If there were a handicapped man in a building that was on fire and he was going to die if i did not help him along with a container of frozen fertilized eggs, I would save the handicapped man first, before rescuing the embryos...if i had the chance, i would go back and rescue the frozen fertilized eggs, but not before rescuing the man that was BORN already and living and breathing, here on earth.
how about you User? what would you do under these circumstances....are the embryos or the frozen fertilized eggs of the same value and worth as the born and living human being? Would you really see them as the same worth as the handicapped man?
People are always saying this as though they think it makes some sort of point about the acceptability of abortion, something like, "Aha! If you would save the handicapped man, it MUST mean that it's okay to kill unborn babies!" Sorry, but this triumphant burning building story doesn't make that point at all.
As Ramesh Ponuru says, think about another hypothetical situation. You're in a burning building. You can either rescue a research scientists who is making great strides toward the cure for Alzheimer's disease, or rescue a heroin-addicted 58-year-old man who has spent his life in and out of prison. Which one do you save?
Let's say you save the scientist. Are you therefore saying that it's permissible to kill hopeless old drug addicts? Are you saying that such people do not have the same right not to be killed as a research scientist?
Neither hypothetical question asks you to contemplate actively killing anyone. The moral question posed by burning-buiding stories is the extent to which you can show favoritism without be unjust. To put it another way, in affirming that all human beings have an equal right not to be killed, we need not affirm that all human beings have equal claims on us in all respects.
well cecille, it happens to be logical and true that the living and born human being does take priority over the developing human being.
In your silly scenario you are trying to make the Firemen choose one born human being over another born human being based on whether they liked his status in life or not....and that's just not in the fireman's protocol of duty. The firemen would rescue who could be rescued first or who needed their help first, with no regard to their position in life, because all human life is equal.
But this is clearly not the case with the frozen embryo and the drug addict, or the frozen embryo and the Scientist, the firemen would be required to rescue the born humans before rescuing the frozen embryos....and rightly so.
I am not saying this to justify abortion or as an ah ha! moment....i am saying it, because it simply is the truth.
I am not one to make up things or distort them in order to try support my cause.
limiting abortion to the first 12 weeks of gestation, is not a bad thing Cecille. It could reduce the number of abortions, at least late term, and it gives more recognition to the fetus, which is a good thing and a step in the right direction.
unlike the rest of you, I don't have a political agenda to guide me ora political agenda to keep...and can be flexible in working towards my goal, of having fewer women abort or feel the need that they have to abort.
Care
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