I never said I was scientifically certified to define the term 'fetus'. I'm not scientifically certified in any of these areas.

Like you said, these are only my thoughts on the subject.

In my opinion, it is totally illogical to state that a biologically alive, biologically human thing isn't human. It's like saying Stephen Hawking isn't a person, because he is crippled.

No thanks are necessary, Patrick. Seriously, it's okay. Really, you're embarresing me.

That fish-fetus hardly passes as a human to me. Life technically begins at conception. Sure, it may not seem like a human, more like the aforementioned fish-fetus, but it is human. However, to say that the murder of said fish-fetus would be infanticide seems inacurrate. It's not like you are going around stabbing babies or anything. If a woman is raped, I think the best option would be to take a birth control pill the next day. But if something comes up or she just forgets, abortion might be acceptable to me. This topic is touchy and I don't have any major side. If it is illegal, women will get it done in alleyways with unsteralised equipment. Then, both the mother and the fish-fetus die. There is never an easy answer.

Life begins before conception. Entire civilizations have crusted and perished in my gymn socks.

Thanks, Bill.

There is a difference between sapient and nonsapient life, Jim.

That was a Bill Hicks referance and a joke. Thanks for responding so quickly and smarmily to it.

I know, just pointing out that the logic is flawed. Also, do you consider Mutual Friend smarmy? As he makes me look like Mother freakin Theresa in comparison.

Patrick, do you even bother reading the posts past the part that makes you want to reply?

Yes. Your argument is that something that supposedly isn't self aware and cannot survive outside the womb is not alive. FOR SOME OF YOU (not Nate), your argument seems to be that nonhuman cells magically become human after some time.

That said, you still haven't responded to my last post.
That's effectively the same thing as abortion, only chemical rather than coat-hangerical.

Evidence?
Well, most pro abortion choicers also tend to be right to die types. It is the same logic, after all, I guess.
Now you're just making up shit. You cannot be "pre-life" anymore than you can be undead or half alive. Fetuses are not dead. By process of elimination, they are alive. And since they are biologically human and alive, they are human.

Killing of humans is murder or manslaughter. A victim of a procedure designed to kill humans is, to quote Nicholas Angel, ****ING MURDERED!

Well, I go to catholic school(I'm not even sure I'm Catholic), and everyone makes a huge deal out of it there.

I'm not really sure where I stand. I think that the child should live, unless the mother isn't ready.

I guess that's the pro-choice standpoint.

I'm like Jay or Silent Bob. A woman's business is a woman's business, 'nuff said.

Patrick is apparently unmovable. I have yet to see him reason or listen to one point of the argument in this thread.

I concede defeat due to Patrick's 'Lalala I can't hear you I can't hear you!' strategy and my inability to say anything else without repeating myself or running the risk of, as Patrick said, 'making shit up'.

/sigh

You are indeed making shit up by inventing a seperate category of biologically human things. A fetus IS BIOLOGICALLY HUMAN, THUS IT IS A HUMAN! Get that into your skull, I'm sorry, but please, try and get that into your skull.

Happened last page. I've already given up.

In other words, 'La la la I can't hear you I can't hear you!'

You know, in retrospect, I and everyone else here are proving that I was correct in wanting to avoid a flame war.

Look, alive or not. As long as the FETUS is inside and attached to the mother no-one should have the damn guts to try and decide for her. Her and her alone should have the decision as to whether or not the fetus dies, end of story.

"No-one has the right to take another human life!!"

Yea? Well good for you that you have those ideals but thats not how the world works. If a girl gets pregnant its her right to decide if she wants to keep it or not. And not only does that apply to pregnancies, it should apply for already born children too. Heck it should apply in a lot of cases but it doesn't. Just because something is alive does not mean it's automatically gets the right of passage. You kill things that are alive every day by stepping on a weed or eating broccoli not to mention the cows and pigs that have their heads cut off because you want a piece of meat for dinner. Don't you dare be such a hypocrite to say that we can kill them and not our own species because we are somehow superior in every single way because we aren't.

In the wild there is such a thing as population control. Not all puppies, cubs or other young animals make it, be it before or after birth. Some of them die and this is a good thing because it keeps the ecosystem in balance.
We as humans don't have such a thing as population control anymore because we feel so good about our selfs that we need to save as many lifes as possible and allow as much births as possible. So in that aspect abortion should be totally legal because we NEED that kind of balancing. It doesn't even come close to how it should be but at least it's a start.

Patrick, not all life is sacred, alright? I don't care what you think because you are a christian but life isn't worth jack sh*t. If you want to say that your life is equally as important as that of a partially grown fetus that can't even survive on it's own then you have a very distorted view of the world because that's bullshit and at the end of the day you better know that.

Havoc

EDIT: Havoc, you're an absolutely terrible debator. You have to try and speak to people on their terms, rather than completely rubbishing their entire belief system. You've added nothing at all for PV to respond to because none of that effects his worldview.

That they have little or no movement can be seen clearly on an ultrasound. That they are not self-aware is simply logical given that young fetuses do not have developed brains.

Okay then; what do you call a sperm cell or an ovum? I would term them as pre-life, just as I would for a random bundle of cells in a womb or even a partially developed fetus.

Fetuses may be genetically human but they are not biologically human. A human does not have a tail. A human breathes through his or her lungs. I could go on.

In researching this, I read an interesting article by Peter Singer where he suggested that instead of referring to fetuses as 'human' or 'not human', to refer to them as a 'person' or 'not yet a person'. Of course a religious individual would claim that you become a person the moment that the soul enters your body at conception. Now, leaving aside the issue there of what percentage of a soul identical twins possess, you must understand that many people would disagree with that assumption.

Thus, you must stop putting the burden of proof on anyone else and instead prove to us that:
(a) Fetuses are biologically human
(b) Fetuses are conscious and have feeling
(c) Fetuses are people.

If you manage to do that without any "process of elimination" handwaving, I will be convinced and will never debate this with you again.

I don't see this as a flame war. In fact, I'm not even trying to convince you to a pro-choice point of view. All I'm trying to get you to do is to justify your point of view, because I don't understand it.

"Look, alive or not. As long as the FETUS is inside and attached to the mother no-one should have the damn guts to try and decide for her. "
BIG MEANIE MAN TRYING TO DOMINEER TEH WOMENS!
Give me a good reason WHY
"Her and her alone should have the decision as to whether or not the fetus dies, end of story."
http://www.fstdt.com/funnyimages/uploads/51.jpg
"No-one has the right to take another human life!!"

Yea? Well good for you that you have those ideals but thats not how the world works. If a girl gets pregnant its her right to decide if she wants to keep it or not. And not only does that apply to pregnancies, it should apply for already born children too"
http://www.fstdt.com/funnyimages/uploads/51.jpg
Child murder is fundamentally wrong as a creature's action as it is the deliberate, instrumentated harm against an innocent being. To paraphrase Angel again, you don't have to be a Christian to think that! As fetuses are human, and alive (NOT DEAD), and under 13, they are human children, and killing them is child murder.
"Heck it should apply in a lot of cases but it doesn't. Just because something is alive does not mean it's automatically gets the right of passage. You kill things that are alive every day by stepping on a weed or eating broccoli not to mention the cows and pigs that have their heads cut off because you want a piece of meat for dinner"
So I would be perfectly justified in shooting my hypothetical Down's Syndrome brother? He's at the level of a non human animal.
"Don't you dare be such a hypocrite to say that we can kill them and not our own species because we are somehow superior in every single way because we aren't."
Sapience, bitch.
"In the wild there is such a thing as population control. Not all puppies, cubs or other young animals make it, be it before or after birth. Some of them die and this is a good thing because it keeps the ecosystem in balance."
See my example above with the Down's syndrome brother. Humans are animals, but that doesn't mean we have to act like beasts. I suppose since dolphins rape weaker dolphins, that's okay too? (Once again, I know this has been abused by anti-gay types, but in this case we are talking about something that objectively terminates)
"We as humans don't have such a thing as population control anymore because we feel so good about our selfs that we need to save as many lifes as possible and allow as much births as possible. So in that aspect abortion should be totally legal because we NEED that kind of balancing. It doesn't even come close to how it should be but at least it's a start."
There is such a thing as condoms and legitimate birth control, boy.
"Patrick, not all life is sacred, alright? I don't care what you think because you are a christian but life isn't worth jack sh*t. If you want to say that your life is equally as important as that of a partially grown fetus that can't even survive on it's own then you have a very distorted view of the world because that's bullshit and at the end of the day you better know that."
Life isn't worth shit because I say so!
http://www.fstdt.com/funnyimages/uploads/51.jpg
Innocent life is worth even more than mine, IMO.
Nate;
"That they have little or no movement can be seen clearly on an ultrasound. That they are not self-aware is simply logical given that young fetuses do not have developed brains."
So you have to have a full brain to be human? Guess that excludes certain people with disorders. What is the movement caused by?
"Okay then; what do you call a sperm cell or an ovum? I would term them as pre-life, just as I would for a random bundle of cells in a womb or even a partially developed fetus. "
Sperm and ovum will, left to their own devices, not become a fetus/post birth baby.
"Fetuses may be genetically human but they are not biologically human. A human does not have a tail. A human breathes through his or her lungs. I could go on."
They are alive (I cannot find any sort of definition for "pre-life", and they aren't dead) and developing into birthed humans. Killing them would be as much killing as shooting a baby while he/she is being birthed.
"In researching this, I read an interesting article by Peter Singer where he suggested that instead of referring to fetuses as 'human' or 'not human', to refer to them as a 'person' or 'not yet a person'. Of course a religious individual would claim that you become a person the moment that the soul enters your body at conception. Now, leaving aside the issue there of what percentage of a soul identical twins possess, you must understand that many people would disagree with that assumption."
Quote Merriam Webster on person (http://www.m-w.com/dictionary/person)
"HUMAN, INDIVIDUAL -- sometimes used in combination especially by those who prefer to avoid man in compounds applicable to both sexes"
Fetuses are humans biologically (I WILL prove that to you in a minute)
"Thus, you must stop putting the burden of proof on anyone else and instead prove to us that:
(a) Fetuses are biologically human
(b) Fetuses are conscious and have feeling
(c) Fetuses are people."
A.They are genetically 100% human, share the basic shape of humans, are the product of two humans having sex, share the same organs and chemical makeup (genetics) as humans, and are made of human bits!
B.(http://www.layyous.com/ultasound/ear...nd_photos2.htm)
C.Google, go!
"(plural) any group of human beings (men or women or children) collectively; "old people"; "there were at least 200 people in the audience" "
(http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&r...efine%3Apeople
Pre life does not exist as a recognised state. Fetuses are alive, as they respond to stimuli and are not dead. Therefore they are alive. Fetuses are biologically human. Therefore, they are biologically alive humans.
"If you manage to do that without any "process of elimination" handwaving, I will be convinced and will never debate this with you again."
Explain to me why the "handwaving" is wrong.

Okay, how much care does a father give a child? I dont really see many men quiting their frigging jobs to look after the child. Also when it gets too tough the man just leaves for Gods sake! AND the man doesnt have to carry the baby, and man will never know what its like to give birth to a goddamn child! How many nappies do they change? How many hours do they spend up every night trying to get the kid to sleep and cleaning up its mess.......

This just became invalid. Screaming wailing and appealing to
emotion is lesser than logic.

I am woman, hear me roar.
Sorry, I'm a bit grumpy.

Nate, the idea of a debate is not to satisfy the other party. I'm rubbing his face in reality and he's gonna have to deal with whether he likes it or not. Like I said so many times before I only debate with facts, not with feelings or personal opinions. And if people can't handle that then that either means I'm right or they are to stupid to come up with a mature response to it. PV already proved the last part with his stupid pictures and meaningless one-liners, so don't tell me I don't know how to debate. If PV was actually so convinced about what he was saying then he could have wiped the floor with everything I said in my previous post, instead he brings in a brother with down syndrome.
If someone has a different opinion then me thats fine but only if the reason for that opinion is even remotely logical. Thinking that the entire human race is better then all else is not logical, thats bullshit. Thinking that there is no such thing as 'natural selection' is just as stupid.
I'm all for a good debate but not if the people I'm debating with 1. Have a retarded view on the world. 2. Don't even allow a fraction of the other sides ideas and views inside their heads to ponder about.

Havoc

Okay, PV. I have been very careful to use the word 'human' with caution because I can understand your objection to it. Please have the courtesy of not using it as a weapon.
Perfect example; I did not use the word 'human' here. I talked about conscious thought and, by inference, whether a fetus is a 'person'. In any case, yes. If a person was brain damaged to the point that they were no longer conscious of capable of thought, I would not consider them a person and would have no problem with them being euthanased.
I was quite clear that I made up the term 'pre-life' to describe something that doesn't have a word in English. Perhaps, seeing as you object to it, you can tell us how you define 'life'. Because I don't see a bunch of cells residing in a mother and dependant on her for everything as 'life'.

Well... yes and no. Certainly I do not agree with abortion in the latter stages of pregnancy. However, in the early stages fetuses do not share anything with fully developed humans other than genes and chemical makeup.

Sorry, what? What on earth has that got to do with fetus emotions and consciousness?
Now that's just plain silly; I was using 'people' as the plural of 'person', which is a very philosophical subject. I suppose the best meaning of what I meant regarding personhood comes from wikipedia:
The criteria a person must have in being a person are one or more of the following:
1. Consciousness,
2. The ability to steer one's attention and action purposively,
3. Self-awareness, self-bonded to objectivities (existing independently of the subject's perception of it),
4. Self as longitudinal thematic identity, one's biographic identity.

None of which a fetus possesses.

Once they respond to stimuli, that negates my point regarding motion and self control and I would consider it too late for an abortion. However, that occurs some time into a pregnancy.
"Handwaving" is wrong because it's playing around with definitions and semantics rather than actually confronting the issues at play.

Surely you would think that the idea of a debate is to convince the other person of your opinion? How can you do that if you demean their intelligence and deride their viewpoints?

Even if you're comfortable with that, it makes no sense to debate with someone in terms that they don't understand or respond to. It would be like you trying to debate with PV in dutch.

I think Patrick's title should be changed to "Tremendous Faggot" just for all his posts in this thread.

Guess what, Pat? It only seems to be you blurting out obsene claims of pro-life because of your obvious Christian bias. Women should only give birth when they're ready, as it is a painful process, and it's not your right to tell them different and that the fetus paracite should be spared just because it's "alive". It's their choice, not yours. Also, plenty of good things can come out of abortion such as stem cell research, which can save many a life. Humanity has to step forward, not back.

Again with the absurd assunption that my pro life position is influenced completely by my religion and attacks on my gender (and sexuality). Yes, I'm a big evil man with male chromosomes and characteristics. DEAL. WITH. IT.

I'm sorry, but I'm tired of the circular logic of many an angry wimmyn or supporter of angry wimmyn in this thread.

By your logic, as raping children is a hard and arduous process (as pedoscum need to track them down and make it secret) we should legalize that, as it's such a hard process that we don't have the right to tell pedoscum not to rape kids (note, once again, this is a useless argument without proving fetuses are alive, and I'm not saying all women procuring abortions are evil Satan worshipping bitches who will burn in hell)

I will prove fetuses are alive;
()
()
()
Please, try and avoid the stereotype of pro-lifers being homophobic, Bible thumping misogynist assholes, and I'll avoid the stereotype of pro abortion choicers being angry militant feminists.

PV - no-one is saying that it should be possible to abort healthy fetuses for the full nine months of pregnancy. Obviously at some point they develop to a state whereby they have enough characteristics of a fully developed human to give them rights as such.

What we are discussing is what is moral to do before that time.

Most of these ultrasounds are around the 1st trimester;
The first one is described as being "early pregnancy", which I think we can safely say is somewhere in 1st trimesterville.
The second one is clearly labeled 11 week ultrasound, which also places us in that town.
Ditto for the third.

The mothers choice. Thats all I say.

Alright....

This arguing over what is a human and what isn't is starting to remind me of Transformers Fans arguing over What is a Transformer and What isn't.

Anyway:

I think that as long as it's not thinking and attached, it's the mothers' choice.

Good lord. I take a week's hiatus and I find that this "debate" has spiralled away from the issue. The pro-choicers are arguing their point using the wrong terminology, and the anti-abortionist is arguing against that point quite correctly, ultimately meaning no one is getting anywhere.


There is no question that a foetus, blastocyst, embryo, zygote and human vegetable are all alive. We can see this quite clearly, it respires, it grows, there's loads of cellular activity going on. There is also no question that they are all human, as a DNA test will show, and given that they have all arisen from the unification of the two applicable human gametes.

The question is whether each has attained/retained this mysterious, immeasurable, undetectable and completely arbitrary quality of "person hood".

According to PV, this begins at the moment of conception.

There, no argument, no opinions. Just an innocent post.

Not joining back in.

basically i think that as soon as the baby starts taking a human form then it should be not allowed but any time before that wheres its basically cells it fine

I'm in two minds. Part of me is Pro-Abortion, due to the possibility of overpopulation. The other part of me is Anti-Abortion, moreso if it's being used as a contraceptive rather than the human equivalent of Tipex ("Whoops, made a mistake, let's quickly erase it!").

Then again, in England the people who're probably the most likely to have more of these mistakes tend to go ahead and have their children, when really they should be held down as a Vacuum cleaner is inserted into them.

I think it depends all on whether or not the mother wants to have the baby. So what if it's an alive living thing? so are the other few million eggs waiting to become born, but are they complaining? I was almost aborted, but i was born three months early, i guess i came out before anyone could decide XD but really, every egg in the ovaries could be the next albert einstien, so have the baby if possible, but if the mother isn't up to it, let her abort it. I was adopted, it sucks and I don't think anyone deserves to be given away just because of the mother not being able to abort them. There is no such thing as murdering it, if i shot a woman, would that make me a murderer of a million eggs/unborn children? If you would like to discuss this furthur with me, please send me a PM.

Eggs won't become babies left to their own devices. Fetuses will be born.

That assumes that the conditions in which they are grown are always perfect, and that is patently not the case.

Miscarriages are relatively rare events.

Actually, late-term miscarriages are fairly rare but early miscarriages (in the first month or so of pregnancy) are quite common. For one thing, women often don't even know that they were pregnant. Even if they did (and this counts for late term miscarriages also) they often don't spread the news around so the statistics are much higher than you may think. I know of several women in my extended family who have had miscarriages.

As a devout Catholic, I just think its wrong! My Religion teacher won me over.

Some abortion clinics are sadistic, they have you name the fetus you kill.

WTF!?