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Old 06-03-2009, 10:41 AM   #41 (permalink)
inBOIL
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Latenter View Post
As far as when we can determine that a fetus is a person, I think there needs to be a hard, scientific definition.
This is what we need, but the problem is that fetal development is a gradual thing. Any line that's drawn will be imprecise and somewhat arbitrary. It might make sense to develop a series of legal definitions of personhood, each more restrictive than the last, to govern what can and can't be done at a certain stage of development. (e.g. a class I fetus can be aborted for any reason, a class III can be aborted only if the mother's health is at risk) Of course, this just makes the line-drawing more complicated, and although it may be more representative of biological reality, I'm not sure it's a better moral solution.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Latenter
I never claimed that this is the point where a fetus can survive without outside help. I know it's not fully developed, but it's human. A full grown cow, with complete brain and everything I'm ok with killing, eating even. It's just the point, to me, where a person (and not their support system/organs) begins.

The reason I make the distinction, (I don't make any laws so all of this is my opinion) is that you don't count your arm as a separate entity from yourself, even if cut off. The difference between biological mass and an individual life is due to the brain/nervous system. That's why the mad scientists talk about brain transplants.
This is part of the problem with defining 'human'. If you rely on CNS development, you invite comparisons between humans and other animals. There's a point at which a human fetus is less developed than an adult cow. If you accept this metric (for example) as a justification for abortion, then you can also apply it to humans that are severely mentally retarded or injured. If an adult human has lower neural functioning than a cow, does he lose the right to life? I think most people would say no. Any rule we create governing abortion has to hold in other situations concerning people with diminished capacities.
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