Hashem,
"You guys are muddying the issue when you keep accidentally calling the fetus a baby. Anti-abortionists always do this, they are scared to death of anyone considering the fetus as a fetus and not a baby. The baby is the born, non-fetus, ex-fetus. Usually at this point the umbilical cord is cut and the baby becomes an individual."
It is not because things have different names in a distinct context that they will have to be considered differently in another one.
For many practical purposes it may be relevant to establish the distinction between babies and fetuses, and call each other by distinct names.
As there are some contexts where it is relevant to establish distinction between european-american and african-american people.
But for legal considerations, such distinctions are not relevant.
Babies and fetuses are both human beings before acquiring cognitive maturity and moral faculties, and what we are discussing is what is the duty of their parents regarding their well-being.
If we are talking about a fetus, we should call it a fetus. It's not a cute cuddly unicorn, and its not a baby.
Anti-abortionists call the fetus a baby, because in our minds we picture a cute pudgy baby playing with toys, eating, pooping, sleeping, and crying.
Call it a fetus and you begin to see it for what it is. Like calling tax theft. You begint o think about the actual thing actually in the mother's womb, connected by an umbilical cord and depending for its every breath on the continued support of the mothers faculties.
That is not a baby. That is a fetus.
Well, the same could be said of abortionists calling unborn children fetuses just to dehumanize them.
Since it is easier to kill what we cannot picture as having a face, or eyes, or fingers.
But I liked your post, because it recognizes that the fact that our somewhat irrational or aesthetical feelings are powerful deterrents when it comes to slay babies.
It is not this whole jibber jabber about argumentation capabilities. This is an ex-post tentative to come up with a notional principle that nobody really uses matter of factly when deciding moral issues.
That's like talking about water, but calling it steam because you expect it to become steam. No. Water is water, a fetus is a fetus.
A newborn human baby is no more a self-owner than a newborn baby animal, by any outwardly observable objective standard. As you say, it is also demonstrably incapable of rights. It therefore becomes the natural (conflict-free) property, by original appropriation, of the mother. If abandoned, it becomes the property of whomever first claims it. If you come to kill a baby, this will become readily apparent, as you will first have to initiate conflict against the mother. Self ownership is something the baby is expected to gradually express over time as it matures.
The fetus or newborn baby human or baby anything is naturally, physically, and demonstrably incapable of being anything but property, either claimed or unclaimed. This is as much a plain fact as is the fact that people have tremendous values for human babies, even those not their own. Values stir passions, natural rights are mundane. Values are not rights.
First, you are confusing the meanings of 'natural rights' and 'values', then 'natural rights' and 'legal rights', and finally 'legislation' with the logical justifications for 'legislation'. Starting with the latter, we can exclude any reference to legislation, government laws, human-decreed rules, etc. because those are all derivative and wholly dependent upon what we are discussing. That is, we are discussing their reasons and justifications.
When I write of 'values', I mean it in the most general sense, completely independent of any particular values. I mean it in the economic sense. Values are the entirely subjective rankings of a particular individual's priorities. So when you write of changing values or norms, you are missing my point.
Natural rights, like natural laws, are strictly limited to the objective observable and logically deducible realm. There can be no subjective valuation in them, or you've left the domain of natural rights and entered the disjoint domain of values. Some of the wholly objective truths from which we deduce natural rights, are the objective truths that values exist, values are subjective, and values are the motivation for discovering, understanding, and teaching objective natural rights. Because of this relationship, and because people's emotions cloud their thinking, people frequently erroneously conflate these two disjoint concepts of natural rights and values. It is like conflating a hammer with a nail because of one's passion for plywood.
Burning the Monet is not fraud, even though it is against my values for the painting. The fraud comes later, when filing a claim, and was included in my example only to give a realistic motivation for destroying the painting. Destruction of one's own property does not initiate violence against another rights-capable entity. The values those entities hold may prompt them, e.g. art lovers, to initiate violence against the property owner.
Malachi:Bad analogy. Steam is water.
go back to first grade. Trolling after troling and you lost all credibility in this debate.
(english is not my native language, sorry for grammar.)
You insist on conflating the issues. Since, in your scenario, the only two entities that exist that have the capacity for natural rights and self ownership are me and the mother, then IF we both share in common the value of the baby's demise, then, as a matter of fact, the baby will die. This is the values-free prediction from natural rights that we can make. Natural rights are as objective and passionless as gravity.
Values, which you seem incapable of distinguishing, are something different. Not less, or disdainful, or avoidable, or unimportant, or irrelevant, but clearly different.
So, if on the other hand, me and the mother do not share that value--if I value the welfare of the baby--THEN rights come into play as a possible mechanism of conflict resolution. I have the capacity to choose, unlike the baby, to disregard rights and violently act against the mother in defense of my values, or to employ rights in a way to persuade her to behave more favorably to my values--e.g. threaten ostracism, offer to take or buy the child, or execute any existing contractual options.
You claim in your last post (but not earlier one's) to have no regard for a rational logical elucidation of these issues on this forum--far away from the heat of such a far fetched scenario--but your words contradict your actions. You act, in this forum with the intent to persuade, while simultaneously openly dismissing the tools of rational persuasion.You do so, I believe, because the emotions of your values for human life dominate your emotions for gaining a coherent grasp of reality.
MaikU: Malachi:Bad analogy. Steam is water. go back to first grade. Trolling after troling and you lost all credibility in this debate.
Actually, he's completely correct. I assume the poster who brought up the comparison meant to say water vapor which is the gasoeus form of water and completely invisible, and compare it to the liquid form, which is commonly called simply water. However, steam is not gaseous at all, but rather it is many many droplets of liquid water.
faber est suae quisque fortunae
There is a reason we call a steam a steam, and water water. I completely understand, that steam consists of water molecules etc., but that's a discussion about definitions, not physics. And the whole point I am still trying to make some people understand here is that it is very easy to redefine something and make it look like the argument is won. And I am not even talking about emotional manipulation being used like someone mentioned (calling a fetus a baby makes people feel sorry for the creature and support ant-abortion stance).
So to repeat myself, if malachi want to claim, that an acorn is the same as an oak, so be it. But I will not stop pointing out this error, because other people, who are not engaging in a discussion still read this and my goal is convincing them, not malachi (whose erroneous thinking I can not change)
MaikU:So to repeat myself, if malachi want to claim, that an acorn is the same as an oak, so be it. But I will not stop pointing out this error, because other people, who are not engaging in a discussion still read this and my goal is convincing them, not malachi (whose erroneous thinking I can not change)
The real issue is whether it is morally correct to have an abortion regardless of what words you prefer to use to describe whatever it is that you are aborting. If you want to call it a fetus, so be it. If you want to call it an entity-unworthy-of-human-rights, so be it. Either way, make a libertarian argument that does not hinge on arbitrary definitions.
I can do it. If you want an abortion, pay for it yourself and do not force anybody else to pay for it. Paying for it includes your own self-defense from crazy wackos, by the way. Nobody should be required to defend your abortion business. If people want abortion, the market will demonstrate that.
so basically, you are right when you say "it is very easy to redefine something and make it look like the argument is won." stop trying to do that. Abortion, in most cases, isnt a crime under libertarian law, since the victim never had an opportunity to seek legal standing. So concentrate on what you really want, which is a free society, and stop trying to dehumanize tiny human beings so you can have guilt-free sex and enjoy supporting state medicine.
I'll admit I was thinking of water vapor or whatever, and said steam. My point isn't what we label it, my point was that they are obviously distinct things with distinct properties, despite their similarities.
Now that we're technical: You don't abort a baby. You abort a fetus.
"You abort a fetus."
Nope. Fetus is the name of living creature in a given stage of its development. Like child, adult, etc.
You can't abort a stage. You abort a process.
In that case the process aborted, a priori, is the pregnancy of the mother.
And a fortiori, the life of the human being carried by the pregnant woman is also aborted, since the former process depends on the pregnancy process not being aborted.
A consequential action that induces the abortion of the life process of another human being can also be called killing, and usually is.
And a consequential and unjustifiable action that induces the abortion of the life process of another human being can also be called murder, and used to be more often.
Charles Anthony: MaikU:So to repeat myself, if malachi want to claim, that an acorn is the same as an oak, so be it. But I will not stop pointing out this error, because other people, who are not engaging in a discussion still read this and my goal is convincing them, not malachi (whose erroneous thinking I can not change) Now that you have cleared that point up, can we deal with the real issue? The issue is NOT whether an acorn is the same as an oak NOR is it whether an unborn child is the same as an adult. The real issue is whether it is morally correct to have an abortion regardless of what words you prefer to use to describe whatever it is that you are aborting. If you want to call it a fetus, so be it. If you want to call it an entity-unworthy-of-human-rights, so be it. Either way, make a libertarian argument that does not hinge on arbitrary definitions. I can do it. If you want an abortion, pay for it yourself and do not force anybody else to pay for it. Paying for it includes your own self-defense from crazy wackos, by the way. Nobody should be required to defend your abortion business. If people want abortion, the market will demonstrate that.
I agree more or less. However, I still think it is all about definition, because you can not escape human language barrier so easily. You can not judge something morally if you do not define your term, what are you judging in this case. Otherwise, it can be reduced to such an absurdity as calling humans only atoms and is it moral to split those atoms apart or not - that makes no sense. Still, as you said, market will decide.
Malachi: MaikU: Malachi:Bad analogy. Steam is water. go back to first grade. Trolling after troling and you lost all credibility in this debate. Just saw this. I like you, Maiku, dont make this personal. I like these forums, we should be able to discuss these issues without animosity. Steam is water. Thats not trolling or deception or anything. Fetuses are also humans. Tiny little humans, with their own little organ systems and their own dna. Do they teach that in first grade?
steam is not water. Maybe you mean stream? Still, I think it is an error to call steam water, as it is an error to call fetus human (if you accept my definition of human, for sure, which I think, you do not, as I define it as rational independent individual.
hashem: I'll admit I was thinking of water vapor or whatever, and said steam. My point isn't what we label it, my point was that they are obviously distinct things with distinct properties, despite their similarities. Now that we're technical: You don't abort a baby. You abort a fetus.
furthemore, if biologists believed fetus is a human, they wouldn't call it that way. Sure, fetus is a part of human evolution, I would agree with this, but to call it fully developed human is not only an absurdity, it is simply false.
furthemore, if biologists believed fetus is a human, they wouldn't call it that way.
They do. Always. "Human," is used interchangably with homo sapiens in biology. The distiction you are making is between fetus and adult, not fetus and human.
Still, I think it is an error to call steam water, as it is an error to call fetus human (if you accept my definition of human, for sure, which I think, you do not, as I define it as rational independent individual.
also, in what manner is a "fetus" as you call it, not rational?
Whether a fetus is so-called rational or not, it can't communicate with us about abstract concepts like property, justice, rights. Even if it had rights, there's no way we can fathom what they are (they aren't property rights), and it would be absurd for us to expect to be able to respect something we can't even fathom.
MaikU: furthemore, if biologists believed fetus is a human, they wouldn't call it that way. Sure, fetus is a part of human evolution, I would agree with this, but to call it fully developed human is not only an absurdity, it is simply false.
"Fetus" is term used to describe a mammal in a particular stage of development. All mammals, except maybe the platypus, but that's always the exception, have this stage of development. It is not a tem for a separate species.
Humans go through many phases in their development from zygote to adult. Fetus is just one of many.
hashem: Whether a fetus is so-called rational or not, it can't communicate with us about abstract concepts like property, justice, rights. Even if it had rights, there's no way we can fathom what they are (they aren't property rights), and it would be absurd for us to expect to be able to respect something we can't even fathom.
A person's property rights in China are not dependent on your capacity to communicate with them. If they gained property rights, they aren't dependent on you.
This has absolutely nothing to do with the property rights a fetus neither has nor needs.
You aren't a fetus and can't communicate with fetuses about abstract concepts, so you don't know their nature and therefore you can't fathom their rights. But just because YOU can't communicate with people in China doesn't mean people in China didn't gain property rights as all non-fetuses do: when they first acted as individuals to become self-owners.
@Hashem- While I'm pro-choice too, I disagree with your approach. Remember, in the Rothbardian ethics system, ALL humans have rights. This includes fetuses. The point, however, is that a fetus violates a mother's right to self-ownership by virtue of being in her womb; if she does not desire the fetus to be there, it is merely a parasitic invader.She can therefore use proportionate punishment to the force initiated by the fetus of being in her womb. Because this would apply to adults who are hypothetically in a woman's body involuntarily, it must necessarily apply to fetuses as well. It's a simple extension of logic.
To me, Rothbard's approach on the issue makes sense. No need for revision.
RothbardsDisciple: @Hashem- While I'm pro-choice too, I disagree with your approach. Remember, in the Rothbardian ethics system, ALL humans have rights. This includes fetuses.
@Hashem- While I'm pro-choice too, I disagree with your approach. Remember, in the Rothbardian ethics system, ALL humans have rights. This includes fetuses.
fetuses are not human beings. They may be a developing humans, but not seperate independent individuals. Rothbard was wrong. And it is not bad to be wrong. Rand was wrong on the State too, but she still manage to inspire many anarcho-libertarians.
"Whether a fetus is so-called rational or not, it can't communicate with us about abstract concepts like property, justice, rights. Even if it had rights, there's no way we can fathom what they are (they aren't property rights), and it would be absurd for us to expect to be able to respect something we can't even fathom."
My 7 month old can't communicate abstract concepts either. Does my 7 month have no rights?
Seems like we have a lot of Peter Singer disciples on these boards.
A person's property rights in China are not dependent on your capacity to communicate with them.
RothbardDisciple, I've read TEoL and FaNL each at least 5 times, but that was years ago. Rothbard is my hero, and even he argues against human rights. There are no rights, which aren't property rights, he says. My point is that whatever a fetus is or isn't, that it doesn't meet the qualifications for property rights.
Malachi, people in China have property rights precisely because they aren't fetuses—they gained property rights as all individuals do: when they acted as individuals.
MtDew, you said, "Does my 7 month have no rights?" Let me flip the question on you: If your 7mo tried to escape your control, to escape the home you provide and the limits you impose. Would you use force to stop it?
But you missed my point, and I'd like a citation on your claims. Rothbard argues, in Man, Economy, and State, that "every man has a right to his own [person and property]." Everyone has a right in their own person, according to Rothbard. This includes fetuses. Conceding this point, the pro-choice view of abortion is still correct, since the fetus is a parasitic trespasser in the woman's body. Where does Rothbard argue that not every human has equal rights of self-ownership?
Using your view, I could very easily argue that infants also have no rights. Which is certainly not the Rothbardian claim. Infants are non-fee simple property of the parents; they have rights, and this means that they cannot be destroyed. Under your view, where an infant doesn't qualify for property rights, it would be legally justified to kill an infant. Which it is not.
If my 7 month tried to escape my grasp (which happens all the time, not sure why you posed that as a hypothetical) I'd do what's in her best interest and use force. Am I violating her rights? Sure, why not? She can sue me when she's older for not letting her wander into traffic.
So are you arguing for against infanticide? If my child is not a rational agent I am doing nothing wrong by murdering her when my wife gets home in a few minutes. If she is a rational agent I suppose I'm a sadist for not letting her crawl off a cliff.
But you missed my point, and I'd like a citation on your claims. Rothbard argues, in Man, Economy, and State, that "every man has a right to his own [person and property]." Everyone has a right in their own person, according to Rothbard. This includes fetuses. Are you sure Rothbard says fetuses have a right in their person, or that they have the potential to have a right in their person?
When Rothbard argues about rights—even the right to one's person—he is talking about property rights. He does this a lot, but an obvious example is the section on "Property rights and "Human Rights"" in For a New Liberty. Thus, "his “human right”—or his property rights in his own person—".
And, "In fact, there are no human rights that are separable from property rights."
He goes over this in other works, but I don't feel like shuffling through them. The point is, there are no rights that aren't property rights, beginning with the property in one's person.
I agree, but a fetus has property in its person, or to elaborate potential property in its person. Rothbard (I'm fairly sure) agrees with me in his chapter on abortion . For example, he says that infants are non-fee-simple property of the parents. If he agreed with your view, he'd say that infants are fee-simple property of the parents. Seeing as, according to you but not according to Rothbard, they don't have potential property in their own person, and therefore don't have rights.