Abortion: What is the measure of a human?

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Bump. Although this thread is auxiliary to the abortion one, and I can't change the title anymore, discussion about the meaning of humanity without an abortion agenda could be welcome.

All indicating a potential to think once the brain mass is sufficient, which it is NOT at 22 weeks.

In fact a new born human infant at full term birth has one third the brain mass necessary to be a human -person-

However after birth the brain grows very rapidly so the infant becomes a person in a few months.

ruveyn

Okay. Let's say I'm a fetus. There are three ways this can go.

1) I am given up for adoption, which can be an utter crapshoot, depending on the type of people who take you in.
2) Abortion. End of the line.
3) I get raised in an abusive/unloving biological home.

It doesn't matter which of these three events occur. All three are going to suck.

It's not a real argument. Everyone knows life technically begins at conception. So any arguments over abortion on the ends of the whole debate of "what is life" or whatever is pointless.

It's just a new way for the old practice of infanticide. We clean it up and sterilize it, but in the end we're just leaving unwanted babies out in the woods to die like in the olden days, except the woods are garbage dumps.

Just like we pay people in sweatshops $1 an hour and make them work 12 hour days so we can get cool clothes, and not call it slavery, this is our way of doing infanticide without calling it infanticide.

Any arguments about abortion from the perspective of "oh is it life or not" are completely delusional.

I would tend to define a "human being" simply as a complete and whole member of the species Homo sapiens. So, as soon as the sperm meets the egg, that's a human being.

However, that doesn't matter to me when it comes to the abortion debate, because I don't believe that "being a human being" gives you special treatment. To me, the wrongness of killing something is all about how conscious the thing is, not about what species it is. So for example, I think it is worse to kill an adult chimpanzee than a one-day-old human foetus.

From this perspective, it is quite difficult to come up with a "logical" place to draw the line when it comes to when it should no longer be allowed to kill a young human. Like a million other things in life, it's a difficult issue with no easy answer. We just have to draw the line somewhere and occasionally have debates about whether we should slightly move the line. Like the age of consent.

Personally, my answer would be "at birth". It's not for any good reason, it just seems like a nice symbolic place to draw the line. It marks the moment at which the baby becomes less of a biological burden on the mother (although of course the baby might quickly become a burden in other ways). But there might be special circumstances which would justify killing the baby after birth. For example, there might be a genetic defect in the baby which can only be detected after birth.

I believe it's "human" at the time of conception.

I still have no problem with abortion, though.

There are plenty of instances where my society has no problem killing something that's "human." I just happen to think that the state of being a fetus is just another instance where it's acceptable to kill something that's "human."

You can't believe it's or it's not human.

You can define 'human' and according to this definition it will or it won't be human at the time of conception. 'Human' is a fuzzy concept and not everybody defines it in the same way. But defining it is not a matter of believing, because there's nothing to believe.

Gotta disagree with you. So I think that a fetus is a human being, but still I think that abortion must be accepted up to a certain view, simply because a grown up person has to accept things she cant influence.

Can I influence abortion? I can try to make legal abortion fobidden, then people will have illegal abortions, as it is proofen by centuries of history, and by that country where abortion is still forbidden. So if I cant change it, as a grown up person, I have to accept the things I cannot change.

At least you can try to reduce number of abortion by better family politics, information about contraceptiva and the correct use of them, ... Additional in my country, people that want to abort need to bring proof that they had an about 2-hour information discussion, so they dont get preached about not to abort, but get informations about what official funds or family helpers exist to support as examples young mothers, that are still in school and so on. To show them, that there would be some support, so they werent completly alone if they wanted to raise a kid.

I am not into religion, so killing is for me a crime, because it hurts people and the free will of people, and because it hurts relatives when you take someone they love. If a fetus doesnt have a free will, nerves, or relatives that know about him, then its not really murder for me, but I think its simply very sad.

But out of this view, I wondered a bit, that it seems to be legal in some countries to have abortion up to the fifth month? O_o So in my country, there is not much discussion about it, not everyone is happy but its simply accepted the way it is, but if there are no medical causes, you are only allowed to do abortion until the 10th week, so that the fetus is hasnt developed a working brain/nerves. While at the fifth month, some of that kids are even able to live with medical help, so they normally grow bigger, but the physical/technical development is pretty far.

I simply wonder, why it needs to be allowed until the fifth month, when it is in my eyes already an human, able to feel pain? 10 weeks are two menstruations, are 56 days to do pregnancy tests. I mean the comparison might be awful, but for me its simply like with an animal: If you have to kill it, at least try to reduce the amount of pain an animal has. So why the hell wait until fifth month? O_o I think it must be awful for doctors too, because until 10th week its a bulb of cells with some nibbles. A 5th month fetus simply is a small baby, and I think it must be horrible for doctors.

So if you want to abort, then abort, and dont fly into holidays, or whatever needs five months? O_o

The first time I was pregnant by the time I manged to get over my fear of doctors enough to go to one it was past 20 weeks and too late.

The second time between realizing I might be pregnant and waiting around for appointments I think I was 12 to 14 weeks.

People don't always know right away and can't always get to a doctor right away.

Sorry, I dont wanna blame someone, if its because of officials so complicated. Around here, until 10th week nobody asks. You simply go to an hospital, offering that service, normally that guys for the 2 hours information talk have their office right in the same building, you pay the money and as long as its in the 10th week limit (so they do a check before, and dont argue around if the cell bulb maybe already is 1 week more or whatever), nobody asks. So without any preperation, it can be done in an afternoon. If you want, you can go right afterwards, depending on your status, or if you are willing to pay you can as well stay for another night. If its medical necessary, then the stay (not the abortion) is anyway payed by health insurance. Normally young women simply say, that they visit capital city for theater/party/shopping/whatever, with a friend of them and sleep there, and instead they go doing that abortion, and if there was no complications, they are already back home the next day and "feel today a little bad/ill" to limit contacts/vistors.

I am sorry, if you felt blamed by me. I was simply used that abortion is simply a matter of half an day without preparation (Hospital - money - stamp about information talk - abortion), so it was hard for me to understand, why people waited that long. Sorry about that.

Last edited by Schneekugel on 30 Jul 2013, 5:05 am, edited 1 time in total.

When I went the first time I went was for a pregnancy test. Then I can't remember if I had a separate appointment for a pelvic exam and the start of the abortion or those were done in the same appointment. They put something in the cervix to start to slowly dilate it and I had to go back the next day.

Some people don't know they are pregnant right away or are scared or depending on where you live you might have a slower health care system.

You forget to mention other options.

4) You are raised in a loving biological home.

While that may happen it's less likely to if the mother was considering abortion, depending on the reason why they wanted one. If they just never wanted a kid in the first place the home is unlikely to be very loving.

I think everyone accepts that an embryo is technically alive. It's just that most people do not think all life has the same value. For example, I am sure you would willingly kill bacteria by washing your hand with disinfectant or pouring bleach down your toilet or similar. Most people in the west will willingly eat meat, which came from killing a cow or pig or chicken. Some people won't eat pigs, but will eat fish. A few people won't eat fish, but will eat insects. Many people who would eat cow would refuse to eat chimpanzee or dolphin (though of course that is not always the case outside of the west).

So, the question is whether an embryo is more like a bacterium, an insect, a fish, a cow, a chimpanzee, or an adult human? I think that using any sensible objective measure, it is closer to a fish or an insect or even a bacterium than it is to a chimpanzee.

But who gives a f**k about life?

I don't go to jail for killing bacteria. They are unique cell-sized lives, the same as a zyg.

We have whole industries based on killing animals that are far more advanced and able to feel harm than an early fetus.

And yet, I do.