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A fetus does not have rights
What defines a human?
You said a fetus is not a human, but gave no support for that opinion. What defines a human?
If 'it can feel "pain," have a heartbeat, or have "brainwaves"' does that not mean is it something different than a mass of tissue that cannot?
There must be some scientific / logical / medical / criteria we can use to determine this.
- ces September 4, 2008 4:06PM
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Already done
In reason, it is not up to me to prove a negative. It is up to you to prove a positive assertion with evidence. You have offered none. You have not explained why feeling "pain," having a heartbeat, or having "brainwaves" is in any way fundamental or even logically relevant to this topic. Do you propose to endow animals with individual rights?
I have explained elsewhere in the comments section that birth is the rational, logical, objective, scientific criteria we use to determine when a fetus has transitioned into a person, and I explained why.
- Wendy
September 4, 2008 5:15PM
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Birth defines personhood?
First, this is a debate, not a court with a prosecution and defense. Both sides of the argument must equally provide support for their position.
I have not scoured this site looking for all of your comments. I'm only responding to this comment and this "argument" as defined by OpposingViews.
Right or wrong, good or bad, animals do have rights in the US; however, I have no intention of using that as a reason to support my position, it would not make sense.
As for my reasons that a fetus (3+ months in womb) is a person, here are the basics: Just like an infant, it
- has a beating heart
- has a brain with detectable brainwaves
- has eyes
- has arms, hands, fingers, legs, feet, toes
- has all organs
- responds to sound, light, movements, pressure
- actually “looks” like a human
By the 4th month of pregnancy, there is no mistaking that what is growing inside the mother is alive and has countless attributes of a person.
It is different than an infant in these respects:
- size: a 24 week old in neonatal care is smaller than a 39 week old still in the womb
- development: a 24 week old in neonatal care is less developed than a 39 week old still in the womb
- environment: a 24 week old in neonatal care may be breathing air with lungs, but probably has a feeding tube (i.e. umbilical cord) but is otherwise identical to a 39 week old still in the womb
- dependency: a 24 week old in neonatal care is 100% dependent on a caregiver, just like a 39 week old in the womb, but the care is administered differently
For these reasons, I draw the conclusion that as soon as science can detect the organism growing inside a woman’s body, it is a life. As soon as science can detect the major attributes of a person (from fingernails to DNA), it must be a person. To my knowledge, no pregnancy has ever resulted in anything but a person, thus empirical science concludes that all human pregnancies must be of persons.
To continue the debate, let's further your position that birth defines life (in this case life = humanity = personhood = legal protection). Given partial-birth abortion (dilation and extraction), at what exact point is a fetus born? Is this different for vaginal births and cesarean births?
- ces September 5, 2008 11:18PM
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Couldn't have said it better myself
Very well put; I completely agree. I will simply add that it is dangerous to cite charateristics as criterion, except those which are universally specific, i.e. DNA.
- JKM121
September 6, 2008 6:15PM
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Birth
Does science detect that a fetus is metaphysically independent? No. Again, a potential is not an actual. Your criteria are completely arbitrary, nonfundamental, and do not survive the light of reason.
Partial-birth abortion is an oxymoron invented by religionists to add legitimacy to their cause. An abortion is not a birth. A physician pulling a fetus out of the birth canal does not constitute a birth.
In actual childbirth, the laws of nature induce a biological process which expels an organism fully developed to function autonomously - in a metaphysical sense.
Exotic, borderline, or abnormal cases do not define the principle or category. The existence of Cesarean births does not in any way change the debate.
- Wendy
September 8, 2008 4:03PM
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Let's get serious
So it is metaphysical independence that creates personhood? I guess Siamese twins are really one person, not two.
Partial-birth abortion is a political term for Intact dilation and extraction and several variants ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Partial-birth_abortion ).
If a physician pulling a fetus out of the birth canal does not constitute a birth, then neither of my children were "born." Both need to be pulled in the final minutes of labor.
If a physician pulling a fetus out of the birth canal does not constitute a birth, then a physician performing a Cesarean certainly would not constitute a birth.
For both of my children, the "laws of nature DID NOT induce a biological process which expels and organism fully developed to function autonomously". Both were induced with medicine, labor did not naturally occur. Both were born attached to an umbilical cord, they were not autonomous.
You are correct, cesarean births do not change the debate, they make it a stronger case that personhood has nothing to do with the birth and must exist before.
If "Exotic, borderline, or abnormal cases do not define the principle or category," then why can we not outlaw partial-birth abortions? Anyone willing to read the description (or watch a video) of the process can only conclude that at minimum 4/5 of a "birthed" fetus (generally called a baby) is killed. Degrees of "out of the birth canal" ARE fundamental here since you have centered your entire argument around this word. I ask you yet again to define when exactly "birth" occurs.
I have now scoured the site and read each of your comments several times. Not once do you actually list a reason for your assertion that "birth" creates personhood. The closest thing to a reason you have given is, "the laws of nature eventually result in a fetus becoming survivable, fully formed, its organs functioning autonomously, and the whole organism becoming metaphysically independent, and at that time, the law of cause-and-effect induces childbirth."
You must not know that 28% of US births are not induced naturally.
You must not know that a baby 24 weeks from conception can live on machines providing the functions of organs for months and within a few years be a normal healthy child.
You must not know that birth does not make a human fully independent from its mother, it is still physically attached.
You must not know that not all fetuses are survivable when birthed.
You must not know that not all fetuses are fully formed when birthed.
You must not know that spontaneous abortions (miscarriages) occur on a regular basis.
You must not know that a fetus 5 seconds before birth is physically identical in every way to the same organism 5 seconds after birth and that there is no magical physical transformation during the birthing process.
Wendy, you are not debating the issue at hand, but simply discounting my statements as meaningless and repeating that you have laid out a solid case for your position which you have not; you have not laid out any case. Please debate the issue so we can see the truth.
- ces September 9, 2008 10:14PM
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As requested
First, a minor correction. I should have stated, "...the whole organism becoming *capable of being* metaphysically independent."
Metaphysical independence is a requirement for any rational concept of "personhood," yes. Siamese twins ARE metaphysically independent. If you do not know what metaphysical means, and the prefix "meta" does not clue you in, that is not my problem. I can tell you it has nothing to do with umbilical cord status.
You keep using an invalid approach, intrinsicism, to make your point, claiming that value resides IN this or that part (arms, fingers, heartbeats, DNA, etc.). But value is objective; it is not intrinsic to anything. You do anything and everything but look at what a fetus IS, what IT is, in its totality, its actual nature, as an entity. I cannot force you to think in rational terms, but don't expect me to say that just because you are arguing something, maybe you have a point. You don't.
In fact, your argument about medical technology only STRENGTHENS my argument and weakens your own. In a Cesarean section, the doctor has determined in THAT PARTICULAR CASE that the fetus is survivable with a certain level of medical support AT THE POINT when the operation is scheduled. In other words, it is objective: The values of the mother, needs of the offspring, and medical capabilities meet at that point.
Now, except in exotic, borderline, and abnormal cases, when is a fetus fully formed, capable of functioning autonomously and being metaphysically independent? At birth. Nature makes it so. The burden of proof would be on you in any particular case to prove otherwise. Can you predict when it will be "5 seconds before birth" for a given fetus? No? The rational, objective standard is birth.
In a premature birth where the baby is kept alive with medical support, it is only alive because it is receiving medical support, which by definition a pregnant woman seeking an abortion does not want to provide to the fetus. What medical technology can do for a fetus, however, is irrelevant. What is relevant is WHAT A FETUS IS. It is absurd and atrocious to suggest that a woman should have to carry a pregnancy because if she did remove the fetus from her body and did provide medical rescue which she by definition is unwilling to provide, it will be a baby at that point. Potential beings have no rights over actual beings, not in any valid ethical or political system.
And to repeat, an abortion is not a birth. In an abortion, a fetus is terminated and removed, or partially removed and terminated. Order does not matter; it is a fetus. There is no intrinsic value to "out of the birth canal." It happens during abortions, and it happens during births. So?
I do not see how any of the other points in your post, e.g., miscarriages, relate to anything or argue for anything. But since you insist on going all the way through all possible exotic, borderline, and abnormal cases, let's go the other way and discuss how a fertilized egg is a human being entitled to individual rights, if you are as interested in getting to the truth as you claim. Still waiting for that evidence that a fertilized egg has a soul.
- Wendy
September 10, 2008 7:09PM
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Birth
Wendy, what operational definition of "birth" are you using? Thanks.
- FredG September 12, 2008 2:40PM
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Still faulty
I find it amusing that you who place so much faith in the natural must rely on the theoretical and the supernatural for your personhood.
You still have yet to address the issue of a caesarian delivered child being a non-person. And pretty much everything else for that matter.
- JKM121
November 18, 2008 6:13PM
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Hope you're not holding your breath, still.
A seven month fetus is a baby.
Not that I'm saying that abortion should be illegal, because I don't. The individual has the right to govern his or her own body parts.
But a seven month fetus is a baby. As is an eight month old. A nine month old. They eat, sleep, poop (sometimes), pee, play... they think. Simply because there is no words for that baby to think with doesn't mean it doesn't think it a good idea to jump on the bladder. Simply because it can't label it a bladder doesn't mean it can't think. My baby would dance... I'm not joking either... to Dvorak. Seriously. A seven month old fetus. He didn't know that what he was doing was called dancing.... he liked it. Hated Dr. Dre's Chronic 2001. That's no joke.
I swear my first memory is seconds after birth.
The fact that a baby is born doesn't mean that that's when it became a baby... that's when the woman's body naturally decided to force it out of the womb through the only opening available. Some babies are not fully formed. They don't survive. The birth doen't make a fetus a baby... time does. Time and raging cellular growth. A seven month fetus is not a potential baby. It's an actual baby. It's not potential being... it's actual. THERE it is. It IS there. It's not potentially there. It's there.
I wouldn't be able to tell you when a baby is a baby and not a fetus if you held a gun to my head and demanded the correct answer. I don't know. That's the seeming debate.
But it wouldn't matter if it were a baby or a fetus... it doesn't lessen the right of the woman to her own body.
I don't think anyone has the right to hook themselves up to me and live off my life... baby, fetus, or some 40 yr. old with a strange disease that could only live by being threaded into my veins with i.v.'s..... No one has the right to force me to use my body in a manner I do not agree with.
But that 7 month fetus is a baby. A small, beautiful baby. Just letting you know.
- SocialistBetty
December 19, 2008 12:47AM
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Define your terms and provide scientific, not philosophical, evidence.
I do love how ces puts forward biology and statistics and you put forth metaphysics and philosophy, but she's the one who is making religious claims. Though the above post is highly disorganized and difficult to follow, what I basically got out of it is this. You would argue that metaphysical independace is the definition of birth. I would ask you to define your terms.
- richardsonkr
January 18, 2009 10:55AM
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An excellent argument
As a rule I don't reccommend my own posts, and if there's a single post on this thread that should be this is certainly one such.
- JKM121
November 21, 2008 5:30PM
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Still not seeing any facts.
Why do you fail to realize that your criteria is just as arbitrary and nonfundamental? Intact dilation and extraction, to use a term you might find acceptable, and thus worthy of debate, does involve the fetus passing through the birth canal. If "a physician pulling a fetus out of the birth canal does not constitute a birth," then what does? Are babies born by induced labor not people, then? What about those rare times in which the subject survives intact dilation and extraction? Are they still fetuses, though they are still alive and clearly outside of the womb? In your previous post, you have once again proclaimed without any justification that these cases will not be considered, but that's not good enough. This is a debate, and you must give counter-arguments against arguments brought to bear, or admit defeat.
- richardsonkr
January 18, 2009 9:47AM
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Still looking at reality
An aborted fetus is an unformed, unviable, clinically dead entity with a destroyed brain. There is no rational sense in which such a thing is a person. Only irrational emotions could lead one to proclaim it a person.
- Wendy
January 19, 2009 3:36PM
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A slight regression, but nothing some hard work can't overcome.
A dead body is a fully formed, unviable, clinically dead entity with a destroyed brain. There is no rational sense in which such thing is a person. Only irrational emotions could lead one to proclaim it a person. You can't do anything for the dead. It's the living fetuses I'm concerned about. Could you at least read over the opposing argument and pretend to acknowledge that there was one, rather than ignoring it entirely and just repeating the same arbitrary religious pronouncements over and over. I'd really appreciate it.
- richardsonkr
January 19, 2009 6:35PM
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I Would Like to Know
Wendy,
When did you have your abortion ? This is the only explanation I can come up with as to why you feel the need to vehemently (and nastily) defend your position. Your attacks venture further beyond the realm of substantive argument than do ces's. You claim that simply because it cannot be proved positive, that it is impossible for a fetus to be considered a human and therefore maintain rights. Probably your most nonsensical argument yet involves arguing how partial birth abortion does not constitute a birth, within which you attempt to argue that a birth only counts when it is spontaneous in nature. I will use your exact words: "In actual childbirth, the laws of nature induce a biological process which expels an organism fully developed to function autonomously - in a metaphysical sense."
You then say that cesarean sections do not count as part of the argument because, and again I quote: "
Exotic, borderline, or abnormal cases do not define the principle or category. The existence of Cesarean births does not in any way change the debate."
Two problems with that argument... if you combine these "exotic, borderline or abnormal cases" you end up with approximately 40-65% of all births in the United States... depending on who you look to for rates of cesarean section and or unnaturally induced births. Not so exotic anymore are they. Do those births count?
- mobilemarvel
January 22, 2009 5:17PM
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In reality...
It is up to the individual who wants to change the status quo to provide a reason. For example, we have a fetus bumping along on it's way to birth. You want to justify killing it. You've got to have reasons. Furthermore, even if the onus of proof is on us, that doesn't also make you the judge of what is valid evidence or not, no questions asked. When an argument is brought up, you must argue against it, you cannot simply proclaim that it is not evidence. I haven't read all of your comments yet, but I'm getting there, and I have not yet seen you give a counter argument. You just state the same arbitrary proclaimation over and over again. "A fetus is not a person, it is a potential person. Birth makes a human. Any arguments you bring against this will not be considered. They will be written off as religiously motivated or invalid because I said so."
- richardsonkr
January 18, 2009 9:35AM
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They will be written off because you don't have a uterus.
“If men could get pregnant, abortion would be a sacrament”
- illusion
June 10, 2009 2:15AM
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