Is Abortion Murder?

[Raptorsin7]

What are your thoughts on abortion

The conventional conservative argument, I think, is that abortion is akin to murdering a small child. At 6 months the fetus basically looks like a small child, so I can see that argument. 

If you support abortion how do you think about the conservative argument that you are supporting murdering small babies?

Should woman have the right to abort an 8 month fetus? And if you support late term abortions then is there any reason why woman should not be allowed to kill a baby at birth as long as the umbilical cord is attached?

I support abortion but mainly because I don't think poor people having lots of children is good for society, and also because I don't think people should be forced into having children if they are not ready. But it seems clear to me that abortion in some form murder, and part of my argument is a eugenics argument.

 

Edited June 9, 2022 by Raptorsin7

[Oeaohoo]

5 minutes ago, Raptorsin7 said:

I support abortion but mainly because I don't poor people having lots of children is good for society, and part of my argument is a eugenics argument.

Brutal!

6 minutes ago, Raptorsin7 said:

At 6 months the fetus basically looks like a small child, so I can see that argument. 

If you support abortion how do you think about the conservative argument that you are supporting murdering small babies?

Should woman have the right to abort an 8 month fetus? And if you support late term abortions then is there any reason why woman should not be allowed to kill a baby at birth as long as the umbilical cord is attached?

I don’t think an abortion this late is legal in many places so all of this seems a bit abstract.

Personally I don’t think there’s any good answer to this question. Every sperm is a potential life so technically every man is a mass murderer. Even a women will inevitably not use many of her eggs. You could say that it is only a potential life when the sperm and egg are fused but then it’s not like it could immediately leap out and become a self-sufficient person.

It largely just depends on the preferences of society. I will say that I find it very silly when people today rhetorically claim that removing abortion is taking away a “woman’s reproductive rights”. After all, the only reason there are easy ways to get abortion today is because society has developed to such an extent. Therefore, if abortion is bad for society, society should have the right to take away a thing which it alone is providing (not that it necessarily should). Like most progressive ideology, it is totally parasitic on prior developments and cultural decadence.

[zurew]

 

Destiny is laying down a strong pro abortion position here. 

It starts at 1:19:31 .

 

[Raptorsin7]

@zurew He's arguing that abortion before 6 weeks is okay because the fetus isn't conscious yet. But I don't think there's any good reason to assume that consciousness develops at that point of development. It's like a materialist technicality to justify abortion, but he's completely overlooking the possibility that consciousness does not depend on brain development.

Destiny is a sociopath who doesn't have any genuine emotional concern for what happens. He could present a strong choice for why it's okay to give old people murder poison and you'd have people presenting it as profound and sound reasoning.

Edited June 9, 2022 by Raptorsin7

[integral]

if we had a system that fully supported developing children then I think abortion should be illegal. Because those children will have equal opportunity and great resources. With out this system if the child is going to be born into a family who is poor or unfit or not ready for a child then it might be best if the child was never born. Also if the birth of the child overburdens the parents and ruins their lives I see no reason why that's any different than ending a babies life. 

Edited June 9, 2022 by integral

[Raptorsin7]

15 minutes ago, Oeaohoo said:

I don’t think an abortion this late is legal in many places so all of this seems a bit abstract.

 

I think most people who are pro abortion would support abortion at around 6 months right?

It's more about understanding the underlying ideology and what positions it commits people. Like if someone supports abortion at 6 months then I don't see why they wouldn't support late term abortions.

20 minutes ago, Oeaohoo said:

Personally I don’t think there’s any good answer to this question. Every sperm is a potential life so technically every man is a mass murderer. Even a women will inevitably not use many of her eggs. You could say that it is only a potential life when the sperm and egg are fused but then it’s not like it could immediately leap out and become a self-sufficient person.

 

Yeah, but there are common sense distinctions we can use. Technically we are all mass murderers of insects and microbes, but it wouldn't make any sense to then justify my murder of my family because well i'm already a mass murderer. 

I think with abortion the point of contention is around whether pro abortion people are pro baby murderers. 

I'd bet most people who are pro abortion think they have the moral high ground, so they would strongly disagree that they support murdering babies.

[zurew]

28 minutes ago, Raptorsin7 said:

But I don't think there's any good reason to assume that consciousness develops at that point of development.

If you want to take the position that consciousness is not necessarily related to the brain, then you will get into a weird position which will be really hard to justify. We would get to a place where killing any small bacteria or life should be considered a murder because generally speaking what we actually value is conscious experience. Also, generally speaking we definitely value consciousness over potentiality, so how do you go around that?

Just as he said, we can keep a body alive, but we no longer consider him conscious (if he is braindead) . I don't think you value 5 braindead bodies the same as 5 healthy person with healthy brains

Also, he can use the "from where do you consider the fetus a human" argument as well. He can say that it isn't a human before 6 weeks and that way he can justify abortion. Its subjective where someone draw his/her own line.

28 minutes ago, Raptorsin7 said:

Destiny is a sociopath who doesn't have any genuine emotional concern for what happens.

He is not a sociopath. He was a pro lifer some years ago, but he changed his position. I think he is giving pretty sounding and rational arguments most of the time.

 

12 minutes ago, Raptorsin7 said:

Yeah, but there are common sense distinctions we can use.

There are no common sense distinctions in morality debates. You need to bite some heavy bullets depending on what position you take. Its the nature of moral arguments that you need to justify everything.

No matter what positions you will take ,you will have to eat some heavy bullets, the only question is, with what bullets you are okay with.

Edited June 9, 2022 by zurew

[Raptorsin7]

Just now, zurew said:

He is not a sociopath. He was a pro lifer some years ago, but he changed his position. I think he is giving pretty sounding and rational arguments most of the time.

 

I'm pretty sure he's a sociopath, how are you assessing whether he is or not?

1 minute ago, zurew said:

If you want to take the position that consciousness is not necessarily related to the brain, then you will get into a weird position which will be really hard to justify. We would get to a place where killing any small bacteria or life should be considered a murder because generally speaking what we actually value is conscious experience. Also, generally speaking we definitely value consciousness over potentiality, so how do you go around that?

 

It's about intentional murder compared to what is necessary to exist. I don't think you can exist without killing some insects at least accidentally, but we have the option to not perform abortions.

I think people don't realize the full implications of their beliefs, and so when the rubber meets the road they get defensive and have to perform mental gymnastics.

3 minutes ago, zurew said:

There are no common sense distinctions in morality debates. You need to bite some heavy bullets depending on what position you take. Its the nature of moral arguments that you need to justify everything.

 

Well yeah there are. It's common sense that the life of a human being is more important than the life of a blade of grass. 

If you want to argue with me over whether a blade of grass is more important than the life of a human being then I don't see a point in having a discussion because we will never get anywhere. Maybe other people like that stuff, but for me I would see no point.

[zurew]

4 minutes ago, Raptorsin7 said:

If you want to argue with me over whether a blade of grass is more important than the life of a human being then I don't see a point in having a discussion because we will never get anywhere.

Generally speaking we would want to get down as deep as we can, to see what you value and why. There is a reason to get down deep, because the other party might change its position if he/she hears a sounding argument in favour of your position, but if you start on the ground of "common sense" then no one will change any positions and noone will be convinced of anything. But we don't need to continue this,if you don't want to, but you have to be aware, that the other party who will argue againts you can use the term "common sense" as well (because you are using it too) as they like and whenever they like without needing to justify or further elaborate why they think what they think.

Using the word "common sense" is begging the question and implies that we didn't really think through our position why we think what we think and why we value what we value.

7 minutes ago, Raptorsin7 said:

I'm pretty sure he's a sociopath, how are you assessing whether he is or not?

Its irrelevant for the sake of this discussion if he is a sociopath or not. Of course i would just use my assumptions, just as you.

8 minutes ago, Raptorsin7 said:

It's about intentional murder compared to what is necessary to exist. I don't think you can exist without killing some insects at least accidentally, but we have the option to not perform abortions.

So if a mosquito put its needle in you and suck your blood and you kill it, regarding to this framework it would still be considered murder, because you intentionally killed it, just to be more comfortable and to not feel pain. 

Or if you kill a fly in your home, just because you got annoyed by it , it would still be considered a murder, and if you use this framework the only justification you can use is that, "it annoyed me , so i had to kill it " but of course that will be very weak to justify murder.

 

So according to you , from where human life begins and why there?

Also, why should we value the potentiality of a life the same way as an already developed life?

[integral]

We should just boil it down to a morality math formula.

is there a field of morality mathematics? 

The morality of the abortion depends on the circumstances and is relative. we can give each situation a unique score. 

all pro life perspectives hold human life as the absolute most important factor and the only important factor. So by definition it only takes One factor into consideration and is therefore not inclusive and  less true then more inclusive perspectives, like pro choice. 

The more inclusive something is the more true it is, magic!

Edited June 9, 2022 by integral

[Twenty]

"Is good for society" if society dont think poor people having kids is good then dont fund them. The kids will die eventually

.

 

[Raptorsin7]

1 hour ago, zurew said:

So according to you , from where human life begins and why there?

I think the moment you know you are pregnant that's when human life begins.

1 hour ago, zurew said:

Also, why should we value the potentiality of a life the same way as an already developed life?

In this case it's not potentiality of life, it's still just a human life. If you know you are pregnant then life is present, and whatever you do you are doing to a human life.

1 hour ago, zurew said:

Its irrelevant for the sake of this discussion if he is a sociopath or not. Of course i would just use my assumptions, just as you.

1 hour ago, Raptorsin7 said:

Well if it was irrelevant you wouldn't have felt the need to say he isn't a sociopath.

[zurew]

1 minute ago, Raptorsin7 said:

Well if it was irrelevant you wouldn't have felt the need to say he isn't a sociopath.

Its irrelevant for the sake of abortion discussion. We could reason why he is or why he isn't a sociopath but the conclusion won't change any abortion position here, so i don't think its relevant to argue about it.

2 minutes ago, Raptorsin7 said:

I think the moment you know you are pregnant that's when human life begins.

Pro lifers will be able to attack your position and say, why do you justify killing a human life, by saying that that human life might grow up in a poor environment. 

Pro lifer could say, why shouldn't we kill then other poor children who grow up in a poor environment?

Your other argument was (correct me if i am wrong) that "people should be forced into having children if they are not ready".  Pro lifer would argue, why should that statement hold more weight compared to a human murder?

I am pro abortion and I think, if you are pro abortion you can't take the stance that you think that human life begins from pregnancy, because it will be almost impossible to defend. Its impossible to defend, because anything you will say will have to hold more weight than a human murder.

[Raptorsin7]

@zurew Yeah my point is people can't hold both of those ideas without getting uncomfortable so they have to perform mental gymnastics.

I think people should be allowed to have abortions, but it's also killing the baby. It's not the same as murdering your neighbor, so maybe we need a different word, but it's in the same ball park.

I don't care about how pro lifers will attack my argument lol. I care about what's true

[zurew]

5 minutes ago, Raptorsin7 said:

Yeah my point is people can't hold both of those ideas without getting uncomfortable so they have to perform mental gymnastics.

Yeah , thats why i said that no matter what position one take we will have to eat some heavy bullets.

7 minutes ago, Raptorsin7 said:

I don't care about how pro lifers will attack my argument lol. I care about what's true

 I bet you care on a political level , if your position on abortion would be used on a societal level. It boils down to subjective prefences and metaethics. Its not more true to say, that abortion is right or to say that abortion is wrong, because ultimately its based upon subjective grounds. Generally, we debate or talk about these topics and arguing because we assume, we can change the other side's mind about their position.

If we assume, that the other side won't change their position at all, then the only point to continue talking about the topic is to be able to understand why the other side they think what they think ,and why they take the position what they take, but other than that, not much value you can get from the discussion.

 

 

[Raptorsin7]

1 minute ago, zurew said:

bet you care on a political level , if your position on abortion would be used on a societal level. It boils down to subjective prefences and metaethics. Its not more true to say, that abortion is right or to say that abortion is wrong, because ultimately its based upon subjective grounds. Generally, we debate or talk about these topics and arguing because we assume, we can change the other side's mind about their position.

Yeah it's tough for politicians, you have to be dishonest to get your point across.

I'd say establish the truth and then find whichever political party is most in alignment with the truth. 

This topic isn't about advancing policy. It's an honest discussion about what's true.

[zurew]

6 minutes ago, Raptorsin7 said:

This topic isn't about advancing policy. It's an honest discussion about what's true.

Yeah, then my bad, i projected my assumption on this thread.

[Bobby_2021]

4 hours ago, Oeaohoo said:

Every sperm is a potential life so technically every man is a mass murderer. Even a women will inevitably not use many of her eggs.

This is a crappy statement.

If sperms had enough potential to be a baby, then every sperm should have become a baby. 

Isolate a sperm and evaluate it's chances of becoming a baby.

Now take a sand brick and evaluate it's potential to become a baby.

Both have negligible potential to become a baby.

Sperm doesn't have potential.

Eggs don't have potential.

Fetus have potential.

A given fetus/fetuses turn into a baby in real time. 

A sperm simply do not turn into a baby.

That doesn't make a man a murderer for jacking off lol. 

[Fadl]

People are afraid.. they can kill another human bieng  just to feel safe.. 

Only a devil will promote that.

 

[AtheisticNonduality]

Killing sperm and fertilized eggs, those two acts as distinct from each other, are both equally a destruction of human life (sperm cells being human cells), and killing both negates the potential in both for a real  human to develop out of it. A fertilized egg, or just as well a fetus, getting obliterated also destroys the potential, thus disproving the argument that sperm does not always develop into fully grown humans whereas sperm-egg unions do. Still, fertilized eggs have more potential to form fully grown life, but then we're left to wonder why having more of something in this case should mean it's more immoral to get rid of that something. If potential for a greater amount of money is dropped away, that correlates with more immorality on the part of the perpetrator (possibly a thief who caused a business to shut down) who destroyed that potential. However, there are also situations where the negation of the potential is a positive event. So alternately, the thief stealing from the business was really taking funds from an organization that was going to commit a string of assassinations and genocides in some foreign land. This means the more the potential is destroyed, the greater the morality, the lesser the immorality. This may also compare well with the potential for a fertilized egg or a fetus to turn into a real human. So this all means that the morality or immorality of any given potentiality or potentiality-dismantling is a determination of consequence relative to harm versus positivity.

Then we have to wonder how a tension between harm and positivity will emerge from those that read their own subjective moralities onto these issues. Does the supposed "positivity" of a fetus' growth outweigh the harm it will bring?