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Diploid
Cuban


Registered: 01/09/03
Posts: 19,274
Loc: Rabbit Hole
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Re: Is Abortion murder? [Re: Silversoul]
#5962372 - 08/14/06 11:09 AM (17 years, 5 months ago) |
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A human without a brain still exists.
The human body exists, but the essence of the person doesn't.
And if the scientific reductionist view is right, then there's no reason why an artificial brain shouldn't be possible.
If a seemingly-sentient artificial brain is ever created by science (I say seemingly because there is ultimately no way to know with certainty if another is sentient), then I'd defend it as I would any other seemingly-sentient being.
I see a clear distinction between a chemical system and a sentient thing, be it chemical, mechanical, or electronic. A sentient thing is deserving of the same respect all life deserves, but chemical systems are just things.
-------------------- Republican Values: 1) You can't get married to your spouse who is the same sex as you. 2) You can't have an abortion no matter how much you don't want a child. 3) You can't have a certain plant in your possession or you'll get locked up with a rapist and a murderer. 4) We need a smaller, less-intrusive government.
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Silversoul
Rhizome


Registered: 01/01/05
Posts: 23,576
Loc: The Barricades
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Re: Is Abortion murder? [Re: Diploid]
#5962403 - 08/14/06 11:19 AM (17 years, 5 months ago) |
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Quote:
Diploid said: A human without a brain still exists.
The human body exists, but the essence of the person doesn't.
The "essence"? If I didn't know any better, I'd think you were starting to talk like a mystic. 
Quote:
And if the scientific reductionist view is right, then there's no reason why an artificial brain shouldn't be possible.
If a seemingly-sentient artificial brain is ever created by science (I say seemingly because there is ultimately no way to know with certainty if another is sentient), then I'd defend it as I would any other seemingly-sentient being.
I see a clear distinction between a chemical system and a sentient thing, be it chemical, mechanical, or electronic. A sentient thing is deserving of the same respect all life deserves, but chemical systems are just things.
Wow, more metaphysics. I'd always presumed you were a materialist(in the philosophical sense), yet for some reason you seem to think that sentience cannot be reduced to a chemical system. Interesting...
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Diploid
Cuban


Registered: 01/09/03
Posts: 19,274
Loc: Rabbit Hole
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Re: Is Abortion murder? [Re: Silversoul]
#5962426 - 08/14/06 11:29 AM (17 years, 5 months ago) |
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The "essence"? If I didn't know any better, I'd think you were starting to talk like a mystic.
It's the best word I can come up with to describe something that currently can't be defined. That's not to say I believe it will never be defined. I think it may be one day and then there will be new words for it. 
you seem to think that sentience cannot be reduced to a chemical system.
I don't think that sentience CAN be reduced to chemistry. I think it springs forth from a part of nature that may be permanently beyond the reach of science in the same way that the cutting edge of physics (strings) is approaching a barrier that may be impossible to breach. Maybe. We're still way too scientifically-primitive to know, but we're making progress.
This isn't a novel idea. It's been a long-held belief in science that things like Heisenberg Uncertainty is absolutely unbreakable, even in principle, in the same way that no scientific advance can ever make 2 + 2 = 5.
That said, it may be possible to harness deep things in nature to create an artificial sentience even if we don't, and never can, entirely understand how it works. We make atomic bombs with an incomplete understanding of the atom, after all.
Check out this thread I started here a few years ago for more on why I think these things may be so.
-------------------- Republican Values: 1) You can't get married to your spouse who is the same sex as you. 2) You can't have an abortion no matter how much you don't want a child. 3) You can't have a certain plant in your possession or you'll get locked up with a rapist and a murderer. 4) We need a smaller, less-intrusive government.
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Silversoul
Rhizome


Registered: 01/01/05
Posts: 23,576
Loc: The Barricades
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Re: Is Abortion murder? [Re: Diploid]
#5962452 - 08/14/06 11:39 AM (17 years, 5 months ago) |
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Just wondering: What level of sentience is required to make the killing of something immoral? Afterall, even a 2 year old human child is no more intelligent than an adult chimpanzee. A human fetus' brain is hardly distinguishable from the brains of other animal fetuses, just as fertilized human egg is indistinguishable from other animals' fertilized eggs. The sentience question gets rather dicey when you look into it.
Now, if we look at it from a utilitarian perspective, then the determining factor is not sentience, but rather the ability to feel pain. Of course, this same logic would require that we all become vegan(and in fact, this was the conclusion of Pete Seeger using the same argument). But I'm not about to give up meat.
One thing I learned from my class on ethical philosophy is that any philosophical attempt to make sense of morality is doomed to crumble apart upon close examination.
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Diploid
Cuban


Registered: 01/09/03
Posts: 19,274
Loc: Rabbit Hole
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Re: Is Abortion murder? [Re: Silversoul]
#5962477 - 08/14/06 11:48 AM (17 years, 5 months ago) |
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Just wondering: What level of sentience is required to make the killing of something immoral?
Oh, now wait a second. I don't assign moral metrics to things. I know better. Morality is whatever each of us says it is. It would be nice if an absolute morality could be discovered, but like absolute motion, it doesn't appear to exist.
My comments address only the question of at what point a thing becomes a human.
Afterall, even a 2 year old human child is no more intelligent than an adult chimpanzee.
Hence the fuzziness of the line that is crossed from thing to human. I don't know the answer.
One thing I learned from my class on ethical philosophy is that any philosophical attempt to make sense of morality is doomed to crumble apart upon close examination.
That must have been a great class.
-------------------- Republican Values: 1) You can't get married to your spouse who is the same sex as you. 2) You can't have an abortion no matter how much you don't want a child. 3) You can't have a certain plant in your possession or you'll get locked up with a rapist and a murderer. 4) We need a smaller, less-intrusive government.
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Icelander
The Minstrel in the Gallery


Registered: 03/15/05
Posts: 95,368
Loc: underbelly
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Re: Is Abortion murder? [Re: Silversoul]
#5962630 - 08/14/06 12:47 PM (17 years, 5 months ago) |
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Quote:
Silversoul said:
Quote:
Icelander said: Why do you care what someone else decides to do with their body? Do you really believe you have the right to decide this for others? Isn't that a tad arrogant and egotistical? They aren't harming you are they? Why isn't it enough to live your own life and let others do the same? In other words what business is it of yours? Are you so sure you are right about everything you believe? Whats really behind all of this wanting to control others?
Although I disagree with musicturkey's views, I can definitely understand where he's coming from. If I believed, as pro-lifers do, that a fetus or embryo was equivalent to a baby outside of the womb, then I too would be appalled at the practice of abortion, and would do everything in my power to stop it.
Everything in your power? Like bombing abortion clincis and murdering doctors. Yes, I guess that makes lots of sense. I can see your point.
-------------------- "Don't believe everything you think". -Anom. " All that lives was born to die"-Anom. With much wisdom comes much sorrow, The more knowledge, the more grief. Ecclesiastes circa 350 BC
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Silversoul
Rhizome


Registered: 01/01/05
Posts: 23,576
Loc: The Barricades
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Re: Is Abortion murder? [Re: Icelander]
#5962658 - 08/14/06 12:56 PM (17 years, 5 months ago) |
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Hey, if there was some factory that was slaughtering newborn infants, wouldn't you try to shut it down in any way possible? I'm just saying that to someone who considers abortion to be equivalent to slaughtering newborn infants, such actions are understandable.
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Icelander
The Minstrel in the Gallery


Registered: 03/15/05
Posts: 95,368
Loc: underbelly
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Re: Is Abortion murder? [Re: Diploid]
#5962661 - 08/14/06 12:56 PM (17 years, 5 months ago) |
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To be fair to the religious crowd, they see prohibition of abortion as the protection of a baby. If I saw someone hurting a baby, I too would step in and stop it if I could.
Really? Well then you must be quite busy with all the babies being hurt around the world in all these wars and such.
From my extensive experience with these religious folk they are rarely worried about protecting anything but their self righteous religious predudice. Mostly giving lip service to there cult and refusing to look at anything not sanctioned by said cult. Whether the choice a women makes concerning her own body is a wise one or not, it really is her choice.
-------------------- "Don't believe everything you think". -Anom. " All that lives was born to die"-Anom. With much wisdom comes much sorrow, The more knowledge, the more grief. Ecclesiastes circa 350 BC
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Icelander
The Minstrel in the Gallery


Registered: 03/15/05
Posts: 95,368
Loc: underbelly
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Re: Is Abortion murder? [Re: Silversoul]
#5962665 - 08/14/06 12:57 PM (17 years, 5 months ago) |
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Quote:
Silversoul said: Hey, if there was some factory that was slaughtering newborn infants, wouldn't you try to shut it down in any way possible? I'm just saying that to someone who considers abortion to be equivalent to slaughtering newborn infants, such actions are understandable.
No I would not. Not if the cure was worse than the disease.
-------------------- "Don't believe everything you think". -Anom. " All that lives was born to die"-Anom. With much wisdom comes much sorrow, The more knowledge, the more grief. Ecclesiastes circa 350 BC
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Irradiated_Feces
doomedgeneration


Registered: 07/11/03
Posts: 4,278
Loc: Great White North
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Re: Is Abortion murder? [Re: Icelander]
#5962850 - 08/14/06 01:56 PM (17 years, 5 months ago) |
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If a fetus is a person, then is it pedophilia to have sex with a preggo? hmmm...
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Icelander
The Minstrel in the Gallery


Registered: 03/15/05
Posts: 95,368
Loc: underbelly
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Following standard human logic; of course. And thus a crime and also a sin.
-------------------- "Don't believe everything you think". -Anom. " All that lives was born to die"-Anom. With much wisdom comes much sorrow, The more knowledge, the more grief. Ecclesiastes circa 350 BC
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The_Red_Crayon
Exposer of Truth


Registered: 08/13/03
Posts: 13,673
Loc: Smokey Mtns. TN
Last seen: 6 years, 8 months
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Re: Is Abortion murder? [Re: Icelander]
#5963054 - 08/14/06 03:14 PM (17 years, 5 months ago) |
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Quote:
Icelander said: Following standard human logic; of course. And thus a crime and also a sin.
everyone knows that sex in general is a sin, we all came to existence by storks and cabbage patches.
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Icelander
The Minstrel in the Gallery


Registered: 03/15/05
Posts: 95,368
Loc: underbelly
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IMO,sad but in every real sense true. Sexually repressed = violent unhappy humanity.
-------------------- "Don't believe everything you think". -Anom. " All that lives was born to die"-Anom. With much wisdom comes much sorrow, The more knowledge, the more grief. Ecclesiastes circa 350 BC
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SneezingPenis
ACHOOOOOOOOO!!!!!111!

Registered: 01/15/05
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Re: Is Abortion murder? [Re: Icelander]
#5963083 - 08/14/06 03:20 PM (17 years, 5 months ago) |
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if abortion was murder, then it would be called murder.
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Basilides
Servent ofWisdom


Registered: 02/10/06
Posts: 7,059
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Quote:
psilocyberin said: if abortion was murder, then it would be called murder.
There are several forms of killing human life that is considered non-murder by some and murder by others. The death penalty is an example. Many believe it is murder while others believe the crimes of the accused remove that status. In war, civilians are killed all the time in what is called collateral damage by one side and murder by another.
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    "Have you found the beginning, then, that you are looking for the end? You see, the end will be where the beginning is. Congratulations to the one who stands at the beginning: that one will know the end and will not taste death."
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SneezingPenis
ACHOOOOOOOOO!!!!!111!

Registered: 01/15/05
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Re: Is Abortion murder? [Re: Basilides]
#5963227 - 08/14/06 04:01 PM (17 years, 5 months ago) |
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exactly. SO in the end, considering it one thing doesn't change anything on the universal level.
Death is death, and all too often we forget that our emotions and illusory attachment to something have weight outside of our own minds.
Edited by psilocyberin (08/14/06 04:06 PM)
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porcupine
Stranger

Registered: 01/09/05
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Quote:
Really? Well then you must be quite busy with all the babies being hurt around the world in all these wars and such.
i doubt the person you were responding to supports "these wars and such".
Quote:
From my extensive experience with these religious folk they are rarely worried about protecting anything but their self righteous religious predudice. Mostly giving lip service to there cult and refusing to look at anything not sanctioned by said cult. Whether the choice a women makes concerning her own body is a wise one or not, it really is her choice.
YOU think its her choice but some people feel like the baby has rights too, just like i doubt you would sanction infanticide because its her baby and her choice. some people simply believe the baby deserves this same consideration before it leaves the womb and not only after. if a pregnant women was using dangerous amounts of cocaine and heroin would you be against interefering with her choices?
No I would not. Not if the cure was worse than the disease.
what if the cure wasn't worse than the disease? if babies were being abused and you had the power to do something about it, would you?
Edited by porcupine (08/14/06 04:14 PM)
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Icelander
The Minstrel in the Gallery


Registered: 03/15/05
Posts: 95,368
Loc: underbelly
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Re: Is Abortion murder? [Re: porcupine]
#5963444 - 08/14/06 05:16 PM (17 years, 5 months ago) |
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Yep I think it's HER choice. It certainly isn't yours except at the point of a gun.
-------------------- "Don't believe everything you think". -Anom. " All that lives was born to die"-Anom. With much wisdom comes much sorrow, The more knowledge, the more grief. Ecclesiastes circa 350 BC
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76degrees
Apprentice

Registered: 06/08/06
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Re: Is Abortion murder? [Re: Icelander]
#5963457 - 08/14/06 05:20 PM (17 years, 5 months ago) |
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Is spermicide homicide? Lol. In all seriousness, IMO, No. Not even fucking close. Fuck all contemplation on the subject. Abortion is not murder.
-------------------- The world is changed. I feel it in the water. I feel it in the earth. I smell it in the air. Much that once was is lost, for none now live who remember it.
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RRRR
Rapture Ready


Registered: 07/26/06
Posts: 170
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Re: Is Abortion murder? [Re: Diploid]
#5963461 - 08/14/06 05:21 PM (17 years, 5 months ago) |
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Quote:
Diploid said: Believe it or not, but population rates are actually declining.
Actually, it's the rate of increase in the rate of growth that's declining. The rate of growth is still staggeringly high.
I never said the rate of growth wasn't high to begin with, all I said is that the population rate of growth is declining, which stands true.
-------------------- Now when He was asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God would come, He answered them and said, "The kingdom of God does not come with observation; nor will they say, 'See here!' or 'See there!' For indeed, the kingdom of God is within you." Luke 17:20-21 (New King James Version)
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