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OD:
In no way can you justify making a law about abortion based on "God".  
Absolute authority in law deals not with god, but with human reason and morality. God does not belong in the law.

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1. Britain is still notionally a Christian country with an established church. Our laws are, though filtered through many centuries of alternative philosophy, still ultimately based in Christian ethics.

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And? Is England then the moral superior to any other nation, simply because it's laws are based on some man's perception of what god wants?
It seems incredibly arrogant that one religion knows what god wants. It seems to me that the most fair way of discerning and creating laws is to create an objective moral code based on HUMAN reason, not on the codes written by a select few who, for some reason, were chosen to be spoken to by God.

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2. The law is not and never has been or will be an absolute authority. It is a social/civil authority, subject to time and place, subject to the personalities involved in politics in any given time and place and the general volkgeist and zeitgeist.

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Agreed, and so the law should display that. The law should be as fluid as the times it is in. There was once a time when stoning people to death was the objective moral law as dictated by God. I am very glad to see that human reason has chosen to blaspheme in that respect.

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3. If there is any objective truth in the world, then that truth IS God.

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Ha! Yes, and which god might that be? Of course it MUST be the christian god, eh?
Arrogant, that is what I call those who believe that religion has any place in state.

Post edited at 12:06 pm on Jan. 7, 2009 by Event Horizon

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Life is pleasant. Death is peaceful.It's the transition
that's troublesome.   --Isaac Asimov

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And? Is England then the moral superior to any other nation, simply because it's laws are based on some man's perception of what god wants?
It seems incredibly arrogant that one religion knows what god wants. It seems to me that the most fair way of discerning and creating laws is to create an objective moral code based on HUMAN reason, not on the codes written by a select few who, for some reason, were chosen to be spoken to by God.

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Agreed, and so the law should display that. The law should be as fluid as the times it is in. There was once a time when stoning people to death was the objective moral law as dictated by God. I am very glad to see that human reason has chosen to blaspheme in that respect.

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Ha! Yes, and which god might that be? Of course it MUST be the christian god, eh?

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Arrogant, that is what I call those who believe that religion has any place in state.

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Human reason is as fallible as religion.  

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How so? If our morals change it is not because we were wrong, it is because that is how we had developed. That was the level to which we had evolved --even intellectually-- it is what suited us at the time.

Religion IS a form of human reason. It is simply mass produced human reason. It is a form of reason and ethical code that had been developed long ago by man to explain things and help THEIR culture survive to what they saw as right. To think that THEY are more ethically sound than us by creating this "god" is silly, we are simply different cultures.  

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Stoning people to death was never law in the UK.

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Oh jolly good. Get off it please. Besides, I'm sure the early Saxons did a bit of stoning in the days they were running about Great Britain and Scotland.  

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no, but thats a different argument.  

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Rationalism and empiricism are as presumptuous as religion.

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Is that a joke? The presumptions involved in rationalism and empiricism can in no way be regarded as equals with those of religion. Religion is founded on the pure faith of something of which is, in essence, not there [barring of course the more eastern religions which are more philosophical than deistic.] All the rest of religion is mystical stories and poems/songs about either the people who taught the code of ethics inherent in the beliefs, or of someone who followed them.

Post edited at 12:55 pm on Jan. 7, 2009 by Event Horizon

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Life is pleasant. Death is peaceful.It's the transition
that's troublesome.   --Isaac Asimov

Why? Apparently you haven't looked at the evidence, Mediocre. Brain waves are detected 6-8 weeks into the pregnancy (Source) and do not have normal "Alpha" brain waves until they are over 5 years old (source). Saying that, how can you possibly state that just-born infants have a will and fetuses don't?

The real argument about abortion is not whether abortion is right or wrong--it is about whether a fetus is a human. If it is a real human, it would obviously be a crime to kill it, but if it is not, it would not be a crime. So, is that fetus a human? What really is a human? A rational being? Fetuses can't make descisions. Neither can old people. But crimes against old people (e.g. euthenasia (SP?)) are punished. Why?

A human is destined to become a human at the moment of conception. Before conception, the woman's egg will go through a natural process to die, and so will unused sperm. But once once an egg is fertilized, the woman's body changes to protect the fetus, to ensure that it will have the baby. It's purpose is to develop into a human. After 6-8 weeks, it will have brain waves, like humans. It will be able to think.

So you say abortion is just. But what do you say about late-term abortion? In some places, it is still legal to abort the baby (scramble its brains) just before delivery, when the baby could be taken out and could survive. (Note: no baby can survive on its own, so don't use the argument that the fetus is dependant on the mother). Obviously, this is wrong. So, I ask you, at what point should abortion not be okay? Once it is born? Or an arbitrary date in late-term pregnancy? Or conception? If you choose an arbitrary date, it is arbitrary. It has absolutely no basis just "okay, I think it's about time not to have an abortion." If it's at birth, it's obviously wrong to abort a baby right before birth if it could live. So when? The only time left is at conception.

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I once heard the voice of God.
It said "Vrrrrmmmmm." Unless it was just a lawn mower.

The simple point is that:
a) if the fetus cannot survive outside the womb, then it is still part of the mother.
b) you cannot kill that which has not been born

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Life is pleasant. Death is peaceful.It's the transition
that's troublesome.   --Isaac Asimov

b) Does being born necessitate life? Asexual bacteria divide--they are not born. So you are saying they are not alive. Your statement should have been: "You cannot kill that which is not alive." Human fetuses are alive.

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I once heard the voice of God.
It said "Vrrrrmmmmm." Unless it was just a lawn mower.

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a) Then if a person cannot live outside of a life support system, then it is part of the life support system? That is simply not true.

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no, however it is that person --or that person's legal guardian's-- decision as to whether he/she will pull the plug. Since the fetus cannot make ANY decisions or even know what decisions are for that matter, the mother is the absolute decision maker. Just as if a man was on life support and could not think --a vegetable if you will-- his legal guardian would be responsible for both his life and his death.

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b) Does being born necessitate life? Asexual bacteria divide--they are not born. So you are saying they are not alive. Your statement should have been: "You cannot kill that which is not alive." Human fetuses are alive.

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They certainly have the potential to live. However, potential for life is not quite life. Having a random useless coagulation of neurons and some beginnings of muscles does not mean that one is alive.

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Life is pleasant. Death is peaceful.It's the transition
that's troublesome.   --Isaac Asimov

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...

Rationalism and empiricism are as presumptuous as religion.

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I tend to agree with your arguments but I think that's a bit of a stretch.

Post edited at 10:54 am on Jan. 8, 2009 by biflexible

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Quote: from osmoticdespair at 8:36 pm on Jan. 7, 2009

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Rationalism and empiricism are as presumptuous as religion.

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I tend to agree with your arguments but I think that's a bit of a stretch.

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Quote: from biflexible at 6:54 pm on Jan. 8, 2009

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Quote: from osmoticdespair at 8:36 pm on Jan. 7, 2009

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...  

 Rationalism and empiricism are as presumptuous as religion.

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 I tend to agree with your arguments but I think that's a bit of a stretch.

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I should have qualified it, in terms of their capacity to determine the morality/justice/value or otherwise of an action.

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I disagree wholly on that point. Perhaps if you were arguing from some annoying metaphysical or existential standpoint you'd have had something, but religion is far from equal to rationalism when it comes to judging morality.
Where rationality examines the society and the people as a whole so as to institute moral laws that reflect the people, religious moral laws cling to ancient codes and the words of "prophets".
I am not saying that religions have bad moral codes, or that religious groups are out to turn the world evil. I'm just saying that when it comes to a system of laws governing ALL people, it would be ridiculous to choose the moral codes of one religion as the basis for law making.
Indeed, it would be ridiculous to choose the codes of ANY religion --save perhaps buddhism which doesn't preach from a deity-- as superior to a set developed rationally and empirically.

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Life is pleasant. Death is peaceful.It's the transition
that's troublesome.   --Isaac Asimov

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a) no, however it is that person --or that person's legal guardian's-- decision as to whether he/she will pull the plug. Since the fetus cannot make ANY decisions or even know what decisions are for that matter, the mother is the absolute decision maker. Just as if a man was on life support and could not think --a vegetable if you will-- his legal guardian would be responsible for both his life and his death.

b) They certainly have the potential to live. However, potential for life is not quite life. Having a random useless coagulation of neurons and some beginnings of muscles does not mean that one is alive.

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a) So you still haven't answered the question of when abortion should be stopped. It is obviously wrong to abort a baby when it can survive outside the mother on its own, but hasn't been born yet (which is legal in many places). So do you propose an arbirary date in the pregnancy to determine when abortion should be stopped? Or do you propose stopping abortion altogether (i.e. from the moment of conception)?

b) So you're saying that a "useless coagulation of neurons and some beginnings of muscles" is not alive? Let me remind you of the definition of life...

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Homeostasis: Regulation of the internal environment to maintain a constant state; for example, electrolyte concentration or sweating to reduce temperature.

Organization: Being composed of one or more cells, which are the basic units of life.

Metabolism: Consumption of energy by converting chemicals and energy into cellular components (anabolism) and decomposing organic matter (catabolism). Living things require energy to maintain internal organization (homeostasis) and to produce the other phenomena associated with life.

Growth: Maintenance of a higher rate of synthesis than catabolism. A growing organism increases in size in all of its parts, rather than simply accumulating matter. The particular species begins to multiply and expand as the evolution continues to flourish.

Adaptation: The ability to change over a period of time in response to the environment. This ability is fundamental to the process of evolution and is determined by the organism's heredity as well as the composition of metabolized substances, and external factors present.

Response to stimuli: A response can take many forms, from the contraction of a unicellular organism to external chemicals, to complex reactions involving all the senses of higher animals. A response is often expressed by motion, for example, the leaves of a plant turning toward the sun (phototropism) and chemotaxis.

Reproduction: The ability to produce new organisms. Reproduction can be the division of one cell to form two new cells. Usually the term is applied to the production of a new individual (either asexually, from a single parent organism, or sexually, from at least two differing parent organisms), although strictly speaking it also describes the production of new cells in the process of growth.

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A human fetus fulfills all this criteria.

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I once heard the voice of God.
It said "Vrrrrmmmmm." Unless it was just a lawn mower.

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I disagree wholly on that point. Perhaps if you were arguing from some annoying metaphysical or existential standpoint you'd have had something, but religion is far from equal to rationalism when it comes to judging morality.
Where rationality examines the society and the people as a whole so as to institute moral laws that reflect the people, religious moral laws cling to ancient codes and the words of "prophets".
I am not saying that religions have bad moral codes, or that religious groups are out to turn the world evil. I'm just saying that when it comes to a system of laws governing ALL people, it would be ridiculous to choose the moral codes of one religion as the basis for law making.
Indeed, it would be ridiculous to choose the codes of ANY religion --save perhaps buddhism which doesn't preach from a deity-- as superior to a set developed rationally and empirically.

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Reason can be used to determine a moral system if one takes preexisting and unreasonable values and applies reason to the world with those values in mind. It cannot create or determine such values.

Post edited at 12:12 am on Jan. 9, 2009 by osmoticdespair

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Κύριε ἐλέησον

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a) So you still haven't answered the question of when abortion should be stopped. It is obviously wrong to abort a baby when it can survive outside the mother on its own, but hasn't been born yet (which is legal in many places). So do you propose an arbirary date in the pregnancy to determine when abortion should be stopped? Or do you propose stopping abortion altogether (i.e. from the moment of conception)?

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I'm for abortions within the first trimester. I believe --and science/biology support it-- that at that point the fetus is not developed enough to be considered an alive, separate, individual. After the first trimester I have a hard time keeping that idea; I am personally for up till the second trimester if the woman truly wants one, but I can't justify it for use as a law.
Thus, I stick with prior to the second trimester.

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A human fetus fulfills all this criteria.

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So does a patch of my skin or muscle.


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Life is pleasant. Death is peaceful.It's the transition
that's troublesome.   --Isaac Asimov