False. It is an entirely subjective value judgement. Dont for a second assume that your position is anymore objective than a pro-life one. I assume no such thing either. My view is no more objective than any other. Its based on nothing more than what "feels" right to me. So is your view.
Yes, they definately do, what are you talking about? What do instincts have to do with this? You just dismissed the entire scientific field of prenatal and neonatal psychology as quackery.
Id just point out that you do not need to claim that foetus is not a person for this to be true. Even if foetus is a person with rights and all that, you could abort it based on right of a person, pregnant woman in this case, to bodily autonomy.
No, they don't have a mind. They aren't capable of thinking. To think, you need an experience to think about. Instincts can give the impression of their being a mind, which is why I mentioned them. Nobody claims to prove a foetus has a mind.
You wouldn't be able to do that if a foetus was a person except in rare cases. It would be a legal shambles, actually.
I don't assume anything, I know it to be true. I am a person. That is definite. the reason I am a person is that I was born alive. That is nothing to do with my opinion, but is a fact. If I had died two hours after my birth, I would be a dead person. If I had died two hours before my birth, I'd have been a stilborn. If you think basing something on what "feels" right to you is not subjective, then you're wrong about that, too.
The experience of thinking itself, the experience of internal feelings or emotions is enough. You dont need experiences of the outside world. If the insticts are experienced by a mind, then it does not matter. Even it it was not 100% sure that newborns have a mind, just to be sure we have to protect them if its possible, so the whole point is moot anyway. As I have written above, we must determine the point when the fetus surely does NOT have a mind (and allow abortions only until then), not when it surely does have it. We know the mind requires brain waves, so lack of them proves a lack of mind - what we need. If you come up with similar 100% proof that newborns, or late term fetuses also dont have a mind, I would be OK with killing them. For our purposes, we need the negative (100% sure absence of mind), not positive.
Read again. I have said my view is subjective. It is an opinion, not a fact. The same with your view that being born gives us value. The same with pro-life view that mere human DNA sequence gives us value.
You need to know there is something to think about. they're not. Instincts are just instincts. A human newborn has an instinct to suck, but not to find a source of nourishment. You can't prove a negative. What is positive is that nobody can say for sure that a foetus has a mind. It's unlikely to have a mind.
What if I reject human rights? Consequently I would ask, what is special about human life? That I do not agree with. No one is the "property" of another without consent. I think you have begun with a number of false premises, at least morally speaking. Legally speaking you seem entirely correct.
Yes. Any law is an opinion you want to force on other people (those who disagree with it). We want to force our subjective opinion that murder is wrong on murderers, who disagree with it and hold a different opinion. We want to force our subjective opinion that rape is wrong on rapists, who disagree with it and hold a different opinion. There is nothing wrong with forcing opinions on others in itself - the only alternative to doing so is anarchy. Are you an anarchist? As I have said before, I dont agree with pro-lifers that mindless human life such as embryo is valuable as person, but I understand them - if I was persuaded it is so valuable, I would try to ban abortion too, just as I like murder banned.
No, I don't. If you wouldn't have an abortion after 24 weeks or whenever it was because you believe your foetus has a mind at that point, then that is fine with me.
the opinion that murder is wrong is not subjective. Murder harms people. We are people with rights. Those are facts, are they not? No, quite the opposite. I believe we should only force people to accept facts. Then you would be forcing opinions on other people. Not facts.
What constitutes "harm"? Is "harming people" wrong? Is murder wrong? Do "people" have rights? What gives people rights? Birth? Conception? Potential? Mind? These all are subjective questions with no objective answer. Opinions. Often forced on others. Its how the world works.
You can prove a negative if the thing in question has attributes or needs that can be shown to not exist. "You cant prove a negative" is often a useful rule, but its a gross oversimplification of the underlying formal logic: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evidence_of_absence#.22You_can.27t_prove_a_negative.22
You may as well legalize murder. Read this, it is philosophy 101: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fact–value_distinction
Another thing to consider: if location outside of another person is what gives human beings value, then we can easily imagine that altough it sufficiently logically consistent and no more subjective than any other opinion, such a trivial and quite meaningless reason could be easily discarded altogether in the future and it is a gross marginalisation of the worth of a human being. Because if a woman will be allowed to kill a 9th month foetus about to be born at will, why couldnt she do it an hour later after it is born? It is a devaluation of human life similar in the end effect to pro-life groups claiming humans are equals to a microscopic blob of cells.
Because it's no longer anything to do with her body and is a person. I think giving the same value to the unborn as the born devalues people. Anyone who has lost a child, or indeed, anyone they love, will tell you that.
Birth. Anything else is subjective. What is meant by potential? The potential to become what exactly? What is meant by mind? The ability to reason? The objective answer is birth. Birth has no subjective meaning. It's the time a human entity becomes a completely separate individual and uses its own organs to sustain its life.
Personhood is a subjective system to begin with -- it's subjective when one becomes a "person" because it's not a scientific term. It's like saying "there's nothing subjective about manhood beginning at 13." It's completely subjective. I laid out my argument in the OP -- this is what ultimately changed my mind. Once you're honest enough with yourself to realize that what you're proclaiming is that "a fetus is not a person because abortion should be legal, and abortion should be legal because a fetus is not a person" you'll realize that your position is based off circle logic. My point regarding Black people not being considered people throughout history was meant to debunk your argument that, historically, it's always been that you're a person from birth. It's irrelevant. What we should be using is scientific, objective definitions. Before you jump on this response, think about your position for a moment. Be honest with yourself and consider if you're using circle logic. Also think about the crying and breathing baby who was aborted being thrown in a bucket while you're at it. Are you implying that murder should be legal...? What are those false premises?
It's not true, is it? Manhood doesn't begin at 13. You can say what you like, mind. What we know as personhood legally begins at birth. It's not remotely subjective. Sometimes nauseatingly coy couples instead of telling people the wife is pregnant ask something like, " How many people can you see?" It's OK, that, mind. It's not harming anyone to say crap like that; but the correct answer is 2, not 3. No, my position is based simply on the fact that a foetus is inside the body of a woman and pregnancy can be a life changing condition. Abortion should be legal because pregnant women have rights and foetuses don't because two entities occupying the same body cannot have equal rights. Yes, it didn't work. Which crying and breathing baby? No. You think foetuses have minds. there is no reason to believe that's true.
