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Genesis315
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Can we agree that the one brother should not be able to cut the dependant one off?
Can we agree it is wrong to kill an innocent homo sapien?
Can we agree it is wrong to kill an innocent homo sapien?
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Tlaloc
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Is an apple part of an apple tree? It may result from pollination between plants as well.
indeed and in that time it develops. What does it develop from? A tissue. What does it develop into? An organism. Look up at ohiobob’s posts to get an idea of the development that goes on.
little girl, yes. Fetus, no. Do you understand the difference between an organism that can eat, excrete, etcetera on it’s own and a blob of tissue that can’t?
The egg is as much of an organism as the early fetus is. Both have the potential to be an organism at some point but are not yet.
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Tlaloc
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No of course not. If ten different people ask you if being a catholic means you worship Mary does that make it true?
Of course I consider it, and as soon as you present a legitimate logical issue I’ll have to do some real thinking.
Maybe but a fetus isn’t a human being. Doh!
An interesting perspective but not really true. We create new cells all the time. Furthermore the moment of conception is simply the combining of egg and sperm which already exists.
You’re welcome to your opinion. I don’t share it. And since you can’t prove any of it I don’t have to. My interpretation is just as valid as yours.
I find it funny that after berating me for not looking things up you post information that vastly supports my position and then segue on to telling me I’m closed minded without ever thinking of revising your own stance.
Projection makes me giggle.
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Tlaloc
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cool, I’m glad you can relate.
And if they could? If your blood could become a new human being would it suddenly be a human being already? Cause with cloning we can do exactly that.
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Tlaloc
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I’m not. Ovum are haploid. That means they only have half the genetic material compared to our other (diploid) cells. Now granted the ovum’s half set of chromosomes did indeed come from the mother’s full set but still one cannot say that they are identical.
To use an analogy if you have a pair of Nike shoes and your firend has one shoe of the same type do you say you have the same thing? No, he has one left, you have a left and one right.
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Tlaloc
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Chrissay, please. You disagreed that it was “a cell from a human being.” You were wrong. At the beginning it is precisely that. At some time later it divides but that’s irrelevent. What I said in the first place was correct.
Hair and fingernails aren’t cells. They are simple proteins.
I’m alluding to DNA which is well proven.
Yes, it is unneeded then because it is not any innate part of the body. As such it does not correspond to an intuitive consensus definition of “common tissue”, nor to a technical one.
That’s illogical you are using a very bizarre definition of common tissue. There’s no reason why the permanency of the tissue would be a factor. If there is a sky bridge between two buildings it is a common structure. Even if there are plans at some later date to demolish it it is a common structure while there.
Your definition is not particularly useful. Consequently I decline to use it and will stick with the more conventional meaning.
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BlindSheep
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No, I wouldn’t say it is.
It develops on it’s own. If you take human tissue (skin cells, blood etc.) and nourish it, no amount of time will cause it to grow its own heart, lungs, brain etc. It does not have that innate ability while a human embryo does - this is the difference.
Not every living thing that lacks the above abilities is the same as a mere ‘blob of tissue’. See the previous answer. Again, disabled people and conjoined twins are also not merely ‘tissue’ because they lack these abilities.
Actually, the very early embryo (not fetus) is not an organism, according to the first definition below:
Only the very early embryo does not have “mutually interdependant parts that maintain various vital processes”. Once the placenta forms (right after implantation) the embryo is an organism. The placenta is a organ of the embryo.
However, note the second definition (considered an entity) is separate from the first. That is, some forms of life may be ‘entities’ even without having organs (mutually interdependant parts that maintain various vital processes). The innate ability of the embryo to develop into an organism (without outside interference) is ample reason to consider it an ‘entity’ and therefore, an organism according to the 2nd definition.
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OhioBob
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Tissue: 3. an aggregate of cells usually of a prticular kind together with their intercellular substance that form one of the structural materials of a plant or an animal.
Organism: 1. a complex structure of interdependent and subordinate elements whose relations and properties are largely determined by their function in the whole. 2: an individual constituted to carry on the activities of life by means of organs separate in function but mutually dependent: a living being.
Ok, so I’ll try to actually engage in a discussion here. Let me circle around and ask you this…
Given what you seem to accept as the developmental nature of the human embryo in the womb, even you must admit that at some point in the process your “blob of tissue” takes on characteristics that even you would have to accept as worthy of the your definition of “organism”. What would that be for you? 4 weeks? 12 weeks? 24 weeks? Ten minutes before birth? There must be some point that you would accept.
How would you justify abortion after that mysterious point? Is there any point prior to actual birth after which you would agree that abortion is morally wrong?
Or do you believe that only physical birth renders qualities that you accept as an “organism”?
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Lisa4Catholics
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:crying:
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BlindSheep
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Exactly. * With cloning. *An ovum can become a zygote with fertilization. In both cases, the cell must be altered in some way, because ova and blood cells do not have the innate ablity to grow into babies. This is because ova and blood cells are not entities in their own right, but mere tissue.
Tissue does not turn into babies of its own initiative - but a zygote does.
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Tlaloc
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Really? I would.
It most certainly does not develop on it’s own. It relies on the mother to provide everything to it to support it while it develops.
I’ve answered that about thirty times in this thread, if you haven’t gotten the message repeating it once more won’t help.
So you’re agreeing with me that the early stages of a fetus do not comprise an organism? You’re use of “very early” seems an exaggeration since its at least the third month of development when kidneys and digestion start to show some activity.
False by your own definition above. Said embryo cannot carry out the “vital processes” to life at the organism level on it’s own.
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Tlaloc
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I’ve said so all along Bob, in fact I think I said it in the first post.
I’ve also answered this several times: I don’t know the timing, I’d have to get the advice of doctors to figure out the “when.” Before that point abortion is reasonable by my definition, afterwards it is not.
I wouldn’t under this argument.
No it only requires it to be developed enough that were it removed from the mother it could survive as a complete (though helpless) organism.
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Tlaloc
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How is the process of fertilization more of an intrusion than, say, the process of implantaion (without which a zygote will not become a baby)? Or the process of providing oxygen to said zygote (without which the zygote will not become a baby). Or the process of providing food to said zygote (without which the zygote will not become a baby). Or…
Its a huge long string of processes. You’ve arbitrarily chosen one as more significant than the others. Without any of them the zygote does not become a baby.
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OhioBob
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You did. Sorry. I didn’t remember back that far.
Ok, so these days the generally accepted limit of viability outside the womb is about 24-or-so weeks. Twenty years ago that point was probably 36 weeks. 10 years from now it will probably be 18 weeks. Someday (with the advent of the mechanical womb) it could very well be conception. Does tissue develop into an organism faster today than it did twenty years ago? Will it develop faster twenty years from now than it does today?
Viability also depends upon geography and medico-economic resources. The point of viability in the developed world is far earlier than the developing world. Does tissue become an organism quicker in the U.S. than in sub-saharan Africa?
So an abortion that would be morally unacceptable to you today, would have been acceptable twenty years ago? And an abortion that is morally unacceptable in the US would be acceptable in the third world?
Heck, maybe an abortion that would be acceptable to you today would be totally unacceptable five years from now!
Doesn’t basing the moral acceptability of abortion on a moving target such as “viability” seem a bit squishy to you?
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Tlaloc
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Viability doesn’t matter. Viability speaks to how well the fetus can survive using machines in place of the mother’s body. That still isn’t an organism. The point I’m talking about is when the infant can survive if removed and treated just as we do any natural birthed baby (fed, kept warm, etc) not hooked up to IVs and kept in an incubator. That point will not change with the advancement of medical science.
No as above viability is irrelevent.
It would which is why I never based it on viability in the first place.
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Genesis315
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Tlaloc, I’d love to hear your thoughts on these posts if you have time: #258 and #260. They’re really short and require like one word answers. Thanks!
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OhioBob
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So your point is that any infant that requires medical support is not an organism? Are you serious? Full term infants often require incubators, IVs, oxygen, bili-lights, even surgery. If they do, does that mean they are not organisms? Would their abortion be acceptable?
Are you telling the couple whose twins born at 32 weeks that needed two months of care in the NICU and are now kindergardeners that those kids were not organisms? Or that aborting them would have been morally acceptable?
How about the fetus that required surgery at 18 weeks to correct a heart defect that then developed normally and is now a healthy child? Would aborting that child have been acceptable just because it needed medical support?
In my own case, both my kids were born by C-section, without which they would not have survived. Both spent time on IVs and in an incubator. Are you really suggesting that they weren’t organisms and that aborting them would have been morally acceptable? Take a minute and think about what you are saying.
If a warm place and a bottle are the only support we are able to give infants in order for them to be considered organisms, there are an awful lot of kids walking the earth who were not organisms when they were born. Fancy that.
Doesn’t that sound silly to you?
Yours is a particularly chilling point of view.
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Tlaloc
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But the words aren’t interchangable. I used “Human” or “Human Being.” I didn’t use “homo sapien.” I can’t just replace human with homosapien withuot changing what I mean.
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Tlaloc
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I’d say it’s wrong to kill an innocent human being.
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OhioBob
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So at what point does a zygote/embryo/fetus/infant/baby/whatever become a human being?
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