Abortion

[AProudLefty]

To recap

@IBDaMann, @gfm7175 and @Into the Night: 0
@Scott: 1

 

[Scott]

We tend to value the -intelligence- of brains far more than simply having one.

Along that vein, most of the brain's development happens -after- a child is born:
**

Neural Growth in Infancy​

Neural growth in infancy is remarkable. At birth, an infant's brain is about 25% of the size of an adult brain. By age two, it reaches about 80% of adult size.
**

Source:

https://physicscore.com/articles/human-brain-development-by-age/

Along that vein, the most crucial brain development happens prior to a child's birth.

According to who?

According to all the people that matter [snip]

Do you have any evidence to support your assertion?

 

[Scott]

If the goal was to simply talk about what a human is, there was no need to put the term "living" behind it.

I will determine the wording of my position, thank you very much.

Ofcourse. I'm just trying to help you with your logic.

 

[Scott]

If the goal was to simply talk about what a human is, there was no need to put the term "living" behind it. But let's play your game. Here are wordnik's first 2 definitions for human:
**

• noun A member of the primate genus Homo, especially a member of the species Homo sapiens, distinguished from other apes by a large brain and the capacity for speech.
• noun A person.

**
Source:

human — definition, examples, related words and more at Wordnik

All the words

www.wordnik.com

If there are multiple definitions, you have to pick the one within the correct context, which means any such usage involving the word "person" is rejected.

Care to explain why you reject using the word person to describe the word human?

 

[IBDaMann]

Do you have any evidence to support your assertion?

Yes, as do you.

 

[IBDaMann]

Care to explain why you reject using the word person to describe the word human?

Nope, nor do I care to explain why I reject the words "peanut butter", "consortium" and "dilithium crystals."

I gave you my definition.

 

[IBDaMann]

Ofcourse. I'm just trying to help you with your logic.

You reject logic and EVADE conversation.

 

[AProudLefty]

Nope, nor do I care to explain why I reject the words "peanut butter", "consortium" and "dilithium crystals."

I gave you my definition.

Your own definition defeats your own argument.

 

[AProudLefty]

You reject logic and EVADE conversation.

A projection.

@Scott, ask him about the square root of -1. It's hilarious.

 

[Scott]

If the goal was to simply talk about what a human is, there was no need to put the term "living" behind it.

I will determine the wording of my position, thank you very much.

Ofcourse. I'm just trying to help you with your logic.

You reject logic and EVADE conversation.

A projection.

I suspect you mean that he's saying I'm doing what he is in fact doing. If so, I agree.

 

[Scott]

@Scott, ask him about the square root of -1. It's hilarious.

ChatGPT tells me the answer is the following:
**
The square root of –1 is represented by the imaginary unit, written as iii (in mathematics) or jjj (in engineering).


Formally:

i=−1i = \sqrt{-1}i=−1
**

This checks with Wikipedia's imaginary number article:

Imaginary number - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[AProudLefty]

ChatGPT tells me the answer is the following:
**
The square root of –1 is represented by the imaginary unit, written as iii (in mathematics) or jjj (in engineering).


Formally:

i=−1i = \sqrt{-1}i=−1
**

This checks with Wikipedia's imaginary number article:

Imaginary number - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Ask @IBDaMann. His answer is hilarious.

 

[jimmymccready]

The keyword is "murder". Is the termination of a fetus murder?

Wrong question. The right question is "Should abortion be defined as murder?"

Of course not.

 

[IBDaMann]

Should our country "contract kill" all of the "stupid living humans" so that only the "intelligent living humans" remain?

It would surely cut down on the rampant TDS.

 

[Scott]

I see that you agreed with my second point, namely that "we can all define words related to our discussion on abortion however we like".

Yes, I agree with this.

Alright, good so far...

If you truly agree with this second point, then no definition can be "in error" when it comes to personal definitions for words.

Of course it can. -- E.g. -- a circular definition.
Definitions can also be too broad, too narrow, too vague, and etc.

I think you're actually making one of my points for me. It seems we agree on 2 points:
1- People can define words however they like.
2- If people define words in ways that are circular, too broad, too narrow, too vague, there will be problems when they use those words in a discussion.

I see that you agreed with my second point, namely that "we can all define words related to our discussion on abortion however we like". If you truly agree with this second point, then no definition can be "in error" when it comes to personal definitions for words. Conversely, this makes things -immensely- difficult when it comes to having a debate on a contentious issue such as abortion. I've already given you an out here- use the term natural person if you want to exclude human sperm and eggs. That word -is- in a legal dictionary and I fully respect this definition.

Nah. I'm fine with "homo sapien with a heartbeat". That excludes sperm and eggs (which aren't homo sapiens to begin with).

Homo sapiens is just the scientific name for human. Human, in turn, is just another term for person. Due to U.S. law, they now have 2 types of people- legal persons, which are corporations, and natural persons. Natural person is the only term I've seen that makes it clear that it starts no earlier than conception. For the audience, here's the definition of natural person that applies to this discussion:
**

Natural Person and Fetal Rights​

The issue of whether an unborn fetus is considered a natural person, with all of the rights and protections associated with that status, has been a hot-button issue for a very long time. In the U.S., this issue is commonly referred to as “fetal rights,” and deals with not only issues of right to life (anti-abortion), but with protections related to the health and safety of the child from conception to birth. This is a complicated issue, with some people attempting to place a fetal age at which the baby can be considered “viable,” or alive; and others claiming that the baby has a right to life and protection from the moment of conception.
**

Source:

Natural Person - Definition, Examples, Cases, Processes

Natural Person defined and explained with examples. Natural Person is a living human being, with certain rights and responsibilities under the law.

legaldictionary.net

 

[Scott]

Setting aside your characterization of APL's post quality, it does seem like he actually believes you, ItN and gfm are all the same person.

Nope.

I suspect we may have to agree to disagree on this point.

Nope.

Or just stop talking about it. That works too.

I have long-since been aware that all you want is for those who shine light on your position to just go away.

On the contrary, I tend to praise those who -actually- shine light on my position. On some subjects, that includes you, but when it comes to others, it appears your main goal is to distort it. In this particular subthread, I've presented my view as to what I believe APL believes. You haven't provided any solid evidence to contradict it, you just keep on contradicting me. As a Monty Python skit said, an argument isn't just contradicting the other side. For those who haven't seen the skit, it's here:

View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ohDB5gbtaEQ

 

[Scott]

I believe that gfm backed you up that you have this disagreement with Into the Night. So I think that your disagreement with ItN on this is probably true. What I am not sure about is whether Lefty knows about this disagreement. @AProudLefty , have you heard about this disagreement?

You'd be absolutely sure if you were to perform a modicum of research and see how @AProudLefty participated.

He's well aware.

He disagreed with you in post #985.

 

[Scott]

Heartbeat does not indicate consciousness/sentience/awareness. Proving it will show it to be a killing if abortion is done.

I'm not so sure. I think the prime issue should be 2 things- bodily independence and relative intelligence.

Both of which are completely irrelevant to what constitutes a living human, even under your own attempted (but erroneous) definition.

I started this discussion with Lefty because he seemed to be saying that if there is consciousness/sentience/awareness, there is killing. I am highly skeptical of this,

I'd instead say something along the lines of "if there is LIFE, and said life is snuffed out, then there is killing".

Life is snuffed out all the time- we would die if we didn't snuff out a great deal of it for consumption.

 

[Scott]

I started this discussion with Lefty because he seemed to be saying that if there is consciousness/sentience/awareness, there is killing. I am highly skeptical of this, because I believe that many non human animals may have these qualities and yet most people still slaughter them for their supper on a daily basis. I include myself here.

Yes, those animals are being killed.

Since they are non human animals, we tend to refer to the induced deaths of these animals as their slaughter. Why do you think that is?

 

[Scott]

I started this discussion with Lefty because he seemed to be saying that if there is consciousness/sentience/awareness, there is killing. I am highly skeptical of this, because I believe that many non human animals may have these qualities and yet most people still slaughter them for their supper on a daily basis. I include myself here. Thus, the important thing should not be whether an animal has a heartbeat

This is a very clear and indisputable sign of life. No fauna with a heartbeat has ever been considered "dead". If you snuff the life out of an animal, then it will no longer have a heartbeat.

You're assuming that the life form in question has a heartbeat to begin with. There are many life forms that don't have one- even the human zygote doesn't have one for at least 16 days:

First of our three billion heartbeats is sooner than we thought | University of Oxford

When does our heart first start to beat? Until now, researchers thought that the first time our heart muscle contracted to beat was at eight days after conception in mice, which equates to around day 21 of a human pregnancy.

www.ox.ac.uk