Wondering if the O/P is just an invitation to the same old do loop of having someone make a faith based claim, then challenge it based on reason. The argument is not, what God is or is not, the argument is why is there a need to challenge faith based claims with reason? If a theist makes some claim about the nature of God, and says this description of such a being is based on reason - have at them. I will even join you.

The underlying issue is why does the agnostic/atheist contingent have such a difficult time with epistemic humility? Why does there appear such a need to disparage a belief that one can not muster a reasoned case that it is in fact false. I see no party having any high ground in the an explanation of the creation of the universe. My reasoned arguments for an un-created creator is as valid as you reasoned arguments. Epistemic humility would dictate we value each others beliefs with generosity.

just a few things:

1. The big bang is the only valid theory on the beginning of the universe, there is near unanimous scientific support for the big bang, and all existing time from right now, backward to a millisecond, before Time 0, is not in any real scientific dispute. Any argument anyone makes for this period of time that is outside the big bang, is in conflict with a near unanimous scientific understanding.

2. Right now there is no scientific theory ( technical definition) for anything that happened inside that millisecond. None.

3. The overwhelming scientific consensus is the universe is finite, meaning it had a beginning.

4. One is free to believe any reasonable option for the causation of the universe. Including God, or something other than God.

5. Epistemic humility should dictate generosity in the acceptance of these views that are contrary to our own.

just a perspective check - the top 5 riches people in the US have a wealth of about 425B dollars, at the risk free rate that generates about 30M per day in interest. IMO that type of wealth generates a great responsibility to do something good with it. And in general, i think most of these folks see it that way as well.

If, like me, you believe Modern Monetary Theory is the best explanation of how the economy really works. Concentrations of wealth are extremely detrimental. The extremely wealthy, as a a percentage of their wealth are small consumers. The conventional wisdom was, that they made up for that by being investors. However, as less and less goods and services are bought, there is less and less need for investment in the companies needed to supply them. Having more and more investment dollars chasing fewer and fewer investments - driving down the price of money, and artificially inflating stock price.

MMT would say the way to manage this would be selective taxes on the very wealthy - to take those dollars out of the economy and allow the government to use them to stimulate economic activity if times of high unemployment.

If you knew why they don't work together you would have already created a unification theory. Both have been proven to work, it's bridging between them into an over-arching theory that hasn't been solved. I suggest you read more about them. That one of them says the other is wrong is the problem, not the nature of the physics. — Christoffer

you are 100 pct right, and I am 100% wrong - have no clue at all what i am talking about -

carry on and enjoy

Both are real, it's why they are trying to reach a unification theory, not a replacement theory. — Christoffer

no GA says entanglement can not happen, and it does, GA is wrong on this issue.

but no worries carry on

Copernican heliocentrism was published in 1543. Since we now have a system that strictly governs scientific work, the methodology cannot break scientific theories. — Christoffer

ok - how about Quantum entanglement which is in direct conflict with GR. Quantum entanglement is real, has been predicted, and experimentally verified. Quantum entanglement is in direct conflict with GR. When it comes to Quantum entanglement - GR is wrong.

I know the technical definition of scientific theory - and some/many of them in the past were, in fact, wrong. Think Copernican heliocentrism for example.

Only theories that didn't face proper verification and falsification (even before the term was invented) were able to be considered false. Generally, scientific theories do not really end up considered "false". A theory is a proven fact about something, even if the theory appears false by new evidence, the theory has still been proven and observations are true. When new theories come up, they are applied in synthesis with other theories — Christoffer

think you are missing the point. Not making a disparaging statement about science. Just making the point that much of what any particular generation believes to be a scientific truth, is often shown to be false or incomplete by future generations. Newton gives way to Eisenstein who gives way to Planck who will give way to somebody else at some point.

understand

Yes, because it's a logical argument, and those don't rely on scientific consensus in any significant way (it would be to their fault if they were to; a premise could be a statement of a common scientific view, but there's no requirement for it to be, and the argument--that is, the connections/implications of one statement in the argument--can't assume scientific consensus without committing a fallacy). — Terrapin Station

So he says finite, you say infinite, and science has nothing to do with it. Not sure I see the logic

Validity, especially in a logical context, has to do with the connection between premises and the conclusion. The only way a premise can itself be valid is if it has premises and a conclusion packed into it and it meets the definition of validity (which is that it's impossible for the premises to be true and the conclusion false, where "and" is traditionally parsed as the inclusive "or"). Truth in logic isn't at all the same thing as validity. Whether any premises are true isn't for logic itself to decide (again unless a statement or formula has a logical argument packed into it). — Terrapin Station

Lots of words. So the overwhelming scientific support for his position over yours is irrelevant to assuming his over yours

Interesting concept

my only point was, you seemed willing to leave scientific consensus to argue against his point. Would you be as willing to leave scientific consensus to argue against an issue it supported? His point that the universe is finite seems a valid assumption for his argument, supported by current scientific consensus.

And this is why science doesn't really have a problem with an infinity of physical things. — SophistiCat

I don't think this is true, I think science has a major issue with an infinity of any thing physical. Working from memory, could be wrong.

the overwhelming scientific consensus is the universe is finite. It could not be, but any other possibility would be against today's best science. The same exact thing could be said for man's impact on climate change. So if you are allowing for an infinite universe against science, would you also welcome an alternative view of climate change?

Now, all a finite universe does in this instance is make an uncreated creator a reasonable possibility. It in no way elevates it to the only possibility as D99 would suggest.

Before we had an understanding of the Big Bang, the best argument against the CA was, "who created the creator", a non scientific way of implying infinity. After the Big Bang science that response is now in violation of the best science.

Two points, in a quantum universe, our reality could be not much more than a giant movie screen, and there can be plane after plane after plane of other realities. This could be really cool, but it is an awful concept to argue anything from, because it allows for every possibility of everything. There are no flying teapots, there could be on universe X, next. Secondly, the real issue in physics now is general relativity works, for everything, right up until it doesn't, an then quantum mechanics kicks in. For applied physics, not much of an issue, pick the right tool out of the bag, plug in the numbers and do the calculations. But theoretical physics has the same problem you have in point one, if everything is possible, nothing definitive is. They need a bridge between GR and quantum to link the 2 worlds. Not there yet. So, in the interim, I would suggest we do what applied physicists do, and unless working in the quantum level, we work in the world of GR.

you are 100% right I should have been more specific and eliminated turtle and turtle dove options.

I am a theist, and an uncreated creator we can call God, is a reasonable belief for the cause of the Big Bang, but it is not a scientific proof. Science says nothing yet about that millisecond we don't understand. So, you and I can hold a reasonable belief it is God, someone else can hold a reasonable belief there is such a thing as a singularly, someone else can reasonably believe in something else.

There is almost complete scientific consensus of the Big Bang, down to a very small fraction of a second before time 0. And that is where the physics ends right now. Everything anyone says about what happened before that fraction of a second, if it is God, or a singularity, or a pure quantum energy wave, or anything else are all a possibility and one has no superior claim than another. That may change, but that is where we are.

agree with you both, and on this with Kant. At is core all physics is, is a mathematical expression of observation, and then expanded. You build a model of how you perceive the world to work, you change the variables to the question you are trying to answer and turn the crank. then derive some experiment to see if your predicted answer in fact happens. If is does great, the model you have works, if it doesn't time to modify the model.

And although the math can get complicated, and the concepts can get more and more complex - that is pretty much what physics is.

your total objections to the argument were, firstly a complete misreading of an innocuous assumption at the start, and secondly a semantic argument that the future does not exist.

Which was, to your credit much better than Banno's

"My argument in full: A woman has far greater moral worth than a piece of tissue."

From my point of view, I made the only full argument about the morality of abortion, and in 24 pages, no one has made a significant dent in it. Which seems to infuriate you all.

Which, by the way it shouldn't. If or if not abortion is immoral has almost nothing at all to do with if it should or should not be legal. Which is all Roe v Wade is about.

physical things have limits, numbers are not physical things

I have a friend who is into physics and he claims because you can divide a quantity up for ever that means that any quantity is made up of infinite points. — albie

He is correct, between any 2 real numbers, there are an infinite number of real numbers

In sum, I offered that Roe v. Wade seemed a pretty good argument and ruing on abortion. It would appear that reasonable people pretty much agree and unreasonable people, well, are unreasonable.

If you don't want the thread closed, simply post a reply to keep it going. Today is 6 Feb. 2019. — tim wood

Happy to have the post end, but your summary is self serving nonsense.

No argument has ever been able to prove the existence of God or gods through evidence. — Christoffer

- accept

Going by Kirkegaard or Pascal, you might reject evidence in favor of the act of belief as a probability of the reward or belief alone as meaningful in itself. — Christoffer

not sure what this adds - will withhold judgement

Russel's Teapot analogy points out that if you reject evidence and go by faith alone it could lead to being made up by anything you can think of; like Teapots in space and as a result, things like "the church of Teapotism” that revolves entirely around the belief of Teapots in space. — Christoffer

Challenge - Russels argument has nothing at all to do with rejecting evidence in favor of faith. Its sole purpose was to place the burden of proof on the person making the claim. If one is holding a view by faith that is in conflict with evidence that is just a fool. And fools do all kinds of things. In the argument, what Russel is saying is, if I make a claim that there is a teapot between the earth and the sun, the burden is on me to prove that, not on you to disprove that.

By Russel’s analogy, religion can be made into whatever people can think of, then people with dark thoughts and ideas can create beliefs around pain, suffering, murder and hate. — Christoffer

Challenge - I don't see how Russels argument has anything meaningful to say about what people say they believe - based on anything. The only thing it would say is the burden of proof for any truth claims they make is on them. People are capable of all kinds of evil, and can find all kinds of basis to justify it. Not seeing the direct or unique link between religious beliefs per se and the evil.

If there’s a possibility that hateful and dangerous belief-systems will be created, it has a high probability of happening over a long enough timeline. — Christoffer

not sure what you are saying here - there is a surety that hateful and dangerous belief systems will be created, and they will be justified by all kinds of things, including religion

There is no such thing as personal belief since you do not exist in a vacuum, detached from the rest of society and other people. As long as you interact with other people and the world, you will project your personal belief into other people’s world-view and influence their choices. — Christoffer

Ok

Epistemic responsibility put a responsibility on the ones who make choices without sufficient evidence. To choose to believe is to accept a belief without evidence and risk spreading this belief-system. — Christoffer

We are free to believe and think all kinds of things - why is the simple act of belief without proof something to be avoided?

Therefore, religious belief will always lead to hateful, dangerous ideas at some point in time and the responsibility is on all people who believe something without sufficient evidence, rejecting evidence in favor of the necessity of faith or comfort in faith. — Christoffer

Like this:

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.

Love never fails. But where there are prophecies, they will cease; where there are tongues, they will be stilled; where there is knowledge, it will pass away

our this

Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
“Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.
“Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.
“Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they shall be satisfied.
“Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy.
“Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.
“Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons[a] of God.
“Blessed are those who are persecuted for righteousness' sake, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
“Blessed are you when others revile you and persecute you and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account. 12 Rejoice and be glad, for your reward is great in heaven, for so they persecuted the prophets who were before you.

I understand that religion, has and might well again cause real evil. But the causal relationship is, religion is a act of man, it is a human organisation, and evil is part of the human condition. I don't see you made any kind of case that says faith leads to religion that leads to evil.

You bemoan repetition... then you reply by repeating yourself.

Here's the rub: A woman has far greater moral worth than a piece of tissue.

Let that be an end to it. — Banno

...and still you do not see the poverty of your reply. Indeed, it is tiresome. You seek to treat the foetus as if it were distinct from the woman. It isn't. Take it out and it is dead. And the reason you need to treat it a if it is distinct from the woman is that you wish to ascribe to it moral standing that it does not deserve. — Banno

occasionally it would be nice if someone else would actually make a full argument with premises and conclusions that we could debate other than me. All I have gotten out of you is your zealous opinion - make a full argument to support it for once.

remember this - you liked it about 10 pages ago

MORALITY
morality itself - is there some level of morality that has a wide application, would be generally accepted as moral or immoral, or is all morality relative.

one must assume there is some generally accepted concept of morality to continue

IF ONE BELIEVES ALL MORALITY IS RELATIVE - STOP HERE

PERSONHOOD
The arguments about personhood are all arguments of if the biology of humans or something else give the fetus moral standing. Although often debated on forums like this - in large measure it has been abandoned in most academic and serious arguments on abortion. The reason for this is that for each criteria given there is a case where such a criteria is only used in the case of the fetus, and not used in the case of a born human. this is just a long series of begging the question.

There is one major exception. Dr. Singer continues to argue that it is not biology that makes us human, it is that we are embodied minds that make us human beings. He argues that this occurs somewhere in early childhood and as such would allow infanticide.

IF ONE BELIEVES NO MATTER WHAT ANYONE SAYS THAT A FETUS IS NOT A PERSON BECAUSE A FETUS IS NOT A PERSON - STOP HERE

FUTURE OF VALUE ARGUMENT (FOVA)
Despite the unsupported dismissals of the argument on the board. This argument is regarded almost universally by academics and serious critics both pro choice and pro life as the best argument about the morality of abortion. it is, because it is based on things that almost all believe are intuitively true, or on pure biological fact.

we do intuitively believe it is wrong to unjustly kill people like you and me
we do intuitively believe we will exist in the future and we value it. ( I have dinner reservations for next week - and keep a calendar)
It is a fact that some number of days after the process of conception there does exist a unique human organism
and it is a fact that if you leave it alone - it will exist in the future as only one thing a human like us.

this argument hinges on the concept of "Ideal desire" that it is reasonable to assume that those, who due to some handicap or circumstance are unable to overtly express their desire, would desire things that would be best for them.

The argument against this is that one must have at least some minor level of cognitive ability to be considered as meriting the concept of "ideal desire"

IF YOU BELIEVE THE CONCEPT OF IDEAL DESIRE DOES NOT APPLY TO THE FETUS - STOP HERE

RIGHT TO THE USE OF THE MOTHERS BODY
Even if you believe that the fetus is a moral actor, that by itself does not de facto give it a right
to the use of the mothers body. The mother possesses bodily autonomy and she can decide to let the fetus use it, or not.

This argument hinges on the concept of implied consent. Does having sex as an act of free will with a known possible outcome being a fetus with moral standing that has a unique need for the use of your body establish an implied consent

IF YOU THINK THERE IS NO IMPLIED CONSENT - STOP HERE

That is really basically where the world is in the argument

NONE OF WHICH HAS MUCH OF ANYTHING AT ALL WITH IF ABORTION SHOULD OR
SHOULD NOT BE LEGAL.[/quote]

Indeed, I am passionate. What makes your argument sinful is that it pretends to show that the life of a piece of tissue is valuable without mention of the woman on whom it is parasitic. It is symptomatic of the grossly distorted view of human dignity that falls from conservative theology. Misogynistic, homophobic, nasty stuff. — Banno

this is so tiresome - i have said at least 10 times and at least 5 to you - this is a second order discussion - even if the fetus is such a thing as it has a right to live. That does NOT NOT NOT mean it has a right to the use of the woman's body - different argument. And I have share the best pro choice argument for that on here, Dr. Judith Thompsons that would make YOUR case.

This thread is like groundhog day - it is like nothing that has already been said - ever happened

Don't take me for a fool. What are "People like us" if not people? The argument revolves around personhood. The pretence that it does not is part of what makes your approach so disingenuous. — Banno

all in your mind, and a lack of a dispassionate reading and understanding of the argument. If you want to do some heaving lifting and re state for me what your understanding is of the complete arguement I will respond, but I am weary of these wack a mole arguments.

↪Rank Amateur Here is the key flaw: the notion of a future of value does not capture what it is to be a person ("like us"). — Banno

it makes no such claim - it makes no person hood claim about the fetus at all.

It is the most popular pro life argument in existence, it is all over the internet, I have done my best to explain it. If your have some real intellectual curiosity to understand an argument that is opposed to your beliefs - sure the internet can do a better job of laying out the argument than I can. Enjoy.

Or is it that I have understood it and still reject it. — Banno

no issue at all with that -

all that shows my friend is as many times as i have repeated the argument you have never taken a second to understand it, or the logic. You know it is wrong before you have read 2 words because you know it is wrong.

so agreed it is a fact ? The concept of future - as defined as time that has not yet happened is a fact ? We agreed that such a thing as the future is real ??

"...as a matter of pure fact it will happen." Actually, no. Maybe? Probably? Intended? Expected? Sure. Pure fact? No. — tim wood

the full comment was

It is as simple as you Tim Wood have a future, if you do not die, or are killed it, as a matter of pure fact it will happen

Which is pure fact.

the point is that there is no such thing as a future anything. There are present speculations and present assessments of present speculations, and in many, nearly all, arenas it's deemed useful to call some of these present activities future somethings, like future values, and even as a convenient fiction to suppose they're real, even though they're just present ideas. — tim wood

Saying there is no such thing as a future is exactly the same thing as saying there is no such thing as time. Taking your point to the absurd. I can stare at the clock on the wall, and imagine and speculate that the second hand will move one more time, and 1 second of my future will turn into the present , and 1 sec later it will be in my past.

Your point would make sense, if your point was what the future will be is unsure. But in the space time reality we live in there is no speculation that tomorrow will come, and unless you die or are killed you will be apart of it. That is your future.

Illustration: I have a dollar in my pocket. What is it worth? It is worth one dollar. Present value. Suppose you promise to give me a dollar one year from now. What is that promise worth? If there is such a thing as a future value, then that question is answerable. But there isn't, and it isn't. What does happen is that people now in the present make present guesses about the present value of that promise, and buy and sell and contract accordingly. — tim wood

Can you apply this to the issue at question, please. Which is, the future is, tomorrow will happen, you, me and most everyone else in the world desires to be there for it, as opposed to not. If you want to apply an NPV calc to it. Take all the future things you are looking forward to, anticipating, all the time you will be spending with someone you love apply them year by year, give them a monetary value and than discount them back today - goodness knows what the discount rate would be.

I have done that for me, and the NPV of my future to me is priceless.

Now you hold that there is such a thing as a future value. But you have yet to make any substantive statement as to what that is. Informally, its a non-issue; we all know what we mean. But this argument hinges in part on a correct understanding of the phrase "future of value" and how it's used. And you will not go there. Either you know full well the argument will blow up, or you fear it, or you don't care and you just want to rant. — tim wood

FOV is not a difficult concept, and it is well argued in what i posted. It is as simple as you Tim Wood have a future, if you do not die, or are killed it, as a matter of pure fact it will happen. You value and desire that future for all the reasons that are important to you. I do not think the concept is very difficult.

To say that anything future is real is a reification of future, and reification in argument is a major error and sin, for the simple reason that it constitutes arguing about something as if it were real, and it is not real. I'll guess that's why Marquis simply presumed without argument that the premises of his argument were true, because he knew darned well they weren't. His was a hypothetical argument, if such-and-such were true, then thus-and-so follows. No crime making hypothetical arguments; they can be useful. And Marquis, as I've noted for your benefit repeatedly, makes clear his argument is hypothetical. But you insist it's all real, and therefore the conclusion follows as a matter of fact. It doesn't, and it's not a matter of opinion. There's no "agreement to disagree." There's right and wrong, and you're wrong. You can still attempt your argument. I thought you did a good job two or three posts ago. But as long as you hang on to this FOV, your argument is DOA. — tim wood

again - the future is real, as real as time.

Now after all that there is a major logic error in all of this, it is you only want to disallow considerations of the future as ethereal for the fetus, or where you think it helps your argument. Yet every reason some woman would consider an abortion is a projection of the future. The woman evaluating her future, she determines her future life, would be worse off with the future life she is carrying. And for what she wants her future to be, she denies the life inside her its future.

So according to you we don't have any real future, and the fetus doesn't have any real future - only the woman contemplating abortion has a real future.

Murder is wrong (unjustified killing = murder) because it is an affront to the community. To consent to murder is implicit consent to be murdered. The community, jointly and severally, do not consent to be murdered. Why do they not consent? Because murder involves a maximum or horror and pain and loss. If you argue that some loss is "better" than another loss, you invoke an unacceptable scale of murder. — tim wood

Agree - can there only be one thing morally wrong with murder, is this and denying a future of value somehow mutually exclusive. Your point while interesting, in no way contradicts the denial of a FOV as a significant harm done by murder.

Now, you argued. Some of your premises - the important ones - are found wanting. Time for you to fix them. I am of the view they're intrinsically unfixable. You might start by thinking about exactly what "future" means and refers to. — tim wood

Futue - what Tim wood will have if he doesn't get killed

It cannot be wrong to the victim - maybe against him or her - because he is no-longer. Were he merely robbed or assaulted, then it's meaningful to think about his loss. To speak to how a dead person values anything is simply wild speculation. That does not mean that one cannot think about it and indeed much informal expression does run that way. But we're looking for - I'm looking for and I hope you are too - for some precision and clarity in our usage. — tim wood

The point that the victim of murder isn't harmed because they are dead is inane. And no where in the argument does it say a dead person values anything, quite the contrary it say the dead person loses the future they value.

I am growing weary of rehashing this argument with you ad nauseam, and was happy to stop.

So I await your next waste of bandwidth and the insult that most definitely accompany it.

I agree it is unfixable and a good place to agree to disagree

:)

OK. thanks the work. Understand your objection that you are not convinced that a major harm in being killed is the loss of your future, due to its ambiguity. Although I am not completely sure what is ambiguous about the concept, but that maybe my prejudice toward the argument.

here is the entire argument from the original argument - it may or may not address your ambiguity issue - if not - then we have got to a good place to end -

A more obvious answer is better. What primarily makes killing
wrong is neither its effect on the murderer nor its effect on the
victim's friends and relatives, but its effect on the victim. The loss of
one's life is one of the greatest losses one can suffer.

The loss of one's life deprives one of all the experiences, activities, projects, and enjoyments that would otherwise have constituted one's future. Therefore, killing someone is wrong, primarily because the killing inflicts (one of) the greatest possible losses on the victim.

To describe this as the loss of life can be misleading, however. The change in my biological state does not by itself make killing me wrong. The effect of the loss of my biological life is the loss to me of all those activities,projects, experiences, and enjoyments which would otherwise have
constituted my future personal life. These activities, projects, experiences, and enjoyments are either valuable for their own sakes or are means to something else that is valuable for its own sake. Some parts of my future are not valued by me now, but will come to be valued by
me as I grow older and as my values and capacities change.

When I am killed, I am deprived both of what I now value which would have
been part of my future personal life, but also what I would come to
value. Therefore, when I die, I am deprived of all of the value of my
future. Inflicting this loss on me is ultimately what makes killing me
wrong. This being the case, it would seem that what makes killing any
adult human being prima facie seriously wrong is the loss of his or
her future.

How should this rudimentary theory of the wrongness of killing be
evaluated? It cannot be faulted for deriving an 'ought' from an 'is',
for it does not. The analysis assumes that killing me (or you, reader) is
prima facie seriously wrong. The point of the analysis is to establish
which natural property ultimately explains the wrongness of the killing, given that it is wrong.

A natural property will ultimately explain
the wrongness of killing, only if (1) the explanation fits with our
intuitions about the matter and (2) there is no other natural property
that provides the basis for a better explanation of the wrongness of
killing. This analysis rests on the intuition that what makes killing a
particular human or animal wrong is what it does to that particular
human or animal. What makes killing wrong is some natural effect or
other of the killing. Some would deny this. For instance, a divine command theorist
in ethics would deny it. Surely this denial is, however, one of those features
of divine-command theory which renders it so implausible.

The claim that what makes killing wrong is the loss of the victim's
future is, directly supported by two considerations. In the first place,
this theory explains why we regard killing as one of the worst of
crimes. Killing is especially wrong, because it deprives the victim of
more than perhaps any other crime. In the second place, people with
AIDS or cancer who know they are dying believe, of course, that
dying is a very bad thing for them. They believe that the loss of a
future to them that they would otherwise have experienced is what
makes their premature death a very bad thing for them. A better
theory of the wrongness of killing would require a different natural
property associated with killing which better fits with the attitudes of
the dying. What could it be?

that's absurd

the argument makes no moral claim about the human organism. It only claims than it is unique, and if left to nature has a future much like ours. It make no person hood claim at all. Its only claim is it has a future much like ours, and exactly like ours at the same level of biological development and it is morally wrong to deprive a future like ours. The entire purpose of the argument is to avoid the issue of person hood.

You are objecting to a claim not made in the argument.

But to save some time will try to address your points that are outside the argument. But to be very clear - none of this has anything at all to do with the FOV argument -

But upon reflection I don't think I will because I can't help but feel that we don't really care about the biological facts of what constitutes an organism. — Moliere

Because >>>>.

definitive statements are fine, but without a basis it makes it difficult to address.

We care about human beings. — Moliere

as do I, What is your definition of a human being ? Mine is rather easy, and purely biological.

We don't care if the scientific world classifies such and such as an organism or not, which surely does not have in mind debates about good or evil in their classifications — Moliere

Whether such and such achieves homeostasis, reproduction, or what-not is of theoretical interest only, and not moral interest. — Moliere

again - because ....


I understand the concept you are putting forth. Is it pure biology or biology plus something else that makes us persons. And if it is something else, is abortion morally permissible before that something else is there. The problem is, with only one exception that I know of. All such arguments turn into

a fetus is not a person, because it does not have trait X
I give you an example of something that is definitely a person, and does not have trait X
You modify trait X so it only applies to a fetus

factoring out the middle - the logic that is left is - it is ok to kill a fetus, because it is a fetus.

All such arguments are arbitrary and variable.

The exception is, an embodied mind, that you are not really you, and only exist as a biological entity until you are an embodied mind. This is a logical argument. The only issue is you are not an embodied mind until sometime in early childhood - so this allows for infanticide.

So what we really are left with, to argue against the the fetus' right to exist you have to ignore biology, and allow for some glaring logic failures.

that's OK because all of us can hang back in our comfortable philosophy chairs and debate the relative morality of your life and death impossible decision.