Does life begin at conception? I think it does.

[fushigi]

Quote by: LF Hypothetically, what if they announced that that it was now possible to clone new human beings from fingernail clippings, would you then feel great concern and want to protect all those little fingernail clippings because they could develop into a human. That seems to be the sum of your argument concerning zygotes.

Once the genetic material used to develop an embryo is successfully developed to the point it can be implanted into an environment in which it can develop into a fully-fledged human, I'd say that thing deserves respect as a living organism, yes. If the embryo is human, then it deserves the respect of a living human organism.

I know my arguments sound mysterious and hard to understand, but that's unavoidable; such is the nature of life.

[The Bacon Guy]

Quote by: fush Uh, him?

How can he suffer if he's dead?

[livefree]

Quote by: livefree
You (fushigi) say: "It's hard for me to think that the physical mass of tissues that had no brain activity in my mother's uterus wasn't me."
I would ask you, who are you now?
and what exactly is it that you identify with as yourself now that was also present then as a zygote?

Quote by: fushigi The linear path of my history returns ineluctably to my status, some 30 years ago, as a zygote. There's no way for you to deny it. Had you killed me then I would hold you no less guilty of ending my existence than if you killed me today.

You seem to be missing the point, fushi. "The linear path of [the] history [of your body] returns ineluctably to [your] status...as a zygote" would be more correct as a biological statement but it begs the question: are you your body?
I asked you two questions here. Try to actually answer them, OK? To rephrase it, who do you think you are right now?
and what part of whatever that is was actually present when your body was undeveloped and existed only as a sort of blueprint in a small cluster of cells? If that cell cluster had somehow not come to term, just exactly who would have been "killed"? Were "you" present then? Or just a potential for something to develop into you, as you now know yourself? Do you understand the question?

So far, in all of our exchanges, you have elaborated on your feelings about stuff but you have failed to directly address many of the most important questions that I have posed to you.
You keep referring to zygotes as "persons", and I have repeatedly asked you to tell us just what there is about that little egg/sperm collision that qualifies it to be called a person (with rights, according to you, that seem to supersede the rights of the person called the mother to have some say about what happens inside her own body). Your visualization of that zygote maturing into a person is, in this moment, only an image in your mind of a potential happening. Does everything that is potential, have to happen? Does every zygote have to grow into a person? What is lost if one doesn't? Is there anyone really there before the body is grown or is a 'person' (as we all understand and use the term) something that is the result of that growth, not something that precedes it? Remember now, you don't believe in souls. This world is overpopulated as it is, so what is the point in producing extra hundreds of millions of unwanted babies? Will you and the other anti-abortionists take care of them? So far there seems to be no evidence that that is even a remote possibility. The majority of zygotes are spontaneously aborted by natural body processes. Is Mother Nature "guilty" of "killing" someone when that happens? Should we take extraordinary medical measures to try to salvage those naturally lost zygotes? Why should a woman be forced to be an unwilling incubator for a cell cluster that has no current personhood? How many ways do I have to ask you this?
What exactly is so precious about that cluster of cells that would make its rights paramount over the mother's basic right to have control over her own body and life?

[fushigi]

Quote by: LF To rephrase it, who do you think you are right now?

I'm whatever I believe myself to be. And, as far as I'm concerned, other people are what I believe them to be as well.

Quote by: LF and what part of whatever that is was actually present when your body was undeveloped and existed only as a sort of blueprint in a small cluster of cells?

I think what you mean to say is, "what part of you now was present when you were a small cluster of cells," right?

Well, if we believe that existence is only proven by a physical presence, we are not the same person from birth to death. After all, with cell loss and regeneration the majority of our bodily tissues is replaced every so often.

The physical mass that you and I are is the closest thing we'll ever get to an identity, and that gives our first physical forms the precedent of life. If you really think about it, and extend the argument to the limit, it's true that sperm and ova are life, but as we lack the insight to understand WHICH ovum or WHICH spermatozoa will become a person and which won't, we certainly can't be blamed for allowing them to die.

With an implanted embryo - with a fetus - however, we know that the mass of cells, the tissues therein have a distinct precedent for life; to call ending that life anything other than killing is euphemistic at best.

[syc-sadist]

well i've decided to abort....not ready


plus check a comparison here


here you have a pro-choice website ProChoice Home

and here a anti-choice website Is Abortion Wrong?

and here a non religious based view on pro-choice Abortion


to me the choice is so much more resnoble it discusses all optiosn and looks at the whoel situation.

the anti-choice is so 'you have to do this don't care aboutt he situation, don't care about the child after it's born...it just should be cause god says so....even though the only exerts from the bible given are along the line sof 'thou shalt not murder' open to interpratation if it is murder


and the lines....


""When men strive together and hurt a woman with child, so that there is a miscarriage and yet no harm follows, the one who hurt her shall be fined according to as the woman's husband shall lay upon him, and he shall pay as the judges determine. If any harm follows"


the death of the child int he womb only warrents a fine....could that be equated to the cost of the abortion? or assuming the mother wanted the child and was ready for it paid for taken the child unessisarily?

it would seem as though the cost for harming the women is more then that for harming the unborn child.


their are more notes in the bible of children being killed then against abortion.....their is so much 'god strikes down children as much as adults' as anywhere else....religion seems to me guilty of picking bits and pieces. so many notes fo first borns killed and virgin women taken and basically raped.....great book. so many notes degrading to women.....so are you saying a women who could by nature abort if put under stress should not have right to do so in a safer procedure thought of by those brains of ours that 'god' apparently created. who are you to say it is wrong and enforce taht on someone else?...it should be personal decision....or just divide the laws so taht religions have their own. you can't enforce it liek that....

majority of the bible is sexist. i hope sincerly that we don't follow that down to a dot....as i believe women every bit as equal and choices as to who do what jobs remains to the people it concerns.


We need protection from discrimination on the basis of religion or belief. enforced pregnancy could be seen as a coercive use of the power of the State to physically, psychologically, economically and socially restrict and control people on a discriminatory gender basis. charming isn't it


each to their own this topic is soooo open to interpratation and that is why i believe it is choice. it is not right to tell people it is wrong specially not confused young children at schools especially not as abortion is still legal and still n option.


another exert from the a theist view on abortion i agree with


"If abortion is unlawful then it follows that sexual intercourse that does not have procreation as its objective is made unlawful with the punishment for the "crime" being the enforced pregnancy and birth of a child or children. (It is a punishment, as this is not an accidental outcome of sexual intercourse, but an inevitable one). Furthermore, the punishment for this "crime" falls solely upon women though in every case it is committed by both men and women equally. The punishment for this "crime" includes economic costs for the "guilty" woman while it often imposes no or little economic costs on the "guilty" man. :

[5010]

Quote by: The Bacon Guy A foetus doesn’t own something simply by residing there. That’s not how property rights work.

Not by residence, but by implantation. The womb then is an organ used by the z/e/f during the pregnancy. The z/e/f naturally takes over control of the uterus via hormones, determining the end of menstruation to facilitate continued growth and when ready the control over labour.

Quote by: The Bacon Guy It really doesn’t make a difference if removing the resources involves actively killing it, since the foetus will die anyway when the resources are removed.

I agree, but the point I was arguing against was that abortion simple removes resources from the child. Of course the end result of death by dismemberment, starvation, poison, chemical burn, etc all is the same: death. But all of those methods apply only to the unborn by discrimination. Comparatively, the born children are protected from both homocide and neglect. The parent unwilling to provide for a born child is obligated to continue care until someone else can take over. You say it is impossible to do so with a fetus but that ignores the fact that every pregnancy is temporary.

[Athena]

Would we even be having this debate if we valued all human beings? The fact is, we live in a civilization that is not very civil, and ignore the starving around the world, and the global warming that will increase starvation and a water crisis. We just do not value and honor all human life, and for this reason, many choose not to conceive children. Also, large populations such as ours contribute so much to global warming and other problems, it is irresponsible to insist every egg become a living, breathing, consuming human. If it were not for abortions, we would have more people living on the streets and in the prisons, and all those good people who insist fertilized egg should have life, have failed to resolve the problems that are reason for not bringing every fertilized egg to full term.

Solve the problems before insisting another human being be added to them and must endure them.

[5010]

Quote by: syc-sadist here you have a pro-choice website ProChoice Home and here a anti-choice website Is Abortion Wrong? and here a non religious based view on pro-choice Abortion to me the choice is so much more resnoble it discusses all optiosn and looks at the whoel situation. ..

The term 'anti-choice' is too broad. The "Is Abortion Wrong" site is merely anti-abortion. I agree the 'ProChoice Home' looks at more options and is more reasonable even though there is clearly pro-life bias throughout. The atheist foundation presents a lot of arguments and clearly is biased towards arguments that include abortion-on-demand as a choice. If you are curious about secular prolife arguments on abortion, embryology and stem research, personhood and rights, obligation, role of government, and other related issues, check out the Libertarians For Life library.

Have you seen any sites that present all arguments without bias for or against abortion options? I haven't.

[livefree]

Quote by: fushigi I'm whatever I believe myself to be. And, as far as I'm concerned, other people are what I believe them to be as well.

I frankly can not tell if you are on drugs or if you are just an extreme solipsist. You are whatever you believe yourself to be? Ha. Far out. If some quirk of brain chemistry caused you to 'believe' that you are a Monarch butterfly, would you, in fact, be a butterfly? I'm afraid that you are just not comprehending the question I'm asking. And, BTW, I am who I am and not whatever you believe me to be, in your incredible arrogance.

Quote by: fushigi I think what you mean to say is, "what part of you now was present when you were a small cluster of cells," right?

No. You're just not getting it. I asked you: "who do you think you are right now?" Why is it so hard for you to give a specific answer? The answer you gave is vague and meaningless. Let's try again. What do you identify with as being your own self? Is there anything that you now identify with as your self, other than your body, that was also present when your body consisted of only a few cells?

Quote by: fushigi The physical mass that you and I are is the closest thing we'll ever get to an identity, and that gives our first physical forms the precedent of life.

OK. Here's where we really differ. I don't see my body as my identity. Do you really think that you are just your body, fushi? The whole complex of likes and dislikes, preferences and aversions, opinions, beliefs, thoughts, memories, emotions, skills, aptitudes and gifts that make a human personality, you don't identify with any of that, fushi? None of that is who you are? Somehow I doubt that you really believe that or live like that.
"Precedent of life" is a strange phrase. Life doesn't begin with a sperm and ovum. Life is already present and has been for billions of years. Some cell clusters develop into human beings and some don't. Nothing is lost.

Quote by: fushigi ...with a fetus...the tissues therein have a distinct precedent for life; to call ending that life anything other than killing is euphemistic at best.

Of course, aborting a fetus is killing life. Squashing a bug is killing life. Humans are killing life of one kind or another every minute of every day. We have moral rules though about ending intelligent, conscious life. So the question comes down to whether we are killing a 'person' when we abort a fetus or whether we are only ending the life of a cell cluster that has no resident consciousness or person present yet.

[livefree]

What is it about this question that causes everyone to avoid answering it? I've asked this repeatedly of fushigi and he won't answer it but neither have any of the other people here who oppose the right to abortion.

What exactly is so precious about that pinhead sized cluster of cells called a zygote that would make its rights paramount over the mother's basic right to have control over her own body and life?

[pikatore]

I repeat, the strongest thing the other side can use is the appeal to emotion fallacy. It's already obvious that a feotus/embryo doesn't hold as much value to society as a viable human that has come out of the womb and detached from the cord, and no matter what our values are in the end, it should be solely the mother's judgement that should dictate the abortion going ahead.

Sympathy for a poor little embryo?! Come on. Its the twenty first century.

[The Bacon Guy]

Quote by: 5010 Not by residence, but by implantation. The womb then is an organ used by the z/e/f during the pregnancy. The z/e/f naturally takes over control of the uterus via hormones, determining the end of menstruation to facilitate continued growth and when ready the control over labour.

That still doesn’t equate to ownership; just control.

Quote by: 5010 I agree, but the point I was arguing against was that abortion simple removes resources from the child. Of course the end result of death by dismemberment, starvation, poison, chemical burn, etc all is the same: death. But all of those methods apply only to the unborn by discrimination. Comparatively, the born children are protected from both homocide and neglect. The parent unwilling to provide for a born child is obligated to continue care until someone else can take over. You say it is impossible to do so with a fetus but that ignores the fact that every pregnancy is temporary.

In the case giving up a child for adoption, it’s a matter of days she must wait. I don’t think anyone can honestly say that expecting her to wait for almost a year is at all reasonable.

Besides, those laws are in place for the benefit of the child, i.e. to prevent it from suffering as a result of the withdrawal of resources. A foetus doesn’t suffer, provided it is aborted before the nervous system is properly developed.

[fushigi]

Quote by: livefree If some quirk of brain chemistry caused you to 'believe' that you are a Monarch butterfly, would you, in fact, be a butterfly?

According to me, yes, I would. Didn't you ask me what I believe I am? If I truly believed I were a butterfly, how could you convince me otherwise? Even if you did, it would require ME to develop the belief that I was not a butterfly.

Quote by: LF BTW, I am who I am and not whatever you believe me to be, in your incredible arrogance.

I find it hilariously ironic that you seek to defend your PERSONAL, INALIENABLE right to define yourself and your existence while you simultaneously feel the ARROGANCE to act as judge, jury and executioner for the life of a fetus. Could you step outside yourself for one second and appreciate the supreme irony of this moment?

[fushigi]

Quote by: LF OK. Here's where we really differ. I don't see my body as my identity. Do you really think that you are just your body, fushi? The whole complex of likes and dislikes, preferences and aversions, opinions, beliefs, thoughts, memories, emotions, skills, aptitudes and gifts that make a human personality, you don't identify with any of that, fushi?

Are you somehow suggesting that all of that would still exist if my body were destroyed?

Quote by: LF Of course, aborting a fetus is killing life. Squashing a bug is killing life. Humans are killing life of one kind or another every minute of every day. We have moral rules though about ending intelligent, conscious life. So the question comes down to whether we are killing a 'person' when we abort a fetus or whether we are only ending the life of a cell cluster that has no resident consciousness or person present yet.

Again, what stays our hand from killing our friends, coworkers, strangers, babies? Compassion stays our hand. Empathy stays our hand. There are violent sociopaths in this world who don't experience that compassion, that empathy. They feel none of that when they end another person's life. And just as you cannot understand that violent sociopath's actions, his lack of compassion and empathy, so I cannot understand yours.

[livefree]

Quote by: fushigi I'm whatever I believe myself to be. And, as far as I'm concerned, other people are what I believe them to be as well.

Quote by: livefree I frankly can not tell if you are on drugs or if you are just an extreme solipsist. You are whatever you believe yourself to be? Ha. Far out. If some quirk of brain chemistry caused you to 'believe' that you are a Monarch butterfly, would you, in fact, be a butterfly? I'm afraid that you are just not comprehending the question I'm asking.

Quote by: fushigi According to me, yes, I would. Didn't you ask me what I believe I am?

No, dude, I didn't ask you what you believe you are. I asked you if you would actually be a butterfly just because you may temporarily believe you are a butterfly. So either you are in some confusion over the meaning of the word "be", fushi, or else you really are a raging solipsist who thinks that nothing has any "real" existence except in his own head.

Quote by: fushigi If I truly believed I were a butterfly, how could you convince me otherwise? Even if you did, it would require ME to develop the belief that I was not a butterfly.

Who is this "I" and "me" that you keep referring to all the time, fushi? I've asked you again and again to explain that to me but you don't seem to understand what I'm asking. Shall we try it again? Please listen closely, because there's a key difference between the personality and memories that you naturally and unconsciously identify with as your core self that seems to persist thru time and the various mental models that you might believe describe or identify you. I've asked you the same basic questions over and over in a variety of ways. Let's review them because you have so far failed to answer them in any significant way.
"Who are you now?"
"What exactly is it that you identify with as yourself now that was also present then as a zygote?"
"What do you identify with as being your own self?"
"Is there anything that you now identify with as your self, other than your body, that was also present when your body consisted of only a few cells?"

Quote by: fushigi I'm whatever I believe myself to be. And, as far as I'm concerned, other people are what I believe them to be as well.

Quote by: LF BTW, I am who I am and not whatever you believe me to be, in your incredible arrogance.

Quote by: fushigi I find it hilariously ironic that you seek to defend your PERSONAL, INALIENABLE right to define yourself and your existence while you simultaneously feel the ARROGANCE to act as judge, jury and executioner for the life of a fetus. Could you step outside yourself for one second and appreciate the supreme irony of this moment?

As with most of what you say, this irony is only in your own mind. Again you just don't seem to comprehend the meaning of some basic words like "be", "to be" and "are". You must not be able to understand Hamlet at all. You say: "other people are what I believe them to be as well", and I say 'get over yourself', binky, and drop this solipsistic arrogance. I am what I am and it has nothing to do with what you believe. BTW, if some fetus speaks up to defend its "PERSONAL, INALIENABLE right to define (it)self and (its) existence", then I will change my mind about all this. Until then, perhaps you should examine your own "ARROGANCE to act as judge and jury" in deciding what women should do about something that is happing inside their own bodies. Your arrogance in telling them, en mass and without knowing anything about their particular circumstances or their mental, physical or financial ability to raise that child successfully, that they must drop all other plans and occupations to spend many years of their lives raising a child. Based entirely on your own rather loony arrogance in deciding for everybody that any random egg/sperm meeting in the depths of some woman's fallopian tubes is exactly the same as a fully developed, born & living-on-its-own human being and moreover that that zygote has rights that surpass those of the woman involved.

Quote by: LF OK. Here's where we really differ. I don't see my body as my identity. Do you really think that you are just your body, fushi? The whole complex of likes and dislikes, preferences and aversions, opinions, beliefs, thoughts, memories, emotions, skills, aptitudes and gifts that make a human personality, you don't identify with any of that, fushi?

Quote by: fushigi Are you somehow suggesting that all of that would still exist if my body were destroyed?

No, of course not, how on earth could you read that into what I said?
Are you somehow suggesting that if all of that were somehow destroyed (massive brain injury) but your body was still alive, that YOU would still exist?
And stop avoiding the questions. I asked you if you really think that you are just your body? I asked you if you do or don't identify with the various aspects of personhood that I listed? Why is so hard for you to give me a straight answers to simple questions?

Quote by: fushigi Again, what stays our hand from killing our friends, coworkers, strangers, babies? Compassion stays our hand. Empathy stays our hand. There are violent sociopaths in this world who don't experience that compassion, that empathy. They feel none of that when they end another person's life. And just as you cannot understand that violent sociopath's actions, his lack of compassion and empathy, so I cannot understand yours.

Compassion and empathy are great. I have a lot of both for real people, billions of whom need it desperately. I don't have any left over though for imaginary, hypothetical people. You can't understand what you perceive to be my lack of compassion and empathy precisely because you do believe in imaginary, hypothetical people. Sorry, dude, but there is nobody there, there is no human person present to have compassion for. You're just all fired up over phantoms in your own mind. Every bit of energy that you put into this crusade to save the lives of these imaginary "unborn persons", is energy that you aren't putting into helping the actual, real suffering, poverty, starvation and death afflicting billions of actual human beings on our planet right now. Try focusing your (hypothetical) compassion and empathy on those folks and not on these hypothetical people, potentially present in a zygote.

[5010]

OK Livefree.

What am I? An adult living human organism whether my mind is actively aware of it or not. My thoughtful debating mind is a highly valued function and necessary for me to communicate my mind, but not essential at all times to carry the existence of me as an organism. I sleep sometimes, but my present thoughtful mind doesn't care whether my brain is thinking or not at some lower level during those times. It would be nice if every moment of my existence was alert and aware, but I am content with being awake and highly mentally functional only part of each 24 hour period. I still want to be protected from whomever doesn't want me around while I'm in vulnerable states, including states where there isn't a high mind functioning to express such wishes.

I am a member of the voting society because a chaotic set of circumstances allowed one of billions of gametes to fuse with another to form me, and a fortunate environment and living parent nurtured me until the first moment the thoughtful part of me formed, and continued to care for me each time that thoughtful part of me went away and returned, and others were brought in and out of relationships with me to help develop my body and mind as I grew into who I presently am, sometimes conscious sometimes unconscious but always protected by a society that values lives that include me. I join with the forces within society that value human lives of all ages that I once was.

I did not come from a child. I was once a child. Likewise I did not come from a conceptus. I was once a conceptus. I came from a sperm and an egg in the begining, and nutrients and energy thereafter.

I am not merely a mind, but an organism that lives even when I do not have a mind that is functioning highly enough to express who I am.

I apologise if a lot of the above seems superfluous, but I was hoping that restating in different ways helps build deeper understanding of the point.

[fushigi]

I completely agree with 5010. Whether my brain is fully functioning at any given moment or not, I'm still a human, and you can't take that away from me. Why? Because I have the capacity for humanity. My lack of consciousness is temporary. No different than a fetus.

Quote by: livefree Your arrogance in telling them, en mass and without knowing anything about their particular circumstances or their mental, physical or financial ability to raise that child successfully, that they must drop all other plans and occupations to spend many years of their lives raising a child.

Who's the solipsist? You're so blind from your desire to win the debate that you've totally ignored the option of adoption.

[ZNFYRH]

I'm glad to see that there are others who don't think consciousness defines our existence.