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Interesting, but this touches on the surface of a question that the study couldn't hope to answer. The journey towards becoming a human is a long and complex pr

Interesting, but this touches on the surface of a question that the study couldn't hope to answer. The journey towards becoming a human is a long and complex process, and any attempt to pinpoint a moment must be arbitrary at some point. It's like trying to say when something turns from red to orange. There's a point where it's definitely one or the other, but there's never going to be a clear moment where you can draw a line on the spectrum between the two. When it comes to the pro right/choice debate, we're just getting started. If viability is what matters, does the proper age to curb abortions change as technology gets better? Given the difference in our view of killing a mosquito vs. a human, it's intelligence that seems to matter to us. If an adult dog is smarter than a newborn, why the disparity in legal protection? Science can and should inform our views, but we also need applied reason and logic to sort through matters of morality.

mapleoin 13y ago
> If an adult dog is smarter than a newborn, why the disparity in legal protection? That's a very interesting question to ask. I think in the end, what we are rightfully protecting with our current laws is potential. The baby (or the embryo?) has the potential to become a fully developed human being and maybe change (save?) the world in the most significant of ways. A dog will not. There is an infinitude of possible worlds that a baby can make possible and an infinitude of ways in which it could develop (which we are more sensitive to perceiving compared to those of an animal). Killing a baby is basically killing an infinitude of possible worlds.
- pgsandstrom 13y ago
  Legal protection is not and should not be related to intelligens. How about mentally retarded people? I have also heard people defend the eating of animals with that we are so much more intelligent. Funny thing is, we would not be accepting of a superintelligent alien consuming humans. We simply protect things that are sufficiently alike us. The line we draw for this protection is arbitrary and has changed throughout history.
- mbrock 13y ago
  It seems fundamentally erroneous to attribute rationality to what's so obviously driven by instinctual processes and deep emotions. A baby is not a potential, it is a holy being, Christ, an intrinsic value, whatever you want to call it. Most of us don't see dogs like this (unless it's our dog).
- ignostic 13y ago
  This doesn't make sense. As we engineer stem cells from skin cells, it becomes theoretically possible to turn every cell in your body into life. When you shower, you're killing millions of potential humans. We must treat things as they are, and not as they might become.
vidarh 13y ago
> Given the difference in our view of killing a mosquito vs. a human, it's intelligence that seems to matter to us. I'd argue you're making the wrong inference. It is emotions that matters to us most. Intelligence is part of that: Something that can appeal to us would be harder to kill than something that doesn't. But also: Something that is cute and fluffy is harder to kill than something that stings us. And: Something that appears similar to us is harder to kill. Religion, politics and other factors all impact the emotions of the issue. We mould morality to fit our emotions more than the other way around.
DanBC 13y ago
> If viability is what matters, does the proper age to curb abortions change as technology gets better? Important to say here that even though technology has increased and pregnancy is much safer now than it used to be, but it's still the case that most children born before 24 weeks will die. The details are very distressing, and I don't particularly want to go into them here, but people suggesting that technology means we can keep these very ill children alive for any meaningful use of the word "alive" is wrong and cruel and heartless. The Dutch went the other way - if viability is what is important should we limit killing of children to just those that are unborn? This would affect about 15 babies a year in the netherlands, about 1,000 worldwide. (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/4093965.stm http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/4093965.stm) > If an adult dog is smarter than a newborn, why the disparity in legal protection? People might say that they dog will stay at its limited intelligence while the newborn will develop. Another example could be any of the more intelligent apes compared to a human with very severe mental disability. (I'm deliberately choosing to use the words of anti-abortionists, because even when the discussion is framed so emotively I am still firmly pro-choice; pro-abortion.)
belorn 13y ago
I doubt this kind of research will ever have an impact on the pro right/choice debate. If babies were to be find to be in a mental state similar to an unconscious adult, what would that actually mean? Most people treat unconscious adult as they would with an conscious one.
skrebbel 13y ago
> If an adult dog is smarter than a newborn, why the disparity in legal protection? Because, like it or not, us humans rule the world, so we get to make the rules. And we chose to protect our kind better than others.
- waps 13y ago
  Then why do we abort so many more babies than dogs ? While foetuses obviously don't have optical processing (you know, no eyes and all), the brain actually "boots up" on the 18th day after conception. So just before/just after a woman will start to suspect she's pregnant, there's an brain actively processing information in her womb. If we took that as the standard, you know, that'd be more conservative than any religious grouping even asks for. (the reason for this is that a human foetus "is not human". Our DNA is only human in that it contains a set of instructions that will transform an ape foetus into a human foetus. But the ape foetus isn't grown from scratch either, it's grown from some four legged animal. Basically the first recognizable animal you start out as is a bilobite (which is extinct, it's essentially a hollow ball of cells), grow into a trilobite (a 2-part ball of cells), grow into something that looks a lot like a tadpole, grow into ... and a tadpole requires a functioning brain, and so a human foetus at that development stage has a functioning brain) The point is we don't protect life at all. We protect ways to make the life of the decision makers (which are nearly all adult humans) easier/more enjoyable. Kids, dogs and abortion are merely parts of that, as is freely killing dogs, intelligent or otherwise. Really the reason we don't kill kids is because humans would rebel. You can try to explain the problem, like stating that a kid, even a small one represents a massive investment of time, money, sweat, and (I'm sure any mother will be glad to remind you) inconvenience and pain, and I'm sure that's a rather good explanation. But in the end it comes down to adult, mostly male, humans vetoing it. We support abortion because it's a way to vastly limit that investment and get rid of both "the product" and the investment (and, frankly, because without abortion anything remotely resembling today's nightlife would be completely out of the question). So really "us humans" don't rule the world. Too bad, not really. A small number of adult, mostly but not all male humans rule the world.
  - robbiep 13y ago

mapleoin 13y ago

> If an adult dog is smarter than a newborn, why the disparity in legal protection? That's a very interesting question to ask. I think in the end, what we are rightfully protecting with our current laws is potential. The baby (or the embryo?) has the potential to become a fully developed human being and maybe change (save?) the world in the most significant of ways. A dog will not. There is an infinitude of possible worlds that a baby can make possible and an infinitude of ways in which it could develop (which we are more sensitive to perceiving compared to those of an animal). Killing a baby is basically killing an infinitude of possible worlds.

pgsandstrom 13y ago
Legal protection is not and should not be related to intelligens. How about mentally retarded people? I have also heard people defend the eating of animals with that we are so much more intelligent. Funny thing is, we would not be accepting of a superintelligent alien consuming humans. We simply protect things that are sufficiently alike us. The line we draw for this protection is arbitrary and has changed throughout history.
mbrock 13y ago
It seems fundamentally erroneous to attribute rationality to what's so obviously driven by instinctual processes and deep emotions. A baby is not a potential, it is a holy being, Christ, an intrinsic value, whatever you want to call it. Most of us don't see dogs like this (unless it's our dog).
ignostic 13y ago
This doesn't make sense. As we engineer stem cells from skin cells, it becomes theoretically possible to turn every cell in your body into life. When you shower, you're killing millions of potential humans. We must treat things as they are, and not as they might become.

vidarh 13y ago

> Given the difference in our view of killing a mosquito vs. a human, it's intelligence that seems to matter to us. I'd argue you're making the wrong inference. It is emotions that matters to us most. Intelligence is part of that: Something that can appeal to us would be harder to kill than something that doesn't. But also: Something that is cute and fluffy is harder to kill than something that stings us. And: Something that appears similar to us is harder to kill. Religion, politics and other factors all impact the emotions of the issue. We mould morality to fit our emotions more than the other way around.

DanBC 13y ago

> If viability is what matters, does the proper age to curb abortions change as technology gets better? Important to say here that even though technology has increased and pregnancy is much safer now than it used to be, but it's still the case that most children born before 24 weeks will die. The details are very distressing, and I don't particularly want to go into them here, but people suggesting that technology means we can keep these very ill children alive for any meaningful use of the word "alive" is wrong and cruel and heartless. The Dutch went the other way - if viability is what is important should we limit killing of children to just those that are unborn? This would affect about 15 babies a year in the netherlands, about 1,000 worldwide. (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/4093965.stm http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/4093965.stm) > If an adult dog is smarter than a newborn, why the disparity in legal protection? People might say that they dog will stay at its limited intelligence while the newborn will develop. Another example could be any of the more intelligent apes compared to a human with very severe mental disability. (I'm deliberately choosing to use the words of anti-abortionists, because even when the discussion is framed so emotively I am still firmly pro-choice; pro-abortion.)

belorn 13y ago

I doubt this kind of research will ever have an impact on the pro right/choice debate. If babies were to be find to be in a mental state similar to an unconscious adult, what would that actually mean? Most people treat unconscious adult as they would with an conscious one.

skrebbel 13y ago

> If an adult dog is smarter than a newborn, why the disparity in legal protection? Because, like it or not, us humans rule the world, so we get to make the rules. And we chose to protect our kind better than others.

waps 13y ago
Then why do we abort so many more babies than dogs ? While foetuses obviously don't have optical processing (you know, no eyes and all), the brain actually "boots up" on the 18th day after conception. So just before/just after a woman will start to suspect she's pregnant, there's an brain actively processing information in her womb. If we took that as the standard, you know, that'd be more conservative than any religious grouping even asks for. (the reason for this is that a human foetus "is not human". Our DNA is only human in that it contains a set of instructions that will transform an ape foetus into a human foetus. But the ape foetus isn't grown from scratch either, it's grown from some four legged animal. Basically the first recognizable animal you start out as is a bilobite (which is extinct, it's essentially a hollow ball of cells), grow into a trilobite (a 2-part ball of cells), grow into something that looks a lot like a tadpole, grow into ... and a tadpole requires a functioning brain, and so a human foetus at that development stage has a functioning brain) The point is we don't protect life at all. We protect ways to make the life of the decision makers (which are nearly all adult humans) easier/more enjoyable. Kids, dogs and abortion are merely parts of that, as is freely killing dogs, intelligent or otherwise. Really the reason we don't kill kids is because humans would rebel. You can try to explain the problem, like stating that a kid, even a small one represents a massive investment of time, money, sweat, and (I'm sure any mother will be glad to remind you) inconvenience and pain, and I'm sure that's a rather good explanation. But in the end it comes down to adult, mostly male, humans vetoing it. We support abortion because it's a way to vastly limit that investment and get rid of both "the product" and the investment (and, frankly, because without abortion anything remotely resembling today's nightlife would be completely out of the question). So really "us humans" don't rule the world. Too bad, not really. A small number of adult, mostly but not all male humans rule the world.
- robbiep 13y ago