"Therefore, Abortion Must Remain Legal"

[alwight]

I seem to be more concerned with the lives of extant persons rather than of potential ones than you are apparently. I also don’t require that others adhere to my thinking if they don’t want to, as you do.

:blabla:

You have no interest in extant people and their extant lives, they have no value against a potential person?

I’ve given you my reasoning based in actual evidence of the CNS but you seem to think that your assertions carry more weight for no apparent reason. Why should I change my thinking based on your beliefs and assertions?

No you haven't. At best you've argued for sticking with the current legal definitions, but have given no evidence these are correct.

I really don’t know how I can be clearer since you haven’t disputed the facts or that damage to the CNS corresponds in damage to the person. Clearly from a natural perspective and unspiritual POV anyway there really is no reason to think it could be otherwise imo, what specifically do you think is incorrect here, I presume you do?

I’ve already given you my reasoning for a “person” based on a reasonably functioning CNS and that DNA is not the “person” factor that you seem to think it is, while you otoh have nothing but bald assertion with which you seem to expect civil law to be founded on.

Your reasoning is faulty and unsupported.

Sorry LH but if you can’t explain why and how the person exists beyond the CNS then I see no reason to alter my thinking.

Why, when I have already done this many times? You simply won’t accept the physical evidence that a CNS is where the person exists and does not exist when it stops functioning. What evidence have you got that it is otherwise?

You have given no evidence that a person is as you define one, and therefore only present with a functioning CNS; or that the CNS is where "the person" resides.

Where else then, explain? I need to know in what other form of existence you think a person in this physical realm exists other than within a CNS. If it exists outside of the body altogether say, then how exactly does an abortion (a physical event) harm a “person”?
Why be so coy about where else you think the “person” is, or don’t you have any idea?

It’s a moral choice, and without evidence even either way then civil laws have no place imposing a particular morality on those who disagree.

With no evidence laws have no place erring on the side of caution?

Your brains are on display under a microscope, aren't they?

What about erring on the side of an extant woman rather than a potential person?
You seem to think here that my brains are indeed my “person” to which I agree, I rest my case.

I simply presented my understanding of the evidence and that my conclusions are based on it.

What evidence?

Do you need physical evidence of a CNS or what exactly? If you don’t dispute anything specific I’ve said about a CNS then how can you complain that there is no evidence?
Do you accept that the CNS exists in fact and functions at least as though the “person” is contained within it unless it stops? Do you require some kind of actual physical evidence of this? What exactly?

I’ll await any evidence from you of why or how a “person” could exist outside of a functioning CNS.

Personhood is not based on self-awareness, it is based on existence and life. If there exists a living human organism there exists a person.

Clearly I don’t think so, have you any evidence of this?

The law tries hard to consider the relevant facts when passing appropriate judgment while your dogma doesn’t.

The relevant fact is there is a living human being that doesn't deserve to be killed; in fact it deserves the opposite: a chance at life.

I don’t advocate killing any living human being unless living might be the worse option.

Red herring more like.

Tartar sauce for brains.

Brains in this case = my “person”, I rest my case again.

A potential person is has some value perhaps but I see no reason not to consider the whole specific situation and let the woman choose at least until a “person” might reasonably exist in the foetus.

So, kill 'em all? Because, hey, they're not people anyway...

Where have I heard similar arguments before?

You are entitled to your opinion too, but not to impose it on others.

I’d need to know the specific details first whether I would agree with what they do in each case. I may not agree sometimes, but it is the woman’s choice in the end afaic.

Is it the rapist's choice to victimize a woman?

I have no idea what a rapist’s choice has to do with anything here, but you would compel a woman to gestate the rapist’s zygote and give birth, I think that is inconsiderate of her needs and needlessly cruel to her.

I have offered you my reasoning based on at least some evidence, if you don’t like it that’s fine but imo you shouldn’t seek to impose your morality on those who may disagree.

I shouldn't seek to stop what I deeply believe to be the murder of the most innocent among us?

When it concerns other people than you, who honestly don’t accept your beliefs hold any water at all and who don’t want their own lives and future lives governed by your beliefs, then yes indeed.

As we’ve already discussed a unique DNA does not necessarily mean a unique person, a unique CNS seems to have that honour, and do you really think that most “persons” that have ever been have only existed for a few short hours and never get past the zygote stage? I don’t.

You haven't proven DNA unique from the mother's doesn't mean a unique person.

And so what if some, or many, don't survive through no fault of anyone else? Such is life. The issue at hand is the intentional taking of innocent life, i.e. murder.

I don’t have to, I already accept that every “person” is probably unique.
One minute you claim to care deeply for the “person” so cruelly deprived of life by abortion and then you say something like this, and apparently then don’t mind that iyo most zygote “person” are doomed to fail, well before I at least think an actual person actually could even exist, hypocrite!

If you simply want to wave your faith at me then perhaps you could be rather more honest here and not even try to bring in physical facts at all since you will probably never accept any I nor anyone else could offer should it contradict your beliefs. Instead you would need to convince me and others of your God’s existence and that your God’s morality is true and absolute, good luck with that btw.

Fool.

Godbot.

The same DNA does produce different "persons" (monozygotic twins).

We've been over this. I know for a fact I agreed.

Good so I don’t need to provide evidence of this then?

But again you simply don’t want to see even the rather clear evidence from a previously functioning CNS that a person existed in it and that when damaged or worse that person is also damaged or worse similarly. It should indicate something to you LH about when a CNS is yet to develop, but apparently it doesn’t perhaps because you don’t want it to.

I never said a person wasn't damaged when their CNS is. A person is damaged when any part of their body is damaged.

The issue is whether or not the person ceases to exist when that happens, or rather if they are yet to exist before there is a CNS to damage.

I don't see a brain dead person as no longer being a person.

Does a “person” get diminished by loss of body parts other than the CNS?
Anyway unlike you, yes I do think a brain dead previously living talking person has gone and no longer exists, anywhere else for that matter.

 

[Angel4Truth]

A quote from the summary:

In reviewing the neuroanatomical and physiological evidence in the fetus, it was apparent that connections from the periphery to the cortex are not intact before 24 weeks of gestation and, as most neuroscientists believe that the cortex is necessary for pain perception, it can be concluded that the fetus cannot experience pain in any sense prior to this gestation. After 24 weeks there is continuing development and elaboration of intracortical networks such that noxious stimuli in newborn preterm infants produce cortical responses. Such connections to the cortex are necessary for pain experience but not sufficient, as experience of external stimuli requires consciousness. Furthermore, there is increasing evidence that the fetus never experiences a state of true wakefulness in utero and is kept, by the presence of its chemical environment, in a continuous sleep-like unconsciousness or sedation. This state can suppress higher cortical activation in the presence of intrusive external stimuli. This observation highlights the important differences between fetal and neonatal life and the difficulties of extrapolating from observations made in newborn preterm infants to the fetus.
​

They "believe" and therefore have concluded... is not evidence. Fact, there is no way to know that.​

 

[gcthomas]

They "believe" and therefore have concluded... is not evidence. Fact, there is no way to know that.

It is no good treating a scientist's belief the same as a Christian's belief, even if it does make the dismissal easier.

The scientists have investigated the physiological development of foetuses over many years and by thousands of detailed pieces or research, actually looking at foetal tissue and determining the function of different structures. It is not an irrational 'belief', in fact not a 'belief' at all as you seem to mean it, but a rational determination from the consistency of the physical evidence. It cannot be dismissed as mere belief.

Go on, have a read of the linked document, if only to see why the medical profession will forever ignore the strident appeals of 'murderer'.

 

[Angel4Truth]

It is no good treating a scientist's belief the same as a Christian's belief, even if it does make the dismissal easier.

The scientists have investigated the physiological development of foetuses over many years and by thousands of detailed pieces or research, actually looking at foetal tissue and determining the function of different structures. It is not an irrational 'belief', in fact not a 'belief' at all as you seem to mean it, but a rational determination from the consistency of the physical evidence. It cannot be dismissed as mere belief.

Go on, have a read of the linked document, if only to see why the medical profession will forever ignore the strident appeals of 'murderer'.

"most" and "believe" arent scientific facts. Even an idiot knows if something says "most" agree on something means there are those who do not.

yes, the article you presented can be dismissed as there is no evidence of what it states, only that "most" (without saying who these "most" are) "believe" its so. They wouldnt "believe" it if it was a fact, and im using YOUR definition of believe, which youve said before for us is "blind faith" right?

You cant have it both ways.

 

[Stripe]

Go on, have a read of the linked document, if only to see why the medical profession will forever ignore the strident appeals of 'murderer'.

Because of your invented notion that without pain there can be no murder?

Nope, the arbitrary lines you draw do not make the taking of innocent human lives OK.

 

[WizardofOz]

Heartless? Only if the foetus is an organism capable of suffering, and there is no evidence to suggest that it is. No evidence, just a straightforward belief of yours that I find unconvincing.

Should it be legal to kill any organism not capable of suffering?

Why stick to the obvious personhood is being a person, self referential definition, and read onto the substantive ones?

"(Personality: ) the complex of characteristics that distinguishes an individual or a nation or group; especially : the totality of an individual's behavioral and emotional characteristics".
​

A foetus doesn't have much of that!

Neither does a 22-week-old fetus

 

[WizardofOz]

.....
2. ...no human-being (post or pre-born) has any right to another person's DNA, blood, organs, womb...etc. without explicit consent or due process.

Sure they do. Right at about 24 weeks +/-

 

[Alate_One]

A fetus is a fetus, at 1 week all the way up to birth. A fetus is a baby. Killing it is murder.

What a woman is pregnant with at one week, isn't a fetus.

In humans, the fetal stage of prenatal development starts at the beginning of the 11th week in gestational age, which is the 9th week after fertilization.

This isn't a fetus, it isn't a baby either. Claiming it is one over and over won't make it true.

Worse, it demeans actual babies, including the 32 week old you posted.

Human development

 

[Lighthouse]

You have no interest in extant people and their extant lives, they have no value against a potential person?

Lies in the form of questions? I thought you were better than this; I should have known better.

I really don’t know how I can be clearer since you haven’t disputed the facts or that damage to the CNS corresponds in damage to the person. Clearly from a natural perspective and unspiritual POV anyway there really is no reason to think it could be otherwise imo, what specifically do you think is incorrect here, I presume you do?

Damage to the CNS does not negate the person anymore than damage to the arm or liver, etc.

Sorry LH but if you can’t explain why and how the person exists beyond the CNS then I see no reason to alter my thinking.

Hypocrite.

Where else then, explain? I need to know in what other form of existence you think a person in this physical realm exists other than within a CNS. If it exists outside of the body altogether say, then how exactly does an abortion (a physical event) harm a “person”?
Why be so coy about where else you think the “person” is, or don’t you have any idea?

Of course it exists in the body.:dunce::duh:

What about erring on the side of an extant woman rather than a potential person?

How exactly would an abortion be erring on the side of the woman?

And what about the possible female in the womb?

You seem to think here that my brains are indeed my “person” to which I agree, I rest my case.

Not at all the implication of my comment.:doh:

Do you need physical evidence of a CNS or what exactly? If you don’t dispute anything specific I’ve said about a CNS then how can you complain that there is no evidence?

I dispute that the person exists solely within the CNS, and you've given no evidence that it does.

Do you accept that the CNS exists in fact and functions at least as though the “person” is contained within it unless it stops? Do you require some kind of actual physical evidence of this? What exactly?

Do I accept that CNS exist? Of course. Do I accept that their functioning is what makes a person? No. Their functioning is what makes the person able to interact, but that does not necessitate the person is contained within.

Clearly I don’t think so, have you any evidence of this?

You don't have any evidence against it, so why do you hold it so dear?

I don’t advocate killing any living human being unless living might be the worse option.

Liar.

Brains in this case = my “person”, I rest my case again.

No, they don't. But you're clearly not smart enough to get that, or the joke.

You are entitled to your opinion too, but not to impose it on others.

Were you dropped on your head as a child? Why are you so daft and stuborn?

I have no idea what a rapist’s choice has to do with anything here, but you would compel a woman to gestate the rapist’s zygote and give birth, I think that is inconsiderate of her needs and needlessly cruel to her.

You offer that it is a murderer's choice to commit murder, so I want to know how far you take that.

When it concerns other people than you, who honestly don’t accept your beliefs hold any water at all and who don’t want their own lives and future lives governed by your beliefs, then yes indeed.

An argument made by many a child molester.

I don’t have to, I already accept that every “person” is probably unique.

Probably?

One minute you claim to care deeply for the “person” so cruelly deprived of life by abortion and then you say something like this, and apparently then don’t mind that iyo most zygote “person” are doomed to fail, well before I at least think an actual person actually could even exist, hypocrite!

I feel the same way when the life of a born person ends. If it is natural then it is natural and I have no qualms about that. But I oppose murder, 100% of the time. The only difference is that those who are already born can be guilty of something deserving of execution, or die as a result of someone else defending themselves against them.

Godbot.

:yawn:

Good so I don’t need to provide evidence of this then?

Nope.

Does a “person” get diminished by loss of body parts other than the CNS?

The person is only ever diminished in death, not by the loss of any body part, or the loss of function of body parts.

Anyway unlike you, yes I do think a brain dead previously living talking person has gone and no longer exists, anywhere else for that matter.

And I believe they still exist, within their body. Can you prove to me otherwise?

 

[gcthomas]

Because of your invented notion that without pain there can be no murder?

You misread what I wrote. I say that you can't murder something that is not a person. A foetus that has not developed a nervous system capable of supporting the features of personhood cannot be a person. One feature which was brought up (not by me, I think) was pain, which is well studied and understood by biologists. NO foetus feels pain when aborted, guaranteed due to the general anaesthetic that is used, so the argument is not about the pain of the abortion, but whether the early foetus can be considered a person.

Nope, the arbitrary lines you draw do not make the taking of innocent human lives OK.

As opposed to the arbitrary line YOU draw? At least I have used some actual evidence to support my argument, whereas you just assert, again and again.

 

[Stripe]

A foetus that has not developed a nervous system capable of supporting the features of personhood cannot be a person.

Question begging nonsense.

As opposed to the arbitrary line YOU draw? At least I have used some actual evidence to support my argument, whereas you just assert, again and again.

Sorry. Yours is an arbitrary and vague line. There's no way to determine for certain when personhood starts with your assertion. You've a standard that you've no intention of enforcing and no compulsion to adhere to.

Conception, on the other hand, is the clear moment that a new human being is created. Before conception what we have are two parts, one from mother and one from father. After conception we do not have two parts. Instead what we have is a complete human being with everything he needs, bar nutrition and time to grow past the stage in life where he is most vulnerable to people like you determined to find any excuse to murder him.

 

[gcthomas]

Question begging nonsense.

Sorry. Yours is an arbitrary and vague line. There's no way to determine for certain when personhood starts with your assertion. You've a standard that you've no intention of enforcing and no compulsion to adhere to.

Conception, on the other hand, is the clear moment that a new human being is created. Before conception what we have are two parts, one from mother and one from father. After conception we do not have two parts. Instead what we have is a complete human being with everything he needs, bar nutrition and time to grow past the stage in life where he is most vulnerable to people like you determined to find any excuse to murder him.

Simplistic nonsense.

The only thing going for the 'at conception' line is it is easy to judge. Just because YOU don't understand what goes on in a foetus during development doesn't mean it is too hard for ANYONE to understand.

I understand that a foetus can the capability of becoming a person, but capability to become something is not a common standard for deciding what is or isn't a think.

Does your capability of becoming a future murderer make you a murderer, for example? You have everything you need, it just takes time to get worked up enough to do the deed. Are you a murderer before you have murdered someone? Yes, a foetus has the instruction set to build itself a body, a brain, a personality. But is an instruction set and not yet a person. It is a 'future person' at most, with most not making it to that stage.

If I want a summer house in the garden I can buy instructions, and later collect the materials to build one, or I can buy a summer house. The instructions and the completed house are not the same thing.

Your decision has only simplicity going for it. It is simplistic, however, and does not take into account any developments in knowledge gained in the last five thousand years. Taking the easiest route is not taking the best one.

 

[Stripe]

The instructions and the completed house are not the same thing.

The baby and the "plans" for the adult that will one day be are the same thing.

So you've clearly not any ability to rightly judge what is going on. Yet you remain determined to justify killing unborn children and determined to continue any argument to hide from that fact.

 

[Desert Reign]

The argument about does a fetus (of any stage of development) feel pain can't be correct. Otherwise it would be right to kill people randomly after injecting them with painkillers. They are alive after all and that is the issue.

I'm not one for making rules because we shouldn't live by rules but by the Spirit. I can envisage possibilities where I would countenance abortion but in general it comes down to the fact that a fetus doesn't have a say in its future. The Bible exhorts us in numerous places to protect the rights of the oppressed, the weak, the orphans, the disabled, the widows, etc. I see no reason why fetuses shouldn't be in that same category of deserving protection. That's just the sort of thing God does and which we as Christians should engage in.

 

[gcthomas]

The argument about does a fetus (of any stage of development) feel pain can't be correct. Otherwise it would be right to kill people randomly after injecting them with painkillers.

Agreed, and that is what I tried to say above. The pain issue is related though. If an organism is not conscious, has never been conscious, does not and never has experienced any sensation or feeling or thought, how can it be thought of as a person?

I agree that foetuses should have some respect for their potential to become people, but that does not necessarily mean that they should have full human rights.

Most Christian groups that I know of feel the same way that you do, but the secular state has decided on the basis of medical evidence. If you want to change the law, then you need to advance secular arguments.

 

[Desert Reign]

Agreed, and that is what I tried to say above. The pain issue is related though. If an organism is not conscious, has never been conscious, does not and never has experienced any sensation or feeling or thought, how can it be thought of as a person?

I agree that foetuses should have some respect for their potential to become people, but that does not necessarily mean that they should have full human rights.

Most Christian groups that I know of feel the same way that you do, but the secular state has decided on the basis of medical evidence. If you want to change the law, then you need to advance secular arguments.

Thanks for your comments.

However, I wasn't thinking in terms of human rights. Only about responsibilties. Rights are very nebulous things and a lot of the discussion here testifies to that. I mean, rights should surely speak for themselves. If you have to have endless discussions to decide whether an unborn person has rights at 15 weeks or 22 (or whatever) then clearly you are asking the wrong question altogether. I regard it as a Christian responsibility, a Christian ethic if you like, to protect the weak and helpless, even to help those who aren't rich enough to have rights of their own or who don't have enough people to decide that they are worth anything.

So I'm really sorry but the more anyone tries to tell me that fetuses don't have rights, the more the ethic to protect kicks in.

I guess that is not really germane to the thread, which is a political question. But whatever the law states, it isn't going to stop Christians from standing up for unborn people. Obviously, it is better to get the age of the unborn person down as low as possible but as I previously said, I can still imagine possibilities where abortion would be necessary so you don't want to entirely eliminate the possibility.

 

[alwight]

You have no interest in extant people and their extant lives, they have no value against a potential person?

Lies in the form of questions? I thought you were better than this; I should have known better.

A question is a lie, really? Clearly you haven’t shown as much, if any, actual consideration toward an extant, perhaps raped, female person as you show for a zygote lacking a CNS, with more than an even chance of failing quite naturally and apparently un-mourned by you if it does.

I really don’t know how I can be clearer since you haven’t disputed the facts or that damage to the CNS corresponds in damage to the person. Clearly from a natural perspective and unspiritual POV anyway there really is no reason to think it could be otherwise imo, what specifically do you think is incorrect here, I presume you do?

Damage to the CNS does not negate the person anymore than damage to the arm or liver, etc.

Then your “person” must be a strange kind of honorary title given to something abstract or ethereal. My “person” however is an actual entity who can communicate and react to others, often with original thoughts and ideas, a personality.
When my kind of “person” is permanently diminished or impaired say by disease or physical damage then afaic so is the person. Your notion of a “person” may be more spiritual, mystical and precious than mine, but ultimately imo unfounded in fact and evidence which is rather more the point to me.

Sorry LH but if you can’t explain why and how the person exists beyond the CNS then I see no reason to alter my thinking.

Hypocrite.

:liberals:

Where else then, explain? I need to know in what other form of existence you think a person in this physical realm exists other than within a CNS. If it exists outside of the body altogether say, then how exactly does an abortion (a physical event) harm a “person”?
Why be so coy about where else you think the “person” is, or don’t you have any idea?

Of course it exists in the body .:dunce::duh:.

Does your “person” still exist if the body was cut in half, quartered, diced or atomised? When exactly does your person no longer exist in that flesh? Does it continue existing elsewhere without a body? If so why would abortion matter so much?

What about erring on the side of an extant woman rather than a potential person?

How exactly would an abortion be erring on the side of the woman?

I can’t believe you haven’t actually tried to think it through from the woman’s pov, she wants to choose what is best for her situation, or perhaps the least worse, and for her longer term future.

And what about the possible female in the womb?

A lot would depend on all the relevant factors, would I regard it as a “person” with a detectable gender or as just another potential person?

You seem to think here that my brains are indeed my “person” to which I agree, I rest my case.

Not at all the implication of my comment.:duh:

Yes of course I knew that LH, but nevertheless you chose to insult my person (me) by insulting my brains (CNS) not my elbow. I suspect that you know very well where my own “person” exists and yet you call me hypocrite and liar because you don’t want to admit it. When my CNS no longer functions there will be nothing left of me to insult as I see it. When your CNS stops I rather doubt that you too will still be arguing the toss somewhere else or telling me you told me so as I drop into hell.

Do you need physical evidence of a CNS or what exactly? If you don’t dispute anything specific I’ve said about a CNS then how can you complain that there is no evidence?

I dispute that the person exists solely within the CNS, and you've given no evidence that it does.

Then you do agree that the CNS seems to be at least one place that the “person” exists in then, as implied by your word “solely”, good. I otoh have no knowledge or evidence that there are any other places, but no I can’t prove a negative or that Narnia doesn’t exist either. Unlike you I presume that no other place exists until evidence makes me think otherwise.

Do you accept that the CNS exists in fact and functions at least as though the “person” is contained within it unless it stops? Do you require some kind of actual physical evidence of this? What exactly?

Do I accept that CNS exist? Of course. Do I accept that their functioning is what makes a person? No. Their functioning is what makes the person able to interact, but that does not necessitate the person is contained within.

What evidence is there that what you say is true actually is true or do you still want me to prove that your particular “Narnia” doesn’t exist?
You perhaps think that the CNS is merely the transceiver or a relay point from where the “person” really is? That’s very interesting, got any evidence for this? :think:
Why would being aborted in this life be so terrible then?

Clearly I don’t think so, have you any evidence of this?

You don't have any evidence against it, so why do you hold it so dear?

As above disproving negatives is not my field of excellence LH.

I don’t advocate killing any living human being unless living might be the worse option.

Liar.

Why would you think I do want to kill anyone?

Brains in this case = my “person”, I rest my case again.

No, they don't. But you're clearly not smart enough to get that, or the joke.

You fell into a trap of your own making LH. :chuckle:
http://idioms.thefreedictionary.com/hoist+with+own+petard

You are entitled to your opinion too, but not to impose it on others.

Were you dropped on your head as a child? Why are you so daft and stuborn?

No argument here then just ad hominems and insult? tsk tsk.

I have no idea what a rapist’s choice has to do with anything here, but you would compel a woman to gestate the rapist’s zygote and give birth, I think that is inconsiderate of her needs and needlessly cruel to her.

You offer that it is a murderer's choice to commit murder, so I want to know how far you take that.

I see no murder here.

When it concerns other people than you, who honestly don’t accept your beliefs hold any water at all and who don’t want their own lives and future lives governed by your beliefs, then yes indeed.

An argument made by many a child molester.

I wouldn’t really know, so what, I’m not a child molester?
Why must your beliefs govern the lives of others LH?

I don’t have to, I already accept that every “person” is probably unique.

Probably?

Yes indeed since I can’t prove that Narnia doesn’t exist either, I have no evidence, but nevertheless it probably doesn’t exist imo seems a reasonable belief. I also can’t know if a duplicate person has never occurred, maybe it has for all I know, but I presume not until evidence suggests otherwise.

One minute you claim to care deeply for the “person” so cruelly deprived of life by abortion and then you say something like this, and apparently then don’t mind that iyo most zygote “person” are doomed to fail, well before I at least think an actual person actually could even exist, hypocrite!

I feel the same way when the life of a born person ends. If it is natural then it is natural and I have no qualms about that. But I oppose murder, 100% of the time. The only difference is that those who are already born can be guilty of something deserving of execution, or die as a result of someone else defending themselves against them.

But then why is murder so terrible for you since the person still exists in another place iyo surely? It’s perhaps much more terrible for me because I don’t believe as you do apparently and yet you seem to think that murder is what I crave for some reason.

Godbot.

:yawn:

:sherlock:

Good so I don’t need to provide evidence of this then?

Nope.

Does a “person” get diminished by loss of body parts other than the CNS?

The person is only ever diminished in death, not by the loss of any body part, or the loss of function of body parts.

I’m not convinced btw LH, got any evidence of in-death diminishment?

Anyway unlike you, yes I do think a brain dead previously living talking person has gone and no longer exists, anywhere else for that matter.

And I believe they still exist, within their body. Can you prove to me otherwise?

No, can you prove a rotting corpse still contains a person?
Where exactly is this “person” anyway since you claim that the CNS is simply a kind of relay or transceiver to the “person” or perhaps even the “soul”?

 

[Lighthouse]

A question is a lie, really?

False accusations are... false.:dunce::duh:

Clearly you haven’t shown as much, if any, actual consideration toward an extant, perhaps raped, female person as you show for a zygote lacking a CNS, with more than an even chance of failing quite naturally and apparently un-mourned by you if it does.

We're not talking about rape victims; we're talking about murdered babies.

And I don't mourn the aborted; I only mourn the loss of those I knew, just as anyone else.

Then your “person” must be a strange kind of honorary title given to something abstract or ethereal. My “person” however is an actual entity who can communicate and react to others, often with original thoughts and ideas, a personality.

I assign a physical being the title of person, nothing else.

Of course, I can't expect you to be present of mind enough to catch on to things I've explicitly stated several times.

When my kind of “person” is permanently diminished or impaired say by disease or physical damage then afaic so is the person. Your notion of a “person” may be more spiritual, mystical and precious than mine, but ultimately imo unfounded in fact and evidence which is rather more the point to me.

Person does not equate to personhood, necessarily. While a person may be damaged, diminished, or impaired their personhood is not; not until death. And my notion of person is purely physical.

:liberals:

Of course.

Does your “person” still exist if the body was cut in half, quartered, diced or atomised? When exactly does your person no longer exist in that flesh? Does it continue existing elsewhere without a body? If so why would abortion matter so much?

You actually missed my previous comments stating that a person is no longer such at the moment of death? Good gravy, you're stupid.

I can’t believe you haven’t actually tried to think it through from the woman’s pov, she wants to choose what is best for her situation, or perhaps the least worse, and for her longer term future.

I can't believe you're stupid enough to make the assumption I haven't done exactly that. Killing someone else who is no threat to you is never the best for anyone's situation.:nono:

A lot would depend on all the relevant factors, would I regard it as a “person” with a detectable gender or as just another potential person?

Coward.

Yes of course I knew that LH, but nevertheless you chose to insult my person (me) by insulting my brains (CNS) not my elbow.

I don't know what your face looks like.

I suspect that you know very well where my own “person” exists and yet you call me hypocrite and liar because you don’t want to admit it.

:kookoo:

When my CNS no longer functions there will be nothing left of me to insult as I see it. When your CNS stops I rather doubt that you too will still be arguing the toss somewhere else or telling me you told me so as I drop into hell.

And?

Then you do agree that the CNS seems to be at least one place that the “person” exists in then, as implied by your word “solely”, good. I otoh have no knowledge or evidence that there are any other places, but no I can’t prove a negative or that Narnia doesn’t exist either. Unlike you I presume that no other place exists until evidence makes me think otherwise.

The whole is the sum of its parts; or possibly greater. Within the living human body the person is, for lack of a better term, omnipresent.

As for the cop out of "I can't prove a negative," I expected that typical dodge.

What evidence is there that what you say is true actually is true or do you still want me to prove that your particular “Narnia” doesn’t exist?

Prove your own argument correct.

You perhaps think that the CNS is merely the transceiver or a relay point from where the “person” really is? That’s very interesting, got any evidence for this? :think:

Is that good exercise: jumping to conclusions?

Why would being aborted in this life be so terrible then?

Murder is murder, whether or not the victim is aware.

As above disproving negatives is not my field of excellence LH.

Translation::granite:

Why would you think I do want to kill anyone?

You're pro-choice.

You fell into a trap of your own making LH. :chuckle:
http://idioms.thefreedictionary.com/hoist+with+own+petard

lain:

How so?

No argument here then just ad hominems and insult? tsk tsk.

Now you know just how worthless I truly think you are.

I see no murder here.

Lasik?

I wouldn’t really know, so what, I’m not a child molester?

:doh:

Why must your beliefs govern the lives of others LH?

Should the beliefs of pedophiles govern their lives, or should the beliefs of those who don't want harm to come to children be the governing force in this regard?

Yes indeed since I can’t prove that Narnia doesn’t exist either, I have no evidence, but nevertheless it probably doesn’t exist imo seems a reasonable belief. I also can’t know if a duplicate person has never occurred, maybe it has for all I know, but I presume not until evidence suggests otherwise.

So now you're arguing that the abstract "person" could be something other than unique? You're contradicting yourself, and you probably have no idea how.

But then why is murder so terrible for you since the person still exists in another place iyo surely?

:doh:

That is perhaps the stupidest question you have asked thus far.

It’s perhaps much more terrible for me because I don’t believe as you do apparently and yet you seem to think that murder is what I crave for some reason.

You don't oppose it.

I’m not convinced btw LH, got any evidence of in-death diminishment?

So now you don't believe the end of the functioning of the CNS is the end of the person?:liberals: Make up your mind.

Also, death is more than diminishing.

No, can you prove a rotting corpse still contains a person?

Why? I don't believe it does.

Where exactly is this “person” anyway since you claim that the CNS is simply a kind of relay or transceiver to the “person” or perhaps even the “soul”?

That's not a claim I ever made.

 

[alwight]

False accusations are... false.:dunce::duh:

We're not talking about rape victims; we're talking about murdered babies.

And I don't mourn the aborted; I only mourn the loss of those I knew, just as anyone else.

I assign a physical being the title of person, nothing else.

Of course, I can't expect you to be present of mind enough to catch on to things I've explicitly stated several times.

Person does not equate to personhood, necessarily. While a person may be damaged, diminished, or impaired their personhood is not; not until death. And my notion of person is purely physical.

Of course.

You actually missed my previous comments stating that a person is no longer such at the moment of death? Good gravy, you're stupid.

I can't believe you're stupid enough to make the assumption I haven't done exactly that. Killing someone else who is no threat to you is never the best for anyone's situation.:nono:

Coward.

I don't know what your face looks like.

:kookoo:

And?

The whole is the sum of its parts; or possibly greater. Within the living human body the person is, for lack of a better term, omnipresent.

As for the cop out of "I can't prove a negative," I expected that typical dodge.

Prove your own argument correct.

Is that good exercise: jumping to conclusions?

Murder is murder, whether or not the victim is aware.

Translation::granite:

You're pro-choice.

lain:

How so?

Now you know just how worthless I truly think you are.

Lasik?

:doh:

Should the beliefs of pedophiles govern their lives, or should the beliefs of those who don't want harm to come to children be the governing force in this regard?

So now you're arguing that the abstract "person" could be something other than unique? You're contradicting yourself, and you probably have no idea how.

:doh:

That is perhaps the stupidest question you have asked thus far.

You don't oppose it.

So now you don't believe the end of the functioning of the CNS is the end of the person?:liberals: Make up your mind.

Also, death is more than diminishing.

Why? I don't believe it does.

That's not a claim I ever made.

My one and only ban here on TOL was when I called you a blithering idiot LH so I'll not repeat it now.

As much as I enjoy conversing with you LH, no really I do , there's nothing at all sensible or rational from you here (or anywhere else?)for me to comment on, so maybe another time perhaps. :wave:

 

[StanJ53]

What are your rationalizations? How do you justify legal abortion? If you're pro-choice, let me know why!

What would it take to change your mind?

WHAT is legal abortion in your country?