I think consistency is important. — Patterner
No. It depends on your standpoint on the status of a fetus. We are only charged with murder if we kill a human being. If a fetus is a human being, then it's murder.If someone was to slip an abortion pill in a pregnant woman's body without her knowing and it results in the death of the foetus. Whether or not the person would be arrested for murder depends on your standpoint on abortion? — Samlw
If someone was to slip an abortion pill in a pregnant woman's body without her knowing and it results in the death of the foetus. Whether or not the person would be arrested for murder depends on your standpoint on abortion? — Samlw
No. It depends on your standpoint on the status of a fetus. We are only charged with murder if we kill a human being. If a fetus is a human being, then it's murder. — Patterner
He made an interesting point, Patterner, I mean. If it's not legally considered a human, just another mass of organic matter of no significant value to the bearer, perhaps even undesired, it would be akin to placing a laxative in someone's food or drink, I believe is what his point is. — Outlander
H'm. You didn't cover "If it's not murder, ..." Given what you've said, if it's not murder. abortion is not murder. It's vicious nasty crime, but who was killed? No-one. So it's not murder.I think we should be consistent. If it's murder then so is abortion. If abortion is not murder, then neither is this. — Patterner
I heard about that case. It was indeed horrible. But I'm afraid I'm very much inclined to include the doctors in my disapproval. True, they have a good deal at risk and they no doubt have families to consider. But still, to stand back and watch her die, or worse, to walk away, and not keep her company while she died.... Still, I don't really know what happened beyond the headlines..... they will not be convinced by any counter-argument, that points out - for example the horror of a pregnant woman bleeding out and losing her baby in the hospital car park because doctors are too afraid of prosecution to treat her. — unenlightened
If moral realism is correct, then there is. So you need to explain why there is no way to prove or disprove a moral claim.Well, this is the issue I have with morality in general. I don't think any moral claims are either verifiable or falsifiable. Unlike science and maths there's just no way to prove or disprove one claim or another. We just either accept them or we don't, and then make our choices accordingly, and such choices include whether or not to pass a law to ban abortion. — Michael
What do you mean I didn't cover that? That's what I said in the third sentence you quoted. In short, either they're both murder, or neither is. (That is, if the law is consistent.)I think we should be consistent. If it's murder then so is abortion. If abortion is not murder, then neither is this.
— Patterner
H'm. You didn't cover "If it's not murder, ..." Given what you've said, if it's not murder. abortion is not murder. It's vicious nasty crime, but who was killed? No-one. So it's not murder. — Ludwig V
Good points. But I'm wondering. We can say therr are just killings of people. For example, it's not murder when we execute a convicted murderer. Or when we kill in self-defence. But what is an example of a just killing of a fetus? When it puts the pregnant woman's life in danger seems like an obvious example. Any others? — Patterner
Russell's tea-pot is another well-known example. It was eventually exploded by the Voyager missions.Moral realism can be true even if moral truths cannot be determined. — Michael
I hadn't heard about whatever is happening in Alabama, and hadn't considered the test tube scenario. Thanks!So, if abortion is declared illegal in a very broad way, you end up with unintended consequences like what happened in Alabama. In vitro fertilization became illegal because the fertilized eggs in test-tubes were considered people because human life began at conception, which means their disposal was murder. — Hanover
I would just say that there is more scientific evidence pointing to the fact that abortion isn’t “killing a child”. — Samlw
Laws are not invented wholesale. Laws are based on an inheritance. Most of that inheritance comes from a time before the United States. — Moliere
For a species to intentionally kill its own fetuses is exceedingly unnatural. — Leontiskos
I'm sorry but that's just not the case.For a species to intentionally kill its own fetuses is exceedingly unnatural. — Leontiskos
Yes, 5 minutes with Google threw up several lists of different species that will kill (and eat) their young. Hunger is one motive. Preventing a predator getting them seems to be another. Males seem to resent or be jealous to new babies. Killing the young is not particularly common, but there is no basis for calling it unnatural. The same applies to that other great taboo - cannibalism.Lots of things we do are “unnatural”. But then also killing one’s offspring happens in nature too. There are various species of birds that occasionally kill the weakest baby so that they can better feed the others — Michael
A subsidiary argument which may not have been mentioned is, "Any species which develops systematic means to kill 70+ million of its own fetuses each year is messed up." — Leontiskos
The child mortality rate in the United States, for children under the age of five, was 462.9 deaths per thousand births in 1800. This means that for every thousand babies born in 1800, over 46 percent did not make it to their fifth birthday — Aaron O'Neill
So you found an exception or two to the rule. Congrats. — Leontiskos
I would hope that anyone choosing an abortion would treat the matter seriously. Whether they do or not is an empirical question. Proper data, properly gathered is the only serious basis for making a judgement about how many do in fact take it seriously and how many do not.Not as casually with little to no thought about the matter, rather. — Outlander
The only way you can answer that question is to talk to women who have made that decision and become infertile (or chosen not to have children, for that matter). Again, proper data, properly gathered. Anything else is speculation, and possibly fear-mongering and propaganda. "What if.." questions are all too often misused.What if, say, a woman chose abortion and later becomes infertile. Or simply ponders, as she becomes older, the magnitude of the act, or rather begins thinking along the lines of "imagine what could have been", etc. — Outlander
subsidiary argument which may not have been mentioned is, "Any species which develops systematic means to kill 70+ million of its own fetuses each year is messed up." A species which so buttresses the killing of its own offspring is not in good shape. For a species to intentionally kill its own fetuses is exceedingly unnatural. — Leontiskos
My main issue with pro-life is that your taking away a choice for people that don't share the same beliefs when having it the other way, — Samlw
I would say to that, your conscious, the foetus isn’t. — Samlw
In this it doesn't matter when a fetus 'becomes human' what matters is the bodily autonomy of the mother — Tom Storm
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