Dr Rick

They are supposed to protect the rights we are born with

You simply don't know what you are talking about.

Fetuses don't have rights, and Roe v Wade had nothing to do with the "right to life;" the decision weighed the State's interests against an individuals right to privacy.



Locke is persusive, but your misinterpretation of what he said and its importance is not. Locke did not say human rights must logically proscribe abortion.



Those rights are derived from our values, however, not logic.

Another fallacy; this one circulus in demonstrado in which you make your assumption a conclusion. Abortion could only "reorder" human rights if fetuses had rights.

non sequitur, and a really dumb one since dk has been shown that fetuses by law are not persons. Why is he blathering about corporations?


Well, at least dk is gracious enough to apologize for his faulty logic. After being shown that he misquotes the Declaration of Independence, he brings up quotes from Lincoln even though his Gettysburg address had nothing to do with abortion.

It's much more likely that dk is wrong.

Rick

dk

Originally posted by dk
President Bush and Congress are democratically elected branches in a triad government where the Judiciary has the constitutional duty to protect inalienable rights from a tyranny of the majority.
Dr Rick: They are supposed to protect the rights we are born with
dk: Legalized abortion asserts that human rights are subjective, or alienable, by the order of the US Supreme Court. I just find it odd that the Supreme Court of a nation dedicated to protect inalienable human rights would trash them so completely. Again, if people are created with inalienable human rights of life, liberty and happiness then by logical necessity a fetus has rights.
o
Originally posted by dk
the Supreme Court has elected to demote the inalienable right to life to a standard of subjective justification.
Dr.Rick:
You simply don't know what you are talking about.
dk: So a fetus 1 minute before birth has no right to life or liberty under the law, then abracadabra, at the moment of birth the infant becomes a person, what could be more arbitrary. To suggest human rights are something other than subjective defies reason.
o
Dr Rick: Fetuses don't have rights, and Roe v Wade had nothing to do with the "right to life;" the decision weighed the State's interests against an individuals right to privacy.
dk: That’s certain what Blackmun wrote in the Roe decision (1973), “We need not resolve the difficult question of when life begins.”, and in Casey (1992) Justice O’Connor agreed, “this Court's post-Roe decisions accord with Roe's view that a State's interest in the protection of life falls short of justifying any plenary override of individual liberty claims.” The bottom line is that a mother’s liberty supersedes the infant’s “right to life”. We agree.
o
dk: As Locke so persuasively argued in the cause of Natural Rights, rights are ordered by logical necessity. For example:

1. If the usurper’s property rights supersede the victim’s liberty, then the usurper becomes entitled to the victims liberty by purchasing the victim as property.
2. If the usurper’s right to liberty supersedes the victim’s right to life, then the usurper by murdering the victim becomes entitled to all the victims liberty.

Dr Rick: Locke is persusive, but your misinterpretation of what he said and its importance is not. Locke did not say human rights must logically proscribe abortion.
dk: I didn’t say Locke was [pro, pre, sub]scribed to abortion. I objectively demonstrated Abortion Rights are based upon stare decisis denial. The Supreme Court first set aside the question of when life begins, then 20 years later buried the question as a matter of stare decisis (legal precedent). In fact O’Connor speculates in Casey, “If indeed the woman's interest in deciding whether to bear and beget a child had not been recognized as in Roe, the State might as readily restrict a woman's right to choose to carry a pregnancy to term as to terminate it, to further asserted state interests in population control, or eugenics, for example.” It seems Justice O’Connor has saved “we the people” from the draconian measures of population control and eugenics. What a woman!!!!
o
dk: So it is by logical necessity that the inalienable rights of life, liberty and property are ordered.
Dr Rick: Those rights are derived from our values, however, not logic.
dk: Like the values of “the tyranny of the majority”, or “the usurpations of the powerful”. Quite frankly I don’t see much value in liberty without a right to life.
o
Dr Rick: Another fallacy; this one circulus in demonstrado in which you make your assumption a conclusion. Abortion could only "reorder" human rights if fetuses had rights.
dk: I’m sorry to hear you find a right to life and liberty fallacious, I suppose that leaves us at liberty to shake bones, to read tea leaves, and to blame fate for a nation of moral degenerates; and; since inalienable rights don’t exist, people have no innate sense of dignity, so any sty will do. Good point.
o
dk: Sorry, but corporations are juridical persons, created by an Act of Law. A corporation by an “Act of Congress” can be granted the liberty to destroy human life, purchase a person’s liberty or seize personal property, once an inalienable rights become subjective(alienable). That’s exactly how Rockefeller, Carnegie, Fisk, Morgan etc... denied labor the right to associate, organize and negotiate for a safe working environment, sonority rights, overtime and. a living wage; ditto for child labor.
Dr Rick:
non sequitur, and a really dumb one since dk has been shown that fetuses by law are not persons. Why is he blathering about corporations?
dk: I’m blathering about corporations to illustrate that the definition of a legal “person” is a juridical contrivance that has nothing to with being human. All this bullshit about a fetus having(not having) rights because they are a person is immaterial. A human being absent inalienable human rights lacks innate dignity so human life in itself, of itself and for itself absent inalienable rights becomes a legal contrivance detached from any unified moral reality.
o
dk: Sorry, but as Lincoln said at Gettysburg...
Dr Rick: Well, at least dk is gracious enough to apologize for his faulty logic. After being shown that he misquotes the Declaration of Independence, he brings up quotes from Lincoln even though his Gettysburg address had nothing to do with abortion.
dk: The Declaration of Independence was signed in 1776, 4 score and 7 years = 87years, and 1776 + 87 = 1863. In 1863 Lincoln delivered the Gettysburg Address. I know this may be a stretch for you, but as the Civil War was drawing to a close, Lincoln at Gettysburg honored the dead of the North and the South alike, as fellow countrymen, that gave their full measure in one protracted struggle for life and liberty. My point is/was that the Gettysburg Address and the Declaration of Independence symbolizes rededicate the United States to that protracted struggle for inalienable human rights, and that abortion therefore defiles the struggle, the people and the Union.

the_cave

Well, I guess you, for one, are arguing what "should" be done! You're saying a woman should be allowed to abort her fetus. That's an ethical claim, and you are claiming authority to say so. Of course it's about ethics! You can certainly take a stand based on what you believe to be a principle, rather than on public opinion, but that's still taking a stand.

I'm not arguing that a woman should be forced to do anything--my proposal in fact gives her a choice up to a certain point (some point--I prefer a point before birth; others prefer birth to be the boundary.) But then, I'm not sure you're saying I'm not. I'm just making sure I'm clear. And I'm making a hypothetical proposal anyway--in fact, I'm not even saying whether I believe in what I'm saying or not! Just testing out an idea...the feedback is helpful, thank you.

Ok, maybe--but again, I'm not arguing anyone should be forced to do anything against their will (but again, I'm not sure you're saying I'm saying this.) Again, I appreciate your response, thank you.

long winded fool

Dr. Rick, I thought we had established that fetuses do not have inalienable rights by law, but that all human beings have inalienable rights by another law. This is a textbook contradiction. I think dk did a good job of showing you your error, yet you seem to shy away from addressing it. You cling to the argument that proves abortion is legal while ignoring the fact that this is contradictory to the fact that the law guarantees all human beings inalienable human rights. Address this to refute the irrationality of legal abortion. Demanding that abortion is legal is only agreeing with the premise of my argument which concludes that legal abortion is irrational.

Jack, the fetus is proven to be a human being. You can change the inalienable right of life to apply only to persons (or any other noun you want,) but you can't change the fact that the fetus is a human being by definition. Until the UN changes the inalienable right of life to apply to something other than all human beings, legal abortion contradicts the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and is therefore illogical and technically renders both laws moot until this is resolved.

trillian

I said 6 months (24 weeks).
Humans are distinct from other animals only in their brain capacity (and looks I suppose which is superficial). We have a unique ability to think (complexly). Though even this could be debated as animals show surprising cognitive abilities in some research.
The neurons start to make some connections in the 24-27th weeks. Before this the fetus has no brain activity. It cannot think or feel.

Viability is not a good measure because this is dependent on new technologies which may be able to save embryos from the womb at earlier and earlier stages (for those who desire to do so). A test of humanness dependent on technological advances in inherrantly flawed.

There is less and less each year that is proven to be a distinctly "human" capability. But I think the brain is the best test and to be conservative I put it at the earliest stage. (even though the neurons are developing there are still no "brain waves" at this point and regular patterns in the brain rarely happen during the entire pregnancy).

Guillaume

Ultimately, attempting to debate on abortion is useless and completely futile. This is because our stand on abortion is based on our personal conception of what kind of organism has a right to life. Such a conception, however, is merely an opinion, an irrational belief devoid of any logic whatsoever and as such impossible to convey.

For example, many shout loudly and proudly that humans have a right to live, yet most of them think that common animals don’t have such rights. But what makes us different from others animals, to the point of us having rights while they do not ?

Some may say, “humans have a right to live because they are human”. But again, this is just another opinion. The statements “cats have a right to live because they are cat” and “plants have a right to live because they are plant” are also opinions, opinions as valid as the previous one.

Others may say, “humans have a right to live because they have a complex brain “. However, why should “having a complex brain” be the requirement to the right to live ? Why can’t it be “having a tail” or “having six legs” ? To determine the requirement of the right of life, why should we value a trait over another, while they is absolutely no logical or objective reason to do so ?

Similarly, some people believe that “having brain waves” , “having intelligence”, "looking human" or "having natural viability" is what give the right to life. Others believe that "having human DNA", "having the potential to be human" or "being from the Homo sapiens sapiens species" give us the right to life. Others believe that "having a white skin", "being from the Arian race" and "being heterosexual" are what give us the right to live. All these people have opinions that as valid as the others, all these people are effectively in the same boat as they all use their personal feelings and irrational beliefs to determine what is worthy of having a right to live.


Ultimately, unless you wish to stay in the realm of the sheer opinion, you either go the Hinduism path and give everything the right of live or you go my way and realize that nothing has a “right of life” and that the whole concept is ridiculous.

long winded fool

Assuming moral relativism (a position that I don't believe can realistically exist) and rejecting legislation (a position not rational in a society which relies on its legislation to exist as a society,) you are right. However, if the laws state that fetuses have rights and other laws state that they do not, then both laws must be viewed as powerless until this has been resolved. If you think laws are subjective then how can you know whether or not it's okay to kill any human being? If laws are objective to those under them, (and by definition they are, or at least logically ought to be,) then the issue of abortion becomes debatable.

And before Dr. Rick jumps on me: Because "laws state that fetuses do not have rights," does not mean that all laws state that fetuses do not have rights. I agree that it ought to, but this is not the case. If any law does grant fetuses the right to life, and fetuses actually do not have this right, then that law must be repealed, therefore the Universal Declaration of Human Rights ought to be repealed if some human beings do not have the right to life. If any law refuses fetuses the right to life, and fetuses actually do have the right to life, then the law denying them the right to life must be repealed. Since law-abiding human beings picking and choosing which other law-abiding human beings have the right to live and which do not is unacceptable in a free society, the law that denies said human beings the right to live ought to be repealed. (no matter what it does to those who earn a living or would otherwise benefit from killing these human beings.) This was the purpose of the UDHR. Passing a law that contradicts it is not rational.

Dr Rick

By both US and international law, fetuses do not have human rights. There is no US or UN law that says that they do. There are not two seperate laws giving fetuses rights and taking them away; you are confused and wrong.

Neither of you have shown that fetuses are protected by US or UN law; you just insist that they do even though they don't.

You insistence that fetuses have human rights under US and UN law when they do not is irrational.


It's been done on this thread ad nauseum; once again you are asking to be reminded that laws that do not protect fetuses do not protect fetuses. Neither the UN UDHR nor the US constitution protects fetuses.



Pointing out the obvious, that abortion is legal, is not an agreement with your false premises asserting that the UN UDHR and the US constitution apply to fetuses.

That's really bizzarre. The UN UDHR is not moot, and your conclusion that it is is just another example of your irrational thinking.

Rick

the_cave

But, Guillame, you yourself are presenting an opinion...the opinion that all moral claims are equally valid. Presumably, this would include the claim you yourself made--so what reasons do we have to believe yours is more valid? What would prevent anyone from taking the life of another?

The fact is, as human beings, we value things--we have values. That's an empirial fact; it's a part of being a sentient being. There is a recent movement among ethicists called Moral Realism--you might want to check it out. It suggests basing morals on actual feelings and states of mind--since such indubitably exist. At any rate relativism--which is what you endorse, as your "opinion" I guess--does have a substantial history. But in its extreme forms, which seem to be what you're arguing for, they become self-contradictory; for you are arguing that reliativism is "correct" (there are lots of threads on that subject). Surely you don't think that anyone can do whatever they want, whenever they want, to whomever they want? If you don't think that, for whatever reason, you're not an absolute relativist, and you believe that people have "rights" that others can't violate.

long winded fool

Dr. Rick, I believe you refer to the first article in the UDHR. The preamble clearly states that inalienable rights apply to all members of the human family. I'll quote to make it inarguable:

Preamble
Whereas recognition of the inherent dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family is the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world, ...

Article 1
All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.

It is not clear in any way that article 1 is specifically meant to exclude the unborn, and if it were, it would still be in direct contradiction with the preamble since not all members of the human family are born. This is an amphiboly. It could just as easily read, "All human beings walk the Earth free and equal in dignity and rights." Just as true, yet there is no way to logically assume that humans who can't walk have zero rights in the same way that there is no way to assume fetuses have zero rights, even disregarding the preamble which directly states that they do. It is implied that, though not all human beings can walk, "All human beings walk the Earth free..." refers to those who can't walk as well. Therefore "All humans are born free..." implies unborn humans, since any rationally thinking individual knows that not all human beings are born.

You make exceptions for some human beings, when "all human beings" is the declared subject of the UDHR. Since the preamble serves to declare what things the articles give rights to, the preamble is where you go when you want to find out who "everyone" refers to. In the case of the articles, "everyone" refers to all members of the human family. The articles specify what rights we have while the preamble tells us who has equal and inalienable rights. If the article read, "All born human beings are free and equal in dignity and rights," I might not argue with you though it would still be in contradiction with the preamble, but the way it is currently worded requires a fallacy of accent to interpret it to apply only to born humans.

Please address this directly so I can understand your argument. Believe me, I'm trying!