September 20th, 2008, 12:28 AM
Isn't the answer to this question obviously related to its opposite: when does human life end? Does not human life end with the cessation of brain activity? So doesn't it make sense that human life begins when brain activity begins? If so that puts it between 20 weeks after conception when we first measure intermittent starts in brain activity and 22 weeks after conception when that brain activity becomes sustained.
September 20th, 2008, 01:47 AM
That is one definition of many. I suspect one could present other definitions that would pair up with each of your 'when does life begin' options.Originally Posted by mitchellmckain
Good luck with the poll, but I don't jump into shark infested waters with a bleeding finger.
If human life doesn't begin at conception, then what do you call it?
What is the average strike rate of a successful conception becoming human life as it is perceived after birth?
What do we call the atom? A potential "brick" we can see?
When does a theory of science begin?
On the atomic level?
Then what are you saying (so very rich)............are you saying that a theory of science, well, does it take root from the time of subatomic experiments?
Are you saying that you do not believe a full bodied theory of space-time can take root from "atomic experiments", even "below" the cullular level.
Shame on you, shaaaaaame.
Get theeee to a Nuuuuuuunery (I say that comically because you have offended the concept enough with your questioning, your poll).
It's ironic watching dog-breeders: watch them if you can: as soon as the dogs do the business, that's that...........they have that confidence that "stork-dog" is coming soon.
Same with horse trainers: they have that faith, and it never fails.
I'm just wondering then: should we take any of the results of CERN seriously, given how embryological it all is.
I can tell you now, their attempts contradict their pro-abortion stance when they claim they do not murder children by using post-conception contraceptive devices.
I'll say at conception. Because if left be, it will become a human like you and I. You can't just say its not life, because it will be, and you know it will be. But thats my concetpion of time, that you can't use it as you please. Once you make life, thats it theres no going back.
But just imagine the effects of not letting a human be born, all the alternate effects of other peoples lives that will be affected. Imagine for instance I was terminated. Well I don't think you have to imagine hard...
You make it sound like a horse race, a bet, a lottery, not a necessarily a sure thing..............why?
Because from the moment a human is created. It is a bet, a gamble, an unsure thing, because we onyl know the human will be born, we have no idea what will become of them or others as a result of them becoming whatever it is that they will or will not become.
September 20th, 2008, 07:49 AM
Firstly, Human life doesn't necessarily end with brain activity. Have you heard of the people who's body is still electronically functioning through machinary but can't think, move, do anything? If your doing this for an essay I wouldn't use that statement.
Secondly, I think human life begins when there is something there. We're made of organic compounds. Living things. Even if the baby doesn't have a brain yet, it has the same thing we're made of. Controlled, living, dividing cells.
I'm pro-life, as you can tell. Just because something can't feel it doesn't mean it's a good idea. For instance, if you have a family member whose a bum, would you pump him full of morphine, tell him you just can't support him right now but maybe later, and off him?
Thank God my mother did not abort me.
That's all I have.
Thank god every sperm is sacred.
True but when we are talking about what is murder and what choices we have, what definition do we use? When a family turns of the machines of a loved one is it murder? Technology changes our ethical challenges doesn't it. Ethics are easy when we don't have the ability to do anything. Do we have a right to use our technology to interfere with the "course of nature" (or "will of God") and stop disease? Are we morally obligated to use what technology we can to alleviate human suffering? Perhaps some people are not up to the ethical challenges of modern life and would prefer to go back to the caves or to the dark ages where all they could do was grunt or worship God.That is one definition of many. I suspect one could present other definitions that would pair up with each of your 'when does life begin' options.
But you know me. I don't care what anyone thinks or whose "perfect" apple cart I might upset.
An embryonic primate.
If DNA is all that makes you what you are then you are a primate (because your DNA is 98.3% the same as a chimpanzee) and nothing more. But this is not true of me at all. I am not a genetic code. I am not a biological organism. I have a biological body at the moment but that is not what I am. Without the operation of my mind to make use of this body, there is absolutely nothing here that is of any interest to me at all -- just biological waste.
Are you asking what is the average success of a zygote becoming a human life given the investment, sharing of resources, protection and care of pregnancy? I would say about the same as the average sucess of an egg becoming a human life given the the contribution of a sperm plus pregnancy. So do we conclude that menstration is a form of murder?
The zygote certainly has potential for human life, but then so does every opportunity for sex. So must every opportunity be taken and every potential be fulfilled or should we make choices based on what is best for the children that might result? What is the proper motivation for having children anyway? Do we give birth to children because we want to give of our lives to them or because some religious nut says we don't have a choice?
When a human being is on drugs, can that alteration of brain activity still be called human, or is that a temporary cessation of human life? If this is not drugs then perhaps it is some kind of irrational fanaticism that is a temporary cessation of human life.
Some peoples need for self-righteousness is so great and intolerance of a diversity of opinion is so immense that they must make up imaginary crimes so that by labeling others with those crimes they can imagine that their rightness is perfect and untouchable. Some fanatics do this by saying that animals are people too so they can call everyone who is not a vegitarian like they are a muderer, but I find that more morally defensible than those who are so convinced that women are no more than baby-making machines with no need of choice in their lives that they would agree with rapist and extend their dehumanization to a period of 9 months.
September 20th, 2008, 01:25 PM
Perhaps not.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clinical_death
I feel better about this, only because you feel different to me......u know, scared.......
( i souldn't say that..........
September 20th, 2008, 04:10 PM
From your link:
Clinical death is not any kind of death at all, except for people who want to tout "near death" experiences as evidence of an afterlife. But getting back to reality, clinical death is just a reason to pull in the crash cart and attempt resuscitation and that is only given up on when the length of time has been so great that a lack of oxygen to the brain means that the brain has died.Death was historically believed to be an event that coincided with the onset of clinical death. It is now understood that death is a process, not an event
...
If a patient with working heart and lungs is determined to be brain dead, who can be pronounced legally dead without clinical death occurring.
From wikipedia on legal death:
In the wikipedia article on brain death the opposition by religious groups was interesting. Perhaps they don't consider the brain very important? LOLWith time the definition of legal death has been reexamined and altered as our technology enhances. The definition of death use to include only cessation of heart and lungs but now after further development it has been altered so that it can include permanent and irreversible brain failure.
I have been thinking about what sort of definition of death would go with the idea of human life begining at conception. Does this mean that as long as we manage to keep a cell of a person alive then they are not dead? That would be great news for the those who steal peoples organs, because then as long as the organ survives then they could dispose of the rest of the person's body and not be guilty of murder. Such are the incredibly bizzare implications of this new fanatical "pro-life" idiotology... I mean ideology.That is one definition of many. I suspect one could present other definitions that would pair up with each of your 'when does life begin' options.
Good luck with the poll, but I don't jump into shark infested waters with a bleeding finger.
September 20th, 2008, 04:26 PM
From the same link:
"This effort will continue until either the heart is restarted, or a physician determines that the heart is too damaged to be restarted. If this determination is made, the physician will pronounce legal death and resuscitation efforts will stop."
There was a joke,a catholic one I think, about those who didn't seem to fit into a catholic education: failed abortions..............like you have the instinct, but you're wearing too many problems, especially in a boarding school.
September 20th, 2008, 11:44 PM
Obviously we cannot live without the function of the heart. Without the sustenance of blood flow the brain will die. But the heart can be replaced. So if there was a heart available and a way to keep the rest of the body alive (especially the brain), until the new heart could be installed then I hardly think that "clinical death" means they would just say that patient is dead already so there is no need to put the new heart in. The brain, however, cannot be replaced.
Why not just define what a human is, huh.
Is a human a translplantable thing?
What about a person with an artificial heart?
Are they human.
The evolution atomic physics took root from someone's mind, and yet it appears we've forgotten this fundamental starting point ingredient.
What about a body on a machine, a body in a coma, brain dead though: are they human?
Of course they are. I think an embryo is more human than someone in a coma: they have more chance (I hate saying "more"........"human" should be a way we accept everything from conception to the moment our body stops ticking...and on that note, does not the most aggressive and constructive ticking happen in the womb?).
If you want to waste your resources and time watching over a brainless body thinking that this is love, well that is your choice. But I certainly believe that others should have the choice to face reality and accept that their loved one is dead and turn off the machines. Likewise I believe that a woman should have a choice in whether to spend her resources on a child deciding whether that child will be welcome and loved for she has 20 weeks before any kind of brain activity starts, so that if like me she believes that she is more than just a primate DNA, she knows that that the foetus in her is not a human being. Perhaps you want to turn her into a slave to bear your babies for you, make women marry their rapist, rape women for 9 months, put rape victims in jail for taking back their life, smile at the suicides and back alley abortions and say how they deserve an eternity in hell. Perhaps you want to turn back the clock to the dark ages where women were property and men had little to do but praise God, but this is the measure of how small your mind is.
September 21st, 2008, 01:28 PM
Perhaps, it will be in the future. The point is that legal death is not just when one's brain has failed, hence you need to adjust your poll accordingly.
Human "life".
When does it "begin"?
At a successful conception in a woman's womb.
(studies demonstrate this to be a fact)
How does one define human "life"?
Some would argue that we are only truly alive when we are "born again".
But, until then, on our level, life begins at conception.
Is a bacterial a life-form?
What about a virus?
So, why cannot "human" represent such a level of development called "life-form" also?
Scientists argue that bacteria and viruses are life-forms, especially when they analyse possible mechanisms for when life began on earth.
I don't believe women are the "property" of anyone. If a woman chooses to end the new life-form within her, that's her choice. But, it is usually the man not the woman at fault when it comes to abortions.
Mitchell, I would have thought that men who proposed the freedom of abortions for women are the ones making women their property, in playing God with their natural abilities.
September 21st, 2008, 04:18 PM
What is it about the poll that needs to be adjusted?
So just what are you saying Q?
Is a person whose brain is dead still alive and turning off machines that keep the body alive is murder?
Is a person whose brain is alive still dead if the heart and lungs don't function, and so if we can keep them alive and replace the function of their heart and lungs then we shouldn't bother because they are already dead? When we replace their heart or lungs is what wakes up no longer the same person?
Perhaps the brain can be replaced in the future? Replaced with what? And when you do that will it be the same person? Do you then believe that the person can be separated from the brain somehow? Why Q, I would never have guessed that you might think such a thing. Now myself, I happen to believe that the mind is a living organism in its own right and that would suggest that it might be transplanted to an artificial brain. But I not only think that this is extremely unlikely, but I don't think you believe that.
So my guess is that you think we might be able program a computer with someone's personality and that we can thus replace a persons brain with that computer as an artificial brain and there would be no difference. I think that in the case of some people, ...you might be right.
Well Q, suppose we built such an artificial brain programed with your personality. We can assure you that it is better than the one you have for many reasons: immunity to disease, no loss of memory, and better access to technology (like a built in cell phone and internet connection). So the question is, will you consent to having your old brain discarded and having the new one installed?
We can certainly say that the zygote is human in the same way we can determine that a hair folicle, fingernail, or cancer cell is human. We can also say that the zygote is certainly alive just as the egg and sperm are both human and alive also. But that really isn't the question, because the same applies to a cancer cell which is also alive and human, and yet we believe that we have a perfect right to removes such cells from our body even if they are benign (not life threatening) and even thought they will "tragically" die when they are removed.
The question we are asking is not what makes something human or what makes something alive but what makes something a human being. A cancer cell may be human and alive but it is NOT a human being. But the zygote is no different. It is alive and it is of the human type, but it is just a micro-organism with a bit of primate DNA in it. It certainly is NOT a human being.
That is indeed the question. Are we nothing more than a DNA pattern? Are you simply a mechanism by which your DNA is propagating itself? Are you no more than a "selfish gene"? I certainly believe that a human being is a lot more than this. A human being is a mind. You can certainly have life without a mind. There are all kinds of that on the bottom of my shoe. But it is not human life in the sense of a human being.
Indeed. But how can that be if we are just DNA? But if it is another kind of inheritance that makes us human - the inheritance of information that forms the human mind, then it makes perfect sense that something like the gospel can give new life to the mind and change us to something that is more human - or rather more divine, perhaps.
Only if we are no different from the animals, and I do not believe that. We already have an inheritance of the mind which has nothing to do with our DNA and it is that inheriticance not our DNA that makes us human.
Of course. But the question is whether you are any different than a bacteria. Certainly a woman has a right to remove bacteria from her body if she chooses.
A good example of the quantitative nature of life. Yes there is life there but less and less. A human body is living community of 50 trillion cells each a great deal more sophisticated than a bacteria (1000 times the volume). Viruses are smaller still and lack the dynamic self-repairing character of bacteria and human cells, for they are little more than DNA with a device to insert themselves into host cells, where they can use the machinery of these cells to reproduce themselves.
If you want to equate yourself yourself to a disease, go ahead. If we get a sample of your DNA we can preserve it indefinitely, then presumably since that is all that your humanity consists of, we could dispose of the rest of you in order to save the cost of your upkeep.
You are not making a whole lot of sense here. I simply want women to have the freedom to make their own choices - freedom from the wierdos who want to force their own dubious metaphysical philosophies and peculiar moral ideas on other people. I applaud and admire the woman who decides to nurture the life of child created by rape just as I applaud and admire the vegitarian whose respect for animals causes them to never eat meat, but if either of these turn their beliefs into a self-righteous condemnation of everyone else as murderers then my admiration turns to disgust and my approval turns to condemnation.
Mitchell, I did a medical case today about what happens to a foetus injured in the womb (obviously, where else). The earlier on in the development of the embryo, the more significant the "damage" to human life.
Take your time to think about that.
Now, as for the issue I wasn't apparently making sense on, I made the point that men would be more interested in women being able to have abortions than women being more interested in the idea. Maybe you might know about that.
And if we damage the egg it is even worse. Oh my gosh! The egg is a human being! Women having menstration are murdering babies! Get real and stop being ridiculous. Remove the zygote and no human life develops at all, just the same as when no sperm enters the egg. Before brain activity there is no human being.
I think you are nuts. Men can and do run away. But guess what? Women can't do any such thing. That is why this is their decision and no one elses.
Know more about what? You are trying to guess that I had something to do with a woman having an abortion? LOL LOL LOL I don't even know anyone who has had an abortion, that I know of. First you imagine human beings that do not exist and then imagine crimes where there are none, and now you imagine things about me! Which just goes to prove how delusional you are, for the truth of all three of these imaginings of yours are exactly the same.
Abortion is the woman's decision and the man has no say at all. If a woman is going to act like a sheep doing whatever men say then that is her problem. Do men force women to do things they don't want? Well that's a no brainer. But how can they force a woman to have an abortion without something like assault? In any case, the question here is whether or not you WANT people making women do things against their will or not. I certainly do not. You are the one who wants to enslave women to make babies for you.
Mitchell, you are exercising a dummy spit.
You are angry, and I think I know why.
You dislike the idea of a male God, someone instrumental in the genesis of life, the decision maker.
You don't like that, do you.
Or, maybe you don't understand symbolism.......ideologies.
Perhaps you are young, and/or lack faith, the taught faith through generations well beyond your imagination of survival scenarios your imagination could ever make comprehensible to you, because your ideas are so much the spawn of a she-wolf your social bubble may as well be a modern day Rome yet to find the liberation of Jesus himself.
Your imagination keeps running amok... wake up ... This being God who knows everything is just a dream. You are not God... you really know diddly squat about me and not much more than that about anything else.
Just because you believe that human beings are nothing more that the DNA in a zygote (since that is how you define humanity) does not mean that others are similarly confused. You are the one who cannot distinguish human from animal and unwittingly define human beings as the propagation mechanism for a "selfish gene", because of this, it is you who have swallowed the nonsense of a modern day Rome, despite all the invented ideology that you use to pretend otherwise. This is the natural consequence of habitually using an ideology to pretend that you know and understand everything better than everyone else which causes you to refuse to learn anything that the world around you has to teach you.
I was worried you had dropped off the end of the earth.....you know, something I said.
But your come-back is admirable.
For instance, you accuse me of knowing you as though it is not human to do that, and you vomit in a way that suggests you know me, tries to, at least.
I like your style (at least you had a little prepartation unlike others who fail at thinking on their feet without even realising they fail).
But, unfortunately, this does not change your status in the greater food chain, because you would kill your own kind in fear of your own strength of species-status. You are the most despicable piece of unspeakeable that I could only vomit up in words as you have attempted over the past 24 or so hours (but not tonight).
You call yourself "human" as though above animal, but can you save your species in the context of all the other species of this planet, or would you take them down in your flames...........your "rubbish"?
You, with the propagation of your abortion beliefs, still make yourself carion to those above you in the food chain.
Two thoughts from me.
1. Woman's body, woman's choice (just to make clear where I stand politically).
2. What about Singer's notion that it is a continuous development issue and that to call someone a 'person', in the philosophical sense of being a moral agent, makes no sense before about the age of four? (Albeit allowing for the possibility of that non-adult human life being a moral patient at some other stage.)
.......mankind.......a species: someone has to make a policy on how humans kill one another.
.....especially laws that govern how the innocent can be protected, protected from abortionists for instance.
sunshinewarrior,
Yes but responsibility and personhood cannot grow in the absence of the expection, thus we treat the child as a person and expect in slowly increasing increments responsibility before the capability is manifest. Love, respect or rights (as you will) must preceede any ability to love, respect or regard the rights of others. A person cannot prove that they are trustworthy until after trust is extended to them, so we do that in increments, extending more trust when they prove themselves worthy of the trust that has already been extended to them.
This is all very easy and natural in the case of the infant/child because it is only as abilities/powers are slowly developing that they even have any capacity to abuse your love, trust or rights.
tQINO,
I do not pretend to know you or what you think. I only examine the logical implications of your words, and your words again only serve to confirm yet again the truth of what I have already said. Your words imply that you think of human beings as nothing more than that genetic organisms fighting for their own survival like a pack of animals. But despite the fact that many behave like this (not the least being the the conservatives whose irresponsible destruction of the earth your ideology is no doubt designed to justify), I know that we are capable of much more than this. We can look to and invest in the future, by doing what is best for the planet and the children of mankind as a whole rather than only our own pathetic self-involved and self important lives and personal genetic code, using some idiot ideolological eschatology that the world will be destroyed soon anyway as an excuse.
There is the life giving message of the gospel and then there is Christianity as an excuse for abdicating responsibility. When many go expecting the name of Jesus to be some kind of password, I am afraid what they will find is Him spewing them like so much tepid water out of his mouth.
Your words suggest you have faith in humanity.
Why not then have faith in the fact that a set of dividing cells curiously placed within a womb will directly lead to the thing you have faith in over the animal kingdom.
Incorrect. I have NO faith in humanity. I just don't use that as excuse the way some people do.
With God all things are possible. But this does not mean that if you sit on your butt, that God will give you what ever you want. God is a parent and that means that he will not indulge those of us acting like children demanding candy in the grocery store, no matter how long we hold our breath or scream till it makes us throw up. He will only act in our best SPIRITUAL interest and that requires us to learn to be responsible, and so he will let us suffer the consequences of our poor choices until we learn that there is no escape from doing the right thing.
I am glad you are finally beginning to see the connection between your definition of humanity as a genetic code and this putting your faith in the things of men (and of animals). See how terribly difficult is to see any difference between man and the animals when you do this? You have to invent imaginary invisible things to make it work just like the rest of your whole "Goddidit" understanding of the universe.
I understand where you get your reasoning from now.
But tell me, when do you think animal life begins in the animal womb? Same time as human? Then what difference is human from animal??
In any case, when you start taking a look at your questionable reasoning, if you believe you can use reasoning to say when human life begins, take a crack at the G.U.T.
I doubt that.
I don't share your difficulties in seeing a difference between animal life and human life. Animals do not have a mind that represents an independent living organism with a different inheritance of any great significance. Some have something which is mind-like but in their case it really is just a function of the brain and body. As a result, despite some of the limited potentialities for mental life, shown by their capacity to absorb some of the mental life from humans, they are really just biological organisms and that means that their life is primarily species oriented. In other words because there is no inheritance of acquired characteristics all their significant learning occurs over a very long period of time and is stored in thier DNA. It means that their primary life, identity and spirit is one of their whole species and not of their individual organisms.
And so yes the life of animals is all about DNA, but although the lives of the individual organisms begin at conception, their true life - their species life began a long time ago. Or to put it another way, only in the life of a whole species does the life of the animals begin to approach the life of a single human being. The only problem with this is that the status of the life of the human mind is not unambiguous for when we behave as if the interests of the body and not those of the mind are what are in control or when we do not show the capacity to learn from one generation to the next, that is when we are more like biological organisms and no different from the animals. But do not think that this provides any suport for the life begins at conception thesis, for like in the flood God will wipe out nearly the whole species in order to preserve the hope that we might actually become the kind of life which He intended.
What? Grand Unification Theory? Look up M-Theory, which unlike the wishful thinking represented by loop quantum gravity, has resolved all the underlying problems of a theory of everything - all we need is proof that it is correct.
You come across like a bird building a nest with words, laying eggs of ideas, hoping they will hatch and grow. You take the words of others, like twigs, and twist them to your own nesting design. Then you try to lay out your master plan, feeling very threatened when someone comes along to threaten your nest egg ideas. You've even taken the "spiritual twig" to help prop-up your argument, and yet what proof do you have of the after-life: been there recently? Do you think you could theorise one? If you have faith, accept the teaching of the Chuch on abortion, leave it to the masters to decide. By "masters" I mean those Priests of the faith who have decided to devote their time to pure study of the faith, celibate, and not those who take sexual experience under their wings in being more joyful with the community (what would they know of matters of the after-life compared to those devoted entirely to study).
The real world is much more different...............for humans, that is.
Your psychobabble artistry, and delicate use of phrases to change the meaning of what others present, may indeed confuse others, but the worst thing you can do in life is not necessarily what you do to others, it is to lie to yourself.
Ah so you believe in a hive society. So are you one of the drones or one of the "truth-givers"? If the former then there is no point in talking to you because you do not really even know what you "believe" and I should go to one of the authorities that makes your decisions for you. If you are the latter then I can inform you that your pretensions are shallow and so you are doomed to fail in conning me with your use of God to gather power and manipulate others.
When Jesus came to the earth there was only one group towards which He showed great anger that was the religious "authorities" and the reason is clear. Their use of God for the manipulation of others and for their own gain was the greatest evil that He could see in the world.
I'm unsure a topical post is wanted. But here goes..
When does the foetus become a human being?
Define "human being" first? That's not gonna happen, so let's just say "human being" is whatever human beings think it is. This is not a cop-out. Because what we think (and feel) is very particular with 99% consensus. Ethical questions are all about what we think and feel.
If a baby cries in the middle of a forest, it does not make a sound. Perhaps it makes a sound in fact to some owl or hyena, but it certainly makes no sound concerning ethics. I'm not picking on babies - if a hermit dies out there it's the same deal. It really doesn't matter ethically, since the hermit doesn't exist. It would only matter perhaps in retrospect if some hiker came across the bones, and thought "oh, here lies a wretched soul" and so forth. This is a mind game. We want to know. We want to find things and attach meaning to them. But if we don't, there is nothing.
Sometimes deep mines collapse so we can't rescue the human beings trapped below. We can't ever dig them out and we don't try. We'll never know their fate exactly, like "did they suffer?" See, it only matters in the psyches of those upon the surface. The buried miners exist purely in our minds. They could even grow larger than life, because of that.
I read in the news this morning, parents being charged in the death of their 9-month-old baby. The baby was clearly abused, with multiple broken bones. You've got to wonder how anybody could actually break the bones of a little baby. Wonder how it must have howled, terrorized and betrayed... what madness. Now to anybody with a heart reading this, the parents and baby became ethically real. Now, even if I say I just made that news item up rhetorically, it exists. It's alive, in a way. Funny an imaginary dead baby could be so alive, but there it is.
So how do we feel about emerging human beings, starting with conception? Firstly, we seldom know before the second pregnancy test, to be sure. The baby comes into ethical existence as the parents are aware of it, and reveal it to others. Still it can be an abstract thing, not really an object of empathy at that stage. Personally, when I first heard my son's heartbeat - when he was about the size of a large bean - I reckoned him more internal organ than human individual. Seeing the fetus squirm under ultrasound, affected me more. Later, I'd prod him, he'd kick back, and I'd think there was some communication in that, so one could say "hey don't annoy the baby, it's got a right to be left alone". Funny we should say that, as left alone we have no rights.
I believe the question hinges on care. If parents don't care, and nobody else does (if they have the the right) then the human being just does not exist. Ultrasound imagery does not make a thing into a person. Birth does not make a thing into a person. But birth pretty conclusively makes people regard the thing as a human individual, like another person. So it is.
So human beings exist insofar as established human beings (members of society) care to acknowledge them. Theoretically, a child could be 100% neglected, and cease to exist (e.g. starvation), no ethical problem, apparently. About the child, yes, I believe, provided I know nothing about it. But I do want to know about it. I expect my fellow human beings to want to know, because I depend on us sharing certain gut instincts. In fact those who fail those gut instincts (e.g. caring for children) I rate less human. Massive failure earns rejection from the "human being club". It's all a sort of mind game, and patently unreasonable, but there it is.
Ah so you believe in a hive society. So are you one of the drones or one of the "truth-givers"? If the former then there is no point in talking to you because you do not really even know what you "believe" and I should go to one of the authorities that makes your decisions for you. If you are the latter then I can inform you that your pretensions are shallow and so you are doomed to fail in conning me with your use of God to gather power and manipulate others.
When Jesus came to the earth there was only one group towards which He showed great anger that was the religious "authorities" and the reason is clear. Their use of God for the manipulation of others and for their own gain was the greatest evil that He could see in the world.
Mary was his doorway. Try respecting that. I'm not conning everyone on that front. Or, let me guess: you think the Catholic Church, the Mother Church, has got it wrong.......obviously, right?
Am I conning you, or am I understanding you?
I have previously taken as stand similar to this: not the anti-realist "tree falling in a forest doesn't exist if nobody hears it" nonsense, nor the morally flawed out sight out of mind cop out either, but simply the idea that the reality of becoming human cannot be entirely separated from our sentiments about when that happens because this is one of those cases where mind does affect reality. It is our treatment of a child as human that teaches the child that he is human.
However, there are some important reasons for hestation at taking this consideration as significant in the question under discussion. This is because the ethical issues which confront us in this are not merely of a prohibitive nature but also of an obligatory nature. What I mean is that the neglect of a child is generally considered morally indefensible. Thus we have obligations at some stage to treat the child as human and thus cultivate the mind of the child at that stage. Thus we must not only confront the question of if and when it is ethically acceptable to terminate a pregnancy (sufficient to leave it to the decision of the mother), but also when are we ethically obligated to attend to the needs of the foetus - and thus obligated to care.
In order to avoid moral ambiguity it is a very good idea to draw the line at a point where we are absolutely certain that the foetus is not and could not be what we would or should call a human child. On the other hand, this should not be an excuse for some religious group to impose its religious beliefs on other members of a free society. In such a circumstances it is the position of science on the matter that quite often makes the most significant contribution. In this case, I certainly think that science can completely exclude the idea that the foetus is human in the sense of having what we call a mind when there is no brain activity. In that case we can certainly say for certain that the foetus does not suffer any psychic (mental) suffering as a result of its treatment at a stage before such brain activity. This of course disregards any beliefs in regards to souls or non-physical minds as purely unsubstantiated relgious beliefs that ought not to be imposed upon others in a theocratic manner.
Quite consistent with your typical attitude that women are like inanimate objects with no need for choices in their life.
Which Catholic church is that? If you mean the Roman Catholic church then it is not any kind of "mother church" at all. That distinction, if it belongs to any church, would be the Eastern Orthodox which is still run by eccumenical councils just like the earliest Christian churches. The eccumenical councils have left a "trail" or series of Catholic churches that have dissented from those decisions and thus I conservatively would consider only the first council, Nicea, to be definative of Christianity, nevertheless it is the RC and not the Eastern Orthodox that finally broke faith with the eccumenical councils all together.
This is not to say that I like the Eastern Orthodox any better than the Roman Catholic church, quite the opposite. Despite my agreement with the Eastern Orthodox on several theological issues, their conservatism is not to my taste at all, and the adventurous spirit of the RC gives me much more cause for admiration.
The Catholic churches are certainly Christian so they have that right at least. But regardless of that they certainly do have a great number of things wrong not the least of which is their attempt to usurp the authority of God for themselves. The head of the church (meaning the body of Christ) is Christ and not any pope or patriarch. Christ is the ONLY mediator between man and God. ->Solus Christus.
Yes I am a protestant and that is one of the 5 solas which define us and here is the other four. 2. Sola Gratia: salvation is by the grace of God alone -- it is only by His work in our lives that salvation is accomplished and by no other work. 3. Sola Fide: salvation is known and determined by faith alone -- the difference between those who are saved and those who are not is not in God, who works in all and offers to all, but in us, by our own choice of faith to accept or deny the gift which is given, and faith is our only assurance. 4. Sola Scriptura: the Bible is the only authority given into the hands of men for determining what is God's word to us -- God may speak through human beings but no human being speaks for God. 5. Soli Deo Gloria: praise and glory is due to God alone -- no human being (Christ being God) should be exalted or revered for anything having to do with our salvation.
You have yet to answer my question about whether you are a drone or a "truth-giver" in your hive?
You forget who Mary was, and her situation.
She apparently had a bastard child: there "waz no" father.
Her need to hide from the establishment was so immense I am sure she would have considered aborting "your savior" by your advice: but she didn't (this might come as a surprise to you, right?).
She stood her ground: she didn;t even hide.
Why not brush up on your early ancient history................do the math.
And then ask yourself, "what would Jesus really say about abortion".............because I can tell you that based on all accounts she was the greatest miracle of all.
Jesus was just a side-show: she had to live through a very dangerous situation without asking some microbiologist centurion to punch her in the guts (you know, the sort of shit you are proposing).
You convince me of a case more difficlt than hers, and then I might start listening to you.
I am not interested in any Mary cult issues. So you can talk all you like about Mary or Hindu godesses or mother nature or whatever and I besides being completely off topic I simply have nothing to say on the topic of your personal religious fetishes or whatever.
Catholicism is not a "cult"
Who do you know, "you" especially, that presents a child with no father to a very hostile clergy, while claiming that God was the "father" (with of course overcoming the idea of having an abortion)..............amd that was just in retrospect (she let him, the child, say everything)?
The only "cult" I can think of is your lack of attention on the ability to read and understand.
But tell me, what ARE you interested "in"?
Abortion is NOT a big deal. Either you abort Hitler or you abort Jesus, you can never know (even though what the child becomes depends mostly on the enviroment it develops in). A fetus is nothing more than a fetus, it's not even human, and in my opinion there is a stark difference. When brain activity starts it makes sense to call "it" a human, or at least a potential human, because now the machine is turned on and thus it starts to function (and "on" is the real line here in my opinion).
And religious reasons to not take abortion makes no sense. Where in, let's say the bible, does it say that one cannot have an abortion? Maybe I've missed it? And even so, God aborts fetuses all the time. Spontaneous abortion! Obviously it seems God has no problems aborting fetuses.
Good point indeed, God apparently has no problem at all in slaughtering nations, cities, and families with all their children and babies both born and unborn, when he deems that this is best for mankind as a whole. In the flood, God wiped out more than 99.99+% of all land life because He thought it best. It seems quite clear that if the God of the Bible does exist then the QUALITY of life is indeed a much MUCH MUCH MUCH bigger concern for him than the sanctity of human life.
By the way Obviously, could you please share how you would feel about these fundamentalist extremists passing laws to make all abortions completely illegal and equivalent to murder?
I said that the Catholic church was Christian, but that does not mean that all its members are Christian and it certainly does not mean that everyone who says that he is a Catholic is Christian. You have declined to answer any questions about what you mean by Catholic. And now you equate Catholicism with some kind of Mary cult.
I started this thread so the answer to this question should be obvious. Go back and read the opening post. I am interested in staying on the topic of this thread as it is defined by the title and the opening post. But I have ask you some questions in regards to this Catholicism that you have been spouting around and so I would be interested in your answers to those questions as well.
..............."this is the muppet show"......?
When did any of you guys have an original idea?
Isn't that being human?
Questioning the fact you were not aborted?
Your post makes sense: you have no idea about when huamn life ends, and why.............you probably think that issue is smaller than when life begins, right?
The connection that pops into my head is that the empty space between the ears of the puppets is like the the large empty spaces in your posts. You keep waiting for something meaningful to appear in that space between your ears and it just keeps turning up empty.
That reminds me of something MM and Obviously asserted, I'm unsure about. Sentience = human being? More or less sentient is more or less human?The connection that pops into my head is that the empty space between the ears of the puppets is like the the large empty spaces in your posts. You keep waiting for something meaningful to appear in that space between your ears and it just keeps turning up empty.
I'm cautiously tolerant of "moral ambiguity" MM wished we "draw the line at a point where we are absolutely certain" to avoid. Since how a woman (or anyone) feels about a pregnancy is often ambiguous, and a fetus does not grow in leaps, and uncertainty rules until we count the toes, ambiguity seems appropriate. Well, call it flexibility. Why kids' curfews and bedtimes vary and might even be flexible day-to-day.
Anyway, the notion of more or less human is already in practice, in my mind regarding everyone I know. It's not like I'm ranking people on a list, but I have a sense of ...where people stand... in terms of their attitudes. The key attitude being "we" thinking, as opposed to "I" or "they" thinking. Promoters of the human club, basically. One may be more or less.
MM and Obviously say membership is gained by having brain activity, in the womb.Something to do with higher cognitive appreciation of pain.
Well, the way I see it, they are taking a moral high by thinking they are somehow morally superior to the rest of us who have different opinions than them. The only thing they show is their moral bankruptcy by forcing people to comply with their opinions. It's not murder removing a tumour. Abortion is after all only natural.
We humans have deluded ourselves to think we should let everything happen "naturally" because any human action would be "unnatural". What we forget is that we're a part of nature, but this is perhaps beyond the point.
So laws like Roe vs. Wade draw lines that are legal fictions. So what? Do you think that can be avoided? I don't see how. Thus it seems to me the question is what line to draw would be the best legal fiction in this case, preserving all the things we hold most dear.That reminds me of something MM and Obviously asserted, I'm unsure about. Sentience = human being? More or less sentient is more or less human?
I'm cautiously tolerant of "moral ambiguity" MM wished we "draw the line at a point where we are absolutely certain" to avoid. Since how a woman (or anyone) feels about a pregnancy is often ambiguous, and a fetus does not grow in leaps, and uncertainty rules until we count the toes, ambiguity seems appropriate. Well, call it flexibility. Why kids' curfews and bedtimes vary and might even be flexible day-to-day.
Anyway, the notion of more or less human is already in practice, in my mind regarding everyone I know. It's not like I'm ranking people on a list, but I have a sense of ...where people stand... in terms of their attitudes. The key attitude being "we" thinking, as opposed to "I" or "they" thinking. Promoters of the human club, basically. One may be more or less.
MM and Obviously say membership is gained by having brain activity, in the womb.
It seems to me that moral ambiguity and the fact that the actual circumstances of life so easily makes crap of inflexible rules, argues for the importance of the role of choice in this issue. And it is in defense of that neccessary role of choice that I fight with my fellow Christians on this issue. So then what is your point... where are you going with all this? Would you argue in favor of an even longer period of choice? Do you deny that there is a point where we should be obligated to nurture the development of a human mind. Are you saying that child neglect is a parent's perogative? Are you saying that everyone should do exactly whatever the feel like doing? I mean.... what is the deal here bro?
I don't think it is necessary to characterize people this way. They have a different opinion than you. That doesn't mean they feel morally superior. Some might. Maybe some of them are humbly and respectfully working to further their own beliefs and political agenda. What's wrong with that?Well, the way I see it, they are taking a moral high by thinking they are somehow morally superior to the rest of us who have different opinions than them.
The connection that pops into my head is that the empty space between the ears of the puppets is like the the large empty spaces in your posts. You keep waiting for something meaningful to appear in that space between your ears and it just keeps turning up empty.
No, you understood me perfectly. I wanted to establish that you could recognise a meaningless phrase, that you can read and understand things as they are presented to you. I want to actually establish if you are for real or not about your abortion stance though.
The wrong lies in forcing others to do what they think is right, I guess.
Life begins at thirty.
And you die at fourty... and most people have kids and get married between the two.... What a life.
My argument is that certain precedents have been set in history. Mary (mother of christ) set one by not having an abortion in a situation that most women would. Then those people who claim to be christian present arguments about when life begins. They are inconsistent.
Ah so no one should do anything that Mary didn't do? Then you are a hypocrite and by your own analysis just as bad as a women having an abortion and serial killer and a slaver and a rapists and a child molester because like all these others you have done something that Mary did not do. You have posted on the internet.
Your religion has absolutely nothing to do with me because it is not in the least bit Christian. The Catholic church may be Christian but your religion most definitely is not. Because your religion makes the salvation of mankind dependent on the actions of a human being. This is definatively characteristic of a non-christian cult and a manipulative religion of men. They create religions like this telling people that God's work depends on them because that is how they manipulate them into doing whatever the manipulators want against their own conscience for the "greater good" of God's kingdom. Again I ask you if you are one of the manipulated drones or one of the manipulators
It is a fundamental principle of Christianity that God is the author of salvation and His work of salvation depend on no human being. Therefore, if Mary had not fulfilled God's plan and given birth to Jesus then someone else would have. Therefore, your argument has NOTHING to do with Christianity.
I'm not taking a side. I'm questioning rationale, of the sides, which stresses individual rights - whether that be the rights of an individual woman, or unborn soul, or brain.what is your point... where are you going with all this? Would you argue in favor of an even longer period of choice? Do you deny that there is a point where we should be obligated to nurture the development of a human mind. Are you saying that child neglect is a parent's perogative? Are you saying that everyone should do exactly whatever the feel like doing? I mean.... what is the deal here bro?brain activity, in the womb.
Another dead baby story to sink our teeth into. There were some reports of newborns, birthed in North Korean prisons, being killed quite chillingly by the nurses. The throats were cut with scissors, the bodies dumped as garbage. Now, this is essentially a full-term abortion, since the hard reality over there is that medical technology is archaic or nonexistent - a woman is better off (physically) having a vaginal birth, then disposing of the baby she can't care for. It often happens this way in poor countries, but with indifferent government it's just another baby found in a trashcan, or not found.
Are the mothers morally reprehensible? I think not. I think that, finding themselves pregnant in prison, their best bet at raising a child is to serve their time and have a child later in relatively better conditions. And to that end they must avoid the probably sterilizing abortion methods offered.
Then the nurses. Reprehensible? Plainly they are helping as best they can, under the circumstances.
Maybe we could blame the government for being so damn poor... see the tragedy of Romanian orphanages for one "solution".
Anyway it seems to me that everybody's doing the best they can, and the real problem here is simply our instinctual revulsion at the solution - murdering a baby.
So what I'm getting at - my point - is that maybe we'd do better pretending less moral rationale, and more admitting how we feel and those involved feel. I believe feelings feed the issue. And that's totally valid. Strained logic about individual souls or sentience is unnecessary here. I mean, when we think about those babies we don't go "Oh, a mind wasted!" We have a gut reaction, which is correct, and we have practical considerations, also correct. Then we try to reconcile them.
I don't think you understand me. This is not an issue of my "ego". I am neither focussing on your own ego. The idea of ending a dividing cellular complex that will lead to a fully grown human life form is the issue. To understand the idea of ending that "life-form" at any step should not bring into attention brain activity, heart activity, or whatever else someone wants to use to define the qunitessential aspect of human life, but bring into attention our ability to use our brains and understand cause and effect. To provide a "reason" why human life should be ended is like determining what type of crime has been committed that warrants capital punishment on that life-form. Every step of the way in the womb, the growing life-form is innocent. We are the victims of that circumstance though, of pregnancy. It is one of our conditions of being human. But just because we are the victims of the concept of pregnancy does not mean we have the right to spit the dummy and take our rights of independence back by offering capital punishment to the innocent life form in the womb.
.
The thread title "When does human life begin" and the question posed below it "When does a fetus become a human being" are different questions, and the answer choices offered are irrational since a fetus does not exist until 11 weeks after conception so conception as an answer to the second question is not even an option.
In any case, despite the careless framing of the questions, it seems that what you are looking for is an ethical basis for laws about abortion. The discussions in response make it clear that this is an emotional question that does not have a scientific answer, and as such must be left to to individuals involved in any particular case.
Indeed, an unfertilised human egg is human and alive. Thus, life begins before conception.
Thanks for the criticism and the information, but.......
This is not a biology thread and not everyone is a biologist or in medicine (myself included) and so these technical distinctions are not something we have used before. In a philosophy thread we should ask general questions in order to discuss the wider issues. From a philosophical point of view I would very much agree that what you have at conception is not what you have at 5 weeks which is not what you have at 12 weeks which is not what you have at 24 weeks which is not what you have at birth. So different names for these things is more than appropriate. However there is the identity of genetics and the identity of an organism going through a 9 month process of becoming.
One of the more precise questions we can ask is where in that process of becoming do we have a human being to which we have an obligation to nurture the developing human being? Because somewhere along the way we have a child that society says should not be neglected. The converse of that question is where in that process of becoming are these obligations sufficiently small enough that decision whether to continue or to terminate should be left up to the choice of the mother?
I quite agree that some role for choice is essential for a free society. However that role of choice is not endless. Some point along the way the termination of the life of the embryo/foetus/infant changes to murder and the question is where? We certainly have a legal status quo but there are growing numbers in the United States that disagree with this and would change it. Thus this is certainly an important topic in which dialog is definitely needed.
Yes the egg, sperm, cancer cell, moles, blood cell, skin cell, brain cell and zygote are all alive, human and dependent upon the host in which they live. And yet are we obligated to give them what they need to survive? In the case of the sperm this is utterly absurd, in the case of the egg it would still be disastrous to follow such an obligation, and in the case of the others people think nothing of killing or removing these from the host so that they will die. To be alive and human is not the same thing as a human being and it seems to me that the significant difference is the presence of the human mind. Egg, sperm, cancer cell, moles, blood cell, skin cell, brain cell and zygote, however human and alive they may be, they do not have a human mind and thus they are not a human being.
There are many places one can draw the line, and yours is as sensible as any other.
Having studied medicine, I personally think that any invasive approach to stopping the life process of a fertilised egg is dangerous. It is dangerous because of what is required to end that life-forming process. The dangers include allergic reactions, hormonal imbalances, and so on. Basically, the process of abortion leads to complications that represent something unnatural has happened to the mother, and in the long run that is not a good thing, on an evolutionary stand-point. There is no such thing as a safe termination of pregnancy. Soon, it will be demonstrated that the contraceptive pill leads to problems like breast cancer. A process that can be so direct as to terminate a pregnancy is no different.
Sometimes one should consider the worth of ourselves, how we have evolved, naturally, over the countless moments we have been a species, with the aim of accepting how our body's work, naturally.
What do you think, Mitch.
You talk about "free society" and "the obligation to nurture a human being".
Wow. What about the obligation to respecting the natural state of the human being itself.
It's not necessary to be a biologist to understand a not-too-subtle technical distinction between fertilized egg and a fetus. If your view is that technical clarity and accuracy are not important if a discussion is termed "philosophical" then, sorry, I couldn't disagree more.This is not a biology thread and not everyone is a biologist or in medicine (myself included) and so these technical distinctions are not something we have used before. In a philosophy thread we should ask general questions in order to discuss the wider issues.
It is not what I am trying to say. I said what I was trying to say pretty clearly I think, WHEN you read the whole thing. Sorry if it was over your head or exceeded your attention span, which is all I can conclude from a rather vacuous response like this, dully repeating yourself and showing no comprehension of what I said at all.
So you have terminology on the brain. Do you imagine like some of these medeival Aristotelian fossils that the words are essense of reality - i.e. that they have a substance beyond composition and properties? Words are after all just arbitrary categories that we stuff things into for the purpose of communication.
I did say I appreciated the info, AND we would certainly appreciate NEW information, but if you are going to have a stick up your butt over it then you make me wonder if you are not a little confused about the difference between the words and the reality.
Since I already responded to what you said before, I leave you to read it again if you REALLY want to discuss the issues you raised. But if you just want to pick a meaningless fight like some of the others here, then bring it on.
It is indeed. So the question is whether we want parenthood to be about love and giving of your life to another person, or whether we are going to let the twisted pseudo-religious wackos change parenthood into a punishment for those that the wackos have decided have been naughty, with their smarmy smiles at rape victims and back alley abortions as women getting what they deserve. These are the wanna-be slavers and rapists who cannot understand what women would need with choice since they are just baby-making machines.
If religion is just going to be a place where these slimy filthy minds can hide out from the light of day then we are indeed better off without it. I am a Christian but seriously, I do very well comprehend the disgust of the atheists. No doubt they got tired of wading through the filth - the regressive irrationality - that they found in religion. I do find the stink rather overwhelming at times.
If I thought that atheism really offered greater rationality I would jump at it. However, the evidence I have seen has shown that this is very far from being the case. But at times like this I have to remind myself constantly of this.
Sorry but when it comes to respecting your wacko religious opinions about what constitutes a human being, then my obligation ends with saying keep it to yourself and mind your own friggin business because women with real problems have no need of your self-righteous gloating. I mean I invited you to share your opinion and all, but now we have heard it, and that is pretty much it. No one is going to be flocking to your admiration society or Mary cult or "some kind of Catholic" church or whatever you want to call it.
Other than congress, right?
Mitch, I am sure you can be more poised with your answers than what you are currently demonstrating. You have reached a limit of your own intelligence ability and now you are resorting to anger. Get a grip.
Anger? LOLLOL you have got to be kidding! Disgust? yes. Contempt? yes. Anger? Don't be silly.
Besides considering the nature and character of your posts in this thread, your objections here are pretty funny.
So putting aside your overly amateurish attemps at psychology and you failing to demonstrate any psychic ability to "see" people's emotions, do you actually have anthing to say on the topic of this thread? Or how about this Catholic church you say that you belong to, is that by right of birth and infant baptism or do you actually know anything about it? Unlike a lot of people here, I take religion rather seriously and if you point me in the right direction I can overcome any miscommunication that might have occured in reading your posts.
When something, such as the use of the "morning after" pill (am I understanding you correctly here, you know, your emotions), becomes "ordained", as it seems you are hoping by your expressed convinction of being more faithful than most, when such a thing becomes ordained, maybe up there like the condom in your church, way up there like the condom in your church, we begin to trust these intruments in times of need.
You have quite a fascinating church, no?
Maybe you can construct symbols, statuesm, in honor of these instruments you want to use in times of need and justice.
In fact, why not put your name to it.
I am afraid your only hope in this post is to not mention the church, and even then who will save you.
Do we understand one another?
This is starting to sound more and more like white noise...
Nothing here enlighten'n you then. You best be on your way.
We white-noise criminals got things to discuss.
Y'hear?
Yes I think I shall give up and stop encouraging him to say anything at all, since the result continues to be that he says nothing at all.
Same way you treat those little life-forms, huh?
Yeak, I get it.
That's your style.
...............silencing.
.
There is now an attempt in Utah to push through legislation to make abortion illegal except for cases like rape and medical problems. This is actually worse than no rape exception at all. Not only will some women just make up charges of rape to justify abortion but other women will now be publicly judged as to whether they were raped or were simply whoring -- quite a delightful country we are making.
It will certain increase the theocracy like atmosphere of Utah. If it is only Utah it will not be too bad since women will simply go elsewhere. But the inevitable consequences of a law like this is that mistakes and trajedies will happen, and resentments will rise, and eventually the "winners" will be the targets of hatred and the losers. The liberal extremists will gain more and more power and influence and the pendulum will swing the other way, and things will get worse.
The people of this country have become so small minded that they only care about whether their opinion wins the day. But this country was built on compromise and investing in the future, so the short-sighted extremists will tear it apart.
--------------------------
In doing some research on the history of abortion I was surprised to learn that the orignal Roe vs. Wade decision ruled that before the 12th week ruling the foetus was not a human being with any rights, but only prohibited abortions after the 24th week (with exceptions), leaving it up to the state whether abortions between the 12th and 24th weeks would be allowed.
In 1992 this decision was overturned in favor of the actual viability of the foetus, which was usually in the 22nd or 23rd week but could be as early as the 21st week.
Anyway it is because of the Roe vs. Wade decision that this has to go to the U.S. supreme court because they are seeking to prohibit abortions completely challenging the Roe vs. Wade decision that prohibits states from doing this.
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