Queen of Swords

Originally posted by Elaborate:
<strong>
Yes, there is mroe to it than just waiting, but IMHO unless it is medically necessary, there is no need for an abortion.</strong>

Is your opinion supposed to trump that of any woman when it comes to what is best for her body? I notice that you again fail to address my points about risks to life and health.

<strong>Why not? It is not that difficult to take a little pill once a week.</strong>

Do you even realize that 1. sometimes these pills have adverse side effects 2. they cost money 3. teenagers might be prevented from taking them because their parents don't wish to see their daughters on contraception?

<strong>That's why we have birth control</strong>

And sometimes birth control fails or isn't used (eg. in the case of rape). But it seems to me that you haven't thought your position through - and are not really prepared to answer questions about it.

[ December 11, 2002: Message edited by: QueenofSwords ]</p>

MarcoPolo

Ahh... I see now. You don't understand what we're talking about then.

Wow. I actually stunned right now. You are taking this to semantic hell.

Let me spell it out for you.

1. Can a sperm become a human? No.
2. Can an egg become a human? No.
3. Can an ALMOST fertilised egg become a human? No. (Why? Because it's not fertilised.)
4. Can a fertilised egg become a human? Yes.


Another shocker. :|

So, with your logic, you're not human because you need food to eat. Wow. You are a clever one.

Great! Once that process happens, it THEN has the potential to become human.

Ok. Ready? Here goes.

A zygote is a fertilised egg. A fertilised egg can become a human.

An egg that is ABOUT to be fertilised is JUST AN EGG. It has no potential to become human until it's fertilised.

(This next one is one for the quote books...)

Here's your 'magic' quality.

Fertilisation.

An ALMOST fertilised egg, isn't fertilised.
A zygote IS fertilised.

Is that simple enough for you?

Elaborate

As I have already said, abotion is permissable when the mother's life is in danger. If having a child carrries a good possiblity of your death, then it would be alright to have an abortion.

1. Yes, I do.
2. True, but just about everything does.
3. Why? Can they not face the possibilty that "daddy's little girl" might just have sex with a boy?

From the <a href="http://www.plannedparenthood.org/bc/" target="_blank">Planned Parenthood</a> website:
The Pill
95-99.95% EFFECTIVE
$15-$35/monthly pill-pack at drugstores — often less at clinics.
(Yes, I do realize that Planned Parenthood is a pro-abortion group. I'm using them to erase any percieved "anti-abortion slant".

I see about 12 different contraceptive techniques listed on Planned Parenthood. Some of these last a week or more. It isn't as if a woman is going to be held hostage and repeatedly raped for over a week. If a woman is not using at least one of those techniques, then isn't she being a little irresponsible in caring for her own body?

Elaborate

Looking at my previous post (the one just above this), there are more ways than just condoms to prevent pregnancy. What I'm saying is that a properly self-responsible person will not even need to have an abortion.

Queen of Swords

Originally posted by Elaborate:
<strong>As I have already said, abotion is permissable when the mother's life is in danger. If having a child carrries a good possiblity of your death, then it would be alright to have an abortion.</strong>

What is a "good possibility" and who gets to determine this possibility?

If having a child does significant damage to a woman's health and leaves her broke, jobless and deeply depressed, but not dead, would this be justification enough to force her to undergo pregnancy and labor? I point out once again that it is necessary to do more than simply "wait" in order to deliver a child.

<strong>1. Yes, I do.</strong>

So if the pills have adverse side effects, what's the solution? Do you think that women should take pills despite these side effects?

<strong>2. True, but just about everything does.</strong>

How do you expect women who don't have money to pay for the pills? That was an amazingly pat and irrelevant answer to a real and complex problem.

<strong>3. Why? Can they not face the possibilty that "daddy's little girl" might just have sex with a boy?</strong>

No. They can't. I suggest you familiarize yourself with real-life attitudes (especially among the very religious) and then try to answer the question of what a twelve-year-old is supposed to do if her parents refuse to let her purchase contraceptives and someone else says "Take birth control pills whether you are in a relationship or not".

<strong>From the Planned Parenthood website:
The Pill
95-99.95% EFFECTIVE</strong>

I notice it doesn't say 100% effective.

<strong>$15-$35/monthly pill-pack at drugstores — often less at clinics. </strong>

Some people might not even have that much money.

<strong>I'm using them to erase any percieved "anti-abortion slant".</strong>

"Perceived"?

<strong>I see about 12 different contraceptive techniques listed on Planned Parenthood. Some of these last a week or more. It isn't as if a woman is going to be held hostage and repeatedly raped for over a week. </strong>

Isn't she? Is this hypothetical scenario completely impossible? Any female journalists or relief workers in war zones might be relieved to hear that.

<strong>If a woman is not using at least one of those techniques, then isn't she being a little irresponsible in caring for her own body? </strong>

Why should a woman be forced to buy and use contraceptives if she is not in a relationship? Are all these twelve methods completely effective? I doubt it - if even the pill has that small margin of error.

And if the woman is irresponsible, is the solution to force this irresponsible creature to undergo pregnancy (against her will)? Is she likely to then become responsible and behave in such a way as to produce a healthy child?

[ December 11, 2002: Message edited by: QueenofSwords ]</p>

frostymama

Pregnancy sucks the big one. I can't imagine going through it against my will. I tried for 4 months to concieve this one and it still sucks.

There is a lot more to pregnancy than just waiting. For some people it is 40 weeks of pure hell.

Just a note... I'm one of those people who can't use most forms of birth control. Chemical birth control makes me need anti-depressants (not to mention pack on the pounds) and I am allergic to latex and spermacide. I am also not a good candidate for an IUD. Not exatly sure what I will use after this one is born. I know that I can't depend on LAM since I got knocked up last year(early miscarriage) while I was still amenorrheic.

frostymama

My parents would not let me get on birth control pills when I was 20 and engaged to be married in just a few months. As long as I was single and living in their house I couldn't even have condoms in my possession.

Doubting Didymus

Marco, darling.

The only reason I can take this argument to semantic hell is because you have chosen an utterly semantic and arbitrary moment to define humanity. You say 'a sperm and egg can not become a human', but it is painfully obvious that they can.

Congratulations on saying it again. You can scream this until you are blue, but you are providing no support at all. An almost fertilised egg can become a human. Just give it time. The sperm WILL fertilise the egg, the egg WILL become a blastocyst. Therefore, the almost fertilised egg WILL become a human. This is stupidly obvious, and simply saying "no it isn't" does nothing to support your baseless claims.

I strongly suggest having a little think before you say things. The statements I made are extensions of YOUR logic, not mine. It is by your (unsupported) argument that a sperm and egg are not human because each needs the other. I point out that the same applies to the zygote and the uteris. Its called reductio ad absurdum, and it happens when you draw a baseless and arbitrary distinction. Of course my examples are stupid. That is because they are built on stupid premises. Whose? Yours.

Again, just saying it does not make it true. I understand that that is the human/inhuman barrier YOU THINK should apply. I understand that only too well. I, however, require more than empty claims. Back up your argument.

Are you blue in the face yet? I asked you to demonstrate this claim. You are merely saying it again (and again).

Perhaps I need to demonstrate my own argument a little better? If I take a human zygote, and I also take an egg and sperm conjunction in which the sperm is so close to fertilising the egg that only human intervention could stop it, and I quickly implant both into the appropriate female IVF patients, which woman has the potential to bear a child? The answer is that BOTH women have the exact same chance of bearing a child. Therefore I can not see what potential a zygote has that a sperm egg conjuction does not.

Its almost as if you think I don't understand what you are saying. I KNOW that you think fertilisation is the moment where human potential begins. I simply disagree. What exactly is it about fertilisation that causes potential to kickstart? How can a zygote have more potential, if it is no more or less likely to develop into a human than an almost fertilised egg? It is obvious that the same potential exists in both examples.

Yes, that is very very very simple. Now all you need to do is demonstrate it. Things do not become more true if they are repeated often. God would exist, if that were the case.

How about you respond to the idea that eating fruit is as bad a crime as deforestation, by your logic? Since seeds are tree embryos, seed destruction must be 'tree murder', and multiple seed destruction must be deforestation. (Just in case: seeds ARE tree embryos, in the same sense as human embryos.)

Longwinded: I will reply to you soon.

Doubting Didymus

Umm, last I looked, refuting the facts used in an argument invalidates it.

Ah! I apologise. You misunderdstand what I mean by 'grey area'. I do not mean "it's impossible to know", what I mean is there is a gradient of more-less humanity that the developing being passes through. My argument is that a new born child is fully human, a zygote is utterly inhuman, and all the qualities that make a human are attained slowly during gestaion, and do not leap into existance at conception.

You should keep in mind that pro-abortionists already think that the inhumanity of zygotes and blastocysts and so on is well established. We are starting from this position, not from ignorance. I agree wioth you, actually. IF I did not think that the inhumanity of blastocysts was known very clearly, I would not condone abortion as a precaution. However, I DO think that that question has been sufficiently resolved. The appropriate analogy in this case is looking in the building or bushes, establishing to your own satisfaction that no humans are there, and THEN firing/bulldosing.

Sorry for the confusion. I don't mean "it is not known", I only mean "humanity develops, it does not appear".

No, I would not draw a line at full development. I do not think a line can be drawn. A thick gradiation of shading is appropriate.

I do not think this argument implys that the older are more human. I think that the development of human traits probably continues into very early childhood and reaches full development. I think abortion can be condoned only up to a certain point in this development, and reaches an impermissable level at around six months of gestation. I think this is mainly linked to the development of thoughts. Without thoughts, I am not human.

I will do this when you do the same for a definition of "oak tree" that excludes acorns. I am serious. An acorn is an embryo, so destroying it is forestry.

I probably haven't anwered all of the questions you would have liked me to, but you are very long winded . If there is something I missed that you would particularly like me to respond to, please point it out. I hope to have cleared up the following: "grey area" refers to a gradual development and not an unknown. Your burden of proof examples do not apply in the way you want them to, because pro-abortionists believe to have already 'checked'.

MarcoPolo

Of course they can! They can ONCE THE SPERM FERTILISES THE EGG. They can't become human until that happens.

Please tell me you agree with that?

Yeah. Hopefully one of these times it will sink in.

Yes, an ALMOST fertilised egg can become a human AFTER it has been successfully fertilised.

Agreed?

And offering nothing more than "I say so" doesn't help your cause either.

Ok. If I'm wrong show me. Show me how a sperm is a human without the egg and show me how an egg is human without the sperm. (Looks like you're the one that needs to do the thinking afterall.)

The uteris is the mechanism to allow the zygote to get its nutrients for growth. It's 'food.'

Remarkable logic.

But it can't be said any simpler.

Show me where I'm wrong. (I'm laying it out for you once again for that purpose.) Just show me which statement is false.

1. Sperm without egg - no potential to become human

2. Egg without sperm - no potential to become human

3. Unfertilised egg - no potential to become human

4. Almost fertilised egg - no potential to become human

5. Fertilised egg - has potential to become human

I know you're going to argue on point 4 so let's just jump to that one.

Is an 'almost fertilised' egg fertilised?
Once it becomes fertilised, is it still 'almost fertilised?'

That should be an easy start.

No. I think we understand each other we're just in a fight of sticking with our own semantics.

I know what you're implying by saying 'almost fertilised' but until it is actually fertilised, there is no potential.

How about this.

A man and a woman are in bed getting ready to have some sex. They do a bunch of foreplay but before any intercourse, the man decides he doesn't want to do it. (I know, that would never happen, but just work with me here.) By your logic, the 'potential' for human life was there. He had some sperm ready to go and she had an egg ready to receive.

Now, if that's the type of potential you're arguing for, then I'll concede the point and stop right here. I would however appreciate if you could understand the type of potential I am trying to use.

When I use 'potential,' I am saying that 'life has begun' and unless something stops it, it's going to become human.

When you use 'potential,' it seems you're saying that, 'All the ingredients are there, they just need to be mixed together, therefore, there is potential.'

I'm saying there is a difference between stopping the mixing process and destroying the already mixed product.

While I think that's overly dramatic, I think you could loosely say that. (Very loosely.)

Just like it would be very loose to say that every time a man masturbates, he's killing thousands of babies.

We've got enough on our plate than to discuss the differences between a tree and a human, so let's save that for another discussion.