Defense of the abortion/Discussion about Ethics

[Nonatheist]

l would rather not go into legal question, this is a topic of ethics after all.
This is how l look at it, l start with ‘It’s immoral to kill a living being for no reason’, and the more sentient one being is the bigger reason is needed to justify killing it’.

Killing both a baby and a rat for no reason would be immoral, baby is more sentient so there would need to be a better justification for killing it.

 

[upant]

gives us more moral worth than any other animal.

what do you base your morals on, what is the authority they fall back on for truth? can your morals change?

That being said, when human is born, it stops being psychically attached to a mother.

yet, the baby (up to a certain age) needs the mother or someone to take care of it just like an unborn child.

while abortion would result in great benefits to the mother.

what benefits do the death of the child bring?

There are women who don’t want or can’t afford to care for a child, those are the most common reasons for abortion

where is the personal responsibility that would prevent this action? we are not ruled by our basic instincts. actions have consequences,

If women doesn’t want a child, it’s cruel to me to have to force her to suffer for something she doesn’t want.

she had options before creating the baby. it is deadly for the baby because the parents are selfish.

l would prefer that all women who can’t take care of a child but want to, be given resources to do so.
Sadly, that’s not happening in most of the world. Also, women has to legally pay a lot of money for the medical debt.

there is help out there, the local church offers this kind of support in my town and I am sure it is offered elsewhere.

Human rights never mean’t to be applied to fetuses

define where your human rights came from. are they the same as God-given rights.

l don’t think human have rights because they are humans, l think humans have rights because they are the most sentient beings.

you seem to be saying there are different levels of human rights depending on how sentient a being is. is this a correct interpretation?

l would rather not go into legal question, this is a topic of ethics after all.
This is how l look at it, l start with ‘It’s immoral to kill a living being for no reason’, and the more sentient one being is the bigger reason is needed to justify killing it’.

but that is the question if a baby is no more aware than an unborn baby is it okay to put the living baby to death as it is to put the unborn to death

what do you think of the position that it is a life issue? Fertilization creates a new, biologically unique human and the four defining characteristics of life are present during or soon after fertilization:

growth
reproduction
metabolism
response to stimuli

 

[Nonatheist]

No, my morals are absolute.
Sentience=moral worth, more sentience=more moral worth.

Yes, but it stops physically being attached to a mother. Meaning it’s no longer required of her to take care of the baby. While being pregnant forces her to care of the child without her consent.

Mother wouldn’t be forced to carry a fetus, mother wouldn’t need to go through pain of pregnancy and changes to the body after it. Pregnancy can be mentally damaging, much more if it was the case of rape.

Women who choose to be pregnant usually want a child, if women didn’t choose to get pregnent, than she didn’t consent to it and the negatives that brings.

Human rights(as we know them) are the product of the enlightenment, they include things such as life and freedom. God given rights depend on what God we are talking about

Because abortion would result in women not needing to suffer, and killing a born baby wouldn’t have any possitives.

l don’t think that life just for the sake of it has any value, cells are life yet l consider them morally meaningless.

If you accept those things as what gives something a moral worth, than you would see dog-fetus and human fetus as the same in terms of moral worth.

 

[Elf01]

Killing both a baby and a rat for no reason would be immoral, baby is more sentient so there would need to be a better justification for killing it.

You’ve just said a rat is more sentient than a one week old baby that can’t feel pain, unless I misinterpreted you.

 

[Nonatheist]

Yeah, my bad.
l stand by that, pain is one of the musts of being sentient.
And a newborn only has that, so if you remove pain, following my logic rat would be worth more.

 

[Wesrock]

l think pain,suffering and death are bad things, That’s set in stone.

But why?

Are you refering to Aristotlean or Thomistic natural law, as they have differences?

I don’t want to quibble, as Thomism is an Aristotlean tradition, and I really mean Aristotleanism broadly as a tradition not just “what Aristotle wrote.”

Also, l reject reductionism that is used in both philosophies

Maybe this would be a tangent, but could you elaborate?

 

[Elf01]

Yeah, my bad.
l stand by that, pain is one of the musts of being sentient.
And a newborn only has that, so if you remove pain, following my logic rat would be worth more.

Would you put a third trimester abortion on the same moral level as killing a newborn?

 

[Nonatheist]

They are brute facts, something that exists in all possible universes/

Thomism is aristotelianism used to justify Christianity.

They have moral reductionist approach, while l place things such as death and pain as absolute things, that are always bad.
Natural law would try to reduce it, and it will always end with God in some form.

 

[Nonatheist]

Depends, if someone just stabbed a pregnent women than yes. If mother benefited from the abortion than no
Example l would give is, it would be more morally wrong to kill a dog for no reason, than to kill a human as a self defense for example

 

[Elf01]

Depends, if someone just stabbed a pregnent women than yes. If mother benefited from the abortion than no

Why does who does the killing matter?

 

[Nonatheist]

It doesn’t matter.
If benefits outweight the negatives, action can be justified.

Women who doesn’t want a child benefits from more freedom and lack of suffering if she chooses to abort it.
While women who wants a child, but someone kills it, suffers both physically and mentally, and also didn’t consent to any of such actions.

 

[Wesrock]

They are brute facts, something that exists in all possible universes.

That’s not an explanation. More of a “just because”. It’s basically an appeal to a type of Platonism, too, which you may be okay with? But if all that is so, how do you know it? And how are you more comfortable with brute facts such as this instead of appealing to something about human or animal things that we’ve observed?

 

[VanitasVanitatum]

l don’t think newborns have personhood.

That being said, when human is born, it stops being psychically attached to a mother. So there would almost never be a good reason to kill a baby, while abortion would result in great benefits to the mother.
l am generally not in favor of third trimester abortions, although they are very small portion of total abortion count

This means personhood is irrelevant.

After conception, if the cells are destroyed it would be like the person never existed, while if 25 year old dies it would be a death of a person.

Looking from the bigger picture there isn’t much of a difference.

Person 25 years later can think, feel pain, reason and understand death.

Not when they are asleep.

 

[kapp19]

Two words for you: utility monster.

Robert Nozick… Anarchy, State, and Utopia. I forget the page number.

You have an entirely arbitrary system of values - your system is based on what you feel has value, simply because you feel it does. It is not grounded in metaphysical order - levels and distinctions of being - it’s just your desire vs. other desires. It’s not morality that we’re talking about, it’s a series of conflicts with various strategies, where feelings get hurt or get satiated.

And there’s the utility monster. Which I don’t think you would like.

Here: Utility monster - Wikipedia

 

[Nonatheist]

Things have to end with a brute fact, that’s how causation works.
Natural law still appeals to a brute fact, that being God.
So, l think it’s simpler to just end on ‘those things are brute fact’
l don’t find natural law theroy to be particularly effective at explaing goodness and badness as well.

 

[Nonatheist]

How so? l don’t think you HAVE to have personhood in order to have moral worth, but personhood gives a being most moral worth.

We have to agree to disagree on that one

Sleeping is a short temporary state, person existed before sleep, and it will exist after sleep.
Also, people can feel pain in sleep.

 

[Wesrock]

Things have to end with a brute fact, that’s how causation works.
Natural law still appeals to a brute fact, that being God.
So, l think it’s simpler to just end on ‘those things are brute fact’
l don’t find natural law theroy to be particularly effective at explaing goodness and badness as well.

The Uncaused Cause isn’t a brute fact. We can speak to sufficient reason as to why it exists.

My main point, though, is it seems appeals to nature at some level in ethics are unavoidable, whether presented as rational arguments or as intuitions from experience and observation. And I find it difficult to believe you holding these as so-called brute facts isn’t based on some such intuition about animal nature and at least some conception of what is “goodness for” things. How do animals flourish and what is contrary to that, and this prior to a judgment that pain and suffering are evils.

 

[VanitasVanitatum]

Sleeping is a short temporary state, person existed before sleep, and it will exist after sleep.
Also, people can feel pain in sleep.

Add anesthesia and they won’t.

Sleeping is a short temporary state, person existed before sleep, and it will exist after sleep.
Also, people can feel pain in sleep.

The fetus is also in a temporary state and it will continue to exist if nothing happens too.

 

[Nonatheist]

First, l am a consequentialist, not a utilitarian.
Second, utility monster though experiment is false, because it doesn’'t understand utilitarianism.
Utilitarianism is based on maximum pleasure for most people, one person being very happy while 100 started to death is not utilitarian by any means.

 

[upant]

No, my morals are absolute.

what are they based on? who is their authority?

Yes, but it stops physically being attached to a mother. Meaning it’s no longer required of her to take care of the baby. While being pregnant forces her to care of the child without her consent.

but it is still attached for its existence, the baby dies if the mother doesn’t take care of the baby. we see babies being thrown out with the trash, what’s the difference between this and an abortion a few minutes before birth?

her consent was given when she had sex. it is called personal responsibility

Women who choose to be pregnant usually want a child, if women didn’t choose to get pregnent, than she didn’t consent to it and the negatives that brings.

by the actions of the parties, they choose to accept the possibility of pregnancy. why give them an out? everybody is not a winner in an abortion, an individual human is created and put to death

Human rights(as we know them) are the product of the enlightenment, they include things such as life and freedom. God given rights depend on what God we are talking about

human rights not produced by God are mere suggestions subject to change. There is only one God and his rights are universal.

Because abortion would result in women not needing to suffer, and killing a born baby wouldn’t have any possitives.

the woman suffers even if the baby is put to death, possibly longer then if the baby was born

l don’t think that life just for the sake of it has any value, cells are life yet l consider them morally meaningless.

then anyone can be put to death by majority rule (secular morals)

If you accept those things as what gives something a moral worth, than you would see dog-fetus and human fetus as the same in terms of moral worth.

you obviously ignore the soul