the Dred Scott decision, the court clearly stated that Negroes are not equal and that slaves are not entitled to full civil rights. If the anti-choice forces are allowed to alter the Constitution to change Dred Scott, will any of our rights be safe? If they can take away the right to own slaves, they can take away any right. It is a Pandora's box to change the Constitution or overturn established legal precedent.

Looks like they're gonna have to change South Dakota's nickname from "The Mount Rushmore State" to "The Coathanger State."

Big deal. Abortion clinics are probably few and far between in South Dakota already. I do think the right to an abortion is protected by the Constitution, but really, if it was left up to the states, political life would be so much easier and practical life would hardly change at all. People sometimes forget that the majority of Americans are actually in favor of abortion rights.

It's called dropping arguments and they're quite good at it. I notice that all of their points get numerous similar responses, but many of our points are ignored because they simply don't have the ability to refute them. We put typical and reasonable arguments out there that get ignored. However, I promise you if someone comes in that's pro-choice but has a completely ridiculous argument or shows a shameful lack of understanding of the subject or science, they are going to be all over that. It's really not a very useful way to debate the points.
Yes, they are good at dropping arguments, which is a strong indicator of the weaknesses of their position. Let's review:

The aggregate argument seems to be that a fetus is a live person because it has certain genetic/physical characteristics. Therefore, rather than abort it, a woman should give birth to it and give it up for adoption if she doesn't want it.

To push this argument they have failed to respond (either by dropping or by what I call blind arguing -- just repeating their initial statement as if it is an answer to your counter-argument) to several well reasoned and supported counter-arguments including the following:

1. Personhood is not defined by physical characteristics.

2. Life is not defined by either personhood or genetic/physical characteristics.

3. Fetuses do not actually have the physical characteristics they claim as proof of life/personhood at the time it is claimed they have them, so even their flawed definition of life/personhood cannot be applied to early stage fetuses.

4. Whether or not a fetus is a life or a person is irrelevant to the woman's ownership of her own uterus. Her uterus is her property and she has the absolute right to dictate who gets to use it and for what. Some attempts have been made to counter this by pointing out that the state restricts what we are allowed to do with our bodies (the illegal drugs argument) but that does not actually answer this point because the state only restricts what we may do with our bodies. The state never imposes things we must do with our bodies. In other words, the state may say we're not allowed to shoot heroin into our veins, but it cannot say we must donate a kidney for transplant while we're still alive. Even a law banning abortions is not specifically saying (though it has the same effect) that a woman must allow her uterus to be used for making babies. Thus, whether the fetus is a person or not, that in no way grants it any right to use my body for its purposes over my objections.

5. Adoption has a low rate of successful placements. Millions of parentless children spend their entire childhoods in government systems, without any kind of family structure at all or, worse, are subjected to terrible abuses within a system that cannot adequately monitor their care. Because of the suffering inflicted on parentless children, putting a baby up for adoption cannot be considered a more caring choice of action.

6. Women electively choose abortion because they don't want to carry a pregnancy to term. How is adoption a solution to that, considering that she actually has to have the child in order to give it up?

7. Many women do not electively choose to abort their pregnancies. They are forced to by medical necessity. Although some of the anti-choice debaters have allowed that women should be able to abort to save their own lives, they then go on to ignore or even argue against that very position. The fact is that whether you are pro-choice or anti-choice, if you agree that a woman should be allowed to abort a dangerous pregnancy, then you cannot support the South Dakota law because it specifically makes no exception to protect the woman's life. And since the South Dakota law is what we are discussing here, at what point does pro-choice/anti-choice become moot in re SD?

Conclusion:

The anti-choice debators:

A. cannot provide evidence to counter the evidence that has been used to disprove their supposedly scientific claims;

B. cannot provide either legal or philosophical definitions of terms that match the way they are using the words "life" and "person";

C. fail to address the right of women to own and control their own bodies;

D. fail to address the failings of adoption as a social system and as an alternative to abortion; and

E. fail to address the lack of protection for women's lives in the South Dakota law and the extent to which that lack contradicts their own stated positions on abortion.

THEREFORE:

I can only conclude that all of their arguments are nothing but after-the-fact attempts to justify their one fundamental position -- they want to ban abortion, and the rights of women and the lives/well-being of children have nothing to do with it. If their arguments had any real validity, they would be better prepared to defend them, and we'd have a harder time knocking them down. They are nothing but props in a debating play. The anti-choice movement does not really care whether fetuses are people or not, nor whether suffering will result from banning abortion. They just want to get their way at the expense of others.

As far as the misery of life as an adopted/fostered baby is concerned, is there not an easy way to decide whether they'd rather live? Take a random sample of all those who have had that wretched childhood, and count those who commit suicide. Presumably a 50% plus rate would suggest they wish they hadn't been born.

As far as the misery of life as an adopted/fostered baby is concerned, is there not an easy way to decide whether they'd rather live? Take a random sample of all those who have had that wretched childhood, and count those who commit suicide. Presumably a 50% plus rate would suggest they wish they hadn't been born.
Way to jump in with a first post. Are they all going to be like this? :cool:

"If you can't say something nice, come sit next to me." -- Dorothy Parker

Big deal. Abortion clinics are probably few and far between in South Dakota already.

People always mention these "abortion clinics". I've never actually seen such a place. I've seen women's clinics that offer, as part of their many services, abortion, but never abortion clinics.

Here are my questions for the anti-liberty folks.

1) How do you intend to fix the educational system to ensure children who would have otherwise been aborted have a decent education and therefore opportunity to succeed?

2) How do you intend to fix the health care system to ensure families can pay for the health care of children who otherwise would have been aborted as well as pay for their own health care even though they have one more person to support?

3) How do you intend to fix various enviormental issues such as pollution and sprawl which the added population as a result of the lack of abortion leads to?

4) How to do you intend to fix the welfare system to ensure the families of children who would have otherwise been aborted can pay for those children?

Please do not responde by saying the parents should have been more careful and not have had sex because that demeans human life by turning a child into a punishment.

This isn't true.

If you are declared braindead, it isn't a matter of 'might you get better' again... you are just... dead. People do not 'get better' after clinical brain death. Of COURSE the patient is not going to 'get better'... but that is not the point. You don't bury your dead aunt because you finally decided this is more than a relapse... you bury her because she's dead.

In the case of a pre-20-week foetus, there never HAS been any coherent thought process, so the thing has never been functionally 'alive'. Thus, the concept of 'alive or dead' is irrelevent. It ONLY becomes relevent ONCE the foetus shows signals that are conclusively 'alive' - if it does.

Brain death itself has nothing to at all to do with the abortion issue, the assertion that brain activity is required for 'life' is ridiculous and a red herring argument in the first place. In the second place, brain death is defined as the irreversible loss of all functions of the brain. It is entirely based on the probability, or the lack thereof, of improving, or not. It's not my fault that you want to define it differently for your abortion argument here, but it is was it is.

The 'bury your aunt' stuff is a strawman argument on your part as well, it has nothing to do with abortion. A beating heart and breathing lungs body requires an assessment of irreversible damage before it is 'declared' brain dead. It can be determined in several ways. First - no electrical activity in the brain; this is determined by an EEG. Second - no blood flow to the brain; this is determined by blood flow studies. Third - absence of function of all parts of the brain - as determined by clinical assessment (no movement, no response to stimulation, no breathing, no brain reflexes.) And since history has shown that people cannot recover from such an eventuality, we allow people who have suffered such injuries to be 'declared' dead, meaning, the 'same -as,' or, 'might as well be.' But the moment such conditions are treatable we will no longer allow them to be 'declared' dead.

Here are my questions for the anti-liberty folks.

1) How do you intend to fix the educational system to ensure children who would have otherwise been aborted have a decent education and therefore opportunity to succeed?

2) How do you intend to fix the health care system to ensure families can pay for the health care of children who otherwise would have been aborted as well as pay for their own health care even though they have one more person to support?

3) How do you intend to fix various enviormental issues such as pollution and sprawl which the added population as a result of the lack of abortion leads to?

4) How to do you intend to fix the welfare system to ensure the families of children who would have otherwise been aborted can pay for those children?

Please do not responde by saying the parents should have been more careful and not have had sex because that demeans human life by turning a child into a punishment.

We need to address these issues regardless, with or without abortion, abortion is not a solution to any of those problems. If such arguments like this one were valid, one could then equally argue that we could have employed the one million aborted people to solve all of those problems if they hadn't been aborted.

*snip*

I can only conclude that all of their arguments are nothing but after-the-fact attempts to justify their one fundamental position -- they want to ban abortion, and the rights of women and the lives/well-being of children have nothing to do with it. If their arguments had any real validity, they would be better prepared to defend them, and we'd have a harder time knocking them down. They are nothing but props in a debating play. The anti-choice movement does not really care whether fetuses are people or not, nor whether suffering will result from banning abortion. They just want to get their way at the expense of others.

Was it really necessary to write a great big post that does nothing but result in simple name calling, used seemingly as justification for your belittling of people who hold a different opinion than yourself?

Well, thanks for sharing.

I call myself pro-people-shutting-the-hell-up.

That would hardly be conducive to keeping an active forum. ;)

If we took such advice, wise council that it is, I'm afraid all we'd hear thereafter is...




*crickets* :p

Was it really necessary to write a great big post that does nothing but result in simple name calling, used seemingly as justification for your belittling of people who hold a different opinion than yourself?

Well, thanks for sharing.

How about you address the dropped arguments? I've listed several so has s/he. It really destroys the credibility of your side when you continue to fail to address the same arguments in thread after thread.

You keep dropping the argument, but I'll ask it again. Why is the your definition for life different pre-birth and post-birth?

Here's one for example. Why is this question so difficult to answer?

Brain death itself has nothing to at all to do with the abortion issue, the assertion that brain activity is required for 'life' is ridiculous and a red herring argument in the first place.
Then again, the assertin that a fetus being alive makes abortion wrong is just as much a red herring.

Then again, the assertin that a fetus being alive makes abortion wrong is just as much a red herring.

How so? In as much as killing another individual is seldom 'allowable,' but I concede that it isn't 'always' banned, one must first recognize that the fetus is alive, and an identity to itself, and 'then' rationalize the right or wrong of allowing other people to 'end their lives through violent means.'

Admittedly, we allow people to kill other people in war and in self defense, but we don’t allow them to do it for financial gain or ‘fit’s of rage,’ for example.

Brain death itself has nothing to at all to do with the abortion issue, the assertion that brain activity is required for 'life' is ridiculous and a red herring argument in the first place. In the second place, brain death is defined as the irreversible loss of all functions of the brain. It is entirely based on the probability, or the lack thereof, of improving, or not. It's not my fault that you want to define it differently for your abortion argument here, but it is was it is.

First of all, brain death defines life at every other stage. The fact that it doesn't define life then is just more proof that you are making up a definition just to validate the subjugation of the will of women. Second, irreversible just happens to be an attribute of death. However, make no bones about it, the beginning of life is in the opposite direction, we are all aware of it, but it doesn't change the definition of life. Brain life is a requirement for life at every stage despite your denial of this basic medical fact. Make claims all you want but this is not an argument of potential but an argument of how we have ALWAYS delineated the living person from the dead person until someone decided they wanted to begin forcing women to bear children. Then and only then did the definition change to make up a brand new definition that narrowly defines life to include the conceptus or the fetus or the implanted embryo or the sperm and egg depending on when in history you're talking about and whom you are talking to. It's a flawed argument it has always been a flawed argument and your side is losing that argument because of the obvious flaw.

How so? In as much as killing another individual is seldom 'allowable,'<snip>
There's your problem. There's a big difference between "alive" and "individual".

Bacteria are alive, the plants and animals I eat are alive, etc, and yet there's not much wrong with getting rid of those. I don't see how a fetus being alive is important. Whether it is an individual is an entirely different matter, which is probably rather more important in an argument about legality.

There's your problem. There's a big difference between "alive" and "individual".

Bacteria are alive, the plants and animals I eat are alive, etc, and yet there's not much wrong with getting rid of those. I don't see how a fetus being alive is important. Whether it is an individual is an entirely different matter, which is probably rather more important in an argument about legality.

We've just (a few posts back, perhaps a page or two), discussed how the embryo (and therefore equally the fetus as well, which comes later) is defined as one or both of the following, either a human 'organism' (medical definition dictionary) or a human individual (word usage dictionary). The question now is whether or not we grant some human organisms/individuals rights, or choose not to grant them rights.

It is in the realm of possibility, constitutionally speaking, to allow some rights to some groups without granting them to other groups, but should it be allowed to continue if the right being spoken of here is the very right to life? We've already established that the supreme court's interpretations of who is a person with rights and who is not a person with rights, is changeable through the ages, having started with just white male property owners having the right to vote (for example), has evolved to include all adult citizens has changed, thus it is altogether possible that the groups that are granted recognition can continue to be modified to include an ever wider range of 'persons’ with certain rights.

Such as, modifying the law to grant the right to life as a constitutional amendment, or simply allowing the states to choose their own laws, or leave it as it is now by denying the embryonic/fetus organism/individual any rights at all.

We've just (a few posts back, perhaps a page or two), discussed how the embryo (and therefore equally the fetus as well, which comes later) is defined as one or both of the following, either a human 'organism' (medical definition dictionary) or a human individual (word usage dictionary). The question now is whether or not we grant some human organisms/individuals rights, or choose not to grant them rights.

I'm still having a problem with their definition, because they don't also include a definition of what they are referring to as an organism. One would *think* that an organism, usually defined as a living thing, would have to meet all the requirements to be deemed living, but that is apparently not the case with whatever definition used by this website.

But there is still the question of when something becomes a human person. Only human persons are granted rights at all, constitutionally.

It is in the realm of possibility, constitutionally speaking, to allow some rights to some groups without granting them to other groups, but should it be allowed to continue if the right being spoken of here is the very right to life? We've already established that the supreme court's interpretations of who is a person with rights and who is not a person with rights, is changeable through the ages, having started with just white male property owners having the right to vote (for example), has evolved to include all adult citizens has changed, thus it is altogether possible that the groups that are granted recognition can continue to be modified to include an ever wider range of 'persons’ with certain rights.

Are you really willing to go there? Are you willing to investigate every miscarriage as a possible manslaughter or murder case? Are you willing to check the menses of women to see if a life was lost that month?

Such as, modifying the law to grant the right to life as a constitutional amendment, or simply allowing the states to choose their own laws, or leave it as it is now by denying the embryonic/fetus organism/individual any rights at all.

The fetus is not denied "any rights at all." Once it reaches certain stages of development, it cannot be aborted, except through medical necessity.

I am teaching in Bismarck, North Dakota. We're in the middle of spring break (my university is on the semester system, and we start in mid-August) now and I took the opportunity to present a choral music clinic at a high school in the South Dakota capital of Pierre (which is pronounced "pier" for those not familiar with the Upper Midwest). Upon crossing the border of North and South Dakota, I can tell you that I saw no fewer than 20 billboards with various pro-life presentations on them. It's like they're obsessed down there. Once I saw them, I had no trouble believing that the SD legislature would pass such a law.

The teachers I talked with in Pierre were, without exception, opposed to it.

We need to address these issues regardless, with or without abortion, abortion is not a solution to any of those problems. If such arguments like this one were valid, one could then equally argue that we could have employed the one million aborted people to solve all of those problems if they hadn't been aborted.

While this is true the situation is made significantly worse when abortion is illegal.

...
Are you really willing to go there? Are you willing to investigate every miscarriage as a possible manslaughter or murder case? Are you willing to check the menses of women to see if a life was lost that month?

By the definition of what abortion constitutes a crime, and what punishment is applied by that law, the South Dakota bill’s only punishment is dished out is to the medical professional who performs the abortion procedure, or sells the aborficant.

With that in mind, I say yes, I'm willing to go there. The proof that a woman took an RU486 pill, for example, would result in trying to find out if she purchased it in S.D., and if so, who sold it to her and then press charges against them. The would-have-been mother would not be charged with a crime.

If the authorities never hear about a crime being committed, they wouldn't have a search warrant to search her house in the first place. Your suggestion of searching every woman monthly, would be unnecessary. It would be more like the narcotics buying person that has already used their narcotics, a crime has been committed (whoever sold the narcotics for this comparison) but the police aren't going to get a warrant to search 'every house' in town just because they know someone is likely to have some drugs somewhere, they would need to have a reason to get a warrant.

...
The fetus is not denied "any rights at all." Once it reaches certain stages of development, it cannot be aborted, except through medical necessity.

I disagree. I think it is more suited to be described as, “when the fetus reaches certain stages of development, it is then granted a limited right to life which then requires a higher necessity for a rationale to override its newly gained right before it can have it’s life taken away.”

And, additionally, I believe that this 'stage' that we choose to grant this right, can be moved to a different phases as we may deem appropriate. In the case of the SD bill, they are arguing for the granting of the right to life be moved all the way up to conception.

While this is true the situation is made significantly worse when abortion is illegal.


I see your assertion, but I don't see a reason to agree with your conclusion.

I am teaching in Bismarck, North Dakota. We're in the middle of spring break (my university is on the semester system, and we start in mid-August) now and I took the opportunity to present a choral music clinic at a high school in the South Dakota capital of Pierre (which is pronounced "pier" for those not familiar with the Upper Midwest). Upon crossing the border of North and South Dakota, I can tell you that I saw no fewer than 20 billboards with various pro-life presentations on them. It's like they're obsessed down there. Once I saw them, I had no trouble believing that the SD legislature would pass such a law.

The teachers I talked with in Pierre were, without exception, opposed to it.


I have no doubt of what you say. But to put it' popularity into perspective, I was reading that the DFL party of SD had to drop abortion rights as part of their party issues because they were having a hard time keeping members in the DFL party there. I think that shows that the general population of SD, even the left leaning members, have a hard time keeping votes when they are pro-choice on the issues.

::( Hey man your really wrong on this. God intends to give life to kids

By the definition of what abortion constitutes a crime, and what punishment is applied by that law, the South Dakota bill’s only punishment is dished out is to the medical professional who performs the abortion procedure, or sells the aborficant.

In other words, it isn't being treated even close to being a human person with the rights that go along with that.

With that in mind, I say yes, I'm willing to go there. The proof that a woman took an RU486 pill, for example, would result in trying to find out if she purchased it in S.D., and if so, who sold it to her and then press charges against them. The would-have-been mother would not be charged with a crime.

Usually, when a person is killed, we punish the person who actually did it, the person who asked for it, and any other accomplices, not just the person who sold them the weapon with which to do it. Once again, this is an incredibly clear distinction between the treatment of a human person and that you advocate for the fetus.

If the authorities never hear about a crime being committed, they wouldn't have a search warrant to search her house in the first place. Your suggestion of searching every woman monthly, would be unnecessary.

Our government is not supposed to protect all human life? We aren't going to worry about all those many lives being lost, perhaps to negligence? I wonder if you would say the same thing about other people dying. I would guess not - so it seems that, once again, you are making a clear distinction between the treatment of a human person and that of an embryo.

It would be more like the narcotics buying person that has already used their narcotics, a crime has been committed (whoever sold the narcotics for this comparison) but the police aren't going to get a warrant to search 'every house' in town just because they know someone is likely to have some drugs somewhere, they would need to have a reason to get a warrant.

If there were a damn good chance that every person in a town had narcotics, they would search every house. There is a damn good chance that every sexually active woman will have a fertilized egg go unimplanted or a miscarriage. Thus, there is ample cause to check every woman - unless, of course, the embryo is not entitled to such protections...

I disagree. I think it is more suited to be described as, “when the fetus reaches certain stages of development, it is then granted a limited right to life which then requires a higher necessity for a rationale to override its newly gained right before it can have it’s life taken away.”

..which is pretty much the exact same statement in less words. Would you prefer that medical necessity be removed? Oh wait, obviously you would, since you apparently support the SD law that has no health clause...

And, additionally, I believe that this 'stage' that we choose to grant this right, can be moved to a different phases as we may deem appropriate. In the case of the SD bill, they are arguing for the granting of the right to life be moved all the way up to conception.

"As we deem appropriate" isn't enough. There must be a logical rationale behind it. In this case, there is not. The exact same logic used in the SD bill could be used equally to grant personhood to a cancer, to declare a chimera to be two persons, and to declare a set of twins to be only one person.

I have no doubt of what you say. But to put it' popularity into perspective, I was reading that the DFL party of SD had to drop abortion rights as part of their party issues because they were having a hard time keeping members in the DFL party there. I think that shows that the general population of SD, even the left leaning members, have a hard time keeping votes when they are pro-choice on the issues.

And I find it incredibly interesting that the population of SD has been steadily dropping for quite a while now. It would seem that very, very few people want to live there....

Recently, I discovered that they are actually the only state to ban any and all research on embryonic stem cells. It's almost like they are trying to turn the entire state into a dead zone.

In other words, it isn't being treated even close to being a human person with the rights that go along with that.

I would suggest that abortion is simply being moved from being an acceptable practice, being moved from ‘justifiable manslaughter’ with no punishment, to something similar to assisted euthanasia (illegal in SD), for example.

Usually, when a person is killed, we punish the person who actually did it, the person who asked for it, and any other accomplices, not just the person who sold them the weapon with which to do it. Once again, this is an incredibly clear distinction between the treatment of a human person and that you advocate for the fetus.

The person performing the crime, in the SD bill, is the person that ‘should know better.’ The person practicing medicine in SD should be the one that knows the legalities of their field and what they can and cannot do. Having different standards in different states.

I would argue that the slavery free states and the slave states had similarly odd working laws for when a person was property and when they were not, and when they were free via escape and when they had to be returned (different laws in different states ~ rule of thumb, farther north you make it, the less likely you would be returned etc.,). Until slavery was outlawed from border to border in all the states, the laws of where and when it was illegal and what punishment/action was taken or used to deal with different scenarios changed from state to state, and from time to time. The same that SD is trying to do with their anti-choice abortion bill now, make it illegal to do in their state what they believe is wrong, regardless what other states say (abortion in their case now, slavery in northern state's cases then).


Our government is not supposed to protect all human life? We aren't going to worry about all those many lives being lost, perhaps to negligence? I wonder if you would say the same thing about other people dying. I would guess not - so it seems that, once again, you are making a clear distinction between the treatment of a human person and that of an embryo.

We make a distinction about death, how death and when death was done to a person, and when it is or is not justifiable, and who and how third or secondary persons are allowed to participate in that death. We have legal euthanasia in Oregon, but not in Michigan, we have negligent manslaughter in most states and we have medical malpractice suits from wrongful deaths in most as well. We have lots of laws that punish the resulting ‘death’ in many different ways, and some that don’t result in any punishment. Abortion laws already exist, what is a crime and what is not a crime is simply changing where is stands in the SD bill (theoretically, it’s not in action of course).


If there were a damn good chance that every person in a town had narcotics, they would search every house. There is a damn good chance that every sexually active woman will have a fertilized egg go unimplanted or a miscarriage. Thus, there is ample cause to check every woman - unless, of course, the embryo is not entitled to such protections...

You are incorrect. We ‘know’ that if we raided certain neighborhoods, apartment by apartment, houses by house, we would find some type of narcotic or illegal contraband in nearly every single residence … But we don’t do it.


..which is pretty much the exact same statement in less words. Would you prefer that medical necessity be removed? Oh wait, obviously you would, since you apparently support the SD law that has no health clause...

Correct. They have a ‘life of the mother clause” AND they have a ‘treatment of the mother clause.’ If, in the treatment of the mother’s health, the embryo/fetus/baby is harmed, the medical professional will NOT be held liable for the life of the baby. So, the mother’s health can be treated in any way required, the same as now, but abortion itself is not an allowable treatment, the SD bill.

"As we deem appropriate" isn't enough. There must be a logical rationale behind it. In this case, there is not. The exact same logic used in the SD bill could be used equally to grant personhood to a cancer, to declare a chimera to be two persons, and to declare a set of twins to be only one person.

“As we deem appropriate” is enough. That is how society works. It is illegal to jaywalk in downtown Minneapolis, but not illegal to jaywalk across the street to pick up your mail on a residential street (for example). The SD abortion bill determines that an embryo in the womb is protected regardless if it is a chimera or a person or twins, but it does not declare a cancer growth in the uterus to be protected because it is not a zygote/embryo/fetus, it is a cancer growth.


And I find it incredibly interesting that the population of SD has been steadily dropping for quite a while now. It would seem that very, very few people want to live there....

Recently, I discovered that they are actually the only state to ban any and all research on embryonic stem cells. It's almost like they are trying to turn the entire state into a dead zone.

It’s a shame that you decided to attack them as a group simply because you disagree with them. It is equally true that lots of places have a declining population or a slower growth rate than other places, such as New York state or Germany for examples, would this suggest that they are less desirable places to live? No, it would not.

Only the most vile definition sources could describe some human individuals as persons and others as less than persons (for example).

The medical terminology didn't say it was a human individual. You are obfuscating.

The problem with this is that an infant is hardly more equipped to survive on its own than a fetus.


That's not strictly true, now, is it...

I mean there's a big difference between not being able to successfully gather food, and not being 'complete' enough to breathe.

Brain death itself has nothing to at all to do with the abortion issue, the assertion that brain activity is required for 'life' is ridiculous and a red herring argument in the first place. In the second place, brain death is defined as the irreversible loss of all functions of the brain. It is entirely based on the probability, or the lack thereof, of improving, or not. It's not my fault that you want to define it differently for your abortion argument here, but it is was it is.

The 'bury your aunt' stuff is a strawman argument on your part as well, it has nothing to do with abortion. A beating heart and breathing lungs body requires an assessment of irreversible damage before it is 'declared' brain dead. It can be determined in several ways. First - no electrical activity in the brain; this is determined by an EEG. Second - no blood flow to the brain; this is determined by blood flow studies. Third - absence of function of all parts of the brain - as determined by clinical assessment (no movement, no response to stimulation, no breathing, no brain reflexes.) And since history has shown that people cannot recover from such an eventuality, we allow people who have suffered such injuries to be 'declared' dead, meaning, the 'same -as,' or, 'might as well be.' But the moment such conditions are treatable we will no longer allow them to be 'declared' dead.

You are fond of pointing out perceived strawmen.... but the fact is that what you keep calling a 'red herring', is what would be termed (if this were a legal court, and we were discussing law) 'precedent'.

You say the foetus is alive. (Indeed, I believe you are actually describing an embryo as 'a human life', no?).

I believe it is NOT a human life.

I believe that the science supports me... since an early-term foetus fails to manage many of the things we consider characteristics of 'human lives'. ANd, I have a 'precedent' for that assumption, based on how we judge 'a human life' at the OTHER end of this particular spectrum.

Your quibbling over that issue, is really tantamount to admitting you cannot PROVE that a foetus IS 'a human life'.

How so? In as much as killing another individual


Your dishonesty appears to know no bounds. You constantly repeat this little mantra (that a foetus is an 'individual'), but you have absolutely failed to PROVE it.


...one must first recognize that the fetus is alive,

According to you one must recognise that 'assertion'. Personally, I'm willing to grant that a foetus IS living tissue, but that doesn't make it an HUMAN LIFE.

We've just (a few posts back, perhaps a page or two), discussed how the embryo (and therefore equally the fetus as well, which comes later) is defined as one or both of the following, either a human 'organism' (medical definition dictionary)


Actually, the medical dictionary did not term it "a human 'organism'..."


or a human individual (word usage dictionary).


Since the transition between life and death is commonly considered one where a medical opinion is needed, 'lay' definitions are no use to us here. Any 'lay' definition you present is invalid when we are discussing what is, essentially, a medical 'state'.

::( Hey man your really wrong on this. God intends to give life to kids

Which God?

Atheists have no 'god'... so they are free to abort?

Of course - the argument could be made that, if God REALLY wanted us to 'give life to kids', he would make it impossible to abort...

Your dishonesty appears to know no bounds. You constantly repeat this little mantra (that a foetus is an 'individual'), but you have absolutely failed to PROVE it.

According to you one must recognise that 'assertion'. Personally, I'm willing to grant that a foetus IS living tissue, but that doesn't make it an HUMAN LIFE.

What kind of life do you suggest that it is?

Actually, the medical dictionary did not term it "a human 'organism'..."

Embryo: The organism in the early stages of growth and differentiation from fertilization to, in humans, the beginning of the third month of pregnancy. After that point in time, it is termed a fetus.
http://www.medterms.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=3225

If you want to suggest that it is not a human organism which is in the human womb of a human mother, please present your evidence.




(As to the calling me dishonest [no different than simply calling me an intentional liar], I'll ask you please refrain from the name-calling. It’s uncalled for and unhelpful to the discussion, thank you for your anticipated future restraint.)

What kind of life do you suggest that it is?


As I said, you have consistently failed to prove it.

But, I guess you are going to ignore that little failing, and instead question my definitions again?

Let me be clear. A cancer is 'human cells', with 'human DNA' (although that is actually a flawed concept), it is 'human tissue' and that tissue is 'alive'.

But, that tissue is NOT 'a human life'.

Quit prevaricating, and address the issues.


Embryo: The organism in the early stages of growth and differentiation from fertilization to, in humans, the beginning of the third month of pregnancy. After that point in time, it is termed a fetus.
http://www.medterms.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=3225

If you want to suggest that it is not a human organism which is in the human womb of a human mother, please present your evidence.


The two parts you refer to are separate clauses. The words 'in human' are (clearly - more obfuscation on your part) specific to the stage of development. It does not say that an embryo is a human organism... it says that an embryo stops being an embryo (and becomes a foetus) in the third month, IN HUMANS.

I don't know if you are deliberately misquoting, or if you genuinely do not understand that difference... but I suspect it is a deliberate attempt to obfuscate.

(As to the calling me dishonest [no different than simply calling me an intentional liar], I'll ask you please refrain from the name-calling. It’s uncalled for and unhelpful to the discussion, thank you for your anticipated future restraint.)

You have stated two things that are either PATENTLY untrue, or still not proved. To state something untrue is dishonest. Did I say you were 'an intentional liar'? No - because I cannot be sure if you are deliberately misinterpreting material, or if you just don't understand it.

However, if you continue to perpetrate falsehoods to support your argument, they will continue to be untrue, your argument will continue to be supported by nothing, and I will continue to refer to that approach as "dishonest".

I have yet to call you names... it is not something I do, as a matter of course.

As I said, you have consistently failed to prove it.

But, I guess you are going to ignore that little failing, and instead question my definitions again?

Let me be clear. A cancer is 'human cells', with 'human DNA' (although that is actually a flawed concept), it is 'human tissue' and that tissue is 'alive'.

But, that tissue is NOT 'a human life'.

Quit prevaricating, and address the issues.

I have shown that the medical definition calls an embryo an "organism," it is a human organism by default. The authority of the definition of the "human individuality of an embryo" from M-W dictionary, you have stated that you choose to not recognize it, which is fine, but you seem to have forgotten that it was presented as evidence at all. To say that I failed to prove it is simply saying that you do not accept it as convincing evidence, but not that others could not look at the same evidence and disagree with your conclusion, based on the evidence I (and others) have provided.

The difference between types of cells, like a zygote and a cancer cluster of cells, even though they may both be 'human cells' a zygote is the stage of the 'organism' before it is an embryo, the cancer cell cluster is not a stage of an entity, but badly performing cells in an organism.


The two parts you refer to are separate clauses. The words 'in human' are (clearly - more obfuscation on your part) specific to the stage of development. It does not say that an embryo is a human organism... it says that an embryo stops being an embryo (and becomes a foetus) in the third month, IN HUMANS.

It doesn't need to say 'human organism' when it says embryo=organism, and then defines when a human embryo's stage is defined, it doesn't need to be stated that a pig embryo could have a different period of time from the stage given for humans, nor does it need to say that a pig embryo is a pig organism, not a human organism.

However, if you continue to perpetrate falsehoods to support your argument, they will continue to be untrue, your argument will continue to be supported by nothing, and I will continue to refer to that approach as "dishonest".

I have yet to call you names... it is not something I do, as a matter of course.

Again, to say that you choose not to recognize the authority of a source is one thing, but then to act like a source was not provided is not good form.

I’ve already stated ‘organism’ for embryo, as provided, and even though you want to disallow M-Webster’s dictionary for ‘embryo’ human individual, perhaps you will accept it’s definition of ‘organism:

Organism
Main Entry: or•gan•ism
Pronunciation: 'or-g&-"ni-z&m
Function: noun
1 : a complex structure of interdependent and subordinate elements whose relations and properties are largely determined by their function in the whole
2 : an individual constituted to carry on the activities of life by means of organs separate in function but mutually dependent : a living being
Thus, I’ve provided quantifiable evidences and deductive reasoning for my assertion that an embryo in the womb of it’s human mother is both human and an individual organism.

Good for South Dakota! Just another step away from hedonistic liberal anarchy, and another step towards a moralistic world. TAKE THAT LIBERALS!!!

I have shown that the medical definition calls an embryo an "organism," it is a human organism by default. The authority of the definition of the "human individuality of an embryo" from M-W dictionary, you have stated that you choose to not recognize it, which is fine, but you seem to have forgotten that it was presented as evidence at all. To say that I failed to prove it is simply saying that you do not accept it as convincing evidence, but not that others could not look at the same evidence and disagree with your conclusion, based on the evidence I (and others) have provided.

The difference between types of cells, like a zygote and a cancer cluster of cells, even though they may both be 'human cells' a zygote is the stage of the 'organism' before it is an embryo, the cancer cell cluster is not a stage of an entity, but badly performing cells in an organism.



It doesn't need to say 'human organism' when it says embryo=organism, and then defines when a human embryo's stage is defined, it doesn't need to be stated that a pig embryo could have a different period of time from the stage given for humans, nor does it need to say that a pig embryo is a pig organism, not a human organism.



Again, to say that you choose not to recognize the authority of a source is one thing, but then to act like a source was not provided is not good form.

I’ve already stated ‘organism’ for embryo, as provided, and even though you want to disallow M-Webster’s dictionary for ‘embryo’ human individual, perhaps you will accept it’s definition of ‘organism:

Organism
Main Entry: or•gan•ism
Pronunciation: 'or-g&-"ni-z&m
Function: noun
1 : a complex structure of interdependent and subordinate elements whose relations and properties are largely determined by their function in the whole
2 : an individual constituted to carry on the activities of life by means of organs separate in function but mutually dependent : a living being
Thus, I’ve provided quantifiable evidences and deductive reasoning for my assertion that an embryo in the womb of it’s human mother is both human and an individual organism.

Why do you keep saying I have chosen 'to not recognise' your non-medical dictionary?

Again - this is either obfuscation of dishonesty.

What I have said is, you cannot legitimately argue a medical issue, with a lay definition.

The same would be true for most anything that uses a specific 'vocabulary'... law, computer programming, engineering...

Good for South Dakota! Just another step away from hedonistic liberal anarchy, and another step towards a moralistic world. TAKE THAT LIBERALS!!!

Morals ae relative. To impose YOUR 'morals' on another, might be considered 'immoral'.