[helene_t]

Codo, on Aug 17 2009, 09:43 AM, said:

We decide not to kill human life.

I am sure you and many others see it that way. But to me, it is not canonical that it is wrong to kill humans. Morality is based on concrete scenarios. It would be wrong to kill Alice (in her present condition). It would be wrong to kill Bob. Etc. So a pattern emerges - Alice and Bob are both Humans so there seems to be a general rule that it is wrong to kill humans.

But it does not follow from that rule that it is always wrong to kill any human. It is the other way round - the rule follows from the particular cases.

Why is it wrong to kill Alice? Or Bob? To me, it is because if we did not offer them guarantee that killing them would not be condoned, they would live in constant fear. It would be bad for them, and it would be bad for society as the fear would impair their ability to function as members of society.

Also, if they got killed their loved ones would miss them.

Do similar arguments apply to fetuses? Only to a tiny extent. I think the father and maybe other family members can feel emotionally attached to a fetus, especially in late stage of pregnancy and/or if some information about it has been obtained through scanning.

This is not to say that I consider abortion unproblematic. I know several examples of women who had been put on pressure to have an abortion while they wanted to have the baby. I wish people would realize that to some women/couples, abortion means killing their own baby so their desire to have the baby should be supported no matter how "irrational" it may appear to others. Fortunately, I think almost everyone understands that. I was just brought up in the militantly pro-abortion 1970's and have therefore become somewhat allergic to pro-abortionists.

To me, first principles of morality include stuff like "people* should not live in fear" and a lot of other principles. These may be just as arbitrary as "one should not kill humans". Fair enough. But I don't think it is good reasoning first to introduce a rule which depends on the vague term "human", and then make its scope dependent on the definition which is later to come: Is a fetus a human? Is a half brain dead person who has lost all cognition but is still able to control heart and lungs a human? Are chimps human? Those are just semantic issues. But whether it is morally acceptable to kill a fetus, is a real issue. It does not depend on semantics.

*This also begs the question what "people" (humans?) means, of course. In this context, it may be any entity capable of feeling fear, i.e. probably extending to many animals although we can't know that for sure. But that's another discussion.

[Codo]

Helene,

I play a little devils advocate here.

If I undersood you right, you claim that it could be ok to kill someone under certain circumstances besides punishment, wars and selfdefence.
Your criteria had been that the being has no fear and that nobody will really miss it and that there is major reason benefit for someone else.

This idea works quite well as long as the being is just a fetus and the birth may bring big harm to the mother.

But it surely does not work for human beings. There had been parents who let there babies starving till they died. Due to your logic this is no major crime, because the life for the parents was better without the baby and they did not miss it later. I doubt that the babies feared death, they did not even know death till they died.

So, your idea does surely not work for humans. Which brings us back to the point: What is a human being?

[helene_t]

Yes, I don't personally think there is much difference between a mother killing her baby a couple of months before birth, or a couple of months after. Of course the later it happens the bigger the chance that someone other than the parents feel emotional ties to the baby, and presumably the later it happens the more pain or fear the baby could feel (other things being equal) but in any case it is a gray scale.

[Lobowolf]

helene_t, on Aug 17 2009, 08:19 AM, said:

Yes, I don't personally think there is much difference between a mother killing her baby a couple of months before birth, or a couple of months after.

This is one of those cases where I have to admit, I'm more surprised by the lack of response to a post than I am by any given response to numerous other posts.

[mike777]

With all this talk about trying to lower the long term cost of health care I think people forget that abortion and assisted suicide are two very cost effective ways to reduce long term health care costs.

Women can do what they want with their own bodies and if we do not impose our moral beliefs on others there are lots of ways to reduce long term costs.

The Swiss and parts of Europe and China are way ahead of everyone else in this respect.


btw as for Helene's comment I am not quite sure at what age a fetus becomes a baby. I assume it is legal to abort a fetus but not a baby. I assume once it becomes a baby then the next step is at what age is assisted suicide legal.

[JoAnneM]

Fetuses are being saved at pretty early stages now, as early as 27 weeks, or earlier, but 27 weeks is one I heard about recently.

I have a lot of mixed emotions about abortions. I personally would never have had one or hope that none of my relatives would be faced with that decision, but who knows, maybe they have. I believe in pro-choice, but only in the first tri-mester. I also believe in adoption and my heart goes out to all the women who cannot have children, and who do not get children because of decisions made to abort. On the other hand it is so much easier to allow a teenager to abort ruin their high school experience. Juno was an excellent movie which explored this subject.

The lowest of the low would be someone who would abort because of gender. That embryo/fetus that they are flushing out in favor of the opposite sex might have been the most loving wonderful child for them, and it has failed the sex test so it dies.

[onoway]

[ I also believe in adoption and my heart goes out to all the women who cannot have children, and who do not get children because of decisions made to abort.]

There are thousands of children to adopt, but most people want children who look like they might be their natural children; many are very reluctant to adopt a child from an asian or african country if they themselves are caucasion. In a way this is understandable, but it certainly is not the truth that there are no children. My nephew and his wife adopted from Russia; friends of my daughter adopted two sisters from Ethiopia.

It isn't exactly easy and it is expensive; most countries now seem to try to check up on the prospective parents to some degree, and good adoption agencies will have the kids checked so the parents won't have unpleasant surprises when they get them home such as finding the child has some sort of degenerative disease. Bribery is apparently alive and well in many scenarios. But it most certainly can be done.

As far as that goes, there are undoubtedly children in North America who are not "perfect" who are destined to spend a major portion of their lives in a series of foster homes or institutions because few people will consider adopting a "flawed" or older child. I find it difficult to imagine that someone who truly wishes to be a parent cannot find a child. They just may not find the child of their dreams..and many natural parents don't find them either

[jonottawa]

I'm adamantly opposed to allowing men to have abortions.

[Winstonm]

I am adamantly opposed to abortions of any kind - without an adequate supply of collateral to damage, wars would be no fun whatsoever.

[mike777]

Now that men have babies I guess this should be legal for them also.

"It's My Right to Have Kid, Pregnant Man Tells Oprah"

http://abcnews.go.co...=4581943&page=1


Just wait until we have artificial wombs down at the corner store. The UK has created artificial sperm.

http://blogs.usatoday.com/ondeadline/2007/...tists_crea.html

"Scientists say they have managed for the first time to create artificial sperm cells, a development that the popular press has seized upon as a sign that sterile men -- and even women -- may be able to fertilize eggs in the future."


"Scientists have developed an artificial womb that allows embryos to grow outside the body"

http://www.nwotruth.com/scientists-have-de...tside-the-body/