Our Next Prez?

No - abortion kills but (barring late-term abortion) does not murder.

Why? Personhood arises with a distinctly human brain - otherwise, consuming animals is also murder.

Here is a "Calm Look at Abortion Arguments" from 1981.
http://members.aol.com/REBissell/mmAbortion81.html
I've shared it with conflicted pregnant women from time to time, and it is convincing that St. Thomas was right to apply Aristotle here.

I've also read the neuroscience on which this argument rests: empirical evidence of the late gestating "humanity" of personhood.

The liberal retreat into mystical relativism is as wrong as the thoughtless pieties uttered on the right.

Or, as the wise Scarecrow from the Wizard of Oz knew: "If I only had a brain" you could be human.

--Orson

 

That is a personal judgment you have made. It has no ethical or moral foundation.

BLD

 

First, thanks for the poll, Tom. I had not seen that one.

Second, I find it quite interesting that women who believe in abortion because a "fetus" is not a "human being" vehemently advocate charging someone who kills a pregnant woman (in the first trimester) with double murder!

Third, if a woman has a right to choose and if a woman has a right to do with her body as she chooses, why don't the pro-abortionists avocate the taking of the baby right up to the ninth month?

Finally, if a women has a right to do with her body as she chooses, why don't the women's libbers support the legalization of prostitution and modeling in Hustler and Playboy?

Afterthought: Why do some many women's libbers want to ban women's boxing if a women has a right to do as she chooses with her body?

The hypocrisies and inconsistencies continue!

 

I wouldn't say Kerry got no bounce from either, exactly; it's beginning to look more and more like Kerry did get a 6 or 7 point bounce from the convention (CBS News now has Kerry with a 6-point lead, conflicting with the bounceless CNN poll), and most polls had him getting a brief bounce from announcing Edwards (one gave 8 points, but I suspect the actual bounce was much lower than that).

As for factors that could be at work here, I'd say that the anti-Bush vote was stronger than the pro-Kerry vote leading up to the convention. Bounces rely on appeal with swing voters, and there simply aren't anywhere near as many this year as there usually are; between 40 and 45 percent of voters are committed for or against Bush, leaving only 10-20 points worth of uncommitted voters. Polls on likability, et. al. suggest that Kerry was able to translate some of the anti-Bush votes into pro-Kerry votes, which is probably more important to his campaign than anything else he could be doing right now. The question is whether he will be able to sustain his fairly slim lead as the economy continues to pick up (assuming it does) and Bush begins to run a more effective campaign (assuming he does).


Cheers,

 

Welcome back, Orson. I have to say that in my months of off on-again off-again lurkdom, I've gained a lot of respect for your chutzpah; on issues like abortion and marijuana legalization, you're taking positions that most folks here strongly disagree with but which are entirely consistent with your political philosophy as I have come to understand it. I generally rate as fairly libertarian myself, though on some issues--abortion and the death penalty being the two clearest examples--I have so many doubts that I have trouble sticking to my guns.

I'm in sympathy with your position on personhood--sentience is also the standard I've tried to go by, which is why I have no trouble with emergency contraception--but the trouble is that we don't really understand sentience as well as we understand intelligence, and I'm concerned that there's a tendency in questions of personhood to conflate the two in terms of perceivable week-by-week brain development. I would agree that a zygote is not a person, you would agree that a viable infant is; the issue is where and how we can draw the line of demarcation.

Remember Bill Maher's really disgusting comment about mentally handicapped kids being a lot like dogs? I think there was a legitimate point of contention buried somewhere in that churlishness, and it gets to the heart of this issue: How can we define human nature if we can't rely on measurable factors? Do we need to rely, as BLD does, on a theology? Can a secular democracy do that? (Kerry's position is that we can't, which is why he holds in uncomfortable tension the belief that life--though note he never says personhood--begins at conception, and that women should have the right to choose whether or not to have an abortion.)

Difficult questions, and they're not going to be answered by a sustainable majority in a country that is and has been so polarized over this issue. I think the best thing we can do in the real world is reduce the number of abortions by legal means--promoting abstinence and responsible sexual behavior, making adoption laws easier to work with, and so forth. I also see emergency contraception and inexpensive pregnancy tests as steps in the right direction, though I can understand why folks might disagree with me on this if they believe that personhood begins at the moment of conception. My agnosticism on this issue forces me into a nominal pro-choice position where I want abortion to be "safe, legal, and rare," but with a much greater emphasis on "rare" than most people who use that phrase probably have in mind. The ideal for me would be to keep abortion legal, but to provide enough preferable alternatives--at any expense--to make it as rare as it would be if it were banned. (As drug use statistics tell us, a ban on abortion will not reduce the number of abortions to zero or anything near it--it will just make abortion more dangerous and less common--so I would argue that this goal is much more realistic than it sounds.)


Cheers,

 

Well said!!!

 

Don't make fun of him!!! He is my hero!!

 

Sounds like the usual narcissistic tripe about splitting hairs to justify what anyone in their right mind would see as a horrific, barbaric procedure. Quit sacrificing human beings to the selfishness that unconsequential sex calls for. I wouldn't allow that to happen to my dog and her puppies, let alone another human being.

 

I doubt Orson or most pro-choicers support legalized abortion because they like the idea of inconsequential sex, just as I doubt BLD or most pro-lifers oppose legalized abortion because they want to punish inconsequential sex. Let's be fair to each other here.


Cheers,

 

Thanks Tom - you got it right.

Getting pregnant prematurely is a life-altering situation: it is a turning point. If one ever ought to revisit crucial issues of identity and philosophy, it's when confronting parenthood.

Of course, a rather significant percentage of these pregnancies would also be "miscarried" or aborted by God. So - with or without God, defining what life is, what one's own life means, and what's best for a future child is hugely daunting for anyone - much more so if the woman is very young! Who could envy the decision? I sure don't.

Put in crudely utilitarian terms, life is short; spend it wisely. And while some are tempted to blame modern selfish materialism, it's worth asking how many of us raise adopted children? Rather few, I think.

--Orson

 

Actually, the need to revisit crucial issues of identity and philosophy should come before becoming preganant.

I'm just curious, at what point during gestation do you believe it is wrong to kill the baby? If there is no limit, would you also be for killing a toddler if it doesn't into fit the parent's plans or becomes inconvenient for them?

BLD

 

I can't tell you how sick I am of this election and this rehashing of the same problems we know we don't know the answers to. Abortion and Israel. Unfreaking solvable. Both sides are right. Let's move on folks, nothing to see here.

 

Maybe we could find a Distance Learning course in Logic for you. Two opposing and contradictory sides cannot both be right. They could both be wrong, but not both right.

 

Yeah, besides my Ph.D. from Stanford I need a logic course from Phoenix.
This is not mathematics; there are no absolutes.

 

Well, I guess your Ph.D. from Stanford didn't prepare you very well. To say there "are no absolutes" is to make an absolute statement. Again, a little Logic 101 is in order.

BLD

 

We're talking about humans and their opinions. Although I'm sure you think you're right about everything you just have opinions. There is no judge to say who's right. It's all relative.
Quit trying to insult me, it isn't working.

 

Khan,
I'm not trying to insult you, but when you base your conclusions on a faulty premise (or no premise at all) you should be called on it. You said there were no absolutes, which is an absolute statement. So are there, or aren't there absolutes?

BTW, I've been wrong plenty of times, this just isn't one of them.

BLD

 

It's relative.

 

Nice dodge!

 

Oh, my, I usually don't get involved in these types of debates, but I cannot keep silent on this one after reading this comment, BLD, plus your statement in a later post that "In addition, why should I fund someone else's immoral behavior?"

Why do you feel that this immorality is all the woman's fault? Perhaps you don't, but your words do not mention, anywhere in this thread, the participation of the male. Women don't get pregnant on their own. Yes, some are irresponsible (which I would argue is not the same as immoral). However, others are pressured, have low-self esteem, are raped, and have other reasons to have sex.

The onus seems to be completely on the woman in your posts to take care of birth control and watch her behavior. So, what, the man shouldn't worry about these issues? Is this the old double standard that women are sluts, men are studs? If women are to be held fully responsible for getting pregnant, then they should be fully responsible for choosing to have an abortion or not. Does this mean I think all women should run around, having abortions? Certainly not -- not much pisses me off more than an irresponsible woman using abortion as a method of birth control, as my roommate in college did . . . four times. That's ridiculous. However, if the blame is going to be put on women, then the ability to choose should also reside with them.