Abortion - why not?

azezil

All this talk of abortion, taking a life and so forth but what about ‘the pill’. The pill is does the same thing only at an earlier stage. So why then is taking ‘the pill’ acceptable when aborting the fetus at a later stage is not?

WHEN DOES LIFE BEGIN?
* In 1981 (April 23-24) a Senate Judiciary Subcommittee held hearings on the very question before us here: When does human life begin? Appearing to speak on behalf of the scientific community was a group of internationally-known geneticists and biologists who had the same story to tell, namely, that human life begins at conception - and they told their story with a profound absence of opposing testimony.
Dr. Micheline M. Mathews-Roth, Harvard medical School, gave confirming testimony, supported by references from over 20 embryology and other medical textbooks that human life began at conception.
* "Father of Modern Genetics" Dr. Jerome Lejeune told the lawmakers: "To accept the fact that after fertilization has taken place a new human has come into being is no longer a matter of taste or opinion ... it is plain experimental evidence."
* Dr. Hymie Gordon, Chairman, Department of Genetics at the Mayo Clinic, added: "By all the criteria of modern molecular biology, life is present from the moment of conception."
* Dr. McCarthy de Mere, medical doctor and law professor, University of Tennessee, testified: "The exact moment of the beginning of personhood and of the human body is at the moment of conception."
* Dr. Alfred Bongiovanni, University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, concluded, "I am no more prepared to say that these early stages represent an incomplete human being than I would be to say that the child prior to the dramatic effects of puberty ... is not a human being."
* Dr. Richard V. Jaynes: "To say that the beginning of human life cannot be determined scientifically is utterly ridiculous."
* Dr. Landrum Shettles, sometimes called the "Father of In Vitro Fertilization" notes, "Conception confers life and makes that life one of a kind." And on the Supreme Court ruling _Roe v. Wade_, "To deny a truth [about when life begins] should not be made a basis for legalizing abortion."
* Professor Eugene Diamond: "...either the justices were fed a backwoods biology or they were pretending ignorance about a scientific certainty."

So if we take these testimonials as fact, life begins at the moment of fertilization. So by taking ‘the pill’ you’re taking of a life. We take the lives of countless species all the time without a second thought so why should this be any different? Because it’s a human child? A sentient being? But it’s not sentient at that time, it is in fact nothing more than a pile of cells.

So now if we can agree that taking the life of an unborn child is acceptable at what age does it become unacceptable, and why? Because if becomes sentient? Well when does that happen and how can you know?

PHB

A child is born, to me, when conception occurs. The pill "tricks" the womans body into not realeasing the eggs needed for conception to occur. Therefore the pills is just the same as Condoms.

Unless your talking about the morning after pill?

Xterminator

I assume you are talking about the morning after pill.

This prevents the fertilised egg from attaching itself to the womb, resulting in the egg being flushed out of the system.

(Note this phenomom happens regularly, in nature.)

Also the IUD or Coil works on the same principal. (preventing a fetilsed egg from attaching).

I would like to hear the arguments of those who seek to outlaw such methods of contraception.
Particurlarly the Coil, as it is a chemical free long term solution to preventing unwanted pregnancy, something which those who seek to reduce the no's of those seeking abortion should inherantly support.

X

ykt0di9url7bc3

i wish we could take the Germans stand point on abortion.....

Its available to everyone but once you apply for the procedure, you are given intense pro-life and anti abortion counsiling.
only after the counsiling can still go through with it.

I believe in a lot of things and other people may believe whatever they want to, but to have every choice and still be shown every side is probably the definition of an educated democratic society

Lemming

I agree with SearraD

Having such a level of counselling before you decide to go through with such a serious decision is a very good idea. At the very least it would allow professionals the ability to try and gauge how serious a situation the mother is in (mentally speaking).

bonkey

Or the Swiss approach, where you are given a psychiatric evaluation, where you have to justify *why* you want an abortion, and they make the decision as to whether or not your reasoning is honest and valid.

As a side-note however, I would point out that while the quoted article mentioned there was a "profound absence of opposing testimony", it is clearly not giving the full story. No scientist who argues that life begins at conception could possibly be in favour of research involving fertilised eggs, but they lobbied in favour of it, agreeing on a 2-week deadline as an ethical "safe point", which would clearly be refuting the concept of "human at conception".

I'm sure the pro-choice lobby can also pick and choose experts and studies which show other findings, and I would also point out that the stufy in question dates from 20 years ago - you will probably find a shift in thinking has occurred since then.

The point is that even if we are not sure, we have strong arguments showing that it is *probably* correct to consider it as human life from conception, which then raises the question as to whether or not we should legislate on that basis or not. At the moment, pro-choice does not appear to err on the side of caution, but rather on the side of convenience. It is my own opinion that this is a very dangerous manner to legislate!!!

What truly galls me is that many respects the "natural process" of conception has less protection under the law than similar lab-work. Should the Bush aministration carry forward their plans for bans/restrictions on stem-cell research and its ilk, it will truly become a situation where the lab offers more legal protection than the womb - that life will be classified differently depending on the manner and location of conception. Is it just me, or is this truly hypocritical?

jc

shaw

That psychiatric evaluation method seems like a good solution.

Bob the Unlucky Octopus

From a scientific point of view, it's about definitions, plain and simple. All those experts who testified used the standard that fertilization is equivalent to the creation of an organism. However, using the same argument, I could claim that both sperms and eggs (especially eggs) are a dormant form of human life, same as an embryo. Why the moment of fertilization seems to dog a medical mind is beyond me quite frankly. Several obstetricians I've spoken to all agree that roughly at the 6-week stage, the embryo assumes characteristics that are more or less human. Prior to that stage, there is practically no difference in the morphologies of human, whale, snake, avian or even crustacean embryos. They all have similar patterns of development - hence evolution.

From a purely ethical standpoint, there are few reasons why (for example) a woman who's been raped has no right to an abortion. The argument that God willed it to happen is plain lunacy to my ears. Most classical monotheistic religions encourage in sections of holy text- infanticide, selling one's children into slavery and killing them to release them from sin. To turn around and form a vague, faith-based argument centered around a personal and selfish moral objection is unsupportable. If a rational and calculated choice is made by an individual, then why not? It's unbelievably selfish to force one's moral convictions on others, however distasteful the thought is. Empathy is a reciprocal emotion, that purely ethical standpoint holds no water with someone rationally pursuing the choice of abortion.

From a scientific standpoint, it can be argued either way. As I said though, it's a slippery slope defining life at the moment of conception, it conveniently waxes over the fact that very often, a mother's own immune system is very likely to abort the fetus as part of a natural primary immune response. If abortion is 'murder', then shouldn't the mother be charged when this happens? After all, even insane cases are confined after a crime if they had no control over their actions... To legislate in this area is as bonkey says, extremely dangerous. Here's another thought...if a fetus is lost in a miscarriage or forced to be aborted because of negative life style choices the mother makes during pregnancy, should she be charged with negligence? Or assault? Or murder, as some pro-life campaigners want? I don't think that's the way forward.

A controlled system, where a psyciatric evaluation and at least a week's worth of counselling are an essential part of the decision process seems the best way. To deny people a choice that very possibly affects their entire life doesn't seem very ethical to me. It's pandering to a pro-life lobby that presents the same, unchanged and unimaginative arguments time after time. That often uses religion and skewed medical definitions to fit arguments of convenience that put forward their views in a pop-science manner. It is also this same lobby that has most likely discouraged and actively prevented stem-cell research from going ahead on human embryos that would otherwise have been destroyed. They don't seem to object to the actual destruction of the (fertilized) embryos that have been in cold storage, just our experimentation on them.

That makes no sense to me, nor should it to anyone who knows the enormous benefits such research could accrue to those with presently incurable life-threatening and debilitating diseases/disabilities. I mean, if stem cell research progresses to any defined level, blind people might be able to see again, and deaf people hear. Paralysis via spinal tissue injury might be cured. All using a straightforward development of embryonic stem cells, it only takes time and patience to find the correct growth factors, environment, and rigorous trials to test implantation.

It's fairly obvious which side of this argument I stand on, and I cannot see a convincing enough opposing argument. Skewing defintions in favor of a politically viable stance doesn't strike me as the correct approach, but unless the public can be convinced of the enormous benefit that would result to both medical research and social circumstances of individuals, the politicans will just continue to pander to the largest lobby.

Occy

JustHalf

It's pandering to a pro-life lobby that presents the same, unchanged and unimaginative arguments time after time.
What, like don't kill babies?

WhiteWashMan

the choice of the mother is absolute.

i cannot belive how barbaric irish society has become with a referendum trying to reintroduce previous constitutions which have been voted out.
its things like this that make me never want to live in ireland again. a state run by pro-lifers and the catholic church where any sort of forward thinking is frowned upon is not where i want to live.

will ireland actually progress at any stage in to the 20 century, let alone 21st?

bonkey

Originally posted by Bob the Unlucky Octopus
Several obstetricians I've spoken to all agree that roughly at the 6-week stage, the embryo assumes characteristics that are more or less human. Prior to that stage, there is practically no difference in the morphologies of human, whale, snake, avian or even crustacean embryos.

So, in your educated medical opinion (as opposed to my pop-science), would this 6-week point form a reasonable cut-off point - as a reasonable point whereby beforehand we can simply say "its alive", whereas afterwards we could say "its a life" ? I'm not trying to be smarmy, but the distinction of this point is (to me) central to any non-religious argument on the abortion issue.

I recognise that anyone can trot out medical experts to back almost any standpoint - you simply have to look hard enough. So, even if you and I were to agree that 6 weeks was a reasonable point (although I thought organ definition occurred at about 4 weeks), I'm sure others can trot out experts to back anything from "no contraception ever", up as far as "drawn its first breath and had the umbilical cut".

This is the problem - that us pop-scientists can have our opinions shot down by the experts, but the experts themselves cannot form a consensus. This very fact highlights how slippery the slope is. Can we have any faith that a medical expert's opinion in this matter is not coloured by (say) his or her own religious and/or moral beliefs. If we cant have that faith, then it becomes a question of why their faith-influenced educated answer is any more intelligent or valid than a faith-influenced or moral-influenced but less educated answer.

From a purely ethical standpoint, there are few reasons why (for example) a woman who's been raped has no right to an abortion.

This is the case I have the most problem in understanding. If a woman is brought to hospital/police after a rape case, should she not be advised immediately to consider the "morning after pill" - which very few bar the religious zealots have a problem with. Why do we need to wait a significant amount of time to find out that she's pregnant in order to offer her an abortion, when there are other shorter-term approaches (or if there arent, could Occy explain them to me) which are typically not considered abortion.

Yes, you will always have the rare cases where this approach wouldnt cover things, but a line has to be drawn somewhere. Would we argue that a woman raped and kept hostage for 3 or 4 months while pregnant has a right to an abortion because of the emotional trauma, despite it being past the point where any form of "legal" abortion would be allowed??? This is the problem that I see - letting the emotions of a specific case override the underlying moral/ethical arguments about the life of the unborn gives rise to a situation where one can easily take the supposed "exceptional case" and reduce it to an absurdity. Would we allow the rape victim an abortion when almost at term - simply because there was no possibility of her getting an abortion previously? If not, then we are arguing that the term of the pregnancy is the more important factor - in which case we should cease with the intellectual dishonesty and stop discussing cases which involve secondary emotive issues such as rape.

The argument that God willed it to happen is plain lunacy to my ears.

Agreed - I believe society has the right (or the imperative even) to define moral laws which apply to everyone, but religion should play no part in this.

It is also this same lobby that has most likely discouraged and actively prevented stem-cell research from going ahead on human embryos that would otherwise have been destroyed. They don't seem to object to the actual destruction of the (fertilized) embryos that have been in cold storage, just our experimentation on them.

As I think I said in some previous thread - I firmly believe that the cutoff point for abortion (if one is agreed upon) should also be defined as the cutoff point for experimentation. If you define abortion legal to 6 weeks, then you can do whatever the hell you like to fertilized embryos's in a lab up to that point. Any differing stance is self-contradictory in my eyes.

That makes no sense to me, nor should it to anyone who knows the enormous benefits such research could accrue to those with presently incurable life-threatening and debilitating diseases/disabilities.

Actually, I think the benefits which stem-cell research could provide are, again, a diversionary secondary issue. It doesnt matter whether its the most potentially incredible research in the history of man, or the most pointless simply carried out by a few crackpots. The fact is that we should not define seperate moral and legal standards for what is effectively the samer thing - a fertilised embryo.

It's fairly obvious which side of this argument I stand on, and I cannot see a convincing enough opposing argument.

Well, unless you can explain to me why your stance is medically correct, and the stance of other docs is incorrect, all I can do is say that I believe the experts in the field cannot reach a consensus. In the absence of such a consensus, I feel obliged to err on the side of caution.

Having said that, I would accept the possibility of abortion being legalised up to the 4 or 6 week period before organ and brain definition, as long as psychiatric evaluation and counselling were included as part of the overall requirements. This would not be "the risght answer" for me, but would be a reasonable and sensitive balance between the various factions.

jc

Biffa Bacon

i cannot belive how barbaric irish society has become with a referendum trying to reintroduce previous constitutions which have been voted out.

You're obviously well-informed on this whole referendum business aren't you?

its things like this that make me never want to live in ireland again. a state run by pro-lifers and the catholic church where any sort of forward thinking is frowned upon is not where i want to live.

Newsflash! Ireland is a democracy. Pro-lifers and the Catholic Church do not run the state.

WhiteWashMan

Originally posted by Biffa Bacon

You're obviously well-informed on this whole referendum business aren't you?

Newsflash! Ireland is a democracy. Pro-lifers and the Catholic Church do not run the state.

ok, please feel free to explain, at length and detail what it really means?

Biffa Bacon

I was just being pedantic. It's an amendment we're voting on, not a constitution.

Giblet

Well it does seem that pro lifers and the church get basically what they want over prochoicers and people who want us to move on from 1950's ireland, what next corperal(?) punishment

WhiteWashMan

Originally posted by Biffa Bacon
I was just being pedantic. It's an amendment we're voting on, not a constitution.

ok, then please feel free to explain to me, at length, and in detail why you are voting yes, and what this means.
and being a pedant, im sure you will give me a good read....

JustHalf

If Ireland is a both run by pro-lifers and the catholic church, then most voters must be pro-life and postively influenced by Catholicism.

Which you can't really argue with and still support a democracy, unless you want to whinge when things don't go your way.

I also fail to see how pro-choice is the more evolved of the two sides, as you seem to insinuate. Want to explain how?

Biffa Bacon

Originally posted by WhiteWashMan


ok, then please feel free to explain to me, at length, and in detail why you are voting yes, and what this means.
and being a pedant, im sure you will give me a good read....

Human life begins at conception.
Therefore abortion involves the destruction of human life.

The right to life is a basic human right.
Therefore abortion is an abuse of human rights.

The law should protect human rights.
Therefore abortion should be prohibited by law.

The threat of suicide cannot be properly evaluated as a real and untreatable condition in any particular case.
Therefore the threat of suicide cannot be allowed as justification for an abortion.

This referendum will remove the right to abortion where there is the threat of suicide.
Therefore I voted Yes to approve the referendum.

WhiteWashMan

Originally posted by Biffa Bacon

Human life begins at conception.
Therefore abortion involves the destruction of human life.

The right to life is a basic human right.
Therefore abortion is an abuse of human rights.

The law should protect human rights.
Therefore abortion should be prohibited by law.

The threat of suicide cannot be properly evaluated as a real and untreatable condition in any particular case.
Therefore the threat of suicide cannot be allowed as justification for an abortion.

This referendum will remove the right to abortion where there is the threat of suicide.
Therefore I voted Yes to approve the referendum.

i dont belive that human life begins at conception.
therefore your arguments mean nothing to me....

JustHalf

It's human. Is it a human "being" is the question.

Thank God I'm a vegetarian. I have the upper hand when people act smart and say "surely then, if you truly believe what you are saying, then you shouldn't eat animals?"

logic1

Originally posted by JustHalf
It's human. Is it a human "being" is the question.

Thank God I'm a vegetarian. I have the upper hand when people act smart and say "surely then, if you truly believe what you are saying, then you shouldn't eat animals?"

Do you eat eggs? Same as eating a foetus... or no wait.. same as killing a foetus...

.logic.

bonkey

Originally posted by logic1
Do you eat eggs? Same as eating a foetus... or no wait.. same as killing a foetus...

Only if the egg were fertilized, which most eggs you buy arent, I believe?

jc

Lemming

Originally posted by Biffa Bacon
This referendum will remove the right to abortion where there is the threat of suicide.
Therefore I voted Yes to approve the referendum.

The irony of voting yes is that you are NOT protecting the unborn.

If the mother commits suicide, then by default, the foetus will also die. Therefore you are letting one life, and one *possible* life die.

Therefore, choose the lesser of two evils. Let one die in the hope of saving the other, or let both die?

JustHalf

Guess what, Lemming!

It's possible to stop a suicidal person from killing themselves in ways other than abortion!!!

Lemming

Originally posted by JustHalf
Guess what, Lemming!

It's possible to stop a suicidal person from killing themselves in ways other than abortion!!!

Really?? Do indulge me as to how! What are you gonna do? Lock them up in a padded cell for 9 months? On what charge? They've not broken any laws? YOu're just gonna have them banged away like a criminal?

JustHalf

They could be sent to counselling. HAVE YOU BEEN THINKING?

What's with the barbarism? And anyway, isn't being locked up for 9 months better than being dead forever?

And if they are going to commit a crime, isn't it our duty to try and prevent them?

Jeez, some people. Just because someone thinks we shouldn't allow abortions it automatically means we want to lock people up as a first resort?

TroutMan

I don't think abortion is wrong. An embryo in early term is a set of chemical reactions. It doesn't care if it lives or dies. It's alive in the animal sense of the word, but not really human. Not conscious, no 'personality', no aspirations. Embryos don't care about abortions, any more than slugs care about the lack of constitutional protection for slugs.

Peter Singer is a favourite philosopher of mine who works in ethics and thinks much like me (ok, I think like him):

http://www.cwfa.org/library/life/1999-10-07_christ-hospital.shtml

“A ‘person’ is a being who is capable of anticipating a future, having wants and desires for the future, which are cut off, thwarted, if that person is killed … Newborn babies have no sense of their own existence over time … Killing a newborn baby—whether able-bodied or not—I think, is never equivalent to killing a being who wants to go on living.”

Suffering is a bad thing. If a foetus can feel pain, any pain should be minimized, just as cows should be killed as humanely as possible. Inflicting pain on a non-sentient creature is worse than killing it.

I dunno when a foetus becomes a person by my definition. Could even be after birth.

two other points; the use of shock imagery by the ageing pro-lifers is a bit tasteless and besides the point. I always get the impression that if the foetus was given a nice funeral with velvet curtains, they'd (the pro-lifers) lose a lot of wind from their sails.

And---I thought it bad of the referendum committee to refer always to the 'threat' of suicide, as if it was a ploy. I voted on the basis of the danger of suicide.

(please don't use too many capitals or rhetorical question marks if you chose to reply)

JustHalf

Originally posted by TroutMan
Inflicting pain on a non-sentient creature is worse than killing it.

Er...

This doesn't make any sense. Care to elaborate why this is the case?

Biffa Bacon

An embryo in early term is a set of chemical reactions.

Either you are totally ignorant of embryonic biology or you are being deliberately disingenuous.

I dunno when a foetus becomes a person by my definition. Could even be after birth.

Perhaps then your definition is not a very good one?

two other points; the use of shock imagery by the ageing pro-lifers is a bit tasteless and besides the point.

Are you afraid of the truth? Would you rather not be confronted with it?

Sharkey

Originally posted by azezil
All this talk of abortion, taking a life and so forth but what about ‘the pill’. The pill is does the same thing only at an earlier stage. So why then is taking ‘the pill’ acceptable when aborting the fetus at a later stage is not?

Respectfully, the pill doesn't do the same thing. The pill fools a woman's body into thinking that it is pregnant and not producing any eggs whatsoever. No eggs, no fertilizaed eggs.

Sharkey

Originally posted by Bob the Unlucky Octopus

... It's pandering to a pro-life lobby that presents the same, unchanged and unimaginative arguments time after time. That often uses religion and skewed medical definitions to fit arguments of convenience that put forward their views in a pop-science manner ...

Occy

I am nor particuarly religious. I will be a father for the first time in two months.

At six weeks, I got to hear my daughter's heartbeat.

At twelve weeks, I saw a sonogram of my daughter in my wife's womb. I saw my daughtr turn over, move about, try to such her thumb. She was very human in all respects.

The other day, my wife had her portable computer on her stomach typing away. My daughter actually kicked so hard as to knock the computer off my wife's stomach. Apparently, she didn't like the noise and heat generated by the computer.

I simply say to all those people who think an unborn child is not human, go see a sonogram first -- I suspect that the majority of you will change your minds.