So, ATS, Pro-Life or Pro-Choice?

Originally posted by Gorman91
reply to post by Brood

 

That's not intelligence. That's fecal matter.

It's neither, it's a METAPHOR.

All things have the 100% potential to die, so under your logic all things might as well be put to death.

I'm arguing that potential has absolutely nothing to do with current identity. You could not be more wrong here. If a fuzzy caterpillar (which can have poisonous bites, symbolizing the complications that come with pergnancy and children that could ruin the mother's/other children's lives) lands on your hand, do you not fling it off as quickly as possible? Now, if it were a monarch butterfly, what would your reaction be? Potential does not define an identity.

We are dealing with specifics. if things that have the potential to become intelligent don't have the right to exist, than murder is a-o-k up to age 5.

Education =/= Intelligence; there is a huge difference between knowledge and intelligence. Newborns are extremely intelligent in their innocence, and I believe they are more mature about it than many of us adults; sad but true. If someone presents an idea to a child that they can prove (with the standard a=b, b=c, therefore a=c argument diagram) the child accepts it as fact because they realize that the people who are telling it to them are more experienced with the subject; many adults argue against facts like these regularly. If someone does not prove it to children, they are hesitant, but still at least somewhat believe them because they are more experienced and educated on the subject, many adults argue against facts like these that they do not have a chance of fully understanding, and in that fear of misunderstanding, create opposing "opinions" that are arguing against facts. Unfortunately us adults like to mangle our preconceptions and ignorance to form ideas against people who otherwise know that they are telling full truths, we simply don't want to believe them because us, as adults, don't want to be educated because somehow it affects our ego; we don't want to learn, we just want to be right. In this way, children, in all their innocence, are much more intelligent than many of us adults.

Fourteen pages, I think the verdict is in. The ATS majority seem to support abortion rights, although a tenacious minority remains rather strong too. Nice debate, interesting things have been said on each side.

Actually, I don't always see much point in assigning too much value to "personal" perspectives. Oh, it's nice to feel this way, or that I suppose, and it's good to have convictions of course. Obviously, personal experience plays a powerful part in the things we come to believe in.

But, what about a bird's eye view here? Not to derail the "vote" / debate, but after all this voting, after all these strong opinions, what does this issue do "to" or "for" society? Seems like some posts have just barely touched on this so far. Or, maybe we could ask, what has abortion done so far, since it became widely legal?

Would this "macro" perspective change anything? Would the perceived value that individuals assign to abortion (for better or worse), could that perceived value be influenced by learning of various benefits and / or costs to humanity as a whole, due to present abortion practices?

I don't know, I'd sort of like to hear from a "sociologist" finally, since the armchair psychologists, philosophers, biologists and theologians have already been heard.

JR

Originally posted by JR MacBeth


But, what about a bird's eye view here? Not to derail the "vote" / debate, but after all this voting, after all these strong opinions, what does this issue do "to" or "for" society? Seems like some posts have just barely touched on this so far. Or, maybe we could ask, what has abortion done so far, since it became widely legal?




I don't know, I'd sort of like to hear from a "sociologist" finally, since the armchair psychologists, philosophers, biologists and theologians have already been heard.

JR

The abortion industry in this country has claimed 80,000,000 lives so far.
4,500 per day.
1 out of every 66 deaths in the WORLD is an American abortion.

►1 out of every 4 deaths in America is an American Abortion.

►Half of the deaths in the world are from abortions.

►Abortion is the leading cause of death in the world. It kills as many people as ALL of the other causes of death combined.

►We have lost more Americans through abortions (64 times more) than we did in all of our wars (12 wars) combined.

64 TIMES

►The world kills more people through abortion than all of the deaths in the America combined. (22 times as many)

22 TIMES

►The D-Day invasion of France (WWII) was the bloodiest in history. There were 53,714 allied soldiers killed in the "Battle of Normandy." Yet, our world kills more people than that in just 9 hours through abortions.

9 HOURS

►America has lost 589 soldiers in its first year of fighting in the Iraq War. The world, however, kills more people than that in just 6 minutes through abortions.

6 MINUTES

Now, do you still think abortion is just a small problem that can be ignored?
www.wickedshepherds.com...




Please pray to end abortion.

reply to post by Maslo


Higher functions? The intelligence is barely noticeable. You are talking about something that has as much brain power as a common mammal. You are still arguing on the potential of those brain cells to organize and become consciousness. And that is dependent upon the first cell continuing to differentiate.

I prefer psychological definition of consciousness. See above. Even the one you have me earlier is good:

Psychology is in itself a homo-centralist subjective topic because it only deals with the ideal human adult brain, not the chances of many other things.

Crows certainly do not display abstract thought. They have no artistic ability. They don't even have the part of the brain that we have to make us intelligent. And yet they are as smart as apes.

I think you really have to rethink the homo-centralist viewpoint of what is worthy and not. It's dangerously subjective. Not objective.

By this definition, the separation line between conscious and uncoscious system is located between biological and philosophical definitions separation lines (uder philosophical, above biological) - single celled organisms like bacteria colonies, or simple vegetative multicellular organisms (embryo) are uncoscious, whereas higher organisms with sufficiently advanced neural networks (or analogous structures, eventually) to meet the above points are conscious (higher animals, fetuses with brain waves in telencephalon, babies, humans..).

Again, homo-centralist.What defines intelligence? The human adult brain? Are we the be all and end all? Like I said, there are species with more neurons that have less intelligence than us. Under Physiology they deserve more rights for more brain function.

You simply cannot deal in this matter with a human adult at the top of the pyramid. You can't just say "It knows it is going to die, so it should have a protected life". That's subjective.

He clearly worries about his software primarily, as do all geth. Thats why he is trying to beam out. He would not be trying to beam out if the software was not important. Hardware is just another material resource for geth, its the information encoded in their neural networks that defines geth. Just like the information encoded in human neural networks is what defines sentient human being, and our bodies, cells, genome is nothing more than potentialy replaceable hardware.

It's just the same with a human with faith in an afterlife. They value the soul more yes, but in terms of the physical tangible world, the primary concern is the hardware. The soul is just taped on.

Consciousness can be replicated just like a scanner. it's digital. it's software. Hardware cannot. it has to be constructed. It has to be perfect. It requires the right alignment of trillions of cells.

To argue what you are arguing is to bring in religion and belief of the soul. This is not objective. This is subjective. You can call it consciousness but it is just the same argument with the soul. You simply put the date it happens differently.

When traumatic brain injury occurs and a person't consciousness restarts itself. We don't care about the consciousness anymore. We care about the flesh. keeping it hardware so that the new consciousness can get back into the world.


Consciousness, soul, physiology and the lot are all subjective sciences and beliefs. They are not objective facts. The objective fact is that a human is defined by their genes, not their consciousness. That starts at conception. If the consciousness is lost, we start over. Maybe we mourn a little, but not nearly as much as when physical death occurs.

Originally posted by Truth_Hz
reply to post by snowen20

 

In a loving relationship yes..

but what about those conceived in violent relationships, rapes, accidental pregnancies.

Not every pregnancy is planned...

As I have stated in another thread, abortion should not be advocated as a replacement to contraception but circumstances dictate necessity.

Hence I am Pro-choice

My stance is similar. There are circumstances such as life threatening scenarios, rape that I place in such circumstances. I am pro-life personally but I don't think anyone has a right to tell another person what they can do or not do with there own bodies either. It's a difficult situation to pin down for me. It really depends on the circumstances as I noted.

reply to post by Brood


Metaphor? I just see oranges and apples.

I'm arguing that potential has absolutely nothing to do with current identity. You could not be more wrong here. If a fuzzy caterpillar (which can have poisonous bites, symbolizing the complications that come with pergnancy and children that could ruin the mother's/other children's lives) lands on your hand, do you not fling it off as quickly as possible? Now, if it were a monarch butterfly, what would your reaction be? Potential does not define an identity.

I would look at it actually. Then flick it off. But we are not talking about Caterpillar or insects that can never be as smart as humans, we are talking about humans. Not to mention your example is pretty much related to rape. If you had sex on your choice, your example would effectively be taking the Caterpillar and putting it there yourself. You face the consequences of that choice. If it landed on you, is that not rape? However, in terms of abortion, most of the time it is not landing there. It is placed there by the person.

Education =/= Intelligence; there is a huge difference between knowledge and intelligence. Newborns are extremely intelligent in their innocence, and I believe they are more mature about it than many of us adults; sad but true. If someone presents an idea to a child that they can prove (with the standard a=b, b=c, therefore a=c argument diagram) the child accepts it as fact because they realize that the people who are telling it to them are more experienced with the subject; many adults argue against facts like these regularly. If someone does not prove it to children, they are hesitant, but still at least somewhat believe them because they are more experienced and educated on the subject, many adults argue against facts like these that they do not have a chance of fully understanding, and in that fear of misunderstanding, create opposing "opinions" that are arguing against facts. Unfortunately us adults like to mangle our preconceptions and ignorance to form ideas against people who otherwise know that they are telling full truths, we simply don't want to believe them because us, as adults, don't want to be educated because somehow it affects our ego; we don't want to learn, we just want to be right. In this way, children, in all their innocence, are much more intelligent than many of us adults.

Yea, no. Babies are retarded. Quite literally. See the difference between retarded and uneducated is that an uneducated person can learn, a retarded person cannot. A child is incapable of knowing certain things up to a certain age. IE, babies are retarded.

Originally posted by snowen20
reply to post by Truth_Hz

 

Often times I have seen those who have aborted feel a great deal of regret that follows them for life, this is not the sign of a murderer.

No. It's not. A murderer becomes a murderer when they take a life. The signs and emotions mean nothing. The act of killing is what makes one a murderer.

On one hand, I can see where bringing another hungry, unwanted mouth into this messed up world would be pointless and on some level wrong. Yet oddly enough, i believe that every human life has the right to a go at living. And I believe that a baby at more then 3-4 months is alive inside of the womb and therefore entitled to a right to life.

I believe that abortion should be legal, but only under a strict set of circumstances, such as rape, incest, severe deformity or chronic retardation. These are legitimate reasons for undertaking an abortion.

Being irresponsible, sleeping around and getting pregnant, even if unplanned and unwanted, does not warrant the taking of a human life. Sorry, but if you can lay down and make a baby then you need to bring it to term, and if nothing else release it up for adoption so that it may have the chance at life that you as the mother are not willing to provide for it.

Otherwise it is murder. Straight up. You choose to kill your own baby because it is an inconvenience for you and the state should force you to be steralized for life.

There are 38,564,000 abortions in the world so far this year.
Because you are reading this your mom choose life.
Was she correct?

American Deaths (each cross represents 5,000 American deaths or fraction thereof) (1) (2)

A visual comparison of the number of American deaths attributed to war vs. to abortion (as of 11-8-05)

American Revolution (25,324)
+++++

War of 1812 (2,260)
+

Mexican War (13,283)
+++

Civil War (498,332 Union, 364,821 Confederacy = 863,153 total)
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
+++++++++++

Spanish-American War (2,446)
+

World War I (116,516)
++++++++++++++++++++++++

World War II (405,399)
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Korean War (54,246)
+++++++++++

Vietnam War (56,244)
++++++++++++

Panama Invasion (23)
+

1991 Gulf War (148)
+

2003 Iraq War (2,000+)
+

Legal Abortion 1973-present (45,951,133+ & counting)
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reply to post by slugger9787


Your graphic representation just falls back into the old "when does life begin" argument and you can't resolve that with a bunch of + symbols.

Oh and you seem to have broken the Internet. Congratulations.

reply to post by Hefficide


guess i broke the internet then sorry.
you could not count that high in fifty years.

yup its broke allright.
the mods will delete this picture of reality soon enough though

reply to post by slugger9787


That is quite an unprovoked, unkind, and irrational statement. I do have the ability to comprehend numbers, regardless of how large they might be.

I am also intelligent enough to realize that you don't win a debate by resorting to insults, you do so by presenting a cogent argument and facts.

In other words, you could have simply stated the numbers and given the reader credit for being able to comprehend them.

reply to post by Hefficide


not everyone is as intelligent as you and me on ats.
so for the benefit of the doubt......
so okay you thin skinned sensitive feelings easily hurt, you could probably count that high in fifty one years, ok satisfied.

And your the one being irrational
I poste a comment that said you cannot count that high in fifty years, and because you were the first toread it you got your feelings hurt.

It was a general comment that you distorted to a specific instance (yourself) and then feighned feelings hurt back onto the general population.

reply to post by Gorman91

Higher functions? The intelligence is barely noticeable. You are talking about something that has as much brain power as a common mammal.

So what? The consciousness is there, and needs to be protected. Yes, I believe that we should also protect some higher mammals too, (even all when we have the means):

en.wikipedia.org...
(this project is the opposite of human-centric line of thinking, as you can see, I am not human-centric at all)

You are still arguing on the potential of those brain cells to organize and become consciousness. And that is dependent upon the first cell continuing to differentiate.

Nope, I am not arguing potential. I think we can kill embryos before third month, even though they have potential to develop into conscious lifeform and ultimately adult human being. Potential is not important.

Psychology is in itself a homo-centralist subjective topic because it only deals with the ideal human adult brain, not the chances of many other things.

Psychology is not exclusively homo-centralist, and does not focus on adult human brain only.

en.wikipedia.org...
en.wikipedia.org...

Crows certainly do not display abstract thought. They have no artistic ability. They don't even have the part of the brain that we have to make us intelligent. And yet they are as smart as apes.

And thats why we have laws to protect them, animal abuse is a crime. They are conscious, and that is enough.

I think you really have to rethink the homo-centralist viewpoint of what is worthy and not. It's dangerously subjective. Not objective.

I dont see why you call me homo-centralist, I am surely not.

Again, homo-centralist.What defines intelligence? The human adult brain? Are we the be all and end all? Like I said, there are species with more neurons that have less intelligence than us. Under Physiology they deserve more rights for more brain function.

Intelligence is not very important, otherwise most of human population would not have much rights.. Consciousness is important. Consciousness (even intelligence ) comes from interconnections between neurons, not from the number of neurons. But like I said, we should give some rights to animals with minds developed enough.
My definition of consciousness is the LEAST homo-central from all. Philosophical definition (requirement of higher, human-like intelligence) is more homo-centric, because my definition requires ANY consciousness, not necessarily human or higher-intelligent. Biological definition is obviously homo-central, because you argue that embryo cells have rights because of HUMAN genes in them, but the same cells, in terms of consciousness and intelligence, differing only in the lack of human genes (microorganism colonies) suddenly do not have similar rights.

It's just the same with a human with faith in an afterlife. They value the soul more yes, but in terms of the physical tangible world, the primary concern is the hardware. The soul is just taped on.

"The soul", or consciousness is tangible and physical. It is created by neural network in brain. It is also the primary concern of medicine. Human death is defined as brain death (absence of brain waves – consciousness death. Some lower autonomous functions and reflexes may still be present). Why not human birth?

When traumatic brain injury occurs and a person't consciousness restarts itself. We don't care about the consciousness anymore. We care about the flesh. keeping it hardware so that the new consciousness can get back into the world.

No, we care about consciousness primarily, the hardware is there just to support the consciousness. When human consciousness ends, the body often works on - for example during brain death. If there is no chance for consciousness to recover, we proclaim the person to be dead and bury now usseles hardware, even though it could live on life support indefinitely.

en.wikipedia.org...

Consciousness, soul, physiology and the lot are all subjective sciences and beliefs. They are not objective facts. The objective fact is that a human is defined by their genes, not their consciousness. That starts at conception. If the consciousness is lost, we start over. Maybe we mourn a little, but not nearly as much as when physical death occurs.

Psychology, physiology, neurology are objective sciences, and can be used to determine when consciousness begins.

Human genes are not why we protect human beings. You are homo-centralist now. What about aliens or AIs? They would have different genes, or no genes. They would not be protected under your definition.

Human at conception is nothing more than a bunch of cells. When you kill a fly or a bug, you have done worse deed than when you kill this bunch of cells.

If you want to protect this bunch of cells, why dont we protect all eukaryotic microorganisms and colonies? Because some string of chemicals (genome) is ordered differently in those than in human cells? That is racism..

reply to post by Gorman91

Yea, no. Babies are retarded. Quite literally. See the difference between retarded and uneducated is that an uneducated person can learn, a retarded person cannot. A child is incapable of knowing certain things up to a certain age. IE, babies are retarded.

Retarded people have rights, because they are conscious. Intelligence level does not matter, only presence (or absence of) consciousness.

reply to post by slugger9787

...do you still think abortion is just a small problem that can be ignored?

Thanks slugger, guess you were the only one who thought my idea of looking at a bigger picture was worthwhile!

I see your other posts, the one that shut down the internet, to me that's someone who is trying to show a bigger picture, from your perspective, and I respect that.

Then there is the other perspective. Obviously you believe that the many millions abortion has claimed is a huge problem the world faces. Others, like Brood and others, for example, I notice have posted some things that seem to take the very opposite position, in spite of the huge numbers involved.

Brood brought up the economic issue again some posts ago. I wonder how many others think about the issue in a similar way. "30 million less mouths to feed" (not a direct quote), but the point was that "if" these millions were here today, what would that mean?

Perhaps the philosophers and theologians will reject the notion outright, but considering the severe economic situation the world faces today, maybe it's not such a bad idea to bring up the issue, in that context. Sure, it would end up appealing to a more or less utilitarian approach, but when considering a bigger picture, this is often the real world case.

I'm not saying the economy is more important than lives, I'm not even saying I agree with the assertion that "less is better", perhaps it could be the other way around. But, I do think sometimes it's not such a bad idea to take a big step back from the in-your-face emotionalism that always seems to dominate these debates.

What is the "bigger picture", from a societal viewpoint, or even better (if we were to speculate), how will "history" eventually judge this chapter that we are presently going through?

JR

Brood brought up the economic issue again some posts ago. I wonder how many others think about the issue in a similar way. "30 million less mouths to feed" (not a direct quote), but the point was that "if" these millions were here today, what would that mean?

There are two epidemics in America today.

1. Addiction disease: Alcohol, drugs, sex money and FOOD.
2. Abortion.

30 million less mouths to feed, so the select 60 million overweight can continue to have more of their excessive share.

Sure, 30 million less mouths to feed, and do not talk to me about that with your mouth full.

Thirty million new pairs of shoes to make and sell.
Thirty million bictcles, school, employed teachers, and eventually taxpayers to pay for health care.

And if you follow closley, the APA is getting ready to eliminate one of their personality disorders. NPD.
Narcissistic Personality Disorder, whose primary symptom is LACK OF EMPATHY.

I believe in the unenviable position of For the mothers but against the unborn.

Thank you.

reply to post by slugger9787

Thirty million bictcles, school, employed teachers, and eventually taxpayers to pay for health care.

Why do you think that aborted children would pay more to the system than they would take? Given that they were aborted, their parents clearly thought that they would be unable (or unwanting) to take care of them properly. Therefore its more likely that there would be more asocials and unsuccessfull people among them than population average. So i the end, they would likely take more from the health care and social benefits system than would they pay into.