h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Colonel Sellers:

Are you saying then that the pregnant woman determines when her child is a human (by child I mean little one or offspring)? If so, then this is the true choice that we are giving women. Your arguments of poverty, maturity, education, drug abuse, child abuse, crime rates, welfare roles, traumitazation, humanity and brain waves are meaningless because ultimately it is the woman's choice.

>>at conception, it is not very different from the egg and sperm that combined to make it<<

This goes against biological fact. Both the egg and the sperm have 23 chromosomes, the zygote has 46. Now, having 46 chromosomes is not what makes a creature human, granted. If that were the case, people with Turner's Syndrome (forty-five chromosomes) and Down Syndrome (forty-seven chromosomes) would not be considered human. An egg cannot produce a child. A sperm cannot produce a child. The egg combined with the sperm is what produces a child. Even if you do not believe that human life begins at conception, you recognise this fact.

>>even when it begins to appear human, it is nothing more than a parasite in the womb of the mother, since it cannot yet beat its heart.<<

A child in the womb does not use its mother's blood to live. If it had a different blood type (which it often does), it would surely die. Also as a side note, if the child is not human, the pregnant woman is not a mother.

Fragilis was just pointing out the limit of our present knowledge. This does not mean that brain-waves were used as an argument. I however also believe that it is important biological knowledge.

>>The ONLY thing we can agree on is that the child becomes a human on or before the day of its birth.<<

I know people who disagree with you. Why do you think that a woman tosses her child in a dumpster? She feels desperate and does not value her born child as a human life.

>>So you backpedaled to "Killing humans is wrong."<<

I was clairifing what I had said in Post 45 in responce to your comment about the USS Cole. I didn't change what I said, I just clarified the context of the original statement.

>>Killing in self-defense is something every civilization accepts. Killing in wartime is something that all civilizations also accept, although a vocal minority within those civilizations denounce it.<<

I need to clairify the context of my statement further. The example of the USS Cole was something done by people to end the lives of other people. In self-defense you kill to preserve life. In war time the "right" side is doing this in self-defence. Often I believe that governments go to war wrongly. Germany went to war (I believe) wrongly. I believe that the officers who knew what they were doing were clearly in the wrong. They were even tried for war crimes. If civilization accept killing in wartime, why is Stalin considered evil? I apologise for going back on an earlier promise here.

Because Stalin killed a large amount of people he didn't have to. During famine they continued to export grain when it could have saved hundreds of thousands of lives. And the way the people who weren't dead were treated isn't too great either. It's not generally accepted to kill people who are supposed to be on the same side as you, even during wartime.

I have nothing further to add on abortion at this point other than that unless we (as in the human race) can come up with the right answers to all the scientific questions (when is a foetus human? When does brainwave activity begin? and so forth) we'll never stand a chance of deciding if abortion really is murder or not. We lack the knowledge to make a final decision, therefore the arguments will inevitably continue.

I want to know your opinions. Can everyone here answer the following questions?

1. When do you believe that abortion is right
2. When would you consider personally having an abortion
3. When would you support someone else's choice to have an abortion

I don't want your reasons or rationalizations, just what you believe.

As for my answers,

1. Never
2. Never
3. Never

I will not attack your opinions or your beliefs, I ask that you do the same to me and to everyone else.

1. Never
2. Never
3. Never

nosretep, take my advice and put on your peril sensitive sunglasses.

1. When the situation has become untennable.
2. I physically can't get one.
3. It's not my place to oppose someone else's personal decision.

-jb

I assume we're talking surgical abortion here rather than the Morning-After Pill, which is often called emergency contraception and to my mind is not abortion.

1. When both child and mother would die otherwise, and there is no other way in which both can be saved, and when the mother agrees. Or in certain situations when pregnancy has come about as the result of rape.
2. I'm a man - the world will be a mighty strange place if I ever need one.
3. If they fully believe they are right in having one, and have made an educated choice for themselves, then I would support them.

1) I believe it is 'right' when the parents-to-be agree it is the right thing for them to do. Of course, the father should get no say in the case of rape or incest. But otherwise, I feel he should.

2) In the case of rape or incest. If my life was in danger. If I knew the baby would be born with a birth defect that would make its life short and painful. If I was pregnant with multiple children who likely all die if one was not removed from the womb. And if I was financially and emotionally unable to support the baby alone, and the father refused to take responsibility for the child -- I might consider it, maybe. It's hard to say when you're not in that situation.

3) See the above answer. In general, I feel it isn't my business to decide when someone else should have an abortion.

I probably should have added a forth question

4. When would you someone else who had an abortion?

but I know that everyone here would say always because we all respect other people even if we don't agree with what they believe or do. Thank you Anthony, jbliqemp, MaW and anyone else who adds to this disscussion for your opinions. This issue is wrought with emotion because it deals with civil rights. No time in our history (of the human race) has a civil rights issue been addressed without a large degree of controvercy (to my knowledge).

1. When do you believe that abortion is right?

When? Oh well: when the parents think it's right.

2. When would you consider personally having an abortion?

This is not a question that can be answered in advance, IMO.

3. When would you support someone else's choice to have an abortion?

Always.

Pattern-chaser

I agree, Pattern-chaser. It's one thing to imagine what it might be like to deal with an unintended pregnancy. But from my conversations with people who have had them, it is much, much harder than most people can imagine.

Hence the bizarre phenomenon of the hard-core pro-life person who finds themself in the odd position of seeking an abortion. I know one couple like this, where both members were pro-life and both agreed abortion was the best option for them. Nevertheless, they remain pro-life even after the abortion. But they do so apart, as the experience was enough to cause a separation. On some level, I think they blame each other for what happened.

I tried to answer the questions best I could, but I couldn't really tell you whether I would *get* an abortion -- only whether I might consider it, among other options. I still found it difficult to come up with answers, though.

There appears to be a verb missing from question 4... what is is supposed to say?

There appears to be a verb missing from question 4... what is is supposed to say?

Sorry about the verb. I meant

4. When would you support someone else who had an abortion?

1) When the situation dictates.
2) When the situation dictates.
3) When the situation dictates.
4) A nonsense question, but I'll go ahead and guess... when the situation dictates.

All ethics are based on the situation. Right and wrong are relative terms. The only people who believe in absolutes in ethics are religious fundamentalists. And when they were in charge of humanity, we called it the Dark Ages. And as religion has lost its power, we have evolved at ascending rates. Get rid of it completely, and we'll become gods ourselves.

Anthony/nosretep: What do you think of pro-lifers who kill abortion doctors?

The definition of murder is more than legal. The word means the unlawful killing of another human with malice aforethought. There are variations in the legal definition, but that about sums it up.

If abortion is the killing of one person of another, I think you'd really have to be twisting definitions to definie it as anything exept murder.

Coroner's inquests are often (if not always) called in the cases of suspicious deaths. Clearly it would be absurd to call them in cases of combat.

BTW, this conversation about sitting on semen is disgusting. I've heard about a case during the civil war where a woman was supposidly impregnated by a bullet that had passed through a man. I don't know how true that is.

I think political movements have the right to call themselves whatever they want. If one group calls itself pro-choice, and another pro-life, calling them pro-abortion and anti-choice doesn't do anything to advance the arguement, but it does inflame passions and annoy the other side.

My answers:

1. To protect the health (not just the life) of the mother. To cull a clearly defective child. I think a person should have the right to choose if they have an abortion, but I wouldn't say it was right to abort for other reasons such as the mother not being old enough to support the child etc. Even if it may be the best choice for her. I consider abortion distasteful.
2. The same as one.
3. I support a person's right to choose. However, I'd be pretty disappointed if a person were to use abortion as their only method of birth control.

Abortion is most certainly not a method of birth control. It's a method of last resort.

As to 4:
4. If they had an abortion for reasons which were right for them and their situation.

Back to question four. What do you mean by support? Emotional support? Financial support? Or is this question 3 again, where you're trying to ask whether I 'approve' of someone else's actions?

Nosretep the answer are
(1)when the mother as made the choice based on what she thinks is right(with some cases this may change)
(2)I could not have one but would if my partner life was in danger would give full concent.(I am at the moment single)
(3)If the person was some one that i knew and called friend then i would support no matter what they do.
That is if a friend was single and wanted to have the baby and keep it or give it up or have it aborted if you do not support them then you are not a friend.
(4)???

For question 4, I was just saying that I am sure that no one would hate a woman because she had an abortion even if you hate abortion. I was totally ambiguous about that. Sorry.

Colonel Sellers:

>>Right and wrong are relative terms.<<

That is why I asked:

>>When do you believe that abortion is right<<

I was not asking for an absolute, that would negate all opinion.

I think that through their actions they cannot be pro-life. They say that they are worried about the unborn child's life, and then they take another's. They are wrong.

Two Bit Trigger Pumping Moron:

My definition of murder came from a non-law dictionary, so I guess I should not have used it as a source for a law definition. The point that was raised about abortion not being murder is over the "unlawful" qualifier. I will say that legally abortion was murder before Roe v. Wade in the United States.

>>I think political movements have the right to call themselves whatever they want. If one group calls itself pro-choice, and another pro-life, calling them pro-abortion and anti-choice doesn't do anything to advance the arguement, but it does inflame passions and annoy the other side.<<

I attempt to avoid rhetoric that distracts from the true goal of a discussion. To call me pro-life might bring in questions of the death penalty and euthanasia, which really do not pertain directly to this discussion.

MaW:

>>Abortion is most certainly not a method of birth control. It's a method of last resort.<<

I hope that no one ever uses abortion as birth control, but when people bring up issues about overpopulation in reference to abortion I have to wonder.

Colonel Sellers:

Another reason why I will not use the terms "pro-life" and "pro-choice" in this discussion is that at the same time someone might think that I am impling that a pro-abortionist is "anti-life" or "pro-death" and an anti-abortionist is "anti-choice" or "pro-misogyny."