A secular debate about abortion

[lordpasternack]

a side-argument, so far as I'm concerned - which is minor to the question of how and when abortion is ethical per se

your argument [...] doesn't really tackle abortion per se.

your argument is more far-reaching than abortion per se

I am not talking about abortion per se? Let me put this to you:

You see abortion from the point of view of what the individual thinks of it, while I look at it from the point of view of what effect it will have on society in the long run. Can you really not see that both our points of view are not only about abortion, but specifically about the ethics of abortion per se?

Well sure - but I still think your argument is much broader and more generalised, and ultimately subject to the type of argument that I'm preferring to hammer away at. You could make precisely the same point about the long-term effects of roasting and eating all babies at birth past the first or second child. Or accepted chloroforming of toddlers in areas of high population density. It would have similar 'positive' effects in curbing population growth and consumption of resources - but the question of its ethical value ultimately rests on addressing the issue at the individual level, and tackling the ethics of the issue right at the roots.

You can't argue that something is ethical because of a particular secondary effect it has, which is 'good' in certain circumstances. It doesn't make that thing ethical in and of itself. That's the basic premise that needs to be accounted for before you go on to explain any other effects that it has, which could be deemed broadly 'for the greater good'.

[HomerJay]

You can also read another atheist on this issue if you want: Jurgen Habermas - Europe's most famous atheist.

Habermas has never been Europe's most famous atheist.

[Hermit]

I just didn't like the long tangent the thread was taking into a kinda broader look at population growth - rather than addressing the simple point of the ethics of terminating pregnancies per se.

If you can't see a real and non-tangential connection between the ethics of abortion and population growth by now from what I said, I guess you'll just have to keep beating your own drum. I do hope it resonates with others as much as it does with me.

I can see a strong connection - but your argument is more far-reaching than abortion per se, and doesn't really tackle abortion per se. It is as much a general argument for effective long-term contraception, fecund females choosing to have smaller families, and voluntary sterlilisation of men and women who've had all the kids they planned to (which may be none). It's a broad argument that I agree with, which INCORPORATES abortion, but doesn't really address it in and of itself, or say much about the ethics of it per se, besides its role (along with other factors mentioned) in curbing population growth.

Looks like I haven't thought this through. You have helped me to a new insight. Thank you. And another plus: You actually said something meaningful, yet only needed a few lines to do it in.

[Coito ergo sum]

If we reject all religious arguments against abortion, the only criterion we are left with is the personhood or consciousness of the fetus when determining whether or not abortion is justified. Most of us would probably agree that in the first few days a fetus is so tiny and insignificant that an abortion can be justified, but what about a three-month old fetus? Or a six-month old? How can we draw a universal line between personhood and non-personhood? It is practically unfeasible to make these decisions on a case-by-case basis, so a universal principle must apply.

In the first few days after the egg is fertilized, there is no fetus. when fertilization first occurs, we have only a sperm and an egg. The first sperm that gets in causes the human egg to polarize, and all other human sperm are doomed to die. The human sperm is alive. The human egg is alive. I would not make a law protecting the lives of eggs and sperms though.

The zygote takes generally a few days to meander down the fallopian tubes. A clump of cells, dividing....first it becomes a morula and then when a small cavity appears between the dividing cells, it is called a blastocyst. It takes about 5 days for the blastocyst to reach the uterus, where it then implants to the wall and starts to develop and enters the "embryonic" period - where there is an embryo.

A fetus doesn't form until about 10 weeks.

I think that your statement "it is practically unfeasible to make these decisions on a case by case basis, so a universal principle must apply" is backwards. It is practically unfeasible to make these decisions on a universal basis, so a case by case decision is the only way to go, at least in the first trimester or so of pregnancy. At a point late in pregnancy, however, it becomes easier to identify the unborn entity as closer to a baby than a clump of cells. Nevertheless, the decision of whether to terminate a pregnancy is, practically speaking, a medical one, and no rule can feasibly be imposed to say "only after X weeks" or "only after Y weeks."

Pro-choice campaigners generally support seeing birth as the boundary past which extermination is morally undesirable, but birth changes absolutely nothing in a child, it simply transports it out of the womb. If we can somehow justify an extermination of a nine-month old fetus, why does this act become a punishable murder as soon as the child is born?

That's actually not, I think, the view of most people who are pro-choice. Most people who are pro choice, in the end, acknowledge that in the third trimester of pregnancy there is room for reasonable regulation.

If we support the view that abortions can only be performed up to a certain point, doesn't this mean that due to the uniqueness of each fetus, we can never establish with any accuracy a universal moment at which a fetus becomes a child? Does it follow that the only way to prevent 'immoral' abortions is to outlaw it altogether?

You can never establish with any accuracy a universal moment when a fetus becomes a child because it winds up being a question of definitions. What is a "child" and what is a "fetus?" It's like asking when the Dark Ages began and ended in history - fetal development - like history - is not a rigid series of clearly defined units. It's a flowing river of events and a constant stream of development. Asking when a fetus becomes a child is like asking when an adolescent becomes an adult, or when a stream becomes a river, or when a sea becomes an ocean. Is the Caspian Sea a sea or a lake? Why is the Great Salt Lake a lake, and the Dead Sea a sea?

[jcmmanuel]

You can also read another atheist on this issue if you want: Jurgen Habermas - Europe's most famous atheist.

Habermas has never been Europe's most famous atheist.

Then you're not living on my tectonic plate; or maybe you're from Great Britain- oh the competition with Europe, especially Germany, eh? Habermas has been on both radio and TV here, and more often than Chomsky. And not just because of his (in philosophical circles well known) discussions with Derrida, but because of a) his insights on globalization, political philosophy, cultural debates, b) his conversations with the Pope, c) his opposition to the Iraq war. Also, again more for those interested in political philosophy and related domains, d) his theory of social evolution. Being of German origin he is familiar with the heart and history of Europe.

So I'm not sure what you are trying to address with your remark. Maybe you are just pointing out that the average man in the street may not know who Habermas is. That may be true. 'Famous', of course, means a different thing in the entertainment industry vs. in a scholarly context.

Kind regards.

[HomerJay]

You can also read another atheist on this issue if you want: Jurgen Habermas - Europe's most famous atheist.

Habermas has never been Europe's most famous atheist.

Then you're not living on my tectonic plate; or maybe you're from Great Britain- oh the competition with Europe, especially Germany, eh? Habermas has been on both radio and TV here.

Oh, I stand corrected, radio and TV, huh?

[Thea]

Back on topic ...


Thea, you said ...

I think we're also in danger of becoming our own worst enemy for failing to take human life seriously enough.

I agree with Seraph's and Feck's comments on that point, but would like you to elaborate on what you think about how this danger will be manifested.

I had in mind something that is sometimes referred to as "disposable human being." This is, roughly speaking, any decision making process that requires dehumanization as a pre- or co-requisite to setting that process in motion, such that the human or humans in question are weighted with a value that places it or them in an inferior (less valued, thus more expendable) position relative to other criteria--i.e., relative to other humans. In particular on the subject of abortion, for instance, there is some question about when a cluster of joined cells of human origin might or might not actually be human--an embryo, in scientific terms. There are some who attempt an end-run around the ethics of abortion by declaring that since an embryo has no sentience, therefore it doesn't count as a human being, and may have its life terminated with no transgression of ethics. Whether or not an embryo qualifies as human in actual fact is, of course, open to debate (at any rate, it's hotly debated). But here's what I see as (one of) the danger(s) in saying yes, an embryo is not human: having a circumstance that is accepted such that a human life is not considered human as a matter of widespread general practice—as if it was common knowledge--thus allowing it therefore to be disposed of as we see fit is insidious and sets a precedent that can lead to abuse on a scale of atrocity that just might be unstoppable. Granted this point of view tends to presuppose something else, which is that I don't find the argument that a human embryo is not human because it temporarily lacks sentience to be particularly compelling, since we all know perfectly well that given the opportunity, that embryo will develop, not into a guppy, but a sentient human being.

What is the end run that I mentioned in aid of? Many, many pregnancies (the majority occurring among teens and young women up to about age 24 or 25) occur in circumstances such that a woman must choose between a) an unimpeded ability to compete in a world which is not designed to cope with the fact that she can get pregnant, or b) going ahead with having a child which will constrain her life emotionally, intellectually, physically, financially, and spiritually to a significant and likely desperate degree. That's a damned awkward position to be in. How do we bear it? So far, as I said, one trend seems to be a growing acceptance of the idea that a human embryo is not human and has no value as a human. What does this permit to remain in place? That world I just mentioned, which not only asks women to make these kinds of decisions, but which holds the lives of these women as something less that full-on human as a presupposition. In other words, the woman herself is disposable (at the very least to a life of struggle and sacrifice) unless she toes the line--she's held hostage, and is asked to pay for her life with the coin of the life she is carrying.

Doesn't that just suck?

Whereas I have said I don't think we humans are intrinsically flawed, nonetheless, we seem to be well-practiced at the subtleties of victimization, and dehumanization is one the the most effective tools for doing so. Whereas human life should not be considered sacred in that we should allow ourselves to reproduce willy nilly without regard to the consequences, neither should it be stripped of its value so that we can be comfortable with destroying it once it exists, ESPECIALLY not in aid of preserving a social milieu that is harshly discriminatory to begin with, and as such tends to CREATE a large number of the incidences in which women find themselves staring abortion in the face.

Where did that social milieu come from? Well...us, of course. We all buy into it to one degree or another. We all collectively help to create and reiterate it as a matter of recursive historical process, which if left uncriticized can go off in directions we don't much like. Or even if our criticism is simply incomplete or weak. Hence my remark about how we can be our own worst enemy if we're not careful.

Is this a definitive and all-inclusive discussion of everything about abortion? No. This discussion only considers dehumanization in context with abortion. For instance, one thing I haven't talked about is what to do for all the women who have already had an abortion, for any reason, and what the implications are for them, if what I said above is taken seriously. Well...that discussion outside the scope of this forum, I think. Which in itself is food for thought, isn't it?

[lordpasternack]

In particular on the subject of abortion, for instance, there is some question about when a cluster of joined cells of human origin might or might not actually be human--an embryo, in scientific terms.

They patently are not human beings. I invite you to examine some human embryos under a microscope, and then examine some fully developed human beings. You can play a quick and helpful game of spot the difference. Human embryos are qualitatively (if not genetically) identical to the embryos of other animals, and have far more in common with the embryos of plants and fungi than they do with developed human beings. They have a human genome, and the potential to give rise to a human being - but they are not persons. I'd much rather respect real sentient beings with real consciousness and real potential suffering - fully developed humans and other animals - than feel that I have some cock-eyed ethical imperative to sanctify the genome of Homo sapiens sapiens.

There are some who attempt an end-run around the ethics of abortion by declaring that since an embryo has no sentience, therefore it doesn't count as a human being, and may have its life terminated with no transgression of ethics.

Yep...

Whether or not an embryo qualifies as human in actual fact is, of course, open to debate (at any rate, it's hotly debated).

A human is a being with a human body, a human brain, human organs, usually sentience and consciousness, experiences, thoughts, potential to suffer and feel emotion...

But here's what I see as (one of) the danger(s) in saying yes, an embryo is not human: having a circumstance that is accepted such that a human life is not considered human as a matter of widespread general practice—as if it was common knowledge--thus allowing it therefore to be disposed of as we see fit is insidious and sets a precedent that can lead to abuse on a scale of atrocity that just might be unstoppable.

You mean like the complete flagrant disregard with which the human placenta is discarded (or eaten) after birth? Don't you know that the placenta has a fully complete human genome (indeed it develops as part of the embyro's body), and therefore is "human life", and worthy, depending on what standards you're using, of being deemed "a human", and being respected accordingly? Shouldn't we gather around the ethics committee to discuss this problematic state of affairs, and the implications that our disregard for the placenta might have on society as a whole, and our respect for other human life?

Granted this point of view tends to presuppose something else, which is that I don't find the argument that a human embryo is not human because it temporarily lacks sentience to be particularly compelling, since we all know perfectly well that given the opportunity, that embryo will develop, not into a guppy, but a sentient human being.

The key words there are "given the opportunity". Yes, given the opportunity it would be a human being. Deprived of that opportunity, it never was and never will be. Given the opportunity, each and every sperm in a single ejaculate would have been one that fertilised an egg, to start to commence towards forming a human being. Given the opportunity, the two top slices of ham in a packet in a supermarket would be in someone's sandwich sometime in the next week. If I had some spaghetti I could make some spaghetti bolognese, if I had some mince and bolognese sauce. Given the opportunity, the zygote that formed you, might have split and given rise to another, or a few other separate human beings...

In fact, there are plenty of cells within your body that given the opportunity might potentially give rise to another complete human being. The constraints of your prevailing biology prevent them from doing so - but perhaps in the future biotechnology will allow you to let these cells attain that potential. Just as the advanced biotechnological pieces of apparatus that we call human uteruses so successfully allow zygotes to do, already...

What is the end run that I mentioned in aid of? Many, many pregnancies (the majority occurring among teens and young women up to about age 24 or 25) occur in circumstances such that a woman must choose between a) an unimpeded ability to compete in a world which is not designed to cope with the fact that she can get pregnant, or b) going ahead with having a child which will constrain her life emotionally, intellectually, physically, financially, and spiritually to a significant and likely desperate degree.

That isn't the only consequence of unplanned parenthood. Children may be born into circumstances that just aren't ideal for themselves, never mind the biological parents. Parents in non-ideal conditions (whatever they may be) just aren't the best hands to be in if you are a child growing up in the world, even if the parents aren't bad people in any respect. If I am to bring a human being into the world myself, I'd far rather I felt I had things set for that event, than just tumbled into it casually.

I myself was brought up by my father, because my mother became an alcoholic when I was a toddler - and my dad is a nice person, but a completely crap parent in some important respects, I can say quite impartially. I obviously can't know how different I'd be brought up in a model happy family, and with hindsight, I don't really wish my entire existence away because the circumstances I grew up in weren't ideal - but with foresight, I can also say that I'd do things different if I'm going to make some kids myself. Just as my brother has done... Parenthood is difficult, complex, deeply rewarding and at times emotionally raw - I can say that as a doting AUNTIE and in watching my brother be a father. In fact, when he became a father of two, it did wonders for my broodiness - on two counts: The first - I could vent all that latent broodiness on the newborn; The second, I realised just how much hard work it all is, particularly as they both get bigger, and you have a toddler and a 5/6-year-old running around.

Parenthood isn't something I'd take lightly - and it is particularly due to my respect for real human beings, real children, that makes me think that way. Again, I'm not going to let a potential human in my uterus give rise to an actual human to be born into my current circumstances due to some cock-eyed view of the sanctity of the human genome.

That's a damned awkward position to be in. How do we bear it? So far, as I said, one trend seems to be a growing acceptance of the idea that a human embryo is not human and has no value as a human.

Like the placenta, yeah.

That'll do. The rest of your post follows from the same premise that I see as faulty: That the coding in the genome, and what it has the potential to give rise to, is what should engender respect for life - rather than what it actually amounts to, qualitatively, at the time of going to press - which may be on a par with pond-life.

[hadespussercats]

Besides the question of the consciousness and sentience of the developing foetus, there is also the issue of the foetus using the mother's body for sustenance - which arguably it has no "right" to do against the mother's will, irrespective of whether or not you dignify it with personhood. See the Violinist Thought Experiment.

An issue that remains with that line of argument is that so many people conflate the right not to have your body used as life support with a right to purposely render said life dead. Going along the lines of the Violinist Thought Experiment, it would be tantamount to purposely going and cutting the medical care that the violinist was already receiving, because, besides not wanting to support their life, you actively want to terminate it - and for your own purposes, completely irrespective of the prognosis for the violinist on conventional medical treatment, or whatever new medical treatments that will be coming along soon.

Let's face it - most women don't abort because they have issues with their body being used to support the development of a baby, or even particularly because they don't like the idea of going through birth - but because they don't wish to become biological parents, point blank. It's primarily birth-control, a parenthood prevention measure - not a squeamishness about being "parisitised" or about the grave hazards of pregnancy and birth. The latter are just raised by feminists to legitimise the former, which they frankly shouldn't really need to do. The problem is that they use the latter to essentially mean the former so much that they do seem to think they amount to the same in their minds. And they just don't. If foetuses at whatever stage in pregnancy are to be granted some basic acknowledgement of sentience and personhood (which would be subject to evidence), then you may state a basic right to have the pregnancy removed from your body at any point during pregnancy all you wish, but it doesn't conflate to the automatic right to have that product of pregnancy euthanised, if it could be removed without killing it - but that's alright, because the only things that the feminists were bothered about was the use of the women's bodies, and their choice not to be used in this way, anyway, right?!

Thanks for the link, LP-- this is the argument I commented on earlier. It´s a good one, I think.

[jcmmanuel]

Oh, I stand corrected, radio and TV, huh?

No correction, just some education about the many channels available to reach people. Scholarly journals or popular-scientific magazines for a smaller part of the population, TV for consumer-mentality people (although highly educational programs are available there too). It's called diversity I think, and making intelligent use of available media. Nothing too strange.

[jcmmanuel]

...since we all know perfectly well that given the opportunity, that embryo will develop, not into a guppy, but a sentient human being.

The words "given the opportunity" are, I think, quite important in this context. There is a decision to be taken. The point of decision needs to be established (this is already part of the abortion discussion since the very beginning; difference between embryo and foetus is one of multiple 'tools' or concepts that have been offered to support the process of decision making). The decision is, as it is today, not (and will probably, or hopefully, never) be an economic one or a mathematical one etc. The decision must reflect our humanity, because conception is the process responsible for our evolution as homo sapiens sapiens - but the decision today is being assisted by medical/scientific information, and even people known to have high moral standard may often agree that the first 3 to perhaps 8 (embryonic stage) are offering us a 'fuzzy' picture of human life.

The danger may not so much be in establishing some age for allowing abortion, but in not doing so, leaving open the door for the dangers you mentioned in your post. In other words, as always, we need a compromise - but one which does not follow extreme views (such as Christian fundamentalism, or raw materialism, or any other for that matter). Experts in all domains related to the study of the human being need to deliver information on the basis of which a justified decisive point in time can be established. And we have the means to stick to those rules (early detection of pregnancy should - theoretically - not be a problem).

Other measures will of course also assist in the decision making process (looking for ways to deal with social conditions etc.), that will be part of the broader picture of human well-being.

It is NOT an option to point out that we know all the answers - which is sometimes a side-effect that embracing science has on people. Today our power largely exceeds our ability to 'know in advance'. Paradoxically, increase of our knowledge decreases the ability to foresee the possible disastrous effects of what we do at the macro-level of life (including effects on our entire species and our planet, or - maybe even worse - to endanger the lives of only 'some' - maybe an entire continent like Africa - because of how we decided to live in the West). We have only run into our current ecological problems, into 46 million abortions/year, into the possibility to destroy planet earth multiple times by means of nuclear weapons etc. because we knew how to do the things that led to this. In all those domains (maybe with the exception of abortion) most people know there have to be limits to what we do (as opposed to what we *can* do).

But it will have to happen by means of debates and reaching a consensus.

[lordpasternack]

Jcmmanuel - briefly, if this is possible - please outline your reason for holding the premise of the imperative to sanctify "human life" by simple virtue of it possessing a human genome, and even before it is qualitatively different from other living organisms broadly, and other animals…

[Thea]

In particular on the subject of abortion, for instance, there is some question about when a cluster of joined cells of human origin might or might not actually be human--an embryo, in scientific terms.

They patently are not human beings. I invite you to examine some human embryos under a microscope, and then examine some fully developed human beings. You can play a quick and helpful game of spot the difference. Human embryos are qualitatively (if not genetically) identical to the embryos of other animals, and have far more in common with the embryos of plants and fungi than they do with developed human beings. They have a human genome, and the potential to give rise to a human being - but they are not persons. I'd much rather respect real sentient beings with real consciousness and real potential suffering - fully developed humans and other animals - than feel that I have some cock-eyed ethical imperative to sanctify the genome of Homo sapiens sapiens.

There are some who attempt an end-run around the ethics of abortion by declaring that since an embryo has no sentience, therefore it doesn't count as a human being, and may have its life terminated with no transgression of ethics.

Yep...

Whether or not an embryo qualifies as human in actual fact is, of course, open to debate (at any rate, it's hotly debated).

A human is a being with a human body, a human brain, human organs, usually sentience and consciousness, experiences, thoughts, potential to suffer and feel emotion...

But here's what I see as (one of) the danger(s) in saying yes, an embryo is not human: having a circumstance that is accepted such that a human life is not considered human as a matter of widespread general practice—as if it was common knowledge--thus allowing it therefore to be disposed of as we see fit is insidious and sets a precedent that can lead to abuse on a scale of atrocity that just might be unstoppable.

You mean like the complete flagrant disregard with which the human placenta is discarded (or eaten) after birth? Don't you know that the placenta has a fully complete human genome (indeed it develops as part of the embyro's body), and therefore is "human life", and worthy, depending on what standards you're using, of being deemed "a human", and being respected accordingly? Shouldn't we gather around the ethics committee to discuss this problematic state of affairs, and the implications that our disregard for the placenta might have on society as a whole, and our respect for other human life?

Granted this point of view tends to presuppose something else, which is that I don't find the argument that a human embryo is not human because it temporarily lacks sentience to be particularly compelling, since we all know perfectly well that given the opportunity, that embryo will develop, not into a guppy, but a sentient human being.

The key words there are "given the opportunity". Yes, given the opportunity it would be a human being. Deprived of that opportunity, it never was and never will be. Given the opportunity, each and every sperm in a single ejaculate would have been one that fertilised an egg, to start to commence towards forming a human being. Given the opportunity, the two top slices of ham in a packet in a supermarket would be in someone's sandwich sometime in the next week. If I had some spaghetti I could make some spaghetti bolognese, if I had some mince and bolognese sauce. Given the opportunity, the zygote that formed you, might have split and given rise to another, or a few other separate human beings...

In fact, there are plenty of cells within your body that given the opportunity might potentially give rise to another complete human being. The constraints of your prevailing biology prevent them from doing so - but perhaps in the future biotechnology will allow you to let these cells attain that potential. Just as the advanced biotechnological pieces of apparatus that we call human uteruses so successfully allow zygotes to do, already...

What is the end run that I mentioned in aid of? Many, many pregnancies (the majority occurring among teens and young women up to about age 24 or 25) occur in circumstances such that a woman must choose between a) an unimpeded ability to compete in a world which is not designed to cope with the fact that she can get pregnant, or b) going ahead with having a child which will constrain her life emotionally, intellectually, physically, financially, and spiritually to a significant and likely desperate degree.

That isn't the only consequence of unplanned parenthood. Children may be born into circumstances that just aren't ideal for themselves, never mind the biological parents. Parents in non-ideal conditions (whatever they may be) just aren't the best hands to be in if you are a child growing up in the world, even if the parents aren't bad people in any respect. If I am to bring a human being into the world myself, I'd far rather I felt I had things set for that event, than just tumbled into it casually.

I myself was brought up by my father, because my mother became an alcoholic when I was a toddler - and my dad is a nice person, but a completely crap parent in some important respects, I can say quite impartially. I obviously can't know how different I'd be brought up in a model happy family, and with hindsight, I don't really wish my entire existence away because the circumstances I grew up in weren't ideal - but with foresight, I can also say that I'd do things different if I'm going to make some kids myself. Just as my brother has done... Parenthood is difficult, complex, deeply rewarding and at times emotionally raw - I can say that as a doting AUNTIE and in watching my brother be a father. In fact, when he became a father of two, it did wonders for my broodiness - on two counts: The first - I could vent all that latent broodiness on the newborn; The second, I realised just how much hard work it all is, particularly as they both get bigger, and you have a toddler and a 5/6-year-old running around.

Parenthood isn't something I'd take lightly - and it is particularly due to my respect for real human beings, real children, that makes me think that way. Again, I'm not going to let a potential human in my uterus give rise to an actual human to be born into my current circumstances due to some cock-eyed view of the sanctity of the human genome.

That's a damned awkward position to be in. How do we bear it? So far, as I said, one trend seems to be a growing acceptance of the idea that a human embryo is not human and has no value as a human.

Like the placenta, yeah.

That'll do. The rest of your post follows from the same premise that I see as faulty: That the coding in the genome, and what it has the potential to give rise to, is what should engender respect for life - rather than what it actually amounts to, qualitatively, at the time of going to press - which may be on a par with pond-life.

Not in any particular order, as soon as I hear tell of a placenta--or anything else that is not a human embryo--developing into a sentient human being, I shall be glad to equate it with a human embryo. Of course, if you take a petri dish and manage to design an actual human being out of tissue other than a combination of sperm and egg as historically constituted by a man and a woman having sex together, guess what you've done? On the other hand, how likely is it that such a thing might happen by accident, I wonder? (There's a can of worms, eh?)

In a naturally occurring pregnancy, if it were possible to get to the sentient part of being human by skipping over the embryonic stage, I might consider that your argument holds water. But you can't get a human being without it. This tells me that there's something about that human embryo which is intrinsically human, and not solely in that it contains human DNA, even if it doesn't yet have a brain, etc., like its more fully developed brethren. Human beings don't live life a slice at a time, as if one moment can be separated from the next. We THINK that way, necessarily (at least so far), in that we model reality in order to make sense of things and create meaning, but that's not the reality.

Essentially what you're telling me is that I should not anthropomorphize a human embryo. Perhaps you can see the source of my confusion. It is true that we have organic, biological, genetic, etc., aspects to our existence. It is equally true that there's more to being human than just this, i.e., sentience, and which dynamic is always present, from conception on, or we wouldn't GET a sentient human being from a human embryo.

Unless of course something goes wrong. At which point, do you intend to argue that since a flawed human embryo is not likely to develop into a sentient human being, therefore it may be aborted, since its quality of life is threatened? So now suddenly the embryo does has some value in terms of sentience? Or at least in terms of how it's life might turn out later?

And how is it that my argument that a human embryo is, in fact, human, and should be regarded as such, serves to sanctify the human genome? I did already argue above that there IS a qualitative difference between a human embryo and that of other embryos or we wouldn't get humans from human embryos, sentience and all, but I don't recall making any remarks about sanctification. All I said was BE HONEST about what you're doing if you decide to have an abortion. It is you who have concern about sanctification. I already argued earlier that it is a very terrible thing to be in the position of having to chose your own life over the life of your child, and that this happens a lot in this world not as a result of "natural disaster," but as a result of choices we humans make, in which we do not consider the consequences of what we choose with strong understanding. When you make a choice, you are almost never making a choice just for yourself, but for others as well.

We live in a social, economic and political milieu such that the value of the existence of fully developed human beings is regarded as something that may be doled out based on a rather narrowly defined matrix of qualifications. And the basis for this doling out is NOT very often with regard to respect for human life at any age. This is called discrimination. In itself, not a bad thing, since human diversity is widespread, and we must discern diversity in order to figure out how to get along. But when there is suffering imposed for failing to meet that narrowly defined matrix of qualifications, then yes, I begin to whisper about "respect for human life." Respect for the diversity of human life, so that none are made to suffer for their differences from each other, i.e., women are "different" in that they can get pregnant. Currently, women are discriminated against for this. It is not taken into account. And many women, being isolated quite as a result of that discrimination, are faced with having to decide between the life of her child, and her own life--in terms of quality--because they do not have the resources to do battle with the whole of the rest of society. A society which refuses to admit it needs to cope with the fact that women can get pregnant, and that meeting the needs of a pregnant woman are within the purview of its responsibility, and which effectively dumps the burden for it on individual women to sink or swim. Swinging back around to the question of human embryos, the idea that a human embryo is NOT human and maybe aborted without any question of ethics serves to maintain discrimination against women and children, because it lets the air out of any outrage and resistance we might have as a result of being asked to make that kind of choice by rendering it into a false non-issue.

In too many cases, it is not the sanctity of the human genome that is in question. It is how we are already living our lives such that the question arises to begin with. What makes more sense? Change the way we live so that an otherwise healthy unplanned pregnancy does not threaten the life of the mother or the child, nor indeed the rest of the community (that's for you, Seraph), or go ahead and continue to construct circumstances in which it is okay to disregard human life?

[surreptitious57]

I use to believe that all abortion was wrong. I still do not believe in social abortions, but do think they should be granted in certain situations if required: rape, ectopic pregnancy or medical neccesity where the mothers life is in danger. I personally think that the dividing line should be at the point where a foetus has developed a central nervous system and can feel pain and is capable of consciousness.

[lordpasternack]

Thea, your whole, long-winded, flowery arguments are built on fallacious premises that could have been answered long before modern science. A human embryo has great potential, but it is, at the time of going to press, not any more special than other embryos. It has no intrinsic qualities observable at that time that mark it out - other than this "potential". And even the potential is due to nothing actually unusual or out of the ordinary, when you break it down. It's just a particular sequence of DNA, replicating, following quite precise instructions for how to form a complex organism, cell by cell, layer by layer, which genes to express for different cells, where to place particular cells - the same as the embryos of practically every other multicellular eukaryote on the planet.

The only thing that sets it apart is that it happens to carry the particular sets of guidelines for forming a human being. It doesn't make it more worthy of respect than the other embryos it is practically indistinguishable from. It doesn't make it a human being. What it could be doesn't change what it is.

Begging to infer otherwise really does come down to claiming that there's something just mystical about the chromosomes, and the particular rules of biochemistry that may form humans from zygotes. There's no other way to interpret it: you're looking to find something somehow mystical and sacred about the potential to become human (as opposed to another, similar, organism) - and on close examination, it just isn't present. No amount of wanting to believe it so will change the fact that the emperor isn't actually wearing any clothing. And there's nothing all that special about his potential to be wearing clothes in future, for that matter…

And read this blog-post on Pharyngula: http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2011 ... fies_w.php