Why no argument for abortion has ever worked.

[Lexicus]

All fine and dandy but fact is a great proportion of the 'pro life crowd' are also pro abstinence and anti-birth control.

 

[Old Hippy]

How about this?

The state is obliged to protect the lives of those under its care. (I think this is generally accepted)

This care extends to unborn lives as well. (As demonstrated by social output for neonatal care and the acceptance of legal causes of action and crimes related to harm against an unborn child)

Private autonomy interests of a person do not extend to permit physical harm against another (in other words, you right to act stops where my nose begins. Another generally accepted rule of liberal government and personal rights that has very few exceptions.)

.

its still an argument based on emotion, the state provides pre natal care for mothers to be that want a healthy child so catering to a parent's emotion need and the states needs to have a happy adult voting population the same states never have quite enough for children born elsewhere around the world where children die of disease and starvation so the value of life is based on emotion and meeting ones own needs

As I'm pretty sure both you and mouthwash don't work in a Central African refugee camp, saving children's lives as you value other things above children's lives which is the same choice a women makes when she chooses to have an abortion. It is a subjective decision that your and mouthwashes arguments fail to address

http://www.bangkokpost.com/news/world/1022197/un-report-tackle-inequality-to-prevent-children-from-dying

 

[aelf]

Abortion is always justified by one of two reasons:

#1: That sapience determines moral value. This makes fetuses, being nonsapient, morally equivalent to a rock or other inanimate object. They're just some flesh, after all.

The problem here is that if we take nonsapience to mean absence of value, it applies to other things which we do value. It is considered acceptable to kill animals, but it is not considered acceptable to kill children below two years of age, although their mental state isn't advanced much beyond than a chimp's. To assert otherwise would be considered abhorrent.

Another problem is that even if sapience were the basis for value, it doesn't follow that a nonsapient object would be valueless. Fetuses have the ability to develop sapience, an inherent capacity which is part of their nature. They may not be able to immediately exercise sapience, but this also applies to someone who is under general anesthesia, or in a coma. It clearly isn't acceptable to kill them!

Finally, even fully-grown humans have varying degrees of sapience. The lives of those with Down Syndrome or other mental disabilities would therefore not be as valuable as those of healthy people.

This argument ignores how people think about applied ethics. People usually make rules based on classes or categories of things to which those rules are applied. If human beings are as a class of organisms (so to speak) sapient, then the rules people make will treat them that way. These rules would likely not change even if there are varying levels of sapience between individuals (with some perhaps close to having none) or if there is a temporary absence of sapience in some. This is probably partly to make the rules easier to follow and more easily accepted by all - so there are no arguments about just how much sapience is enough.

The potential status of a class of objects is a less important consideration, as it leads to all sorts of complications. That's why people bring up the examples of sperm and, with current technology, skin cells - as these things have, under the right conditions (just like a fetus), the potential to become sapient organisms. If the potential status of a class of objects should be a primary consideration, then you would have to agree that any object with the potential to become sapient should be protected, which makes the rule much more difficult to follow to the point of compromising human well-being.

Actually, none of that is really new, but to those who somehow still don't get it, this might be an easier way to understand.

 

[BvBPL]

None of those are good arguments, a good argument would be something like 'abortion being legal causes more harm than its being illegal' and then would adduce evidence to that effect.

It's a fine argument. It just isn't persuasive to you because you've already determined to damn logic and make up your own mind before hearing it. You hide behind consequentialist morality for this case to make it seem that my duty based moral argument is inapplicable. That's not a refutation of the argument itself as much as a statement of its inapplicability to the moral system you've opted to avow here. An adoption that you made to cement your prior decision on the matter.


Which is exactly the sort of moral prestidigitation everyone performs all the time on this subject.

As well, a coma victim is functionally different from a fetus in that it certainly was sentient. It's qualitatively different, in the 'having had sentience' is a feature a fetus does not have.

If we are going to rest out arguments upon qualifying words than I think you mean "a feature the fetus might not develop."

So is the child born in a coma like state, that is lacking sentience, a person?

 

[BvBPL]

its still an argument based on emotion,

It is an argument based from duty, ethos. It is not aimed at being a logos argument, although the syllogism used is a logic device. Merely because an argument is not based from logic does not invalidate it however.

As I'm pretty sure both you and mouthwash don't work in a Central African refugee camp, saving children's lives as you value other things above children's lives which is the same choice a women makes when she chooses to have an abortion. It is a subjective decision that your and mouthwashes arguments fail to address

]

I'm not sure what you're getting at here but a state's obligation to others in the care of another state is less than its obligation to its own subjects. not sure if that address what you mean or not though.

 

[Old Hippy]

I'm not sure what you're getting at here but a state's obligation to others in the care of another state is less than its obligation to its own subjects. not sure if that address what you mean or not though.

well it dose establish life's value is subjective and therefore a women's view on abortion is just as valid as any other, if duty and law are more important, this thread has already established that they support abortion, all the arguments against abortion are based on emotion and ones own point of view, so carry no more weight than someone having an abortion

 

[El_Machinae]

If we are going to rest out arguments upon qualifying words than I think you mean "a feature the fetus might not develop."

Sure.

All arguments rest on qualifying words. "Might not develop" is in the same group as "does not have". The important thing is that they're functionally very different from a coma patient.

Lots and lots of living things are capable of becoming sentient that do not. But as 4D entities, they're not sentient. A coma patient is a 4D entity that has sentience as a feature.

So is the child born in a coma like state, that is lacking sentience, a person?

I guess. Though that is a bit of a non-starter. You're talking about a specific level of damage to a baby.

 

[Tahuti]

There. Can we all agree that abortion is wrong now, and get on with our lives?

Hey pal, I suggest you look up dead baby jokes. If these make you laugh, you have no right to challenge abortion rights.

 

[Mouthwash]

You might respond that all these things need outside intervention to achieve that potential. So does the fetus. Specifically, the fetus need the outside intervention of a human mother to nurture and nourish it. Without that intervention, the fetus will, most certainly, fail to realize its potential.

Yes, but that nourishment and protection isn't a part of the fetus's capacity for intelligence, regardless of how necessary they are. Gems aren't formed by teleological processes, organisms are.

That was only a joke, but...really? Your obsession with forcing women to give birth actually would make you demand a woman bring a pregnancy to term, even if you knew the baby would die of starvation within a year or two?

If you state it as "force women to give birth," than it sounds horrible. How about "you would actually let a child live if you knew he was going to die in a year or two?"

Since I don't believe in rights-based ethics, I would arguably kill the fetus if I knew he was going to suffer terribly for the year of his life. But I can't imagine that that sort of situation is common, or inevitable, and would more often than not assume that the child would live. The thing about rights aren't that they're natural or 'real,' it's that the objections to them are often much less trustworthy than they appear. Your scenario is a bit like the "what if you had totally accurate information about a bomb exploding soon and were 500% sure that the terrorist had information on it" that torture advocates use, completely missing the point that this is extremely unlikely to ever occur.

What use is speaking about morality then if it can't stop anything or affect anything?

The thing is, it can.

Democratic laws are the system through which the people express their moral preferences. They are a good starting point for examining what people find moral.

No, democratic laws are mainly used to keep order in society, not to bring about moral outcomes. If the latter comes into conflict with the former, the former inevitably wins. You can see this with abortion- it's highly inconvenient to many taxpaying voters that they should not be allowed to kill their fetus, and they would likely do so in a more dangerous fashion anyway, so fetus-killing remains legal.

No. We value humans because they're human to us. Fetuses are not.

What's the difference between this and valuing fellow whites over dark-skinned people?

We're pretty safe in the assumption that people will know the relevant properties of what make fetuses non-human, and what make coma patients and down syndrome patients genuine human beings deserving of rights.

'They appear human to us' is not a good criteria.

If the political system begins to justify killings, it's probably not going to cite the legality of abortion and suddenly categorize living human groups as fetuses.

I didn't say it would at all. I just think it's morally equivalent.

Well they're not babies. A nut isn't a little tree, it's just a nut.

And that nut's inherent purpose (for lack of a better word) is to become a tree. That's why nuts evolved.

What? Like, how did you miss the word "palatable". I mean, it's right there in my post.

I didn't miss it. I just think whether someone lives or dies should never be decided by how palatable it is to others. But that's my silly ole' opinion.

A fetus becomes sentient in the 3rd trimester, certainly. But the phrase 'a fetus is sentient', as a catchall, is false. You'll note that my statement was if the fetus never becomes sentient.

As well, a coma victim is functionally different from a fetus in that it certainly was sentient. It's qualitatively different, in the 'having had sentience' is a feature a fetus does not have.

Once sentience occurs, there's a manifest shifting in the nature of the organism. The body now belongs to the sentient organism, and this ownership extends back in time to his constituents. No one thinks a sperm is morally significant, but if you were to poison the sperm that created me, it's clearly an assault on me. The ownership extends forwards and backwards, but only once my status as a person is actualized. You may poison sperm all you want, if they're disposed of.

So, the coma patient's body belongs to the coma patient, triggered when that patient had originally become sentient. We let people announce whether they will be DNRed, and we let them give commands on the disposal of their corpse.

A fetus cannot be compared to a coma patient, they're qualitatively different.

This is actually a very good argument, and my rejection of abortion as a whole has been properly shaken. But I don't see how to completely deny that the capacity of a fetus (or a nut or seed) to become mature organisms doesn't in some way impact their worth.

The potential status of a class of objects is a less important consideration, as it leads to all sorts of complications. That's why people bring up the examples of sperm and, with current technology, skin cells - as these things have, under the right conditions (just like a fetus), the potential to become sapient organisms. If the potential status of a class of objects should be a primary consideration, then you would have to agree that any object with the potential to become sapient should be protected, which makes the rule much more difficult to follow to the point of compromising human well-being.

I'm not talking about the mere potential for any object to become sentient. I'm saying that, if an object is actively geared towards sentience, than it takes a whole or part of the moral worth assigned to that sentience (or sapience). Sperm and skin cells only acquire this capacity with major tampering and alteration.

 

[onejayhawk]

This thread got big fast.

I have always equated abortion with historic infanticide. Both have been practiced, condemned, but tolerated for the same reasons. The Romans, for example, made a virtue of stopping an infanticide by adoption. The dirty side of the ritual is that abandonment was legal, even encouraged.

J

 

[Lexicus]

If you state it as "force women to give birth," than it sounds horrible.

Yeah, it does. Maybe you should think about that for a while, and get back to me when you're finished.

Since I don't believe in rights-based ethics,

Then why does it matter whether we kill all the fetuses

Your scenario is a bit like the "what if you had totally accurate information about a bomb exploding soon and were 500% sure that the terrorist had information on it" that torture advocates use, completely missing the point that this is extremely unlikely to ever occur.

It's precisely like that. Attribute it to my morbid fascination with how far you're willing to take the 'force women to give birth' thing.

You hide behind consequentialist morality

I'm not "hiding behind" anything. I am pretty clearly rejecting your argument on the basis that I think policy judgments ought to be made from a consequentialist perspective and not a deontological one. We have no 'duty' to do anything but that which leads to the best outcomes.

 

[BvBPL]

I guess. Though that is a bit of a non-starter. You're talking about a specific level of damage to a baby.

Where you purpose a universal system of determining humanity based on sentience then it must be broad enough to address corner cases like the non sentient newborn.

Fuehrer more, your analysis raises the question as to the rights of the sentient versus non sentient fetus. Where the normal healthy fetus displays sentience sometime between the early second and early third trimesters, how do you feel that affects abortion of sentient fetuses?

 

[El_Machinae]

It's a corner case insofar as it's imaginable, but not truly so. We can imagine your scenario, but it becomes imaginary when you know more about biology. A non-sentient baby would be some type of anencephaly.

But yes, I believe the moral status of a fetus changes as it becomes sentient. How could it not?

But I don't see how to completely deny that the capacity of a fetus (or a nut or seed) to become mature organisms doesn't in some way impact their worth.

It's a fair concern. We have intuitions in our morality, and then we try to shoehorn our justifications into them. Sometimes we recognize this bias, other times we cannot avoid it. There's the urge to recognize fetuses as morally significant. But we have other times when we have a similar issue. Upthread I casually pointed out that we allow people a say in how their corpses are disposed of. But why? Putting your finger on the why is not very easy at all. In fact, why should they even get a say? They no longer deal with any of the consequences of corpse disposal.

As a rule-of-thumb, conservatives and liberals (self-identifying) tend to have slightly different instincts when it comes to the sanctity of bodies. If my family dog were run over, and I ate it, many people would shudder. But why? Why should that meat go to waste? Isn't eating it a way of honouring it, a way of getting delight from my dog one last time?

It's not easy. It's not easy seeking first principles instead of post-hoc justifications.

 

[sophie]

It can't develop any sapience by itself. Neither can an egg. That's like saying that food ought to have moral value since humans would die without consuming it.

Neither can a zygote, blastocyst, or fetus.

 

[aelf]

I'm not talking about the mere potential for any object to become sentient. I'm saying that, if an object is actively geared towards sentience, than it takes a whole or part of the moral worth assigned to that sentience (or sapience). Sperm and skin cells only acquire this capacity with major tampering and alteration.

"Actively geared" is probably not something that can be parsed in ethics. What does it mean? Does it imply intentionality? That would probably underlie theists' understanding of the ethics of abortion, but since they can't make the argument on a theistic basis in a secular space, they resort to coming up with such terms that are quite meaningless without the element of intentionality.

The interruption of a natural process, even if it can be argued that such a process would complete without any human intervention, is not self-evidently bad. Making the argument that interrupting it is morally wrong is just another appeal to nature.

 

[Evie]

Yes, but that nourishment and protection isn't a part of the fetus's capacity for intelligence, regardless of how necessary they are.

Even conceding that for the time being (but retaining the right to go back to it), you have given no reason whatsoever why potential should be treated the same as actuality.

I simply see no reason to do so, and I see very few cases in human society where the two are treated as equivalent. A player with the potential to be a great scorer in hockey won't have the same value as one who actually is, right now, a great scorer. A kid who had the intelligence to someday be a doctor before being crippled by a drunk driver won't get as much compensation as someone who actually had their doctor degree - because there is no certainty they would have some day become a doctor, and so we cannot assume their lost revenue (from working) would actually have been those of a doctor.

Wherever one looks, the fundamental truth remains. The potential of a thing doesn't have as much value as the actuality of the thing.

You propose that we treat fetuses as an exception to that widespread rule, yet present no reason why we should do so.

 

[Senethro]

The OP is a nice example of how anti-abortion arguments are all about smoke and mirrors attempts to grant a fetus rights by claiming it has properties in common with other things that have rights, when it does not.

They aren't people and you can't make them people without huge blurring of definitions.

 

[Lexicus]

Well, as I'm in the camp that assigns moral worth to fetuses and still believes abortion should be legal, no questions asked, that doesn't entirely satisfy me. I think most women who have abortions do not feel about it the same way as they would about, I dunno, picking off a scab or something. It's a big deal. But 'the rights of the fetus' is a one-dimensional way to look at the issue, that actually leads to greater harm and abuse than other ways of looking at the issue.

 

[BvBPL]

. A kid who had the intelligence to someday be a doctor before being crippled by a drunk driver won't get as much compensation as someone who actually had their doctor degree - because there is no certainty they would have some day become a doctor, and so we cannot assume their lost revenue (from working) would actually have been those of a doctor.

If we are going to get all actuarial then an unborn child is at times worth more for life insurance and the like than a living infant.

 

[Birdjaguar]

Abortion is always justified by one of two reasons:
#2: That women have an absolute right to complete control over their bodies. Therefore, since the fetus resides within her body, she has control over it, and may kill it if she desires.

This simply ignores the rights of the fetus. Yes, women are generally accepted to have rights over their bodies, but fetuses, being young human beings, also have a right to life. A woman's right to her body doesn't trump a human's right to their life. This is demonstrated by supposing that the atmosphere has developed sapience, and decides to suffocate all humans within itself, though they pose no threat to it. I think it is pretty clear that the atmosphere is not acting morally here.

A final point for those who think the right to bodily integrity is stronger than the right to life. Yes, women do, under your logic, have the right to kill their unborn child, and no one has the right to stop them, but this doesn't mean it is any less monstrous. You aren't doing it because the fetus poses a threat or hindrance to your body, you're doing it because you don't want the fetus to grow up and for you to be forced into an obligation. It's the same as the government rounding up and shooting homeless people on the grounds that productive citizens will not longer have to support them.

There. Can we all agree that abortion is wrong now, and get on with our lives?

Rights and morality.

Rights are granted by governing bodies. They come and they go as people and cultures change. There are no "god given" rights. Women have the right to control their bodies because they have been granted that right by other people in most places over the past 150 years or so. You disagree with that and want to take away that right. You want to impose your own set of rights.

Certainly, there is no natural "right to life" built into our world. The preponderance of evidence actually points to killing and dying as important, major influences on how we live.

There are even some people who want to make sure that people do not have the right to die.

You mention morality once. You do not know what morality is. You only know what you want it to be or what you have been told it is.

And Sapience is just a smokescreen to separate people from the rest of life and justify our actions.

Is abortion a good thing? Well, it certainly depends. But it is with us and is a right under our laws.

Since you do believe that all of these unborn babies need to be born, would you support a law that required every adult who opposes abortion be willing to raise the child of a woman who wants an abortion, but chooses not to have it? Those who oppose abortion would be randomly assigned and required to raise babies not aborted.