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Subscribe to RSSFertilized eggs could be granted human rights, depending on how Mississippi voters cast their ballots Tuesday on Initiative 26. The ballot measure, otherwise known as the "personhood" amendment, proposes to amend the state's constitution to redefine "person" to include "every human being from the moment of fertilization, cloning, or the functional equivalent thereof." Among other things, it could mean that couples who have turned to fertility clinics for help becoming parents won’t be allowed to ever destroy their unused fertilized eggs.
The polls say the anti-abortion referendum is likely to pass.
First Read: Personhood measure divides conservative ranks
It shouldn’t.
Not because passage would mean the end of all abortions, even for rape and incest. And not because its passage would create absurd public policy consequences: Do embryos get counted in the census? Could they inherit property?
The reason this law makes for bad public policy is that it is completely at odds with what science knows to be true about embryos and fetuses.
A statewide vote has a lot of women in fear over the future of certain forms of birth control. NBC's Than Truong reports.
Those who defend the amendment say they have science on their side. "The unborn child in the womb is scientifically proven to be a human being,” says Jennifer Mason, communications director for Personhood USA, the Arvada, Col.-based national advocacy group pushing for passage of Initiative 26. But Mason has no idea what she is talking about.
It is true that for centuries science has shown that all human beings begin as fertilized eggs. But it is not true that all fertilized eggs can or do produce human beings. In fact, it is so utterly wrong to say that every fertilized egg is a person, that to even suggest that science provides support for enacting the initiative is utterly absurd.
What are the odds of a fertilized egg becoming a person?
This is what we know: During the period of embryonic development that begins with fertilization and ends with successful implantation, about 50 percent of human conceptions fail to survive. The main reason for this high failure rate is the inability of huge numbers of fertilized eggs to implant.
What science has found is that around half of all conceptions don't make it to implantation. Calling a fertilized egg a person flies in the face of this cruel biological reality. Half of all fertilized eggs cannot even become an embryo, much less a person.
Indeed, given the grim odds that face fertilized eggs, no one in science or medicine refers to a fertilized egg as an embryo unless it manages to implant. By talking about embryos and fertilized eggs as equivalent, supporters of Initiative 26 are not even using the correct scientific definition of an embryo.
First Read: Personhood measure divides conservative ranks
If the rest of the story of human reproduction -- as medicine and science know the facts to be -- is brought to bear, things only get worse for Initiative 26.
Sadly, all too many couples know about the high rate of spontaneous abortion and stillbirth that haunts embryonic and fetal development. Roughly, one in six embryos will spontaneously abort or produce fetuses that do not develop properly and die in utero.
There are a huge number of embryos that are not properly genetically programmed for life. Nearly all of these completely lack the biological ability to develop into anything resembling a viable baby. Legislation -- like that about to be voted on in Mississippi -- that declares fertilized eggs to be persons from the moment of conception simply ignores that the failure rate of human embryos is very high. A considerable number of embryos and fetuses never have any chance of producing a baby.
Medicine and science know very well what many millions of heart-broken would be parents around the world know first-hand: To call all embryos “persons” flies in the face of spontaneous abortion, stillbirth and fetal death.
In the push to declare fertilized eggs “persons” advocates claim science is on their side. But it is only by ignoring what science has learned about the long odds that face fertilized eggs that anyone could even suggest that a fertilized egg is a person.
Arthur Caplan, Ph.D., is director of the Center for Bioethics at the University of Pennsylvania.
Leave a Comment:
Dr. Arthur. You have a very weak argument here. The fact (your contention) that many fertilized eggs don't survive has no more to do with the fact that they are human beings than the rates of infant mortality, teen driving deaths, 20 somethings drug overdoses, 30 somethings whatevers. I am not heavily in the pro life movement and am (was) a scientist, but I can easily see the logic in their attempt to save lives. As far as the fertility clinic paradox goes, Is it OK in your mind for a couple to have six kids and kill off those that they don't like?
That they are "human beings" is not a fact. It's an opinion. As the article states, one in six embryos simply don't have the potential to ever develop into babies (actual human beings). Comparing a once-celled fertilized egg that doesn't even reach implantation to a baby that dies due to disease or malnutrition is just disgusting.
That they are "human beings" is very much a fact! Something is defined as living as soon as it begins to grow and change. As soon as cells are multiplying the definition of life (by any scientific standard or by the definition of the dictionary) has begun. Are you questioning weather these life forms are human? What else do you think they would be?
Everyone wants to make this a religious issue and it is no more a religious issue than the other commandments that we have made into law. Not because of religion, but because it is what is right and moral. Murder is not OK. Especially when it is your own child!
portnutz
No, it's not. It's an opinion. Calling a single-celled organism that doesn't even have the mind of a goldfish a human being seems ridiculous to a lot of people of the more rational persuasion.
But do you call an acorn an oak tree? There is a huge difference! And it is the same as between a fertilized ovum and a human person.
No...you attempt define "life" but not a "human" . A "human" is not an egg...look at all human literature, have you ever seen that an fertilized egg is called a human. Only religious freaks do that...the rest of the cilvilized world thinks different.
If fertilized eggs were really human beings, then we should be spending trillions of dollars to find a way to save the 50% of "human beings" that never make it to implantation. The Earth's population is now 7 billion. Think of those 7 billion single-celled "people" who never even got a chance to divide and know what it's like to be a multicelled life form. Oh, the (alleged) humanity!
My appendix is living. It has human DNA, has higher complexity than an 8 week old embryo, and can feel pain. Should we outlaw it's removal as well?
If not, the only distinction you can make is that it has the potential to develop into a human. And a potential for something has never been grounds to consider it as such. I can possess marijuana seeds but not the plant.
I think that if this law passes - every unused sperm and egg could be interpreted as killing of 1/2 a person.
Gee - all those teenage boys could be charged with 1/2 a homicide (actually up to a billion 1/2 homicides). Another way that the 'good old boys' could start locking up black youth.
If this law passes - would rape still be a crime in MS? After all - it is the attempt to make a life - how could they ever say that is illegal?
What idiocy. A tumor also can grow and change. It is alive. But it does not have the capacity to form a human being. All fertilized eggs do not have the capacity to become human beings. Even if the environment for implantation were ideal they wouldn't because their genetic process is incomplete. The fertilized egg is not viable. To make the claim that they are human beings, is utterly foolish. While the potential is there, the genetic process has to be complete, for even an iota of the claim of a whole being can be made.
Sounds like the United Nations has moved part of it's headquarter's Human Rights staff to Mississippi.
California, you are next on the U.N.'s list.
Salsassin
Neither do one out of six embryos. If you actually read the article you'd know that.
From the article that the right wingers don't want to read:
Oh, and by the way. Once human cloning is sufficiently advanced, the any cell in the human body is a potential NEW human. All surgical procedures would have to be outlawed as murder because all those blood cells and tissues that are destroyed would actually be tiny people.
A fertilized ovum is only a potentiality. It is not a person, yet. It is not able to live on it's own or act in the world. Birth has been a traditional crossing over into personhood for much of human history. Even then, for much of earlier, less civilized, times babies weren't even named until their 1st birthday due to the high rates of infant mortality.
The real question is, should the sacredness of human life be determined by the genetic definition of homo sapiens, at inception, only. Or, should there be some reasonable determination of viability.
Does that mean everyone's birth day should be the day they were conceived? Since that's the real day they became a person?
ChibiShi... Do a little research. In Asian countries, particularly China, a child's age is computed from 9 months before the baby is born.
It simply depends on the culture, and I do not think we have the probity to say a yea or a nay about that.
So, someone who disagrees with Terry of Nevada (#1.0) decides to silence that poster. Wow.
There are a cluster of you who are very inconsistent, and I think you are as wrong as is the article which is an opinion piece, not irrefutable science. (A Ph.D., behind someone's name does not guarantee brains; and I suspect many of you know I am right.) Our writer did not provide a whit of evidence; in fact, logic goes dead against him.
None the less, I, personally, would never vote to silence him or you because your opinion jives with his. If I disagree, I will grant any good points you might make (if I see them), and offer some concepts that might vary from yours.
Bottom line... it's your opinion, as is mine, and neither of them is locked in a pair of clay tablets somewhere. Opinion is not fact. Never has been, never will be.
But silencing another? Trying to take away his or her right to be heard? Did you never read the First Amendment to the American Bill of Rights? Perhaps the worst admission of a person's insecurity about his own opinion, and shows his big time bigotry, is silencing another's post.
It's something you have to live with because it also shows something else... people who try to silence another's opinion should take a look at themselves. Are they so insecure that they cannot grant another person his right to disagree? Where do these folks think they are living? In Hitler's Germany almost a century ago?
Get next to the fact that silencing another doesn't silence what one fears within himself. It's simply a damaging admission of one's own inadequacy, and something that's not fun to live with.
And that is inevitable.
I agree with the author. She is actually using logic. A fertilized egg has the potential to develop into a person, but then so do eggs and sperm un-united. To suggest otherwise is theological dogma, based on someone's interpretation of the Bible. Interpretation is the key word. like the creationists who attack evolution(what a joke), it is just theologians attempting to impose their values on society, as they have for thousands of years.
The fact is. this amendment shouldn't become law. If it does, expect a whole new set of court cases by the attorneys who hatched this nonsense, and the attorneys who will oppose it.
At the end of the day, its bad science and bad law and bad religion.
Will Dallas
Arthur is a female?!?
I would have to disagree. The only ontological end for a fertilized egg - otherwise called a zygote - is to be a separate human, with distinct DNA. An egg or sperm is only that - it can never develop into an embryo, child, or adult without some other outside process; that is, fertilization.
The logic behind this article also leaves me unsatisfied. If zygotes are not human because many of them die and do not continue developing into adults, then does a high infant mortality rate mean that infants are not human? Or, all humans die - does that mean we are not human?
I do not consider an embryo or a zygote to be a "potential" person - they already are humans by the scientific definition. Any stages of development after fertilization, be it birth, puberty, or the onset of old age, are milestones in human aging.
Finally, although I am disagreeing with you, Will, am I using any theology? Biblical evidence? No - only philosophy and science, which are the same tools the author uses.
It'd be lousy to be a scientist in MS, but a great place to be an attorney. They're once more proving that "common" sense, isn't. Maybe we could leave it to the IRS to decide -- if fertilized eggs are "persons", then let's see if they recognize the deduction. Or maybe they'll punt to the SSA -- will they give a fertilized egg a social security number? Will the newspapers print death notices for unimplanted eggs? Will any woman caught drinking after having sex be guilty of endangering a child?
The right-wing nuts are perverting the government and legal systems with this BS, trying to create an untenable situation so they can negotiate a "compromise" that inches their social agenda forward just a bit. It's corrupt and unfair to the sensible people who have to live in MS in this economy -- they'll have to help foot the legal bills to defend this law, which will be a total waste of resources since it'll obviously be struck down.
@Carly-4467373
"I do not consider an embryo or a zygote to be a "potential" person - they already are humans by the scientific definition. "
You are using the terms human and person interchangeably when they do not mean the same thing.
They may be "human" by the scientific definition but they do not qualify as "persons." The definition of a person is "a human being regarded as an individual." Embryos are not individuals because their lives rely on the mother's life. Infant's can survive outside the mother so can viable fetuses (side note: abortion is illegal if the fetus is viable), but embryos can not they are not individuals even though they are human and so they should not be considered "persons" even if they are made up of "human" matter.
@Carly-4467373
Furthermore, even if in some make believe world a non-viable fetus were to be considered a person with it's own set of rights, what right does this fetus have to another person's body without that person's say so?
If a man hit a woman with his car by accident, her kidneys fail, and they are a match, does she have a right to demand a kidney from him so that her life can be saved? Should their be a law forcing him to give her a kidney? I don't think so.
Yet if a woman's actions accidentally results in pregnancy many people think she should lose the basic right to decide what happens to her body because she committed the acts that accidentally resulted in pregnancy. Yet another example of society feeling the need to punish women because they have the "audacity" to be sexual.
Hmm... I could get an embryonic cold storage tank in my garage and fill it up with fertilized human eggs and deduct a few hundred children... Think of the epic tax credits!
@ Sam,
Why do you consider that an embryo/zygote is not an individual? Just because they must rely on someone else to live, why does that change their innate human individuality? An infant must be fed to live, a disabled person may require the use of machines or intensive nursing to live - are they not persons? Also, an embryo does not require the mother's life - just her lifestyle, perhaps. But abortion takes the embryo's life.
Furthermore, if we can accept that fetuses/embryos/zygotes are human persons, as I rationally understand them to be, then can you see that the argument "a fetus has no right to occupy a woman's body" fails, because we can agree that it is never acceptable to kill another human person, regardless of the possible burden on another person. You may consider that to be unfair towards women, but how do you think you were born? Both of us "imposed" on our mothers for months, and potentially on our fathers; then, I, at least, spent the next 18 imposing upon them for food, clothing, and shelter. Did I have a right to do so? Were my parents responsible for such things? Or, could they have simply given up when I was say, 5, and then just left me to starve because I was an inconvenience? I don't think so.
I must disagree with your final argument, that a woman has a right to decide what happens to her body, regardless of what she has done, too. I am completely free to do what I will with my body, so long as it does not hurt another. I can punch a punching bag all I want, but it becomes immoral when I punch someone in the face (legally, it's assault). I think the analogy stands here, as well. Also, what do you say about the rights of the thousands of female zygotes and embryos who are given no rights in the womb? They have the right to decide what happens to their bodies, I should think.
Finally, in many states abortions are legal past the age of viability, and with advances in science the age of viability keeps going down. Will you reevalue your stance on the okay age for abortion with each such scientific achievement?
Thank you for the discussion. I enjoy being able to talk rationally with people on this issue - too often people become emotional on both sides, and reason degrades.
Carly - I have a question. If it becomes available to choose the sex of a child and this was socially acceptable, would the government have the right to choose for you? Suppose the government was wanting to increase the armed forces and they wanted more men, to do this, they decided to intervene in the pregnancy and made sure more boys were born.
@Carly-4467373
I consider an individual to be someone whose present existence doesn't rely on the present existence of a specific other. There's a difference between relying on any other person for survival and relying on one specific person for existence. An infant can rely on anyone for survival but does not cease to exist because a specific person ceases to exist, the same goes for disabled people and viable fetuses, the same can not be said for embryos and non-viable fetuses. An embryo does in fact need a mother's life for existence because if her life were to end simultaneously so will its, again this "parasitic" relationship isn't seen in infants and viable fetuses.
Furthermore the statement "we can agree that it is never acceptable to kill another human person, regardless of the possible burden on another person" is debatable. State executions are held, officers shoot on-site persons who pose lethal threats to individuals, soldiers are expected to kill enemies, self-defense is justifiable, and the phrase "trespassers will be shot" is renown - all of these are examples of humans being killed because of the possible burden they pose to other people.
Also, we are not "imposition" on our mothers if we were intentionally conceived (like I was) and our mothers willingly agreed to have us. We were not "impositions" for the very fact that they "chose" to have us and were weren't forced on them (at least I wasn't). And even if we were accidentally conceived we are not "impositions" if our parents "chose" to keep us afterward. No you did not have a right to "impose" yourself on your parents for 18 years you were given that right when they "chose" not to give you up for adoption. Yet forcing a woman to have a child she did not plan to have (whose very action of taking birth control proves that she does not want a child) is an unfair "imposition" (predominately to women) and is wrong, especially when that "imposition" is not another person (which I do not believe an embryo is).
@Carly-4467373
As to my final argument yes we are limited certain freedoms when it comes to our actions harming other people but as I repeat fetuses aren't people.
Yet since you do then I'll adjust a say that people are limited certain freedoms when it comes to their actions harming other people and if you include fetuses as people then they too are limited. Their "right to life" is limited if their existence poses a threat to others (the mothers) which would make abortion legal in the case of woman whose lives are at stake because of pregnancy. People who pose psychological threats to others that could result in a person committing suicide are removed from them and since an embryos existence relies on it's connection to the mother that would make abortion legal in the case of woman who were raped and the fetus she carries poses a psychological threat to her that could result in her committing suicide. Also if embryos were considered persons then as persons their "right to life" does not supersede another person's right to their body. An example of this is again how a person does not have a right to another person's organ even if without the organ they will die.
Bottom-line is, if an embryo is a person (its own individual) then separating it from another person will not be considered killing it but letting it die - which is considered permissible especially in the cases of conjoined twins. Abortion would be permissible, making the vote for personhood redundant.
@Carly-4467373
As for "in many states abortions are legal past the age of viability" I actually did not know that. Thank you for telling me. I do not agree with abortion being performed on a viable fetus unless the mother's life is at stake and there is NO way to deliver it without putting her life in danger.
If the age of viability continues to go down so be it, because I know that at a certain point a fetus will be non-viable and unlike advocates for personhood I do not think that point is before fertilization but months after.
Sam,
The article reminds us that there is a difference between the words "human being" and "person", but it fails to admit that one is scientific and the other isn't. Would you agree that the question of "what is a person?" is metaphysical, not purely scientific (depending upon physical reality, but regarding a meaning that cannot be tested scientifically)?
As it deviates from the scientific, it begins to say, as you do, that there is a separate criteria for determining what makes one group of human beings "persons" and the other "non-persons". The article goes no further, but you claim that a human being can only be given the dignity of "person" if they can survive without having utter dependence on a specific other individual (here I understand you to be exchanging the words "individual" and "person" interchangeably. Am I right?)
Since its shown that "person" has a meaning other than the merely scientific "human being," it seems adequate to equip common experience to help define what is meant by "person". Most people when they say that something is "personal" are expressing that something is particularly relational - beyond mere biology or facts as such.
Someone walking by a billboard that they hardly notice, that's not personal. But something with a particular meaning shared by friends has the depth of experience that touches on what's meant by the word "personal." Isn't, then, the definition of person more wrapped around having a relationship with specific others, even one of need? Even utter need?
Wouldn't, then, having one's whole existence dependent upon another human being be a glowing example of what it means to be both "person" *and* "human being"?
I understand that charity cannot be forced, only proposed - but at the very least laws are warranted in order to protect people from violence, regardless of their levels of burden or dependence.
-Greg
**Since you mentioned the case of pregnancies that pose a threat to the life of the mother, you might be surprised to know that many anti-abortion advocates would agree with you that doctor's are obliged to protect the mother's life. I'm Catholic, and I know that the Catholic Church (perhaps known for being the largest voice against abortion), teaches the "principle of double-effect," that an action can be taken with the intention of doing good even when it will probably include an evil consequence, provided that the evil consequence is not itself intended by the action.
In other words, a procedure to save a mother's life, such as removing her uterus in an ectopic pregnancy, is acceptable even if results in the tragic death of her unborn child - but this is not the willful destruction of the child, as in an abortion. The same Church also has been a vehement voice against the death penalty, recognizing that in the United States alternatives at least *ought* to be available.
Of course the fertilized egg is human,you idguts, it ain't a monkey or a bear or even a freaking duck. Of course it is alive you mor@n$, it ain't a rock growing in that woman's belly. Of course it is unique, it's a one off combo of DNA unlike any other. None of this, however, should be used to imply that a mass of cells that is human based can be called a person.
As Personhood USA says- "A person, simply put, is a human being. This fact should be enough. The intrinsic humanity of unborn children, by definition, makes them persons, and should, therefore, guarantee their protection under the law."
It is a false argument to say it is the human nature of the cells as the reason it is a person.
It takes much more to be a person than being a bunch of cells, like viability outside the womb to start with, and a brain for the potential to think. Being a Human "BEING" implies being an independent individual, and not mass of cells that is dependent upon another for life giving nourishment.
And also quoted by Personhood on their website- "In the eyes of the law...the slave is not a person." Virginia Supreme Court, 1858"
If this is true, then isn't forcing a woman to carry a fetus that she does not choose make her a slave to the state? Talk about trying to give rights to a bunch of cells that are not even persons by taking away the right of another group and making them slaves.
Please, whenever you see any of this legislation pop up, do all you can to defeat it, for it is their desire to make you a slave to their way of thinking and not let you have free choice.
@Greg-12
One's thoughts are personal even if one doesn't share them. Yet if one does share them they do not become personal (they were personal to begin with) and they do not become more personal. I'll even go as far as saying that sharing one's thoughts make them less personal.
That is why I say, no, the definition of personal isn't "more wrapped around having a relationship with specific others." A meaning is personal even if it isn't shared with others. A meaning shared by 2 or people is still personal because of it's exclusivity. It's until a meaning loses that exclusivity and becomes more widely known that it becomes less personal.
You are right a billboard viewed by everyone isn't personal. But if the content of the billboard affects a person in a particular way the billboard takes on a "personal' meaning for that person. And if he shares that meaning with a specific set of people it still retains a personal quality but the fact that it was shared doesn't make it personal. What makes it personal was that it affected a "particular person" rather than everyone.
So your conclusion that: "having one's whole existence dependent upon another human being be a glowing example of what it means to be both "person" *and* "human being"" doesn't hold up since your premise that: "the definition of person [is] more wrapped around having a relationship with specific others, even one of need" is false.
Yes Terry, because the good doctor is a "scientist". That gives her the "right" to rationalize almost anything. You would probably win in a bet that if she and her scientist buddies fertilized the egg themselves they'd "brag" about their success rate - even if it didn't implant.
I agree that every fertialized egg is a human being, not just a bunch of cells that haven't yet formed into a human. I also think that whenever a woman fails to implant a fertilized egg she should be arrested for murder.
I really hope you're being sarcastic, because that's the most misogynistic thing I've read in a long time. If the zygote fails to implant, you should arrest God for murder, not the woman.
And I think all doctors and mothers should be arrested processed for manslaughter charges if they dont execute all possible methods for ensureing that the egg has best chance of survivability, no matter the cost!
I mean, after all, we want to make sure these "people" can live a complete and full life, yes?
And therefore also held criminally accountable if their child/adolescent/adult (a.k.a. off-spring) dies from anything before reaching the average life expectancy for their gender. Seems to make sense to me.
Oops! We slipped!!
Will fetiform teratoma (parasitic twin) or chimeric twin get legal protection then?
If person's life begins when the particular DNA combination forms, does it never end if the DNA is still kept intact, by means of cell line culturing?
Are monozygotic twins one person or two? Conjoined monozygotic twins?
If a fertilised egg or embrio was frozen, and then implanted after a few years, what will be the legal age of the child when it's born?
I do hope you're kidding. The writer is quite right about the science. Declaring a fertilized egg a "person" is unscientific and ridiculous. I'm the mother of three, never had an abortion, but I can attest that there is a vast difference between the mass of cells that is a fertilized and a fully formed, breathing child. These people simply want to force their religious beliefs on everyone else and take away a woman's right to control her own body.
Better yet if half of fertilized eggs do not implant shouldn't we lock up all females as soon as they become sexually active or just before to keep them all from becoming killers. If god is responsible for the miracle of conception why does he abort all these little people, shouldn't god be locked up and maybe at least in Texas put to death.
also If god does so many abortions how can he say they are bad? Is this where hypocrisy comes from? Maybe we should do way more abortions to get right with god.
The god concept is evil.
The argument is weak and hardly scientific. It demonstrates bias on the part of the author. Whether or not all fertilized eggs can survive or not is neither the question nor the point. By your own admission, one in six abort because they are not well suited to grow. This would mean that five in six do not. The point of the legislation is not to argue whether or not all fertilized eggs will grow enough to be born, but rather to override past efforts to define life as "at x amount of months" after conception. Now if you want to argue about what is scientific ... defend that as science. You cannot.
Don't know where you got the 1 in 6 because in the article the author talks about 50% of the fertilized eggs do not implant. So that would be 3 in 6 if my maths are still good. So if your science is as good as your reading too bad for science.
Yea, all those pesky scientific facts are just "opinions" The Bible is ultimate truth!
Whatever.
So, if all people are people at conception, and people should never abort, let me ask you this:
You have a 16 year old daughter. She is raped. Do you make her carry her rape baby? Even though she is not emotionally or physically ready for a child? Do you blame her?
What if she is 13?
What if she is 11? (Yes, 11 year olds can get pregnant)
Is that embryo more important than her?
How about 5 years, 7 months, and 21 days, the age Lina Medina from Peru was when she gave birth? I'm sure that was a pleasant pregnancy for everyone involved!
Anyone who is so cruel and heartless that they would force a child to carry and bear an infant should be shot.
A child of 10 or 11 should suffer because of some misguided religious belief?
It makes me livid.
Yes, children forced to bear pregnancies to term (and you see them in Christian theocracies in Latin America like the South wishes for) not only have the emotional and burden of a child themselves, they also face a significant risk of sterility, deformation, and death since their bodies are not mature, not to mention the health problems of the infants that actually can come to term.
I always enjoy watching people that do not understand basic science and reasoning attempting to drag everyone else back into the dark ages.
Ever since Roe v. Wade the anti Planned Parenthood contingent has been trying to force their religious and moral beliefs on rational people. Whether or not to have a child is a personal matter and all options including abortion must remain.
And the rest of the country should pass a law that any genetically 'human' creatures living in Mississippi not be counted as people because, frankly, they're too damn stupid to be people. Good grief, do these people actually pray to their sky ghost to make them dumber as they get older?
By my understanding, the argument that a fertilized egg is a human arises from the known fact that a completed DNA string (half from mom, half from dad) exists in the fertilized egg. But, it's also true that every cell I scrape from my face shaving each morning has a complete DNA string. Yet, shaving seems not exactly murder.
What's odd here, however, is not the science, but the faith. To equate a single cell with the magic and mystery of humanity is to marginalize humanness, reducing it to mere biology.
Virtually all religions wrestle with the precise moment when God breathes life into chemicals, thus creating a human being. The idea that sperm breathes life into an egg is to fundamentally dispense with God, insisting that man creates life through biology. That seems presumptuous.
Not everyone is religious, and in fact this country is founded on religious freedom (even if that freedom is the absence of religion). Every citizen has the right to practice whatever religion or not they want so why is it ok to force your religious views on every female citizen regardless of hers?
J. Mills...Many of us have already dispensed with God. We have science, we don't need God anymore. Sorry, wait...hear that knock on your door? That's the 21st century calling, asking you to catch up with the rest of us.
Your post also shows a horribly embarrassing lack of understanding of science, or how life actually works. I mean, really...you should be embarrassed by suggesting that anyone believes that "a sperm breathes life into an egg". No one "breathes" life into anything, except for in old useless religious myths. Life simply happens. It's that simple. We are here merely because we're here.
Terriels,
My religion says that it is bad to kill defenseless humans. I know a few atheists who believe this as well. Some beliefs like this make their ways into the laws of our civilized society, the basics of which we generally agree upon. It's not right to deprive somebody else something that is due to that person. People of various beliefs or even non-belief assent to this.
A fertilized egg has its own DNA, similar to that of the father and the mother but still completely unique. From a completely scientific standpoint, when else would it make more sense to call a human a human?
Paul-4459890
Oh, I don't know. Maybe a brain? A mind? SOME fertilized eggs are potential human beings, but not even all of them have any potential to become human at all, as the article explained.
And if "uniqueness" is the test for humanness, then does that mean that twins are not human? Identical twins are not genetically unique from each other.
Will fetiform teratoma (parasitic twin) or chimeric twin get legal protection then?
If person's life begins when the particular DNA combination forms, does it never end if the DNA is still kept intact, by means of cell line culturing?
Are monozygotic twins one person or two? Conjoined monozygotic twins?
No protection for them due to the Cloning Clause. Identical twins and attached twins are from a natural cloning and do not have a soul as they are clones and god hates clones. I am not sure if one identical twin get a soul and the other does not or how you could tell the soulless one that's OK to kill from the other one. That is, I am glad, a problem for more theological kinds of people then I am. No medical professionals allowed
"The unborn child in the womb is scientifically proven to be a human being,” says Jennifer Mason, communications director for Personhood USA,
aside from the argument , as well as not choosing sides , the term of ignorance " Scientifically Proven " is an oxymoron . Ignorance is not a bad thing , however society at large must understand the Scientific method , before they so often mistakenly refer to it as Proof of any thing . OK go on about your Bickering , thank you
All life forms experience risk to survival. Apparently, Caplan postulates that a human does not achieve "personhood" until all risks have been surpassed. Unfortunately, life forms never reach a state where there is no risk to survival. Consequently, according to Caplan's logic, none of us will ever achieve "personhood". But, as a "bioethicist", it is Caplan's job to rationalize desired outcomes until they are warped into some form of acceptabilty.
I think you've misread the author's intent. It seems to me that you and the author disagree about what it is to be a person, which leads you to disagree about when one becomes a person. For example, you are applying the author's discussion of survival probabilities to those of us who have been born--whom we presumably all agree are people. However, the author's discussion of survival probabilities applies only to unborn (in fact, unimplanted) fertilized eggs, whom the author contests are not yet people.
So, it seems to me that you first have to agree on the definition of a person before you can discuss when one becomes a person.
tsdc7- According to what your saying, the author is making the argument for using low survival probabilities of those he already considers non-people in order to determine if they are people.
If the authors uses the premises of survivablity as a basis for determining personhood, then it doesn't make any difference whether they are born or unborn.
If every fertilized egg is a human being (which they aren't) then every pregnancy (whether it comes to term or not) is a $500 child tax credit. From the moment of conception, if it happens on December 28th then that is one tax write-off. If the mother miscarries in January or February, they get a second write-off for that tax year. If every embryo sitting in a frozen state is a human being, then the parents can write of the six or eight embryos at $500/embryo for a nice little break per tax year. With that as an incentive, I wished I hadn't had a vasectomy.
Every person who speaks out against abortion should have to take in one foster child and realize that some one has to take care of all of gods children when others fail or have a difficult time doing it themselves. We as Christians and humanity need to remember our responsibilities to take care of this wonderful life god has given us. It does no good to save a child and then turn your back on him!!!!
The author raises the question: Does a fertilized egg count in the census? It seems silly, but consider it for a moment. It is within our laws.
What about....
Will a woman on welfare get extra money for additional children before the 'person' is born?
Will the people of Mississippi pay to raise orphaned children of rape or incest?
How far are parents and doctors required to go to save a 'person' that was conceived two days ago?
Can a mother be held criminally responsible for behaviors that increase the risk of spontaneous abortion? What if she doesn't know she's pregnant? Should the charge be Voluntary or Involuntary Manslaughter?
How far is MS willing to carry the war on woman's health rights? How far is it willing to intrude into a woman's uterus?
How far is MS willing to carry its war on personal liberty?
How about creating some jobs instead?
Yes, indeed.
Do you have to pay extra airfare?
@tsdc7. No. For two reasons. One: The first carry-on is always FREE and two: If you already have a carry-on, the airlines allow for a "person" under the age of two to sit on the lap of an adult. One would assume that a "person" that is negative six months old can sit comfortably "inside" the lap instead.
And of the 50% of fertilized eggs that successfully go to term and are born, 100% of those born will die. Given those statistics, and Dr. Caplan's logic, personhood should not be granted to anyone, ever.
I think you're misrepresenting the author's argument. It seems to me that you and the author disagree about what it is to be a person, which leads you to disagree about when one becomes a person.
Your counter-argument assumes (rightly or wrongly) that a fertilized egg is a person, whereas the author's contention is that the fertilized egg is not a person. Therefore, your contention that those who are born are analogous to fertilized eggs is inconsistent with the author's assumption that they are not. Therefore, your counter-argument misrepresents the author's argument.
Perhaps it is not a misinterpretation, but a simple disagreement. If one person believes that "fertilized eggs" are human persons, and the other disagrees, there's not much to talk about, is there? You can't have a discussion about the same issue if you have different premises.
I think the problem with the misunderstanding is the Dr. assumes that anti-choicers are such because they want to see babies born rather then having complete control over women's bodies.
Since many fertilized eggs have no capacity of the complexity of pond scum why would you consider them people? But if thinking of cells with less complexity as pond scum = power, then her argument makes no sense.
That's the problem with stipulated definitions: I can define a peanut butter sandwich as a person.
It seems that we've skipped "What is it to be a person?" and jumped straight to "When does one become a person?"
Such is the idiocy of an uneducated electorate.
I think this was covered pro and con in book 4 of the popular free e-book series at under the abortion chapter. As I remember one question was whether or not the expelled fertilized eggs, which exceeded the number of implanted fertilized eggs, when they are expelled are they've been victims of murder? And if so who is guilty of the murder? The woman or God, who caused it. it would also seem that to define a human being who would require enumerating the number of chromosomes. While most of us have 46, some have 45, some 47 and some 48. It seems that it should be necessary to define biologically, rather than evangelically, was a human person is. That may be too much in a state at the bottom of our educational rankings.
If you want a "scientific" definition of when human life begins, I'd suggest that NEITHER side makes any sense. It's no more rational to say that passage through the birth canal magically bestows personhood than to say that an unidifferentiated blob of cells is a person -- both are absurd.
I propose that we define the beginning of life the same way we define the end of life: by the existence of discerbible brain activity. As far as I can tell from the literature, that would occur around the sixth week of pregnancy. I doubt that I'll get many people from either the pro-life or pro-choice camps to get on board with me for that idea -- their preconceived notions are too strong!
It's a plausible definition. I'd be willing to entertain it. Your proposition leans heavily to the pro-life side, though, since most women find out they are pregnant somewhere around the 6 week mark (doesn't leave much time for an abortion). Fine by me, as I am pro-life.
But you are right. You will always get argument from most people on the pro-life side because the vast majority of us are pro-life for religious reasons: we believe it is morally repugnant to extinguish an innocent human life, and we define human life as a being with a soul. Since the bible does not spell out precisely at what moment the body receives a soul and thereby becomes "human", we are left to our own judgement. Most want to err on the side of caution. Unfortunately, the issue has become so polarized that many clergymen prefer to gloss over the uncertainty and simply preach that "life begins at conception. period"*. The result is that most Christians have never even realized that the bible doesn't actually clearly state any such thing.
*The Psalmist is often quoted, saying "Your eyes have seen my unformed substance, and in Your book were all written the days that were ordained for me, when as yet there was not one of them." While I myself believe this to be true, it could mean simply that God foresaw/ordained that the embryo would receive a soul and become a human, not necessarily that the embryo already had soul. As I stated, the ambiguity leads me to tread cautiously, but I can respect that for legal purposes we need to take a more empirical approach, and yours seems as logical as any.
Not trying to be argumentative, but I have to point something out: The claim that most women are six weeks along before they find out they are pregnant is completely inaccurate. She ovulates roughly two weeks before she is due for her time of the month, and after ovulation she has (at max) 24 hours for fertilization (and the optimal time is actually only 12 hours after ovulation). By the time she is late for her time of the month, she is roughly two weeks pregnant. Most women know once they are a week or so late, which would put her three to four weeks into a pregnancy. Although many women know once they hit that five day mark, as on the fifth day after conception implantation typically occurs....and the massive illness begins (the hormone changes spurring the vomiting and exhaustion). In sum, most women know for certain when they are roughly three weeks along (as by then they'd be a week late, and they are usually so sick they wish they were dead).
Keep in mind, what physicians use to calculate gestational age is the first day of her last menstrual period. In other words, they are tacking on an additional two weeks when the fertilization hasn't even happened yet...so "six weeks pregnant" or "six weeks gestational age" is actually four weeks since conception. I'm just pointing out women are not as far along as you think, by the time they realize they are expecting.
True, Achick, many women realize they are pregnant that early, but many others do bleed during their first normal menstrual cycle after they become pregnant and don't realize for several more weeks. Others just don't keep that close an eye on when they are "due for a visit from Aunt Flo" and might not realize they are late immediately. I myself have never been pregnant, but most of my friends have been, and most of them have found out anywhere from 4-8 weeks along. A quick internet search tells me that this is fairly typical. Women may realize as early as about 5 days, as you said, or it may be as long as a couple months. And we have all heard of those rare cases where women never realized they were pregnant until they went into labor.
So, upon passage, who is going to support prosecuting any Initiative 26 supporter that happens to have a miscarriage for murder?
I am not a "pro-life" person by any means, but I find the doctor's argument very weak. My question to the doctor would be what are the chances that the fertilized egg/embryo will become a puppy, or a lizard? Zero...there is a 100% probablility that it will be human. Viablity is irrelavent. And the 50% survival rate is irrelavent as well. You don't measure something's worth by the likelihood it will survive. Is a baby with a genetic defect or disease that only has a 50% chance of survival not worth protecting?
How can viability be irrelevant? If an embryo or fetus cannot survive outside of the womb, how can you give it rights? Furthermore, how can the rights of an embryo or fetus surpass those of the woman, who is already living, breathing, and functioning? Do you really want the government to force women to be incubators, regardless of risks to their livlihood or health?
If someone accidentally unplugs a freezer at a fertility clinic, will he/she be charged as a mass murderer?
No. But they are going to get their pants sued off by all of the parents with their $500/embryo tax breaks chillin’ inside.
if it's an etopic pregnacy, can the "child" be arrested for murder of the mother?
I'm not a Christian, but I've always heard only God can create a life. The doctor joins an egg and sperm together in a petri dish. I don't see God there. I see God at work, if there is a God, when the fetus takes it's first heart beat.
Another thing that leaves me scratching my head about this, especially from the Christian community. WHY I ask do they make such a fuss about ending the life of an embroyo but say NOTHING about us making these lives in the first place !!?? Where is the out cry here ?!?!?!
For me it's the breath (since the heart beat is myogenic and doesn't require a body to beat - pretty cool actually, you can take a heart out of a dead frog and add all sorts of chemicals and conditions to increase and decrease it's beat).
While I'm not Christian either I was raised as one and the only references to when life begins is when they take their first breath. To me this is poetic and a pretty simple clear-cut definition.
Either way, I agree that there is nothing particularly magical about fertilization - we do it mechanically now in some cases for goodness sakes.
The author uses a lot of circular reasoning that basically says nothing. For instance: "It is not true that all fertilized eggs can or do produce human beings." It is true if we start with the premise that all human beings start with conception.
"What science has found is that around half of all conceptions don't make it to implantation. Calling a fertilized egg a person flies in the face of this cruel biological reality. Half of all fertilized eggs cannot even become an embryo, much less a person."
So if the odds were in fact 100% that all fertilized eggs would reach birth, the author is saying he would change his mind? What if it were 90%, 80%, 55%? At what point do the odds make a difference in deciding personhood?
The stupid Righters aren't smart enough to know that there is no science to support their claims. All they want is to have their own way. If they are so damn keen to ensure all conceptions progress to birth, then let the damn fools find a way to support and raise these unwanted kids, devoid of their holy roly babble.
This is just so ludicrous, it is impossible to imagine that a state in this nation would actually put something like this on the ballot. These people are insane, if we except "in a state of mind that prevents normal perception," as a functional definition; combined with "in a state of extreme annoyance or distraction," as the anti-abortionists always appear to be. Call the doctor, someone.
Then corporations cannot possibly be people.
They did not begin with a fertilized egg.
Conservatives spend half their lives trying to ensure everyone gets born. They spend the other half of their lives developing more efficient killing machines and weapons to kill all those who get born.
They are full of it coming and going.
Honestly, if my company was ever considering opening up anything in Mississippi, that's pretty much out the window now. If they vote for this the rest of the country should, honestly, just refuse to do business there. If I were a doctor, I'd be looking at other employment options right about now because this is going to be a lawyer's paradise!