Pointless pro-choice statements

[ThomasToo]

I am certain that brainwave patterns discerned from prenatal human beings are not adult patterns.
I would hazard that patterns discerned from adolescent human bengs as well as teenager as well are not adult patterns.

I hazard this because I have not studied directly.
I simply know that a child is not an adult.

Also, concerning “it’s not our fingers, our faces or our gonads that make us unique as a species…”
Yes, it is. Every cell in our bodies is unique to our species.
They are all human, and that is the defining difference.

The same sorts of brainwave patterns–I’m not a neurologist so I’m not going to start using technical knowledge on which I do not have a solid grasp–that appear in the fifth or sixth month of pregnancy are uniquely human brainwaves (i.e. those sort not present in non-human animals) and their presence persists throughout the life of an individual.

My point about fingers and such was in response to a claim that having seen a fetus in the process of development and saying it looked human. It does, I grant that point, but for much if not almost all of gestation it is hard if not impossible to distinguish between a developing human fetus and a developing chimpanzee fetus. If you are resorting to sub-cellular analysis to determine what a thing is that is a different claim than the one to which I was responding but I would argue that simply saying ‘human DNA implies human person implies rights’ is an over-simplistic trope that has outlived its useful life and lacks intellectual rigor.

 

[ThomasToo]

This doesn’t need to happen at the zygote phase either. And with the potential of human cloning may eventually be possible at all stages of development. Tangentially the information is interesting, but irrelevant to JimG’s point.

-Prophecy

The point that naturally until more than two weeks into pregnancy an embryo can split into two individuals is hardly irrelevant to the claim that ‘at conception the sperm and ovum unite to form a new and distinct individual’ (emphasis added). The zygote that will naturally go on to become a set of twins can hardly–at least not intelligibly–be considered an individual.

Artificial cloning is a different case (and perhaps an interesting one) but the in the context of this discussion we’re concerned with natural development in utero.

 

[JimG]

The point that naturally until more than two weeks into pregnancy an embryo can split into two individuals is hardly irrelevant to the claim that ‘at conception the sperm and ovum unite to form a new and distinct individual’ (emphasis added). The zygote that will naturally go on to become a set of twins can hardly–at least not intelligibly–be considered an individual.

Artificial cloning is a different case (and perhaps an interesting one) but the in the context of this discussion we’re concerned with natural development in utero.

If that happens, then there will be two new and distinct individuals of the human species–not mom, not dad, but two new human beings. Whether the two new human beings are distinct from conception or a new individual arises at the point of separation is a moot point. The biology of the matter is that (at least) one genetically distinct individual of the human species is created at conception. Do we have the right to kill it because it might be a twin?

The concept of personhood is not a biological concept. But from a philosophical and ethical standpoint, we must treat every human being as a person. If the state can determine which human beings are persons, none of us are safe.

 

[ThomasToo]

Now I feel the need to explain something. The ‘paradox of the heap’ is drawn from a quasi slippery slope fallacy (as we remove one piece of sand from a heap it remains a heap until we get to the last grain of sand or no grains at all). The same thing goes for crowds of people, but not necessarily for humans. So what’s the difference? Heaps of sand and crowds of people are words which presuppose the presence of multiples. For example, a crowd of people is a large number of people, but the question is what constitutes a large enough number for a crowd?

The ‘paradox of the heap’ isn’t necessarily valid here because the definition of a human doesn’t ontologically rely on the presence of a large number.

My point is that the definition of person in the moral and ontological sense (note I don’t use the word ‘human’ which is synonym with ‘member of the species h. sapiens’)–at least to a great many people–does indeed depend on a large number [of cells]. I find it beyond nonsensical to claim that a single cell is a person for moral purposes or is a person in the metaphysical sense. Your argument simply assumes your idea of personhood and then says ‘see look, go back up from adult to child to fetus to zygote and nothing meaningful changes so I’m right.’ There are plenty of changes–most notably in embryological and fetal development–that are radically important. I, for one, think having a brain with a cerebral cortex is a necessary precondition for consideration as a moral and ontological person. I’m sure you disagree.

However one could say that there is a flavor of intelligibility fallacy to permitting abortion based on this ‘paradox of the heaps’. Basically the fallacy is that an object can be determined despite relying on a non-intelligible factor or one from which information has not yet been drawn. For example, a hunter is in the woods and has his trusty shotgun drawn. He hears a rustle in a nearby bush. Now if he can pull the trigger and blindly shoot into the bush, but he’s not really sure what’s there. It could be his quarry, or even another hunter. He has to determine if the rustle in the bush is fair game or not before he can fire a shot.

Another tired trope… Everyone and their brother has heard this argument and it’s specious on the face of it. This isn’t about not having enough information but about radically differing notions of anthropology and claiming that yours is just the careful course while others are being cocksure in an ambiguous situation is absurd from the outset. You can’t claim in the same post that (1) a human being is a moral and ontological person from the moment of conception and (2) we’re not quite sure how these things work so let’s be on the safe side and protect developing embryos. You need to pick a claim (or at least two that are internally consistent).

 

[Prophesy]

Another tired trope… Everyone and their brother has heard this argument and it’s specious on the face of it. This isn’t about not having enough information but about radically differing notions of anthropology and claiming that yours is just the careful course while others are being cocksure in an ambiguous situation is absurd from the outset. You can’t claim in the same post that (1) a human being is a moral and ontological person from the moment of conception and (2) we’re not quite sure how these things work so let’s be on the safe side and protect developing embryos. You need to pick a claim (or at least two that are internally consistent).

I’m sure I would be insulted if you read my argument more concisely. I am not making the argument ‘I don’t know if an embryo is a person therefore we shouldn’t permit abortion until we find out’. I was making the point that you didn’t answer the question of when the life of the embryo should be preserved from abortion, but now you have and we can progress. You’ve at least set a point of the presence of the cerebral cortex (which starts development at the 8th week and is the largest organ by the 24th week).

Out of curiosity, is there a point in development at which abortions are no longer permissible in your eyes?

-Prophecy

 

[vz71]

If you are resorting to sub-cellular analysis to determine what a thing is that is a different claim than the one to which I was responding

I am glad we understand each other.
Physical characteristics are nice, but they are wholly inadequate when dealing with someone that usually is completely unseen until the birth.

but I would argue that simply saying ‘human DNA implies human person implies rights’ is an over-simplistic trope that has outlived its useful life and lacks intellectual rigor.

And also flawed. That argument alone cannot be used to counter abortion support.
There are other factors to be considered in determining right to life.
The human DNA only tells us that the object in question is without doubt human.

 

[vera_dicere]

Just to add an aside note:

Here’s a fine example of what legal abortion has ensured, safety wise, for women:

jillstanek.com/abortionist-quacks-pervs/is-fetal-cannib.html

Perhaps a new slogan should be: “Not a person! Just lunch!”

 

[ThomasToo]

If that happens, then there will be two new and distinct individuals of the human species–not mom, not dad, but two new human beings. Whether the two new human beings are distinct from conception or a new individual arises at the point of separation is a moot point. The biology of the matter is that (at least) one genetically distinct individual of the human species is created at conception. Do we have the right to kill it because it might be a twin?

It cannot be a person, strictly speaking, since it is not ‘an individual substance’ (Boethius). That is why this question is far from moot.

The concept of personhood is not a biological concept. But from a philosophical and ethical standpoint, we must treat every human being as a person. If the state can determine which human beings are persons, none of us are safe.

How can you step without proof from saying ‘personhood is not a question of biology’ to ‘every [biologically] human being [should be treated] as a person’? Right now this isn’t about the state, this is about intellectual rigor and discussion.

 

[ThomasToo]

I’m sure I would be insulted if you read my argument more concisely. I am not making the argument ‘I don’t know if an embryo is a person therefore we shouldn’t permit abortion until we find out’. I was making the point that you didn’t answer the question of when the life of the embryo should be preserved from abortion, but now you have and we can progress. You’ve at least set a point of the presence of the cerebral cortex (which starts development at the 8th week and is the largest organ by the 24th week).

Out of curiosity, is there a point in development at which abortions are no longer permissible in your eyes?

-Prophecy

I set the cerebral cortex–or intended to–as the earliest possible point at which it is so much as intelligible to think of an embryo/fetus as a person.

I have severe hesitations about late term (3rd trimester) abortions but have not needed to vote on the issue nor have I made an extensive study of relevant biology so I don’t think I can point to a specific time in development where personhood is clearly evident–there will be a gray area between clearly not and clearly so, of course. As a rough estimation I would probably point to the emergence of brainwaves with patterns typical of adult human brains so end of the 2nd trimester.

That said, the question also stands of what you mean by ‘permissible’? Do you mean legally allowed or do you mean the morally licit? My philosophical issues above aside I am beyond hesitant to set my moral and metaphysical philosophy as national law on this issue when there is a great deal of disagreement on it.

 

[ThomasToo]

I am glad we understand each other.
Physical characteristics are nice, but they are wholly inadequate when dealing with someone that usually is completely unseen until the birth.

And also flawed. That argument alone cannot be used to counter abortion support.
There are other factors to be considered in determining right to life.
The human DNA only tells us that the object in question is without doubt human.

But ‘human’ in the biological sense and ‘person’ in the moral and ontological senses are not self-evidently synonymous. I’ve done my best to explain why I don’t think they are but to be frank I don’t feel like anyone here has done anything to defend the supposition that they are.

 

[vz71]

But ‘human’ in the biological sense and ‘person’ in the moral and ontological senses are not self-evidently synonymous. I’ve done my best to explain why I don’t think they are but to be frank I don’t feel like anyone here has done anything to defend the supposition that they are.

Moral and ontological are religious arguments.
Attributing these traits to a human being that cannot be seen or heard is unreasonable and illogical. We simply cannot know.

Likewise it is irresponsible and illogical to assume they do not exist. We do not have sufficient evidence to suggest anything.

It is simply flawed thinking to base abortion justification on some perceived lack of this evidence. No argument at all on abortion can utilize this evidence. It is faith and nothing more.

 

[JimG]

It is quite remarkable to find such resistance to the idea that human beings have a biological beginning which distinguishes them as individuals, genetically and biologically, from their parents.

The only real objection seems to be the idea of twins, which though they may not be biologically distinguishable from each other until several days after conception, are undoubtedly biologically distinguishable from their parents at conception.

Proposing a death sentence for any human individual depending on his or her stage of development seems to me arbitrary. The stage of development required may be moved as far forward as the state may decide to allow at any given time.

An infant is not fully developed at birth. It will be more developed at the toddler stage, and even more developed as an adolescent. In its later and elderly years, it may even lose some of those characteristics which we seem to rely on as evidence of “personhood,” thereby putting its life at risk by losing the protection of the state.

I’ve noted in other threads that such famous academics as Professor Singer of Princeton have seriously proposed that legal personhood not be granted until several months after birth. This gives the parents an out if the infant proves to be not what was expected, or is defective or unsatisfactory in some way. It could be legally terminated at any point up to, say, 3 months old. But there is no logical need to place the limit at 3 months.

This is the logical end of making personhood dependent on bodily development.

Brain waves are detectable by week six:
nrlc.org/abortion/facts/fetaldevelopment.html

See here for a timeline of development.
wpclinic.org/parenting/fetal-development/first-trimester/

Shall we then make week 6 the limit for abortion? OK to kill before week 6, not OK after? Or shall we wait till birth plus 3 months?

 

[ThomasToo]

It is quite remarkable to find such resistance to the idea that human beings have a biological beginning which distinguishes them as individuals, genetically and biologically, from their parents.

The only real objection seems to be the idea of twins, which though they may not be biologically distinguishable from each other until several days after conception, are undoubtedly biologically distinguishable from their parents at conception.

The fact that a zygote that will/may become twins is unique from its progenitors is not the point. The point is that it is not singular (yet) and hence fails to present itself as an individual substance and hence a [NB, one] person. I’m not trying to be obtuse, the definition of the word ‘person’ I’m using comes from Boethius, a 6th Century Christian philosopher whose philosophy on this subject (the definition of person, he said nothing on abortion) is unimpeachable.

Proposing a death sentence for any human individual depending on his or her stage of development seems to me arbitrary. The stage of development required may be moved as far forward as the state may decide to allow at any given time.

This isn’t about proposing a death sentence any more than saying any non-human animal is not a person in the ontological and moral sense is proposing a death sentence on them.

An infant is not fully developed at birth. It will be more developed at the toddler stage, and even more developed as an adolescent. In its later and elderly years, it may even lose some of those characteristics which we seem to rely on as evidence of “personhood,” thereby putting its life at risk by losing the protection of the state.

I’ve noted in other threads that such famous academics as Professor Singer of Princeton have seriously proposed that legal personhood not be granted until several months after birth. This gives the parents an out if the infant proves to be not what was expected, or is defective or unsatisfactory in some way. It could be legally terminated at any point up to, say, 3 months old. But there is no logical need to place the limit at 3 months.

This is the logical end of making personhood dependent on bodily development.

So this is the slippery slope then? You’re not averse to my claims in principle but you don’t like where you think they would lead? That’s not an indictment of the idea…

Brain waves are detectable by week six:
nrlc.org/abortion/facts/fetaldevelopment.html

See here for a timeline of development.
wpclinic.org/parenting/fetal-development/first-trimester/

Shall we then make week 6 the limit for abortion? OK to kill before week 6, not OK after? Or shall we wait till birth plus 3 months?

I didn’t say ‘brainwaves,’ I said ‘brainwaves with patterns typical of adult human brains,’ which is a radically different claim; brainwaves, in and of themselves, are unremarkable as an EEG of many non-human animals can show. Further, you’ve established a false dichotomy between week 6 and birth plus 3 months. There is no reason the answer cannot lay between.

 

[ThomasToo]

Moral and ontological are religious arguments.

Moral and ontological arguments are religious arguments for many but they are, at their heart, philosophical; both are among the handful of main branches of philosophy. If, however, you stipulate that these are religious ideas then you are proposing a law that is binding on all–most notably those not of your creed–that is based on religion? That sounds, to be frank, rather un-American (‘Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion’).

Attributing these traits to a human being that cannot be seen or heard is unreasonable and illogical. We simply cannot know.

I’m not exactly sure why hearing is important but we can certainly observe a pregnancy as it develops in very intricate, descriptive and precise ways. To say ‘we simply cannot know’ is a cop-out (see my argument on that above) and a falsehood.

Likewise it is irresponsible and illogical to assume they do not exist. We do not have sufficient evidence to suggest anything.

So you grant that you (as part of we) have insufficient evidence to support your claims that life and personhood begin at conception? It seems that if even what most of your claims here are true that this abortion is a personal moral (and religious) issue and hence the government–and the people–have no grounds in legislating on the question.

Frankly, those who are pro-life (i.e. those who oppose legal protection of abortion rights, ‘pro-life’ on its face intends [or at least ought to intend] much more than an answer to that one question) but support a view like that are respectable. That means more than praying outside of Planned Parenthood on Saturday afternoons; work against the social factors that lead to abortion: teach adolescents about birth control–as well as abstinence–, help women who are working 60 or 80 hours a week just to stay at the poverty line without children out of the circle of poverty &c&c. That’s all well good and fine but when–as someone else here put it in the bumper sticker slogan–you start trying to put rosaries on other people’s ovaries on a question that is confessedly (a) religious and (b) uncertain then we start disagreeing quite radically.

 

[jilly4ski]

So this is the slippery slope then? You’re not averse to my claims in principle but you don’t like where you think they would lead? That’s not an indictment of the idea…

I didn’t say ‘brainwaves,’ I said ‘brainwaves with patterns typical of adult human brains,’ which is a radically different claim; brainwaves, in and of themselves, are unremarkable as an EEG of many non-human animals can show. Further, you’ve established a false dichotomy between week 6 and birth plus 3 months. There is no reason the answer cannot lay between.

Except that your definition of personhood is just that: Your definition, not based on extensive study or knowledge of brainwaves in either adults or children, nor based on logical proofs. You merely stated that these brainwaves that are seen in other humans are needed before we can say a a human is a person. But we do not know that these specific kinds of brainwaves actually is what makes a human a “person.”

The definition of a person is a created definition, based on an either an arbitrary point in time or an arbitrary skill/trait that is exhibited by the human. On person on this site wanted the definition of “person” to be when the human is self-aware which they claimed didn’t happen until long term memory kicked in around 2 years of age. Your definition is as arbitrary as that definition.

You are assigning “personhood” to an arbitrary trait that the human exhibits at 4-6 months in utero. Thus saying that a human can be killed for no other reason than the parent(s) don’t want to take care of him/her. We are saying that your definition of “person” is just one of many definitions of “person” which allow for a human to be killed even though you cannot prove that your definition is correct or that these brainwaves is what actually makes us a person as opposed to merely a human.

 

[ThomasToo]

Except that your definition of personhood is just that: Your definition, not based on extensive study or knowledge of brainwaves in either adults or children, nor based on logical proofs. You merely stated that these brainwaves that are seen in other humans are needed before we can say a a human is a person. But we do not know that these specific kinds of brainwaves actually is what makes a human a “person.”

The definition of a person is a created definition, based on an either an arbitrary point in time or an arbitrary skill/trait that is exhibited by the human. On person on this site wanted the definition of “person” to be when the human is self-aware which they claimed didn’t happen until long term memory kicked in around 2 years of age. Your definition is as arbitrary as that definition.

You are assigning “personhood” to an arbitrary trait that the human exhibits at 4-6 months in utero. Thus saying that a human can be killed for no other reason than the parent(s) don’t want to take care of him/her. We are saying that your definition of “person” is just one of many definitions of “person” which allow for a human to be killed even though you cannot prove that your definition is correct or that these brainwaves is what actually makes us a person as opposed to merely a human.

So if it is only one definition of many then why ought yours get the full force of law?

 

[colmcille1]

So if it is only one definition of many then why ought yours get the full force of law?

The fifth commandment would seem to be a reasonable moral and legal basis for legislation.

 

[jilly4ski]

So if it is only one definition of many then why ought yours get the full force of law?

I am saying that “personhood” should not be the test of whether a human has the right to life, rather mere humanity is enough.

 

[marysmessenger]

The funniest bumper sticker I’ve seen:

“Save the unborn gay baby whales.”

What’s on my bumber:

Healing After Abortion
www.rachelsvineyard.org

 

[ThomasToo]

The fifth commandment would seem to be a reasonable moral and legal basis for legislation.

Which assumes what you seek to prove. ‘Thou shall not kill [murder]’ doesn’t really answer the question of what sorts of things oughtn’t to be killed. Surely trees and cows needn’t apply. Further if we’re going to the Old Testament for answers it treats a fetus as not a person in that when a man strikes a pregnant woman and causes her to miscarry, the husband of the pregnant woman is owed a fine (Exodus 21.22) but is not put to death as he would be for murder as ordered just nine verses before (Exodus 21.12).

I am saying that “personhood” should not be the test of whether a human has the right to life, rather mere humanity is enough.

Saying ‘humanity’ doesn’t get around the problem. Personhood is a moral (and legal) concept intending those entities which are the bearers of rights which is conflated by many with the biological concept of human without proof, explanation or–frankly–reason. Saying all biological humans are persons is a moral and ontological outlook but it’s not a simple answer to a complex question and it’s certainly not a way to get around the question completely.