Being cruel has a selective advantage so that trait is still in the programming. But humans have learned to override the programming. I think eventually evolution might filter out the cruelty. That is, if humans overriding evolutionary programming doesn't kill us first. The concept of gender these days is definitely overriding programming, and maybe in a very selectively destructive way. A positive feedback loop towards extinction.
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Leaked/breaking:Roe v. Wade expected to be overturned
- Thread starter Cameramonkey
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I'm betting protests will be much more controlled than the BLM riots, simply because the money that finances them will insist on it as a condition of payment. Without the added incentive of looting I think attendance for these "demonstrations" will be quite low by comparison.
This is another illustration about worldview. You believe a fertalized egg is the same as a human being. So then you attach all the immorality of killing any innocent human. But the people you're talking about have a worldview where that's not the same thing as a human person. That's the point where the argument belongs, not "they're murdering people"
The left does the same thing with their gun argument, when they say the blood of the victims of mass shootings is on the hands of the gun owners. They're applying the reasoning of their own worldview on guns, to say gun owners must be aware that their gun ownership is causing those deaths. But gun owners don't believe their ownership has anything to do with why other people decide to use guns to murder people. And it doesn't.
So then people who don't believe the "at conception" point of view, don't think it's murder. You impose that belief on them that they don't actually hold themselves.
No. I think the looting was encouraged to enhance societal instability. Of course the looting does provide a payoff. And the looters won't be there. But in the crowds that I've seen personally, the number of looters and troublemakers were far outnumbered by the people who were there protesting in good faith.
I'm not sure what the riots will look like exactly. I think establishment Democrats understand that the violence hurt them. I think they will be at odds with the ideologues who want to destabalize society and have a violent revolution. Who knows which faction will win. But I don't think there will be a shortage of white progressives, as warrior knights, fighting to proclaim their own virtue.
Supply chain issues could delay the pallets of bricks being prepositioned in various locales.
Well. Maybe BLM leaders can sell their homes for the cause and pay the inflated prices for bricks. Having a social justice education doesn't really prepare them for thinking on the fly. I mean, normal people typically have improvisational skills. Ever see what a farmer can do with a broke tractor stuck in the middle of a field? Nothing if zhe's had a social justice education.
Now, let's not go off the deep end here.
I really hate this topic. Not really the topic... I HATE the way it is used.
It's important. It's worthy of deep reflection and discussion. Strong feelings are reasonable. However...
It's Pavlovian. "Ding!...slobber, Ding!...slobber." The political parties abuse it shamelessly. They can count count on it with precision to illicit predictable responses.
It's a giant issue that threatens to rip our society apart - because they've groomed it that way!
I can't believe it's a coincidence that this got 'leaked' with the perfect timing before the coming mid-term elections - possibly the most monumental mid-terms ever. Mid-terms I thought would be a critical turning point for our nation. It's desperate, calculated, and sociopathic. Unfortunately, it's also very effective. Many will vote this one issue - everything else be damned. it got played as a trump card to deflect and distract from every other issue, and it will have it's effect.
This current situation makes me VERY ANGRY and very concerned.
It's important. It's worthy of deep reflection and discussion. Strong feelings are reasonable. However...
It's Pavlovian. "Ding!...slobber, Ding!...slobber." The political parties abuse it shamelessly. They can count count on it with precision to illicit predictable responses.
It's a giant issue that threatens to rip our society apart - because they've groomed it that way!
I can't believe it's a coincidence that this got 'leaked' with the perfect timing before the coming mid-term elections - possibly the most monumental mid-terms ever. Mid-terms I thought would be a critical turning point for our nation. It's desperate, calculated, and sociopathic. Unfortunately, it's also very effective. Many will vote this one issue - everything else be damned. it got played as a trump card to deflect and distract from every other issue, and it will have it's effect.
This current situation makes me VERY ANGRY and very concerned.
AndreusMaximus
Master
Thanks for acknowledging the difference even if you don't believe there is one. But I think what is missing is the acknowledgment that the decision to attach rights to the point you do is not "science". I'll use that placeholder again to illistrate that you guys don't seem to like. If science could determine precisely when "sentience" happens, and I believed that rights should be conferred then, it would not be "science" that decides to attach rights at that point. Science can inform one's belief about rights. But the belief about rights, itself, is not scientific. And honestly, after all the covid "science" talk, I almost hate using the word. It feels dirty.
Attaching the point of rights to a fixed place seems like a good idea, but the fixed nature of the point make it the right point? We can find lots of fixed point, unchanging criteria during a pregnancy, to decide that it is at that point which rights should attach. But you will only agree with one. You will not accept any other. That doesn't make you right and everyone else wrong. It's a belief.
I prefer to call it evolution.
If we're talking about how to make a law that attaches rights at the right place, I agree. It has to be some objective point.
Something that I want to make clear, this is the part of the abortion argument I wanted to pursue. I don't think I have said that there isn't a rational secular argument for "at conception". I said there wasn't a good one. The best one that I've thought of is the "potential" argument. I haven't heard one in this thread that is really any better than that one.
Well, there's one that is compelling if not a good argument for "at conception". If a person murders a pregnant woman, that person can be charged with two counts, or however counts depending on how many unborn children were in the womb. That's not really an argument for "at conception" as it is an argument that the laws are inconsistent.
Truth, at least in how you seem to be using it, is the full representation of facts and reality. Facts can change with circumstances. Reality can change with circumstances. Some things are subjective. Not every belief we have has a definite truth value. Is it true that pineapple does not belong on pizza. I believe that's true. It's not true for everyone. I'm not trying to be glib with the subject. It's a serious matter. For you, "at conception" is true. But as I've said, I think you have to step out of secular thinking to get you there. And I don't have a problem with that. Just recognize that almost every non-religious person is unlikely to agree.
I'm running out of enough words to do a point-by-point breakdown, but let me hit what I think are some of the important things:I think this illustrates part of the problem, that most of my involvement in this discussion is around the idea that it's a religious belief that drives "at conception". The question was in service to that point.
But if we're going to talk about what the public policy should actually be, I have agreed that laws should be based on something objective. But there are a lot of objective, measurable points during a pregnancy that could be the policy. "At conception" is objective. First heart beat/brain waves, is objective. When the fetus reacts to pain. First kicks. Up to the first trimester. Second trimester. Third trimester. Before cutting the umbilical cord at birth.
Undoubtedly some of those points sound morally reprehensible. More of those points would sound morally reprehensive to a religious person who believes in a soul than a non-religious person who doesn't. I think it tugs at the heartstrings more at a point where there's a heartbeat and brainwaves. Even more at the point where the fetus can feel pain. And so on. Non-religious, non-ideologically driven people feel the moral weight of those points too. But at conception, there isn't the same reactive moral repugnance when someone doesn't believe in a soul.
I suppose you might think I'm an atheist. I'm not religious. But not an atheist. I'm more of an agnostic. And I do think there is something sacred about life. But I have no reason to believe there is a soul that's separate from human existence.
What drives your belief? Why is it that pretty much all the people who believe "at conception" are religious? That belief is highly correlated with religion. Again, I'm not disparaging that your religion drives your beliefs. It's reasonable that it does. I would find it absurd if it didn't. If we believe in freedom of thought, which I do, then people have a right to believe what they believe, for whatever reason they have. I think I've answered that last question already, but in case it's not clear, it's associated with religion in service of my point that "at conception" is driven by religion. It is subjective. And as I've said many times. All opinions on when rights should attach regarding abortion is subjective.
I would be proud of the person who could stand up and say, yes. My belief is driven by God. That's my right. Deal with it. But no. People keep thinking it's necessary to find a place to argue it on the ground of secular thinking. They say, "no, but the science!" And I say ********. Claiming rights should be conferred at conception is not "science". It's an opinion as much as any other point on this topic. Of course you're free to disagree. And that would be your own opinion.
From the beginning of the conversation I had no doubts that you were quite certain about the objectivity of your thinking. There is nothing murky about this topic to you except the views of the people who disagree with you. I don't hope that you'd ever agree with me on my subjective views. My only hope of agreement between us would be that we can acknowledge that your belief, though steadfast, is not the "science". There is not a logical path that flows from "the science" to applying the same rights "at conception".
Morals are relative to one's moral beliefs. But there are "objective" morals. Just about every culture throughout human civilization, has had the concept of murder, the unjustified killing of a person, as being morally wrong. What's different in the details of that morality is the underlying beliefs about what is "justified" and what is "a person". If we both believe the same thing then we both would have the same moral belief. That's why religion is an important part of the discussion. Whether one is religious or not, that drives the difference whether you want to acknowledge that or not.
Hold the **** on now. If you think I sound like there's no point in trying to have clear and objective morals, I don't think you have a very good understanding of what this discussion between us is. Those are assumptions you make, I think because you're trying to understand what I'm saying within your own worldview. And it doesn't make any sense.
The way you've described my position looks to be the only way it makes any sense to you. That I must believe there's no point to try to have clear, objective morals, because what I'm saying doesn't make sense otherwise. Well, let's clear this up first. Human morality does change. It used to be considered immoral to marry a person of another race. In some circles it still is. But, I do think we should strive to have clear, objective morals, as much as we can agree on. But, that all morality is fixed, is objectively not the case. The Bible hasn't changed. But do you think people still shouldn't intermarry?
To understand another person, you have to step out of your worldview and try to get into theirs. It's not always possible. I've had the worldview of a Bible-believing Christian man for a few decades of my life. So I still remember a lot of that worldview. So I think I can step back into that to try to understand. And I do get it. I used to make some of the same arguments about abortion back in the day.
I'm not saying you're wrong, but I do think you're more confident in your position than a non-religious, non-ideological, secular person would be. They don't have the surety of a faith in something that transcends the reality of what is seen. I don't think that's a bad thing. But I'm sure you think you're better off. We can agree to disagree on those things.
On the question of morality itself for non-religious people? That's a different topic in itself. Probably would be a good thread. But briefly, don't harm people who don't deserved harm. Treat people like you want to be treated unless they behave otherwise. (you get what you give). I'm sure some of that sounds familiar.
Except I don't believe God told me to do it. And I don't believe I'll go to hell if I don't. I think morality perpetuates the species and we're programmed through an evolutionary process to develop morals.
Why do some cultures not wipe with their right hand? That's an issue of morality to them. Probably because they noticed people wiping and then eating with the same hand, and then getting sick. They attached a moral significance to that because they didn't have any other mechanism to deal with that curse. If they had a scientific process, they could have found their way to common sense. That if you eat with ****** hands, you ingest bacteria that can make you sick. So wash your hands and you can eat with either hand after ********.
1 - I know it can be hard to keep our responses straight with so many of us dog-piling on in this thread, but I don't think I ever claimed that rights at conception was based on science. If I did, it was by mistake, and I take it back. Science can help us determine facts about a human organism, but can't, by itself, make moral determinations.
2 - Yes, my belief that "life" (ie, human rights) begins at conception is rooted in my religious belief. I'm not afraid to say it. On my part, the anxiousness to prove that "life" begins at conception from a purely secular standpoint is not rooted in insecurity about my religious beliefs, but rather in the notion that our government should not impose laws based on religious belief, but rather on rational criteria that can be agreed upon by reasonable people, regardless of their religious views, or lack thereof.
3 - I think I may have oversimplified, and therefore misstated, my argument for why I think conception is the only objective point at which human rights begin. What I really meant is that it's the only objective and consistent point. Everything else you listed is completely arbitrary. Conception is the only point at which a fundamental change occurs, that will never be reversed until the person dies. Before conception you have two cells that are unarguably NOT human beings; they are a PART of another human being, and each one has DNA 100% identical to the person it came from. At the moment of conception, you now have a separate, individual being, with its own DNA, and it will continue being a separate, individual being, with its own DNA, until it dies. With all the other objective points you mentioned, they're either things that may come and go at different points in a person's life, or are simply completely arbitrary time periods based on how long the human organism has been alive.
Why should a heartbeat confer human rights? We still believe that the man lying on the floor suffering from a heart attack, who needs to have his heart restarted with a defibrillator, has human rights. And first heartbeat isn't even as objective as one might think; before the heart is fully formed with four chambers, there's a period where it's a small tube pumping blood. There's been a push in recent years by some medical associations to redefine heartbeat to only mean once the full four chambers are formed and beating.
Brain waves? How far do you have to go to try to detect them before determining they're not there? There's been more than one case of a person in a coma being declared brain dead, and then waking up later.
First kicks? There's been people born without legs. I guess they would never get human rights then.
And things like first or second trimester, while they may be objective, are purely arbitrary. Why on earth would a rational person pick a random number of days that a human organism has to be alive before they are considered a human life?
Cutting the umbilical cord at birth? I guess you could maybe make a somewhat reasonable case that we could consistently use the criteria that a human must not be physically attached to and reliant on another human in order to be considered a life. But then I guess Siamese twins are out of luck...
4 - And I think this is the most important point. Do you believe that there is such a thing as objective morality?
Morality can have two senses: first the morals of a given human society at a certain time/place. Of course this can change, and is constantly changing throughout history; that's simply a point of fact.
But when I'm talking about objective morality, I'm talking about a set of morals that are, and always will be, true, regardless of the degree to which they are acknowledged by humanity at any given point.
For instance, you mentioned regarding truth, that certain truths change with time (it's true that I'm awake right now; tonight that won't be true, then tomorrow morning it will be true again) and certain truths are subjective (it's true for me that pineapple on pizza is good, it's not true for some people.) But these are really just slightly improper ways we have of speaking about truth. The fact that I was awake at 10:11 AM on May 11, 2022, will ALWAYS be true, even if there comes a point in time when everyone on earth believes it to be false. And the fact that I, at said date and time, found pineapple on pizza to be appetizing, will always remain true, regardless of if my tastes change in the future.
Then there a truths that do not change at all, like the fundamental properties of matter. We may eventually find that our understanding of those properties was flawed, and has to be revised, but the truth didn't change; our understanding of it did.
My question to you is, can we agree that there are fundamental morals that transcend time periods and societies, that have always been and will always be true? Do you believe that your and my right to life is something that exists as a matter of truth, that doesn't change based on subjective perceptions? Or do you believe something more like: one day humanity may evolve to the point where they realize that you and I were just peons in the grand scheme of things, whose rights didn't really matter, and if that point were ever reached, that would become truth?
AndreusMaximus
Master
I'm not imposing my belief on anyone; I stated clearly that I was talking, objectively, about human organisms as a scientific concept. I recognize the fact that many people nowadays don't consider a fertilized egg to be a human "life" in the moral sense.This is another illustration about worldview. You believe a fertalized egg is the same as a human being. So then you attach all the immorality of killing any innocent human. But the people you're talking about have a worldview where that's not the same thing as a human person. That's the point where the argument belongs, not "they're murdering people"
The left does the same thing with their gun argument, when they say the blood of the victims of mass shootings is on the hands of the gun owners. They're applying the reasoning of their own worldview on guns, to say gun owners must be aware that their gun ownership is causing those deaths. But gun owners don't believe their ownership has anything to do with why other people decide to use guns to murder people. And it doesn't.
So then people who don't believe the "at conception" point of view, don't think it's murder. You impose that belief on them that they don't actually hold themselves.
What I am saying, is that every other definition throughout history that other societies have used in the past to define what is scientifically a human organism as NOT a human "life" in the moral sense, is now regarded by the general public as outdated, cruel, and befitting only of barbarians or murderers. Therefore, I find it highly likely that the same will occur at some point in the future, regarding our definition of human "life", which excludes certain human organisms.
Twangbanger
Grandmaster
- Oct 9, 2010
- 7,137
- 113
Nobody's going to change their beliefs, but that's not the point of the conversation. The conversation is happening because Republicans / The Right now find themselves in a new political situation, and handling it correctly will be of importance.
What if Abortion gets banned in a relative handful of southern states...but outside of there, it remains legal everywhere else? And, as part of the bargain, Republicans in other states lose their control of state legislatures and other offices? Because The Left now possesses/manufactures/wields a vibrant new tool for making people really believe all conservatives are scary, extremist religious zealots who only care about their own belief system to the exclusion of all else?
I think most of us would consider that a "fail." Because it could affect gun rights, the justice system, social policy, and on down the list.
A geeky fascination with driving the "moment of conception" narrative down other people's throats, because it aligns with some religiously-reinforced concept of what they consider a "fixed, objectively simple" place to draw the line, could cause exactly that. Because it could drive a tank over the life of a woman who just got raped, or who just found out her child will have massive life-altering complications, or anyone else in a position to empathize with such people, either actual persons or just hypothetical ones.
This isn't to get people to change their beliefs. It's to get them to not be too "in-love" with the fact they draw the line in a different place than someone else.
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SheepDog4Life
Natural Gray Man
Yup... if a conservative justice's clerk leaked the draft in order to manipulate the process, as Totenberg hypothesizes to "lock in" the votes to overturn Roe, then THAT would have been the story that Politco ran with... "Conservatives cannot overturn Roe, resort to unprecedented dirty tricks".
Lol, was that the point of the conversation, that must have gotten lost somewhere in the 30 something pages. How is any of this a new political situation Republicans and democrats have always had different views on this, it's something every political candidate is asked about. I doubt abortion is suddenly going to make red states blue states, in reality most people are probably about as ambivalent about it as I am.
Its always been there. But it was established and therefore nothing more than idle chatter.
Kinda like how you and your buddies always talked about banging that Britney level hottie over beers, but she's married so its pointless. Now she just filed for divorce, so now y'all are REALLY talking about her again But more than just "remember when" . Because you each think you have a shot.
SheepDog4Life
Natural Gray Man
Yes and no... the vast majority of voters are neither staunchly Pro-Life nor staunchly Pro-Choice and view each end of the spectrum as "extreme".
If the draft comes to pass and Roe is overturned, as appears likely, this becomes a political issue... i.e. the voters decide.
The LONGTERM WIN politically is to be somewhat moderate like the electorate is... all of the 12/15/20 week state bans that brought us to this point ARE MODERATE in that they very much align with 95% of European laws.
The bill that the dems are getting ready to vote on today is EXTREME... unrestricted abortion for any reason up to the second before birth, clearing ALL state laws like parental notification, clearing all protections for healthcare providers who have moral/religious objections to abortions, etc.
This will be a hot topic for the midterm election and likely many to follow... the side that goes EXTREME, loses.
Lose two Senate seats, and unfettered 9 month abortions will be the law of the land in all 50 states. And will remain so until House, Senate and Presidency are flipped.
So, keep your powder dry, folks.
So when do inalienable rights begin? That question is where you bring in the emotional, not scientific.
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