A fetus is not alive? Waaah?

[Shogun]

or, better yet, A DISTINCT GENETIC INDIVIDUAL...

On what grounds is such a categorization pertinent?

On the grounds that, genetically, a fetus is not "the body of the mother" and quickly disregarded as nothing more than disposable fetus jelly.

 

[Agnapostate]

On the grounds that, genetically, a fetus is not "the body of the mother" and quickly disregarded as nothing more than disposable fetus jelly.

That in itself does not constitute any intrinsic moral value of a fetus. A snail or caterpillar is similarly "genetically unique," yet why are they not considered to be of similar moral value? You need to incorporate additional criteria.

 

[Shogun]

On the grounds that, genetically, a fetus is not "the body of the mother" and quickly disregarded as nothing more than disposable fetus jelly.

That in itself does not constitute any intrinsic moral value of a fetus. A snail or caterpillar is similarly "genetically unique," yet why are they not considered to be of similar moral value? You need to incorporate additional criteria.

that certainly is your opinion. However, You'll have to forgive me for aborting any actual consideration of such things.

snails nor a caterpillars are genetically distinct human beings. a fetus is. I'll go ahead and stick with this criteria until you can come up with a better retort than butterflies and snails, thanks.

 

[manu1959]

The pointless contention of whether a fetus constitutes "human life" is entirely pointless; a far more pertinent insight would arguably be whether a fetus is a person.

it is alive.....it is a person....it is human and it has rights......unless the mother decides otherwise.....

 

[Agnapostate]

that certainly is your opinion. However, You'll have to forgive me for aborting any actual consideration of such things.

snails nor a caterpillars are genetically distinct human beings. a fetus is. I'll go ahead and stick with this criteria until you can come up with a better retort than butterflies and snails, thanks.

You've not defined any element that makes human life inherently superior to nonhuman animal life with similar sensory capacities and ability to suffer. For instance, an adult chimpanzee would be superior in terms of both basic sentience and self-awareness than a human fetus would be. Asserting that a human fetus is of superior moral value simply because it is a member of the species homo sapiens is not an argument; it is a petitio principii (begging the question) fallacy. You need to offer appropriate arguments in favor of your conclusion.

it is alive.....it is a person....it is human and it has rights......unless the mother decides otherwise.....

You provide a conclusion, yet offer no reasons or arguments in support of your conclusion?

 

[Shogun]

The fact remains that a fetus is a genetically distinct human being. I'll go ahead and skip the part where the guy trying to make an equivalence between a chimp and a human baby is giving out advice on the strength of an argument.


Let's put it THIS way... Le's say I've got your child sitting next to a chimp and I'm going to shoot one of them in the face with a 9mm. Are you busy making equivalences or are you busy hoping that I shoot the monkey instead of your genetically distinct human offspring? Should I shoot your child because the chimp can interact with environment more than your 2 year old? No? Then spare me your silly lecture on this debate while you suggest that a human being is somehow less worthy of consideration than a ******* primate.

 

[Agnapostate]

The fact remains that a fetus is a genetically distinct human being. I'll go ahead and skip the part where the guy trying to make an equivalence between a chimp and a human baby is giving out advice on the strength of an argument.

You're obviously under no compulsion to do otherwise, but the fact remains that this is a petitio principii fallacy and does not constitute an argument. That a claim is uncommon or unorthodox does not disqualify it as an argument, and the guidelines of logical debate necessitate that you provide legitimate arguments, not logical conclusions. Begging the question is obviously an unfortunate example of the latter.

Let's put it THIS way... Le's say I've got your child sitting next to a chimp and I'm going to shoot one of them in the face with a 9mm. Are you busy making equivalences or are you busy hoping that I shoot the monkey instead of your genetically distinct human offspring? Should I shoot your child because the chimp can interact with environment more than your 2 year old? No? Then spare me your silly lecture on this debate while you suggest that a human being is somehow less worthy of consideration than a ******* primate.

This is a similarly fallacious example because it abandons the principle of objectivity necessary for logically sound ethical analysis. For instance, if I were to take your child next to three stranger children, and I could either shoot your child in the face or shoot the three stranger children in the face. An ethically objective analysis would conclude that it is preferable to save three lives instead of one, but your own personal perspective would obviously lead you to a different conclusion. It would be obviously understandable from an emotional standpoint, but it wouldn't be suitable for objective ethical analysis.

Incidentally, two year olds are quite far past a mere "gray line" of self-awareness; it's effectively the case that they are either equivalent or superior to chimpanzees in that regard. A human fetus, however, is clearly not.

 

[Shogun]

If you see no difference between the following then I feel sorry for your family if you were to be ever caught in a fire at the zoo. You can hide behind whatever jargon you learned in debate class all you want. If you make an equivelance between a human baby and a chimp then you fail this topic at the starting gate. Human feti are not caterpillars. They are not baboons. They are not dogs, cats, gerbils or bats. Their inherent value above animals SHOULDN'T have to be explained to another human being. But, again, feel free to talk debate fallacies with the roaring flame as you guide a chimp to safety instead of your own child.

 

[Agnapostate]

If you see no difference between the following then I feel sorry for your family if you were to be ever caught in a fire at the zoo. You can hide behind whatever jargon you learned in debate class all you want. If you make an equivelance between a human baby and a chimp then you fail this topic at the starting gate. Human feti are not caterpillars. They are not baboons. They are not dogs, cats, gerbils or bats. Their inherent value above animals SHOULDN'T have to be explained to another human being. But, again, feel free to talk debate fallacies with the roaring flame as you guide a chimp to safety instead of your own child.

Another logical fallacy, I see. This one is known as the argumentum ad misericordiam, or more commonly, the "appeal to pity." I shall again note that emotional partiality to a human infant (though I don't see how this applies to abortion, since an aborted fetus is obviously not an object of "partiality"), over a chimpanzee, for instance, does not endow the human with greater moral value any more than emotional partiality to one's own child over three stranger children endows one's own child with greater moral value than the stranger children.

Instead of advancing logical arguments, you've chosen to rely on repeatedly begging the question. Rather than argue about whether an adult chimpanzee could be of greater moral value than a human fetus, you instead claim that there is no argument, effectively constituting an "argument before an argument." You draw conclusions based on premises that you allege are "indisputable." Similar claims were once made about the inferiority of blacks to whites or women to men, yet those premises are obviously not logically sound. It is thus incumbent upon modern analysts to defend their premises and conclusions with the usage of the best logically sound arguments available, to therefore avoid falling prey to a similar pattern of irrational discrimination.

Of course, as was mentioned previously, you're under no compulsion to advance logically sound arguments, though similarly, others are obviously under no obligation to pretend that you had.

 

[manu1959]

that certainly is your opinion. However, You'll have to forgive me for aborting any actual consideration of such things.

snails nor a caterpillars are genetically distinct human beings. a fetus is. I'll go ahead and stick with this criteria until you can come up with a better retort than butterflies and snails, thanks.

You've not defined any element that makes human life inherently superior to nonhuman animal life with similar sensory capacities and ability to suffer. For instance, an adult chimpanzee would be superior in terms of both basic sentience and self-awareness than a human fetus would be. Asserting that a human fetus is of superior moral value simply because it is a member of the species homo sapiens is not an argument; it is a petitio principii (begging the question) fallacy. You need to offer appropriate arguments in favor of your conclusion.

it is alive.....it is a person....it is human and it has rights......unless the mother decides otherwise.....

You provide a conclusion, yet offer no reasons or arguments in support of your conclusion?

if it wasn't alive you wouldn't have to abort it.....if it wasn't a person wasn't human and didn't have rights scott peterson would not have been charged with murder for killing one......

abortion is leagalized murder of a human life ..... same as the death penalty ......

 

[Agnapostate]

if it wasn't alive you wouldn't have to abort it.....if it wasn't a person wasn't human and didn't have rights scott peterson would not have been charged with murder for killing one......

This is descriptive, not prescriptive. The legal status of fetuses is not relevant to their ethical status, as ethics is necessarily divergent from the law at certain points. For instance, the slave trade was legal yet morally wrong, while freeing slaves was illegal yet morally right. So the fact that Scott Peterson was convicted of the murder of his unborn son was not relevant to the ethical status of doing so. Regardless, I have not disputed that a fetus is "human life."

abortion is leagalized murder of a human life ..... same as the death penalty ......

I have not disputed that abortion kills a human life. I have disputed that it kills a person, and have referred to nonhuman animals with a greater level of both sentience and self-awareness as a component of my query as to why human fetuses are considered to have greater moral value than such animals, and why they are "persons" whilst such animals are not.

 

[Ravi]

that certainly is your opinion. However, You'll have to forgive me for aborting any actual consideration of such things.

snails nor a caterpillars are genetically distinct human beings. a fetus is. I'll go ahead and stick with this criteria until you can come up with a better retort than butterflies and snails, thanks.

You've not defined any element that makes human life inherently superior to nonhuman animal life with similar sensory capacities and ability to suffer. For instance, an adult chimpanzee would be superior in terms of both basic sentience and self-awareness than a human fetus would be. Asserting that a human fetus is of superior moral value simply because it is a member of the species homo sapiens is not an argument; it is a petitio principii (begging the question) fallacy. You need to offer appropriate arguments in favor of your conclusion.

it is alive.....it is a person....it is human and it has rights......unless the mother decides otherwise.....

You provide a conclusion, yet offer no reasons or arguments in support of your conclusion?

if it wasn't alive you wouldn't have to abort it.....if it wasn't a person wasn't human and didn't have rights scott peterson would not have been charged with murder for killing one......

abortion is leagalized murder of a human life ..... same as the death penalty ......

It wasn't Peterson's choice.

 

[Zoom-boing]

if it wasn't alive you wouldn't have to abort it.....if it wasn't a person wasn't human and didn't have rights scott peterson would not have been charged with murder for killing one......

abortion is leagalized murder of a human life ..... same as the death penalty ......

 

[manu1959]

if it wasn't alive you wouldn't have to abort it.....if it wasn't a person wasn't human and didn't have rights scott peterson would not have been charged with murder for killing one......

This is descriptive, not prescriptive. The legal status of fetuses is not relevant to their ethical status, as ethics is necessarily divergent from the law at certain points. For instance, the slave trade was legal yet morally wrong, while freeing slaves was illegal yet morally right. So the fact that Scott Peterson was convicted of the murder of his unborn son was not relevant to the ethical status of doing so. Regardless, I have not disputed that a fetus is "human life."

abortion is leagalized murder of a human life ..... same as the death penalty ......

I have not disputed that abortion kills a human life. I have disputed that it kills a person, and have referred to nonhuman animals with a greater level of both sentience and self-awareness as a component of my query as to why human fetuses are considered to have greater moral value than such animals, and why they are "persons" whilst such animals are not.

doesn't change my view in the least....apples and oranges....further.... they don't.... you can late term abort a human fetus with no penalty whatsoever.....but you can't kill a pregnant dog without going to jail.....

 

[Agnapostate]

doesn't change my view in the least....apples and oranges....further.... they don't.... you can late term abort a human fetus with no penalty whatsoever.....but you can't kill a pregnant dog without going to jail.....

That is a question of the legal status of killing fetuses and dogs, respectively. It says nothing to the ethical status by itself. If we wished to speak to the ethical status, I would say that it was preferable to induce labor in the case of a viable fetus rather than abort it.

 

[manu1959]

doesn't change my view in the least....apples and oranges....further.... they don't.... you can late term abort a human fetus with no penalty whatsoever.....but you can't kill a pregnant dog without going to jail.....

That is a question of the legal status of killing fetuses and dogs, respectively. It says nothing to the ethical status by itself. If we wished to speak to the ethical status, I would say that it was preferable to induce labor in the case of a viable fetus rather than abort it.

no need it isn't a "person"

 

[Agnapostate]

no need it isn't a "person"

It isn't a person, but it could conceivably be adopted by others once viable, so killing it would constitute a utility minimization.

 

[Ravi]

if it wasn't alive you wouldn't have to abort it.....if it wasn't a person wasn't human and didn't have rights scott peterson would not have been charged with murder for killing one......

This is descriptive, not prescriptive. The legal status of fetuses is not relevant to their ethical status, as ethics is necessarily divergent from the law at certain points. For instance, the slave trade was legal yet morally wrong, while freeing slaves was illegal yet morally right. So the fact that Scott Peterson was convicted of the murder of his unborn son was not relevant to the ethical status of doing so. Regardless, I have not disputed that a fetus is "human life."

abortion is leagalized murder of a human life ..... same as the death penalty ......

I have not disputed that abortion kills a human life. I have disputed that it kills a person, and have referred to nonhuman animals with a greater level of both sentience and self-awareness as a component of my query as to why human fetuses are considered to have greater moral value than such animals, and why they are "persons" whilst such animals are not.

doesn't change my view in the least....apples and oranges....further.... they don't.... you can late term abort a human fetus with no penalty whatsoever.....but you can't kill a pregnant dog without going to jail.....

Because of the living dog, not the non-living dog fetuses. jeesh

 

[manu1959]

no need it isn't a "person"

It isn't a person, but it could conceivably be adopted by others once viable, so killing it would constitute a utility minimization.

so your definition of a person seems to hinge on the word viable?

does viable occur inside or outside of the womb.....

 

[Agnapostate]

so your definition of a person seems to hinge on the word viable?

does viable occur inside or outside of the womb.....

My definition of personhood does not correlate with viability. For instance, as with a fetus, an infant is not a person. I simply consider it morally impermissible to kill an infant because it can be adopted by others, unlike a non-viable fetus. My definition of personhood correlates with a number of factors, the most necessary condition being self-awareness.