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There's no good way to draw a line. Morally, arguments are just as strong in terms of the fetus putting the mother at risk, or the obligations on society to fo

There's no good way to draw a line. Morally, arguments are just as strong in terms of the fetus putting the mother at risk, or the obligations on society to force the mother to behave in ways that care for the fetus and later for the child itself, with limited support or assistance. Similarly, you can claim that life is life even if it obligates others to sacrifices of their own. Both arguments also have their equal share of counterpoints. The thing is, it's a decision, similar to deciding that suicide is a crime. You believe what you want, and choose what you'd prefer the rules to be, but society must kind of all agree to those decisions so we can coexist in harmony, find some compromise amongst ourselves. For a lot of things, people tend to agree more easily on what they'd prefer. Would you rather have the right to kill others, but it means you could in turn be killed by others, or would you rather lose your right to kill and similarly have others prevented from killing you? What if something lives inside you, drains you of energy, blood, minerals, food, could cause health complications, and will require lifelong time and financial support and commitment. What if you didn't consent to this thing living in you, maybe it was rape or accidental? Would you rather be allowed to choose to care for it or not? Or would you rather that had it been you living inside a host, you'd have the right to live no matter the choice of your carrier and to their sacrifice or to the circumstances of your conception? Some people feel at that point, little would be lost to them, so they'd rather get to choose to carry or not. Others feel differently. Everyone might have their own reasons. There are other options as well, often not discussed, because people are just trying to get their way most of the time. Men don't have this problem at all, so it is less surprising when they think that the carrier should be forced to carry, since they will never be the one in the "being forced to carry" position themselves. Complicating the matter even more, since we're not all as impacted by the issue itself. So often a compromise has to be found in practice. A middle ground looks like allowing it but not past some time, gives you enough time to decide what you want, but wait too long and the choice is made for you. Exceptions can be made for special cases, those can be listed. You'll find people unwilling to compromise as well on both sides. It's how it goes. The point being, there is no science to draw on for the cutoff, unless you contextualize it with other arbitrary criteria, and even then, a lot of those criteria are subjective, like "consciousness", that's not a scientific concept, we cannot observe, prove or disprove it, understand nothing of it's mechanisms if it exists, etc.

sp527 4y ago
> fetus putting the mother at risk I have absolutely no qualms with abortion in the event of life-threatening complications experienced by the mother at any stage of pregnancy. That seems perfectly reasonable. In fact, I think most supposedly 'pro life' states carve out such exceptions? > or the obligations on society to force the mother to behave in ways that care for the fetus and later for the child itself, with limited support or assistance > What if you didn't consent to this thing living in you, maybe it was rape or accidental? Does it really take 20-24 weeks to realize and act upon this? Keep in mind I'm asking about where the line is placed, not about whether or not abortion should be permissible. > The point being, there is no science to draw on for the cutoff I disagree. Science tells us very precisely what kind of life is being disposed of at every stage of pregnancy. People are being intellectually dishonest about this on both sides to serve their own purposes. Extreme pro-lifers, for example, will argue that life begins at conception merely because of the potential for it to become a child. My point was that setting the cutoff at "viability outside the womb" is equally as extreme and just as likely to be motivated by political expediency, in the opposing direction. I see nothing in your comment that meaningfully invalidates that assertion.
- paulryanrogers 4y ago
  > Does it really take 20-24 weeks to realize and act upon this? Maybe some genetic test results came back indicating severe problems, or the mother got a diagnosis herself, or the father has backed out of support. It's hard to judge without intimidate knowledge of the circumstances.
- didibus 4y ago
  > In fact, I think most supposedly 'pro life' states carve out such exceptions? I think a lot of them are explicitly not carving out any exceptions. But for some reason, it's really hard to get accurate acces to this information. > Does it really take 20-24 weeks to realize and act upon this? Keep in mind I'm asking about where the line is placed, not about whether or not abortion should be permissible I wasn't discussing what should or shouldn't be. Simply explaining why there's no easy way to gather consensus on where to draw the line. In practice, in most places that allow abortions, there are already limits in at what point you can get an abortion. This is a common compromise between pro-life and pro-choice. I think only two states used to allow abortions at any point for any reason, all others had reasonable limits with carve outs for exceptions. If you look at the statistics, an incredibly small number of abortions are made beyond the first few weeks. There's a lot of secrecy in the details, but it's likely those made after the first few weeks are cases of medical complications, unforseen life altering surprises (death of the father, financial bankruptcy), or were due to inability to actually get an abortion sooner, long waiting times, social stigma, etc. > I disagree. Science tells us very precisely what kind of life is being disposed of at every stage of pregnancy Things are a lot fuzzier than you claim. Sometimes you can't even tell that there are two fetuses until the 20 week mark. It's not that there's nothing you can observe, but what observations you consider important to use as a criteria on a cutoff is arbitrary. A beating heart? What does that mean? We can grow a beating heart in-lab, is that life? A 6 months old baby? Is it conscious? Self-aware? You can try to see if it acts differently when seeing a photo of itself versus that of other babies, what does that truly tell you? People can't agree on if a lobster feels pain when boiled alive... That's what I mean by that you can't just appeal to science, you have to apply an arbitrary judgement to what science is able to observe. > My point was that setting the cutoff at "viability outside the womb" is equally as extreme and just as likely to be motivated by political expediency, in the opposing direction Yes, that's my point as well. I was arguing to your other point: > Shouldn't it be something more reasonable like "has a relatively developed brain", "can experience pain", "shows early signs of consciousness", "has major organs", "is a recognizably bipedal/human lifeform", etc? [...] grounded in anything scientific or morally conscionable My point is that none of these are any more or less reasonable. They're all based on some arbitrary rational we've agreed too. If you're curious though, it's not "viability in the womb", it's actually "fetal viability", and it refers to the complete opposite, which is viability of the fetus to survive outside of the womb. > Fetal viability is the ability of a human fetus to survive outside the uterus. Medical viability is generally considered to be between 23 and 24 weeks gestational age. Viability depends upon factors such as birth weight, gestational age, and the availability of advanced medical care The argument goes, if the fetus can now survive without the carrier, on "its own", aka inside advanced medical incubating machines and under advanced medical supervision, the fetus is therefore no longer dependent on the carrier, that means instead of giving an abortion, you could remove the fetus and see if it'll live. The mother can therefore "end" her pragnency without resorting to aborting it, she can simply choose to accelerate the delivery instead. Now some people think this is also a good criteria for the threshold to be considered alive, that you can survive on your own, independently, detached from a host. You could argue that it's reasonable to say life begins when you can survive as an independent organism (and maybe being dependent on machines and medical care counts as well).

sp527 4y ago

> fetus putting the mother at risk I have absolutely no qualms with abortion in the event of life-threatening complications experienced by the mother at any stage of pregnancy. That seems perfectly reasonable. In fact, I think most supposedly 'pro life' states carve out such exceptions? > or the obligations on society to force the mother to behave in ways that care for the fetus and later for the child itself, with limited support or assistance > What if you didn't consent to this thing living in you, maybe it was rape or accidental? Does it really take 20-24 weeks to realize and act upon this? Keep in mind I'm asking about where the line is placed, not about whether or not abortion should be permissible. > The point being, there is no science to draw on for the cutoff I disagree. Science tells us very precisely what kind of life is being disposed of at every stage of pregnancy. People are being intellectually dishonest about this on both sides to serve their own purposes. Extreme pro-lifers, for example, will argue that life begins at conception merely because of the potential for it to become a child. My point was that setting the cutoff at "viability outside the womb" is equally as extreme and just as likely to be motivated by political expediency, in the opposing direction. I see nothing in your comment that meaningfully invalidates that assertion.

paulryanrogers 4y ago
> Does it really take 20-24 weeks to realize and act upon this? Maybe some genetic test results came back indicating severe problems, or the mother got a diagnosis herself, or the father has backed out of support. It's hard to judge without intimidate knowledge of the circumstances.
didibus 4y ago
> In fact, I think most supposedly 'pro life' states carve out such exceptions? I think a lot of them are explicitly not carving out any exceptions. But for some reason, it's really hard to get accurate acces to this information. > Does it really take 20-24 weeks to realize and act upon this? Keep in mind I'm asking about where the line is placed, not about whether or not abortion should be permissible I wasn't discussing what should or shouldn't be. Simply explaining why there's no easy way to gather consensus on where to draw the line. In practice, in most places that allow abortions, there are already limits in at what point you can get an abortion. This is a common compromise between pro-life and pro-choice. I think only two states used to allow abortions at any point for any reason, all others had reasonable limits with carve outs for exceptions. If you look at the statistics, an incredibly small number of abortions are made beyond the first few weeks. There's a lot of secrecy in the details, but it's likely those made after the first few weeks are cases of medical complications, unforseen life altering surprises (death of the father, financial bankruptcy), or were due to inability to actually get an abortion sooner, long waiting times, social stigma, etc. > I disagree. Science tells us very precisely what kind of life is being disposed of at every stage of pregnancy Things are a lot fuzzier than you claim. Sometimes you can't even tell that there are two fetuses until the 20 week mark. It's not that there's nothing you can observe, but what observations you consider important to use as a criteria on a cutoff is arbitrary. A beating heart? What does that mean? We can grow a beating heart in-lab, is that life? A 6 months old baby? Is it conscious? Self-aware? You can try to see if it acts differently when seeing a photo of itself versus that of other babies, what does that truly tell you? People can't agree on if a lobster feels pain when boiled alive... That's what I mean by that you can't just appeal to science, you have to apply an arbitrary judgement to what science is able to observe. > My point was that setting the cutoff at "viability outside the womb" is equally as extreme and just as likely to be motivated by political expediency, in the opposing direction Yes, that's my point as well. I was arguing to your other point: > Shouldn't it be something more reasonable like "has a relatively developed brain", "can experience pain", "shows early signs of consciousness", "has major organs", "is a recognizably bipedal/human lifeform", etc? [...] grounded in anything scientific or morally conscionable My point is that none of these are any more or less reasonable. They're all based on some arbitrary rational we've agreed too. If you're curious though, it's not "viability in the womb", it's actually "fetal viability", and it refers to the complete opposite, which is viability of the fetus to survive outside of the womb. > Fetal viability is the ability of a human fetus to survive outside the uterus. Medical viability is generally considered to be between 23 and 24 weeks gestational age. Viability depends upon factors such as birth weight, gestational age, and the availability of advanced medical care The argument goes, if the fetus can now survive without the carrier, on "its own", aka inside advanced medical incubating machines and under advanced medical supervision, the fetus is therefore no longer dependent on the carrier, that means instead of giving an abortion, you could remove the fetus and see if it'll live. The mother can therefore "end" her pragnency without resorting to aborting it, she can simply choose to accelerate the delivery instead. Now some people think this is also a good criteria for the threshold to be considered alive, that you can survive on your own, independently, detached from a host. You could argue that it's reasonable to say life begins when you can survive as an independent organism (and maybe being dependent on machines and medical care counts as well).