[quote]Sloth wrote:
What was teenage pregnancy like before abortion was legal, the welfare state, and condoms distributed in schools?[/quote]
…i don’t know, but i bet the statistics were skewed since being a unwed mother was a social taboo. How many shotgun weddings ended in divorce and caused bitterness and pain for everyone involved?
[quote]DoubleDuce wrote: beliefs and values have everything to do with an education system.
If you were to justify everything about best for state and cheapest, you would agree with euthanasia. You think the state can do something considered immoral if its cheaper?[/quote]
…i do agree with euthanasia. Under strict rules, euthanasia is legal in Holland, and i wholeheartedly concur with that ruling. Government should not draw it’s values from religion and beliefs, but it should be pragmatic, logical and reasonable. Qualities that can’t be found in religion, imo…
[quote]ephrem wrote:
DoubleDuce wrote: beliefs and values have everything to do with an education system.
If you were to justify everything about best for state and cheapest, you would agree with euthanasia. You think the state can do something considered immoral if its cheaper?
…i do agree with euthanasia. Under strict rules, euthanasia is legal in Holland, and i wholeheartedly concur with that ruling. Government should not draw it’s values from religion and beliefs, but it should be pragmatic, logical and reasonable. Qualities that can’t be found in religion, imo…
[/quote]
Ouch.
Morals, aren’t logical, but I sure as hell hope governments are held to moral standards.
Also I’m not talking about strictly voluntary euthanasia.
[quote]DoubleDuce wrote:
ephrem wrote:
DoubleDuce wrote: beliefs and values have everything to do with an education system.
If you were to justify everything about best for state and cheapest, you would agree with euthanasia. You think the state can do something considered immoral if its cheaper?
…i do agree with euthanasia. Under strict rules, euthanasia is legal in Holland, and i wholeheartedly concur with that ruling. Government should not draw it’s values from religion and beliefs, but it should be pragmatic, logical and reasonable. Qualities that can’t be found in religion, imo…
Ouch.
Morals, aren’t logical, but I sure as hell hope governments are held to moral standards.
Also I’m not talking about strictly voluntary euthanasia.[/quote]
…morality may not be stricly logical, but logic can be applied to morality to arrive at legislation that is not based on religious principles…
[quote]Psicks wrote:
Its amazing how much interest arguments like this create and how many people are willing to argue for their belief yet so few people actually do anything to improve the situation; that is the morally disgusting part.
Everyone has such strong opinions on who is right and wrong; yet so few take any action to create a society where abortions aren’t even considered because there are better options available. Why not focus on the root causes instead of simply arguing for the moral high ground while sitting idly by.[/quote]
…i think you have a strong point here; there are ways to reduce teenage pregnancies and unwanted pregnancies, and thus reduce the number of abortions needed, that do not infringe on women’s rights.
The philosophy behind many liberal aspects of dutch culture is, by acknowledging that people will do certain things inspite of it’s illegality, it’s better to legalize those things in order to control, educate and prevent excesses.
In some ways, condoning the sale and possession/use of weed for instance, this legalisation is diffuse and prone to confusion, but on a whole, it does work…
[quote]ephrem wrote:
pat wrote:
ephrem wrote:
pat wrote:
What is it, if not a person. And when does it graduate to person hood. Babies have been born as early as 21 weeks, you know…
…that claim has been refuted earlier in this thread. How do you define personhood? By mental and emotional faculties only, or simply the fact that a body has gained a few responses to stimuli?
Refutation is a strong word sir. There are many cases in which people who exist outside your specified criteria and would yet still be constituted as a murder to terminate their life. You mental and emotional faculties are really nothing more than response to stimuli. For however you complicated you feel human behaviour is, it really is not. There are only three primary factor for determining behaviour. One is genetics which is plain wiring which determine how stimuli will be received and processed. Then there is opperant and classical conditioning. Those three in tandem will determine how a person will react to stimuli.
Hence, that definition is a reach, not a refutation.
…which all require some level of consciousness, and consciousness requires a well developed cerebral cortex. At 21 weeks a fetus does not have a cerebral cortex developed enough to give rise to consciousness, but it’s body does respond to certain stimuli it does not need a brain for: e.i. pain and breath reflexes…
…so, from my POV [for what that’s worth] a fetus can not yet be seen as a complete human being, with all the rights associated with complete human beings…
[/quote]
Consciousness is NOT quantifiable! You cannot even know if a rock has consciousness. I could argue for it and you could not refute it.
[quote]ephrem wrote:
Psicks wrote:
Its amazing how much interest arguments like this create and how many people are willing to argue for their belief yet so few people actually do anything to improve the situation; that is the morally disgusting part.
Everyone has such strong opinions on who is right and wrong; yet so few take any action to create a society where abortions aren’t even considered because there are better options available. Why not focus on the root causes instead of simply arguing for the moral high ground while sitting idly by.
…i think you have a strong point here; there are ways to reduce teenage pregnancies and unwanted pregnancies, and thus reduce the number of abortions needed, that do not infringe on women’s rights. The philosophy behind many liberal aspects of dutch culture is, by acknowledging that people will do certain things inspite of it’s illegality, it’s better to legalize those things in order to control, educate and prevent excesses. In some ways, condoning the sale and possession/use of weed for instance, this legalisation is diffuse and prone to confusion, but on a whole, it does work…
[/quote]
Because you must define it otherwise you don’t know what you are talking about.
Life begins somewhere, the debate is as to where. Most of the definitions are inaccurate at best. The are only two decernable breaks in the life cycle, conception and death. Everything else is carving up sematics without a real defining element.
[quote]pat wrote: …which all require some level of consciousness, and consciousness requires a well developed cerebral cortex. At 21 weeks a fetus does not have a cerebral cortex developed enough to give rise to consciousness, but it’s body does respond to certain stimuli it does not need a brain for: e.i. pain and breath reflexes…
…so, from my POV [for what that’s worth] a fetus can not yet be seen as a complete human being, with all the rights associated with complete human beings…
Consciousness is NOT quantifiable! You cannot even know if a rock has consciousness. I could argue for it and you could not refute it. [/quote]
…it is though. Our consciousness can be attributed to certain areas of the brain. Tamper with those areas and you’ll see changes in personality, body awareness disconnect, language and memory loss. One can experience touch, smell, sounds and presence by stimulating areas of the brain…
…one could indeed argue that a rock has consciousness, but that consciousness would be so different from how we perceive our consciousness, that we could not relate with eachother. Given the fact that i’ve never had a meaningful conversation with a rock, i’d say that’s a fair assumption…
[quote]pat wrote: …i think you have a strong point here; there are ways to reduce teenage pregnancies and unwanted pregnancies, and thus reduce the number of abortions needed, that do not infringe on women’s rights. The philosophy behind many liberal aspects of dutch culture is, by acknowledging that people will do certain things inspite of it’s illegality, it’s better to legalize those things in order to control, educate and prevent excesses. In some ways, condoning the sale and possession/use of weed for instance, this legalisation is diffuse and prone to confusion, but on a whole, it does work…
Because you must define it otherwise you don’t know what you are talking about.
Life begins somewhere, the debate is as to where. Most of the definitions are inaccurate at best. The are only two decernable breaks in the life cycle, conception and death. Everything else is carving up sematics without a real defining element. [/quote]
…science does define consciousness as being dependant on the cerebral cortex. Our existence as a person is solely dependant on the brain. From my POV, there’s no dualistic nature of man: there is no immaterial soul inhabiting the material body, but consciousness is simply of function of the brain and the result of an extraordinary large cerebral cortex…
[quote]ephrem wrote:
…i don’t know, but i bet the statistics were skewed since being a unwed mother was a social taboo.
[/quote]
Yeah, we wouldn’t want that…
[quote]ephrem wrote:
pat wrote: …which all require some level of consciousness, and consciousness requires a well developed cerebral cortex. At 21 weeks a fetus does not have a cerebral cortex developed enough to give rise to consciousness, but it’s body does respond to certain stimuli it does not need a brain for: e.i. pain and breath reflexes…
…so, from my POV [for what that’s worth] a fetus can not yet be seen as a complete human being, with all the rights associated with complete human beings…
Consciousness is NOT quantifiable! You cannot even know if a rock has consciousness. I could argue for it and you could not refute it.
…it is though. Our consciousness can be attributed to certain areas of the brain. Tamper with those areas and you’ll see changes in personality, body awareness disconnect, language and memory loss. One can experience touch, smell, sounds and presence by stimulating areas of the brain…
…one could indeed argue that a rock has consciousness, but that consciousness would be so different from how we perceive our consciousness, that we could not relate with eachother. Given the fact that i’ve never had a meaningful conversation with a rock, i’d say that’s a fair assumption…
[/quote]
All you can see with various techniques is electrical activity and chemical reaction, that is it. Consciousness is metaphysical,and hence cannot be measured by any known device or scientific formulation. You CANNOT know whether or not something or someone has consciousness or when it gains it. You examples above are simple reaction to stimuli, but according to your own definition that doesn’t make it human.
Science has not answered the question of when life begins. You are making determinations from a very small body of work. The biggest certainty we have about science, is that we know very little of what can be known.
You are hacking up very small hairs of what makes one a human. We are more that a series of chemical reactions and electrical activity.
I’m not sure why this even gets to a debate of consciousness. We know that we’re talking about a human already in they’re own life cycle.
[quote]ephrem wrote:
pat wrote: …i think you have a strong point here; there are ways to reduce teenage pregnancies and unwanted pregnancies, and thus reduce the number of abortions needed, that do not infringe on women’s rights. The philosophy behind many liberal aspects of dutch culture is, by acknowledging that people will do certain things inspite of it’s illegality, it’s better to legalize those things in order to control, educate and prevent excesses. In some ways, condoning the sale and possession/use of weed for instance, this legalisation is diffuse and prone to confusion, but on a whole, it does work…
Because you must define it otherwise you don’t know what you are talking about.
Life begins somewhere, the debate is as to where. Most of the definitions are inaccurate at best. The are only two decernable breaks in the life cycle, conception and death. Everything else is carving up sematics without a real defining element.
…science does define consciousness as being dependant on the cerebral cortex. Our existence as a person is solely dependant on the brain. From my POV, there’s no dualistic nature of man: there is no immaterial soul inhabiting the material body, but consciousness is simply of function of the brain and the result of an extraordinary large cerebral cortex…
[/quote]
Whether or not you believe in a soul does not nullify our dualistic nature. Conceptions, thoughts, feelings, consciousness, all exist but are all metaphysical entities. You can see a bright spot on a brain scan, but that bright spot isn’t happiness, or anger, or a thought, or anything but a measure of heightened activity. That may correlate with something or it may not, but that activity on the brain is not the thing in itself.
[quote]Sloth wrote:
I’m not sure why this even gets to a debate of consciousness. We know that we’re talking about a human already in they’re own life cycle. [/quote]
…it’s life cycle is, upto a certain point, dependant on the host, the mother. If you want to be consistent with this argument, you’d have to outlaw male masturbation aswell. While you’re at it, unfertilised ovulation should then be unacceptable too. Good luck with that (-:
[quote]pat wrote:All you can see with various techniques is electrical activity and chemical reaction, that is it. Consciousness is metaphysical,and hence cannot be measured by any known device or scientific formulation. You CANNOT know whether or not something or someone has consciousness or when it gains it. You examples above are simple reaction to stimuli, but according to your own definition that doesn’t make it human.
Science has not answered the question of when life begins. You are making determinations from a very small body of work. The biggest certainty we have about science, is that we know very little of what can be known.
You are hacking up very small hairs of what makes one a human. We are more that a series of chemical reactions and electrical activity.[/quote]
…consciousness is metaphysical? Consciousness is nothing more than brainactivity in a large enough cerebral cortex. The fact that you can imagine all kinds of scenario’s that leads you to believe otherwise should be of no concern to decision making, or legislation…
[quote]ephrem wrote:
Sloth wrote:
I’m not sure why this even gets to a debate of consciousness. We know that we’re talking about a human already in they’re own life cycle.
…it’s life cycle is, upto a certain point, dependant on the host, the mother. If you want to be consistent with this argument, you’d have to outlaw male masturbation aswell. While you’re at it, unfertilised ovulation should then be unacceptable too. Good luck with that (-:
[/quote]
Not true. We’re not debating the life cycle of a sperm. We’re debating the life cycle of a human.
I forget the term for it, but wasn’t their a belief that some life forms would spontaensouly come into existence? Such a flies from heaps of rubbish? Like one minute there’s not a fly, boom, there’s a fly. I sometimes get that impression in these debate. As if the embryo and fetus aren’t part of a human’s life cycle. It’s just, boom, suddenly there’s a human.
Or, that suddenly some seperate organism, sha-zam!, becomes the organism “human.” Wasn’t such thinking abandoned?
By the way, are there science texts and journals that describe the parent-child relationship as a parasitic releationship? IS that why “host” is used instead of parent? Are is it not being used here with that in mind?
…ofcourse it is, how else would anti-depressants work? Or acid? Or drugs that combat schizoprenia? Our bodies generate heat. You could say that body heat is not the thing [the body] in itself, but it’s a result of the bodies processes, and you can’t separate the two. Consciousness is the same…
…this is actually very interesting to ponder, and even as an intellectual exercise, the consequences can be far reaching for an individual who is generally pre-occupied with the intangible and the unsubstantiated. But that’s just wishful thinking on my part though…
[quote]Sloth wrote:
ephrem wrote:
Sloth wrote:
I’m not sure why this even gets to a debate of consciousness. We know that we’re talking about a human already in they’re own life cycle.
…it’s life cycle is, upto a certain point, dependant on the host, the mother. If you want to be consistent with this argument, you’d have to outlaw male masturbation aswell. While you’re at it, unfertilised ovulation should then be unacceptable too. Good luck with that (-:
Not true. We’re not debating the life cycle of a sperm. We’re debating the life cycle of a human.
I forget the term for it, but wasn’t their a belief that some life forms would spontaensouly come into existence? Such a flies from heaps of rubbish? Like one minute there’s not a fly, boom, there’s a fly. I sometimes get that impression in these debate. As if the embryo and fetus aren’t part of a human’s life cycle. It’s just, boom, suddenly there’s a human.
Or, that suddenly some seperate organism, sha-zam!, becomes the organism “human.” Wasn’t such thinking abandoned?[/quote]
…if you are willing to extend the concept of humanity, and the rights of a fulfledged human being, to something that [before a certain point in it’s development] only has the potential of human life, then you can’t stop there. Then every seed and every egg is sacred and can’t be allowed to go to waste…
…that means that when a woman becomes fertile, she must marry and become pregnant every time her body allows it. It means men are forbidden to masturbate, can only have sex without ejaculation or only have sex with the intent to procreate…
…we’d all be Hare Krishna’s!
[quote]Sloth wrote:
By the way, are there science texts and journals that describe the parent-child relationship as a parasitic releationship? IS that why “host” is used instead of parent? Are is it not being used here with that in mind?[/quote]
…i don’t know, but it is fitting, isn’t it? All pregnancies pose real health dangers to the female, but i use it for the same reason pro-lifers call fetus’ unborn babies; to get a point across…