Value of life
Offline So, someone started a thread wondering why an atheist might be a "homophobe"
I shall start one about life and abortion.
How could a free thinking atheist, even consider abortion except under the most dire of situations?
I am an athesit and I realize when I am dead, I am dead. Gone, that's it.
To me life is sacred. I am very anti war, anti death everything basicly that may cause death unwarranted or unwanted.. Unless perhaps someone kills, tortures etc, then perhaps they should have the same done to them, because they have proven they have no care for the most important thing we have, life.
Sure, if you want to go skydiving and chance your own life in this fashion, it's up to you.
Using religion in anyway to propogate war and play like "oh if they die they go to a better place" is BS. They are simply dead and their shot at life, is over.
Abortion, as I define it, is mutilating an unborn fetus prematurely to insure it's death. In my eye's you have just taken away someones legitimate chance at life. Yes, for me this is at conception, you just started a chain of events that will result in another human life. If you stop that you have broken a link in that chain and taken away that potential.
Sure people screw up with sex and get pregnant but as a "pro lifer" I feel they should have to deal with those consequences. We are not animals haphazzardly running about having sex when we have any opportunity.. we are supposed to be more intelligent than that.
Faith is the word but next to that snugged up closely "lie's" the want.
"By simple common sense I don't believe in god, in none."-Charlie Chaplin
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How can I tell someone who I am not what to do with a body that is not mine?
We can all speculate about utopias and project "If I were in this position I would do this or that". Reality is not mental masturbation and frogs and princes have little to do with reality.
"We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus -- and nonbelievers."Obama
Check out my poetry here on Rational Responders Like my poetry thread on Facebook under Brian James Rational Poet, @Brianrrs37 on Twitter and my blog at www.brianjamesrationalpoet.blog
Rape? Incest? Mother's life in danger? Mother is on drugs?
Dolt:"Evolution is just a theory."
Me:"Yes, so is light and gravity. Pardon me while I flash this strobe while dropping a bowling ball on your head. This shouldn't bother you; after all, these are just theories."
I did not tell you what to do, I asked how could you.
Faith is the word but next to that snugged up closely "lie's" the want.
"By simple common sense I don't believe in god, in none."-Charlie Chaplin
Those are all valid examples. I agree.
Faith is the word but next to that snugged up closely "lie's" the want.
"By simple common sense I don't believe in god, in none."-Charlie Chaplin
Oh, brother. Here we go.
So it's technologically possible to end it's life painlessly, you're OK with it? I think many atheists would agree it should only be done with minimal pain to the fetus. But I think it's more of a libertarian thing than an atheist thing to say we don't want the government invading our privacy to this extent. To make abortion illegal would require putting the women in jail that do this and testing them for pregnancy everytime they leave the country. Is this what you want.
Why not start earlier? Every sperm is sacred, it's potentially part of a new life. Make sure every sperm has an egg to fertilize.
We have an overpopulated planet, so one more person in the world is going to be lack of resources for the rest. So this does nothing to lower human misery.
So would you support mandatory birth control as an alternative to so many abortions?
Taxation is the price we pay for failing to build a civilized society. The higher the tax level, the greater the failure. A centrally planned totalitarian state represents a complete defeat for the civilized world, while a totally voluntary society represents its ultimate success. --Mark Skousen
If someone is running about haphazardly like an animal having sex when they have the opportunity and they catch a disease, can they be cured or treated, or should they have to deal with the consequences and die of a treatable illness?
There are twists of time and space, of vision and reality, which only a dreamer can divine
H.P. Lovecraft
That is off topic, way off topic, your avatar is disturbing btw lol is that Shatner?
Faith is the word but next to that snugged up closely "lie's" the want.
"By simple common sense I don't believe in god, in none."-Charlie Chaplin
You said people have to deal with the consequences when they run about haphazardly like an animal having sex. There are lots of consequences of that behavior. I want to know if people should have to deal with all of them or just some of them.
yeah it's Shatner.
There are twists of time and space, of vision and reality, which only a dreamer can divine
H.P. Lovecraft
Faith is the word but next to that snugged up closely "lie's" the want.
"By simple common sense I don't believe in god, in none."-Charlie Chaplin
Yes I suppose there are many consequence to sex, but you know I'm talking about the main one, pregnancy, abortion/pro-life views have nothing to do with gonnoreah aids syphllis etc etc.
Why would you kill them for having a disease though?
Faith is the word but next to that snugged up closely "lie's" the want.
"By simple common sense I don't believe in god, in none."-Charlie Chaplin
Yes, I would and do. It's unprotected sex engaged in by people that don't have to deal with the means of the consequences that is the problem. I never looked at sex in itself as a moral issue, only negligent sex that has the potential of creating life. I have pro life tendencies but would never want abortion banned. Like most bans, it wouldn't stop abortions but just drive them underground where desperate women would just end up hurting themselves.
I Am My God
The absence of evidence IS evidence of absence
What I want to know is if it has something to do with the person's actions, and if it doesn't then why you felt the need to bring it up.
There are twists of time and space, of vision and reality, which only a dreamer can divine
H.P. Lovecraft
I never suggested we ban it. I asked what do you think about pro life and how could you justify abortion as an atheist.
Do you play golf by chance..? lol
Faith is the word but next to that snugged up closely "lie's" the want.
"By simple common sense I don't believe in god, in none."-Charlie Chaplin
The religious ppl are pro life but that's because god told them it was so, or the fetus will go to heaven or something. Curious about other atheists view on it.
I think some religious and atheist views can be shared, though probably not for the same reasons.
Faith is the word but next to that snugged up closely "lie's" the want.
"By simple common sense I don't believe in god, in none."-Charlie Chaplin
I Am My God
The absence of evidence IS evidence of absence
I'm not in favour of any sort of killing. People usually have good reasons for it though.
There are twists of time and space, of vision and reality, which only a dreamer can divine
H.P. Lovecraft
Life has no value, only sentience
You're nothing but a fleshy little meatbag without it, and so is a fetus
So its womans choice how she wants to dispose of her meatbag
What Would Kharn Do?
So is it ok if a woman kills her 2 year old newborn as well? That is the natural result of that philosophy. Can I kill the man that gave me a funny look on the subway? That justification for abortion justifies murder.
I Am My God
The absence of evidence IS evidence of absence
2yr old falls under sentient (might not be intelligent, or even mentally capable, but it is sentient)
If the guy in the subway is wearing a cardboard box, yes you can
... i have no problem with justified murder... or unjustified murder... but thats another topic!
What Would Kharn Do?
I agree that murder can be justified rather often, but i don't think sentience is an appropriate measure to justify it. I also wouldn't say that sentience gives life value. A couple of counterexamples would be a man in a coma, or an infant. I would not say that a five month old is very sentient. A cow would be more sentient than an infant (I could just be making assumptions, but you don't seem like much of a vegetarian). And to tie it back to abortion, it is conceivable to think of a man in a coma less likely to regain consciousness and sentience before a fetus would develop one. You would have to consider killing a man in a coma justifiable in order for your philosophy to be consistent. If you do think so then that would bring up a host of other problems.
I Am My God
The absence of evidence IS evidence of absence
Murder is not really justifiable, it means killing with malice or with premeditation, no just cause.
I hope you are talking about justified killing?
Faith is the word but next to that snugged up closely "lie's" the want.
"By simple common sense I don't believe in god, in none."-Charlie Chaplin
Murder is most commonly a strictly legal term. Even in your definition, all just killings will have been premeditated (meaning if i was killing someone b/c it is just to do so i would have had to have thought about it beforehand), and i can kill someone with malice that deserves to die, there is no inherent contradiction there. I feel like you threw in the no just cause bit at the end to exclude what we were talking about; I would consider justification an independent issue from any definition of murder.
I'm also curious to know if you would define abortion as murder (under your definition)? as most women probable don't abort out of malice and probably have some cause.
I Am My God
The absence of evidence IS evidence of absence
Sentience doesnt give life value, life has no value, only sentience has the value.
Sentience = 1
Life = 0
1+0=1
fecal matter is "alive" with all forms of "life" but do we cry when we flush it? No
Do we care if we step on some ants? or squah a butterfly? No
How about a mouse? they're a mammal, they feel pain, their brain pattern matchs ours more than an insect
The further up the chain we go, the more of a difference you start to see, larger sentient animals (ie. Cows) are even protected from un'do harm / cruelty under our laws. Sure, we kill them by the thousands, for food... but they are given protection because of their capacity to think and feel pain.
A man in a coma, cannot think, his body may physically register the pain, but not mentally. For comas you are given a timeline, in which you are expected to "wake-up" , past that time line, you're a vegetable... i have no qualms about pulling the plug. Man, woman, chlid, relative, or unknown... if you've been in a coma longer than 9 months-to a year, your dead.
A fetus cannot think, or feel pain... until it does, i dont care wtf happens to it.
And is it possible for a pro-lifer to hold their position on abortion without an emotional appeal?
What Would Kharn Do?
Nope, without emotion we could just kill babies all day long. Without emotion you could stab yourself in the eye, no problem, well you might flinch because of built in reflexes but, you could do it man!
Faith is the word but next to that snugged up closely "lie's" the want.
"By simple common sense I don't believe in god, in none."-Charlie Chaplin
I could give perfectly logical reasons as to "why not" kill babies all day long (as fun as it would be) or to stab myself in the eye.
Which is the whole point, find me some perfectly logical reasons that support pro-life, without appeals to emotion
I'd be glad to hear it, for a change.
What Would Kharn Do?
I see nothing wrong with destruction of a zygote. It cannot exist on it's own independently, and is not self aware.
It is a part of the woman's body. It is technically a parasite.
If a woman wishes to remove it, it is functionally the same as removal of a botfly, nasal leech, or guinea worm.
Besides this, women have been doing this for as long as history records. Making it a crime only adds punishment to women in society. It will force them to again seek out the black market, and force the dangers associated with that onto them.
My mother is very very glad abortions are legal. She told me how bad things were before that. She said she would be horrified if they were made illegal again, because of all the girls dieing painful deaths alone in silence, too fearful to talk while unsanitary conditions of their black market treatment slowly killed them.
Theism is why we can't have nice things.
I said nothing about what anyone thinks about banning abortion, I asked as an atheist how could you choose to abort.
Faith is the word but next to that snugged up closely "lie's" the want.
"By simple common sense I don't believe in god, in none."-Charlie Chaplin
The typical end of reasoning for someone who is "pro-life" is making abortion a crime. I was merely following it to that conclusion. Without that, my points above it still stand.
Theism is why we can't have nice things.
So with that you are simply pro abortion and have no problem at all and the fact that it will be life means nothing. This is actually the type of response I expected from a typical atheist. Zygotes and parasites sound like things I want to squash, well played.
Another guy said "meat bags" sounds like something that would be fun to punch, you guys are really well versed in making things sound terrible.
edit: Typical end of reasoning, did you notice I started the thread? lawl
Faith is the word but next to that snugged up closely "lie's" the want.
"By simple common sense I don't believe in god, in none."-Charlie Chaplin
encompasses a topic so emotive and personal I doubt there's a lot of good in any of us beating each other up over it. This is serious stuff - too personal for point scoring.
I think I'd dive in front of a bus to save a runaway pram but dictating to women what they can and can't do with their bodies and their lives is another monster altogether. I notice none of the women on the site have dipped their toes into this and it's probably not a surprise.
From the male perspective, is the moral imperative to insist all newly pregnant women carry to term for fear we might be accused as accessories to the fact "life means nothing"?
My partner has terminated due to profound fetal deformity and believe me, this is a decision that never dies. Fourteen years later it has not died, even though another life has come. Such decisions are always bought at high personal cost.
No woman blithely terminates and walks out of a clinic giddy with joy. We should recognise that to the greater extent this is woman's business.
"Experiments are the only means of knowledge at our disposal. The rest is poetry, imagination." Max Planck
I said it was the typical conclusion that "pro-life" people make. It does not necessarily reflect your views, I was simply addressing it in case it was. I am strongly against anti-choice people that look to criminalize abortion, due to the harm it causes to society.
I am pro-choice. Whether someone has an abortion or not is up to them, it is not an issue I imagine I will ever have to deal with as I am not a woman.
I have no issue with someone that simply does not like abortion though. If you are a woman and do not wish to have one, that is up to you. I don't consider it my business.
Theism is why we can't have nice things.
See, you are still pushing the abortion ban thing, I asked "if you are an atheist, how could you justify abortion"
Again, with the answers you have given, I can only assume if they feel like not having it, then abort it. I don't think you read the original post, I think you saw "abortion" and just went with an assumption. If you read the post then you know I would likely accept abortion if it were a danger or anything to the child or mother. I would mainly be against the "oops I got pregnant lets snuff that out because I don't want to take responsibility for my sexual behavior""
Faith is the word but next to that snugged up closely "lie's" the want.
"By simple common sense I don't believe in god, in none."-Charlie Chaplin
Under that definition, self defense is murder. In fact, self defense is murder 1. You buy a weapon, you buy ammunition for it, and you leave it within easy reach around the house for the express purpose of murdering a total stranger. Just how premeditated can you get?
FYI, I think self defense is perfectly okay. Please do blow the bad person away. I just hope it isn't your old Auntie with Alzheimer's who lost her way and wound up at your house.
"Just cause" is rather subjective, don't you think? Who is going to determine whether a cause is just? You? Please.
Let's see... the girl is 17, the man says he won't acknowledge the child, she and her parents can't afford DNA testing, he is only willing to pay for an abortion. Just who is going to pay for the child? Did you know many insurance policies do NOT pay for a minor child's pregnancy or the complications from a pregnancy? Just how much do you think it costs? $5,000-$10,000 US for normal vaginal delivery. Cost of an abortion? $350-$1000.
http://pregnancy.lovetoknow.com/wiki/Cost_of_Having_a_Baby
http://www.prochoice.org/about_abortion/facts/economics.html
Oh, never mind, we can find someone to adopt the baby and pay for all the medical expenses. Uh huh. In what dream world do you live? Checking my local paper I found one (1) ad for a couple wanting to adopt. The last time I looked (and these numbers may be way out of date), there were about 1.4 million abortions every year. The website estimated there were about 1.5 million prospective adoptive parents out there. And an additional 500,000 prospective parents applied every year. Let's run some numbers:
1.5 million parents - 1.4 million new babies = 100,000 parents with out children -- year 1
100,000 parents (year 1) + 500,000 parents (year 2) - 1.4 million new babies = 800,000 babies without parents -- year 2
Doesn't look good, does it? And this website didn't cover older children with health or mental problems. And if the children didn't start out with mental problems, they would surely have them after a few years in foster care, huh? Fudge some numbers, change some regulations, convince people to adopt less than perfect babies or children, and you STILL are way short on prospective parents. Who is raising all those babies? You? yeah, sure.
It costs more money to raise that child for all of their life. And you don't give up nine months of your life, you give up ALL of the rest of your life. And if dad doesn't want to contribute, mom can go looking for that mythical adoptive couple or attempt to raise the child herself. Or abandon her in a dumpster. I don't agree with the action, but I surely understand why some young women feel that is their only choice.
As an atheist, I place no special store on "souls" or "sentience" or any other mythical hoo-raw. I do love my three sons and my grandson. And I would be very upset if anything were to happen to any of them. But I am not about to get all dewy eyed over some blob of tissue that doesn't have pain receptors. And if I had it to do all over again, I would have fewer pregnancies.
Yeah, in a perfect world, every child would be wanted, loved, cared for, and no one would have to worry about money or careers. But this isn't a perfect world and I see no sign of it becoming one. There is plenty of justification for having an abortion. And it is NONE of your business as to what justifications anyone else has for that action or any other legal action.
-- I feel so much better since I stopped trying to believe.
"We are entitled to our own opinions. We're not entitled to our own facts"- Al Franken
"If death isn't sweet oblivion, I will be severely disappointed" - Ruth M.
If it is a zygote it is not a person.
I cannot qualify it as a person until self awareness, which happens early in an infant's life. I would say it is reasonable then that it becomes an individual entity at the point it can survive independently.
High school biology should have covered the process of development for mammals.
I don't see a need to justify abortion. Humoring your question though: if I were to attempt to, I would reference "A Modest Proposal". The creation of this literature was due to an overabundance of children without parents to raise them. It was very effective at making it's point. I would say that point still stands as valid in today's society.
Beyond that, why would someone need to justify having an abortion?
Theism is why we can't have nice things.
Just cause would be..self defense. Simply google "murder".
Random sites from the net quote murder as:
"The unlawful killing of another human being without justification or excuse."
Main Entry: 1mur·der Pronunciation: \ˈmər-dər\Function: nounEtymology: partly from Middle English murther, from Old English morthor; partly from Middle English murdre, from Anglo-French, of Germanic origin; akin to Old English morthor; akin to Old High German mord murder, Latin mort-, mors death, mori to die, mortuus dead, Greek brotos mortalDate: before 12th century1 : the crime of unlawfully killing a person especially with malice aforethought
Faith is the word but next to that snugged up closely "lie's" the want.
"By simple common sense I don't believe in god, in none."-Charlie Chaplin
What are you advocating then? Do you want a man with a gun to come and arrest women that have abortions? You want them to go to illegal clinics? Or do you just want us to express moral indignation at women having abortions?
Why, does the soul enter at the moment of conception? Then we should find a uterus for all the frozen embryos in the world, so they can live out their lives?
I don't think were going to turn earth into an atheist utopia in my life time. So if abortion reduces world overpopulation, this is another reason to keep it legal.
I'm saying it as a horny guy.
Taxation is the price we pay for failing to build a civilized society. The higher the tax level, the greater the failure. A centrally planned totalitarian state represents a complete defeat for the civilized world, while a totally voluntary society represents its ultimate success. --Mark Skousen
Please note: "unlawfully killing". Abortion is lawful. And we still haven't agreed on what is person hood. A zygote is NOT a person. Not even when it is my zygote. Feel free to disagree, but lawfully, that is the definition. And so, lawfully, abortion is fully justified.
No one says you have to like it. But it will never be your problem, will it?
-- I feel so much better since I stopped trying to believe.
"We are entitled to our own opinions. We're not entitled to our own facts"- Al Franken
"If death isn't sweet oblivion, I will be severely disappointed" - Ruth M.
Um i didn't say it was murder, someone else did and they were talking about something else, something about killing a guy on a subway wearing a box or some such lol. You did not read through all the posts I guess. I already said I would step on a zygote or a parasite myself if I happened across such a thing.
Main Entry: 1mur·der Pronunciation: \ˈmər-dər\Function: nounEtymology: partly from Middle English murther, from Old English morthor; partly from Middle English murdre, from Anglo-French, of Germanic origin; akin to Old English morthor; akin to Old High German mord murder, Latin mort-, mors death, mori to die, mortuus dead, Greek brotos mortalDate: before 12th century1 : the crime of unlawfully killing a person especially with malice aforethought
Faith is the word but next to that snugged up closely "lie's" the want.
"By simple common sense I don't believe in god, in none."-Charlie Chaplin
Then clearly you have no problem with abortion. In fact, you seem to disturbingly love it. Why did you make this thread?
Theism is why we can't have nice things.
This whole thread just goes from bad to worse.
"Experiments are the only means of knowledge at our disposal. The rest is poetry, imagination." Max Planck
Theism is why we can't have nice things.
Main Entry: sar·casm Pronunciation: \ˈsär-ˌka-zəm\Function: nounEtymology: French or Late Latin; French sarcasme, from Late Latin sarcasmos, from Greek sarkasmos, from sarkazein to tear flesh, bite the lips in rage, sneer, from sark-, sarx flesh; probably akin to Avestan thwarəs- to cutDate: 1550
1 : a sharp and often satirical or ironic utterance designed to cut or give pain
synonyms see wit2 a : a mode of satirical wit depending for its effect on bitter, caustic, and often ironic language that is usually directed against an individual b : the use or language of sarcasm
Faith is the word but next to that snugged up closely "lie's" the want.
"By simple common sense I don't believe in god, in none."-Charlie Chaplin
Oh, a satirist. And here you just appeared to everyone to be acting Palin-American. Well, okay then.
Theism is why we can't have nice things.
Many uses for sarcasm. I used it as an out in another post and I used it as an out in this one, and no one really noticed. However taken literally it made it look as if I had changed my mind or something. Generally when I use sarcasm in such a manner, I no longer care to continue because something got too silly or taken out of context.
It's a "hey you win" but at the same time, I know it is sarcasm so, not really, hah
Palin? She is an utter moron. Hope she wins the next election, not bad lookin for her age. She would be more fun to look at than mccain or obama for sure. As a bonus we would get to make fun of her more often! Like it matters who the president is, they are all puppets for their parties. This stopped being a democracy long ago. All about money.
So far off topic.
Faith is the word but next to that snugged up closely "lie's" the want.
"By simple common sense I don't believe in god, in none."-Charlie Chaplin
I don't believe a "soul" even exists. I have yet to see one. I agree, a zygote is not a human, yet. But it is still life, and will become a human. When you take that you have taken it's potential with it, just my opinion.
Now, I'm not trying to argue, if you want to work at an abortion clinic, or have a baby killing fetish I don't care. I was just curious as to what atheists think about it. The abortion thing is pretty big, christians site pro abortion as an evil of atheism. I site myself as an example that that misconception is parshally unfounded.
In general, when religious people speak of atheism they include, abortion, drug use, homosexuality etc. Anything they consider to be immoral they will pin on atheists.
Once again, my question was to determine if they are even correct in their assumptions. I don't think so, but I am betting most atheists are far more imparshal or accepting of things. I seriously doubt the majority of atheists will actually propogate what they call deviant behavior. If this could be proven a lot of religious points and fears would be moot. To accept and to propogate are two different things.
I think atheists in general are probably just more accepting and accepting does not mean "yay we are going to smoke crack, kill babies and fornicate with each other on the street corners" Thus a lot of their fear is unfounded.
Also note I have not tried to argue with anyone on the "reason for abortion" thing, I have my idea of what life is, and other people have theirs.
Faith is the word but next to that snugged up closely "lie's" the want.
"By simple common sense I don't believe in god, in none."-Charlie Chaplin
Doomy wins again, it seems...
What Would Kharn Do?
Don't let them fool you: http://www.prochoiceactionnetwork-canada.org/articles/anti-tales.shtml
Another good article from the same site: http://www.prochoiceactionnetwork-canada.org/abortioninfo/misconce.shtml
Please note from the article that almost 2/3 of all pregnancies are spontaneously aborted. I'm sure you could find additional confirmation of this number elsewhere.
I don't care what you think, you are not ever going to have to deal with the issue unless you get a girlfriend knocked up. And then only as an interested party, not as the person who has to make and live with the decision. But I do encourage you to read the above articles for a different point of view.
-- I feel so much better since I stopped trying to believe.
"We are entitled to our own opinions. We're not entitled to our own facts"- Al Franken
"If death isn't sweet oblivion, I will be severely disappointed" - Ruth M.
THANK YOU. As I said elsewhere, until you magically grow a uterus--until you can have that experience of something growing inside you for nine months--you have NO SAY IN THE MATTER. Period. We men have no right to even have an opinion on the subject one way or another.
As I've also said elsewhere, pro-life isn't about protecting unborn children, it's about controlling what women do with their reproductive systems. This is why the majority of pro-lifers are men hiding their rampant misogyny behind some kind of highly-questionable moral crusade.
And here's Dawkins:
http://www.youtube.com/user/richarddawkinsdotnet?blend=1&ob=4#p/f/2/ihdlsARGAJk