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8th amendment referendum part 3 - Mod note and FAQ in post #1
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nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »Awww cool is that a thing now
That's nice. Also nice that you have decided to talk about me rather than with me as the thread has gone on. Because that is always a mature and polite move to make isn't it?
This is my first post on this thread. I've read about 1% of it in total. It just seems to me that you have bandied a particular argument around that is catching. I sought to address that.nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »Medical facts give you the data required to make that decision though. Science and morality and ethics are not as separable as people make them out to be. After all morality and ethics is in the business of valuing the results of our actions. While science is in the business of telling us what the results of our actions are. Therefore one has to inform the other.
We seem to be in agreement here. Not sure if you're objecting to anything. My point seems to stand. I argued that the original poster had used certain information to make a value judgement about the unborn and I even said that was fine. I was just pointing out that it was their judgement and not some sort of self-evident truism as the language ("a foetus of less that 12 weeks cannot be considered as valuable as the life of an actual born person") seems to imply.nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »What rights have we NOT to? The very concept of valuing anything lies in sentience. Without it the universe would not only have nothing to do the valuing, but no concept of what value even is. If it is not us deciding what to value, then what the hell can? Unless you want to go the route of inventing a god, without any substantiation as so many have done in the past, then the process of value and valuation starts and ends with us.
I don't believe we have a right to value one form of human life over another nor do I think we have the capability quite frankly. The basis of devaluing the life of the unborn is to appeal to its lack of x,y, or z. I think that is a flawed and morally wrong approach to the issue. A foetus might need to be aborted for many reasons, none of which require this kind of sophistry.
Perhaps, you feel comfortable making these kinds of value judgements on human life. I do not.nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »I did not describe it as a blue print. I suggested an analogy between the two. The great thing about analogies, which you may not have noted, is that they do not have to map two things together 1:1 and many differences can exist between them and the analogy can still hold.
The point of the analogy was merely to make explicit the difference between a human being, and the process that produces that human being. And affording the latter the rights and concerns we afford the former is a judgement error.
Yes I understand the concept. Analogies have to be sufficiently similar to merit the analogy. My point is that your analogy is not sufficiently similar with the prominent differences outweighing the similarity you are pointing out. You're saying it's not a human, it's a plan for a human. I'm saying it's not a plan for a human, it's a proto-human. A blueprint is not a proto-house. Hence, your analogy is poor.nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »Firstly I do not think that it is that unique or remarkable really.
I don't think self-building blueprints exist so yes, if one did exist, it would be quite unique and indeed remarkable.nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »ALL life appears to do it pretty much. Which makes it far from unique. Yet somehow it only confers values in your mind in the case of humans? The common house fly does it too, yet somehow it is not conferring the house fly with the same level of relevance or value in the minds of the masses. I think we both know why.
Ah you're not talking about self-building blueprints anymore, you're talking about self-replicating life. I think it's quite remarkable in all lifeforms actually. And is unique to life itself. But we're not talking about repealing an amendment on animal or insect abortion rights so I'm not sure there's much point going into it. As a human species we value human life above other life. That's fine. My point is not as to appropriateness of that but that appropriateness of valuing one human life over another. That is unjust in my opinion and I don't believe I, or anyone else, is in a position to do it (at least not in a manner that should be enshrined in law - it may be necessary and practical to make an urgent judgement in emergency situations which indeed is what a woman may have to do when pregnant)nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »Secondly however you are value projecting when you say I am using it as an argument to "lessen the value of something". What I mean by that is you are taking something which is valuable (I think the process by which life produces itself by such processes is very wonderful, valuable, precious and amazing) and placing that value on the wrong location. The value of that process is on life as a whole. I do not think it lends value to any one individual in that set however.
So I am not using the argument to lessen the value of any individual life, so much as I am pointing out it is an error to place the value at that locus in the first place.
I'm not sure I fully follow this but I think I disagree. I believe you use this language to dehumanise the foetus. Or, if you don't intend to, that is still the result. Of course, if you don't see the early unborn as human then that is probably fine with you.nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »It is possible I have, but I think I more often use the phrase "Barely differentiated collection of cells" which is somewhat more accurate. A phrase which I think pre-empts some, or even all, of your "we're all just bunches of cells." concerns?
I don't know, I'm not a scientist. My point is that you can describe something as "just x" or "just y" and make it sound thoroughly unimportant. It's just sophistry though. We're all "just something".nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »And as I said above I think the exact opposite. We have no right NOT to do this. Because it appears no one and nothing else is going to do it for us. And it is simply an error of moral and ethical philosophy NOT to be explicit about what we value and why we value it, and construct arguments to that effect.
Yes and I value all human life. I don't break it down anymore than that and nor do I think we can or should.nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »That is a false analogy however in all the ways my blue print analogy is not. Because here you are equivocating between the value of two instances of human sentience. Do not get me wrong that ALSO is a conversation worth having. And there are interesting intellectual and philosophical discussions that come from it. For example most people seemingly would save a young child of 8 from a burning building than a 25 year old. I likely would too. But if you sit down and have that discussion at a philosophical level it turns out the opposite is actually easier to defend morally.
But the reason the analogy fails HERE is when aborting a fetus at 16 weeks we are not equivocating between two sentient agents. But between agents that are sentient and agents that are not, never have been, and are a distinct period of time away from ever being.
So by all means equivocate between children and adults and which sentience is more valuable. It is a discussion we DO have despite you claiming we do not. But do not lose sight of the fact that abortion is generally a discussion with only ONE sentient agent involved, not two. So there is no analogy to be drawn between them.
No, I reject your use of sentience as the be all and end all of determining the value of human life. I don't equivocate between the sentience of the child and the adult because I don't see it as a worthwhile distinction. That is my whole point. You can use that as your criteria all you like. It doesn't mean the rest of us have to.nozzferrahhtoo wrote: »There is a MASSIVE difference between devaluing X, and suggesting the value you are assigning to X was not warranted in the first place. I am doing the latter.
There's not really.0 -
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