Define essentialism. — Fire Ologist

In this context that the phase "being human" refers to some unambiguous set of necessary and sufficient conditions such that if some entity does not satisfy all of these conditions then it is not human and if it does then it is.

Although some terms, like "triangle", have such an unambiguous set of necessary and sufficient conditions, other terms, like "human", do not. This can be shown from the facts that humans evolved from non-human ancestors and that there was never a specific generation where two non-human parents birthed a human child (the "first" human).

And it still hasn't been explained what the hell this has to do with abortion. Biological taxonomies are not the source of moral worth. If evolution had taken a different route then perhaps the Earth would be populated by some other intelligent species, and they would rightly ask whether or not abortion is morally acceptable despite the fact that they wouldn't be human.

Why can’t souls be as amorphous as whatever else we are talking about? — Fire Ologist

I think they can be. There is actually a lot of freedom in the concept. The sticking point is that the concept is part of a tradition and traditions are by nature slow to change.

And if the majority decided we need to have a human sacrifice to help the crops that would settle it for you?

What this overly simplistic, knee-jerk response fails to acknowledge is that if we lived In an era where the majority of people concluded as you propose, we'd be in a level of human cultural development where you and I could reasonably conclude as you suggested. The attitude of the majority can honestly best be evaluated in the moral framework of the era. Thus why a moral stance that enjoys majority acceptance, when evaluated in it's own era, the majority acceptance signifies that the moral stance is reasonable (though perhaps not optimal) within the framework of it's era.

Why can’t souls be as amorphous as whatever else we are talking about?
— Fire Ologist

I think they can be. — praxis

:victory:

Ok, just above, you said Catholics have to be essentialist because Catholics believe in an immortal soul.
I then said that this doesn’t follow as there is nothing about the amorphous term soul that requires belief in essentialism.
You agreed they can be amorphous.

So then are you agreeing with me that you did not make a good enough argument about Catholics and essentialism? Maybe Catholics are essentialist, but you haven’t shown that yet, correct?

You willing to acknowledge me as a partner in a conversation?

That would be a victory for us both, and for this thread.

…souls..be as amorphous as whatever…
— Fire Ologist

I think they can be. — praxis

Your words. Agreeing with my words

You either just concede on this tiny point, or you should provide a lot of ‘splaining on how you still made a point despite the amorphousness of the “soul” concept, which is fine if you want.

But I hope you just agree because I really don’t think the Catholic/soul speak will be fruitful here.

In this context — Michael

A doctor identifies a 7.5 month old fetus meeting specific criteria so that he can remove it without removing too much more during an abortion.

A prosecutor says the doctor violated the law and murdered a person, because the law says after the close of 6th month the fetus shall be treated as a person, having met the criteria of being a human fetus more than 6 months old.

The doctor defends he hasn’t met the necessary and sufficient criteria for “murder” because he only intended to save the life of the mother…

Roe v. Wade case spent a lot of time considering this.

And it’s not a taxonomy question.

The only reason anyone cares at all about the abortion procedure is because people think it’s a person, think it’s not a person, or don’t know.

The only reason people think it might be a person is because biologists and doctors show us before we could walk and talk, we used to be a zygote.

Saying the metaphysics are linguistic problems will never help the doctor defend a charge of murder or the lawmaker, or most women who haven’t decided yet what they think about abortion.

I was talking about being human, not about being a person. Do you understand that the words "human" and "person" mean different things? Do you understand that Kryptonians, if real, would be people but not be humans?

Your posts show why it's such an emotionally charged topic. :strong:

Thus why a moral stance that enjoys majority acceptance, when evaluated in it's own era, the majority acceptance signifies that the moral stance is reasonable — LuckyR

Majority acceptance does not signify that a moral stance is right. That's what matters.

the words "human" and "person" mean different things — Michael

Can you say this without using the word “things” because that makes me think you might be able to point to a person, and separately point to a human being.

They mean different things. Are they each a thing at all?

The distinction between human being and person may to you be like a distinction between “an organism with 46 chromosomes” and “intelligence”.

All you “person” people have to do is admit there is no “person” present in a newborn. That’s fine. Would be consistent. You can still love and value your babies, but to call them “persons” if that means “intelligence” is bullshit.

Ok, just above, you said Catholics have to be essentialist because Catholics believe in an immortal soul.
I then said that this doesn’t follow as there is nothing about the amorphous term soul that requires belief in essentialism.
You agreed they can be amorphous. — Fire Ologist

It's not the amorphous nature of the concept that makes it essentialist, it's the immortal nature. We touched on this before you volunteered your faith and took a defensive posture. You agreed with me that everything seems to be in a constant state of change, but then also said that you could be wrong and things may exist that are static and unchanging.

Catholics don't believe that souls are mortal.

It's not the amorphous nature of the concept that makes it essentialist, it's the immortal nature — praxis

Things that don't change are dead. — praxis

Are you saying immortal equals unchanging?

Why is that?

But doesn’t seem relevant to essentialism either.

Do you think essences immortal or something?

How will any of this move the ball regarding what abortions you like and which ones you don’t?

Are you saying immortal equals unchanging?

Why is that? — Fire Ologist

I hate to answer a question with a question but can you name anything that doesn’t die or decay?

Do you think essences immortal or something? — Fire Ologist

No, but Catholic's do. If the immortal soul isn’t the essence of someone then what is it?

family. *vin diesel voice*.

interesting- I’m not sure an immoral soul equates with essentialism unless you are saying that the nature of the soul is unchanging. Isn't the theory that souls can and do change - can be lost or redeemed, etc? I'm not in the soul business so this is entirely about the storytelling of such matters.

I’m not sure what it means for something to equate with essentialism.

Catholics believe that the soul is immortal (can’t die or decay) and is the essence of a person from conception (maybe before that?) to beyond the grave. Physicality doesn’t seem to matter so what could change it?

Yes but the immortality is just one aspect of the soul - which can change and has no essential attributes. Freewill and all that. Anyway it doesn't much matter since I suspect neither of us actually believe in souls. Essentialism tend to mean that there are fixed attributes - such as biological essentialism on gender. The soul, if the literature is correct, can be corrupted or redeemed.

Essentialism tend to mean that there are fixed attributes — Tom Storm

Something that exists in a life from conception to beyond life and regardless of the physical condition of any part of life sounds pretty fixed to me. Also, immortality is an attribute, an eternal attribute.

. Also, immortality is an attribute, an eternal attribute. — praxis

The soul may be immortal, but that says nothing about whether it is damned or not. The soul's essential nature is subject to change - that's the bit I think you are missing. It's immortality is incidental. And for me it's the most relevant given the above discussion since the soul is not essentially saved or good. But I get your point.

Actually on reflection, from the position of some thinkers and the religion I was brought up in, the soul starts pure and good, so I guess I’m probably wrong about it’s essential nature.

And about being damned, the damning is eternal. The eternal part of eternal damnation is far from incidental, if you asked me. :grimace:

Was I born damned or only after I became an atheist?

I looked it up and the Catholic Church considers abortion murder, so if you’ve been involved in an abortion somehow and are unrepentant, and maybe especially if you’re unbaptized, you’ll be eternally separated from God. I think that means damned.

I don't get what's difficult to understand.

"Human" and "solider" mean different things.
"Human" and "swimmer" mean different things.
"Human" and "person" mean different things.

And by "mean different things" I mean that the words are not synonyms.

Something can be a solider, a swimmer, and a person without being human, e.g. if it is an alien, or if in a million years chimpanzees evolve into a new intelligent species.

My claim is that being human has no unambiguous set of necessary and sufficient conditions. The gradual evolution from non-human to human was just that; gradual. There was never some point where the first human was born (to non-human parents). Biological taxonomies just don't work that way.

We can say at one extreme that we are human and at another extreme that Homo heidelbergensis were not human (if by "human" we mean "Homo sapiens"), but in between there's a large grey area where any designation as being a member of the one species or the other (or some intermediate species) is arbitrary.

"Human" and "solider" mean different things.
"Human" and "swimmer" mean different things.
"Human" and "person" mean different things. — Michael

Here is what is so difficult: how do you know they mean different things? Can’t you use words to define them in some way?

e.g. if it is an alien, — Michael

I hate to say it, but this is a non sequitur. A straw man. You are just pointing to more undefined, ambiguous “things”.

My claim is that being human has no unambiguous set of necessary and sufficient conditions. — Michael

So you will say “human” means something different than “soldier”, which means to me you must be able to set out some condition, even just one condition would be sufficient, to show a difference between what “human” and”soldier” mean - you can do that - but for “being human” you can’t even begin to define it. Although you know a human zygote cannot be called a human being.

The gradual evolution from non-human to human was just that; gradual. — Michael

Agreed, although I’m not sure what method you used to identify some “non-human” bunch of beings that gradually grew into “human beings”.
By raising evolution, you really just restate the problem over a longer period of time. You need some necessary conditions that allows you to put beings into those two different buckets.

Instead of millions and hundreds of thousands of years, what if the life of a human being was 15 seconds long? Pregnancy lasted two seconds and boom the infant pops out, grows through childhood to old age and dies in 15 seconds. Would it still make sense yo draw a line between whatever such a being is at 1 second compared to whatever you want to call it at 10 seconds? Would we still want to say this creature didn’t start its short life until sometime after 2 or 3 seconds?

We can say at one extreme that we are human and at another extreme that Homo heidelbergensis were not human (if by "human" we mean "Homo sapiens"), but in between there's a large grey area where any designation as being a member of the one species or the other (or some intermediate species) is arbitrary. — Michael

Spreading the same issue out over millions of years and just replacing the ambiguous zygote with the ambiguous Homo heidelbergensis, and replacing the ambiguous adult human being with what you now refer to as any human being that evolved, doesn’t really help your point.

I get that we have a starting point where there is no human being, and an end point where we clearly have a human being, and that the motion from non-human thing (like some pre-hominid ape) to human being (like Mrs. Smith), is a gray swirling mess of ambiguity, but, since people are asking me about when we can or maybe can’t terminate pregnancies, about when was the time period that we get critical mass, I press on into the gray swirling mess.

It just seems weird to be able to say you obviously value a pregnant adult woman, and obviously do t value her human zygote, but then say there are no conditions you will make necessary in defining “human being” when you wrap your arms fully around the woman to hug her in a tough time, and wrap the scalpel fully around the human zygote being.

It’s a dance that takes advantage of the gray motion of biological growth, here in order to assert things like there is no essence, or a “human zygote” means something totally different than a “human being” and human beings are organisms whose beginnings are gray enough that it makes sense to you to honor and value it as an adult, but kill it without any concern when it is gray.

It’s all just full of holes to me. Life is ambiguous. 2+2 may always equal 4, but we don’t see all the equations. In the meantime, new adults pop on the scene. When does that happen - probably sometime between 16 and 30 years of age, depending on how you define “adult”.

And in the meantime, pregnant women want advice from their doctors - should I get an abortion, what is the procedure like, how long does it take, will it hurt me, what do you do with the fetus afterwards, what is the law on time frames - these all need answers. Some women ask whether the fetus will feel pain, or is it a human being, or when does it become a person even. They want to make a fully informed decision and, since their own moms carried zygotes to term once, they think it’s a legitimate question.

Your answer to these latter questions seems to be “who the hell knows, that’s up to you to figure out, I mean intelligent aliens would be persons, and Homo Heidelbergensis is in the mix, but just look at a picture of a zygote - an ugly clump of cells. I won’t conjecture when that clump might begin to be personal or human or intelligent or a soldier. But you, Mrs. pregnant Smith, you are certainly a valuable human being and a person with intelligence - for some reason, I can say that much.”

Brutal.

Here is what is so difficult: how do you know they mean different things? — Fire Ologist

I'm a native speaker. I know what the words "swimmer", "solider", and "person" mean, and that they don't mean the same thing. For example, Michael Phelps is a swimmer, not a solider.

If you can't even understand this very simple fact then I don't know what else I can tell you. I'm not interested in teaching you English.

Majority acceptance does not signify that a moral stance is right. That's what matters.

No one said the majority moral opinion automatically makes an opinion "right", so I don't know who you're addressing. I said when viewed in it's own era a majority opinion is reasonable. That is a logical train of thought can lead to that opinion. Perhaps you're unfamiliar with the reality that when dealing with complex issues reasonable, thoughtful individuals can come to different conclusions.

I said when viewed in it's own era a majority opinion is reasonable. — LuckyR

So if you're a 2nd Century BCE Carthaginian, it's moral to sacrifice babies to Baal. What does this have to do with anything?

In the news today, Josseli Barnica from Texas died of an infection because doctors couldn’t properly treat her miscarriage.

In the news today, Josseli Barnica from Texas died of an infection because doctors couldn’t properly treat her miscarriage. — praxis

Also Nevaeh Crain from Texas.