real life wrote:Eorl wrote:Thanks Jane and Momma
edit:and mesquite!
Real Life, your question is trap built on semantics. It all depends on the definitions of the words "living" and "human being". As I pointed out, the whole right to life case rests on their definition as being assumed to be the right one. The word "child" is also used (see above) because it conjurs up images of the killing of the child that the feotus has the potential to become, rather than the foetus that it is right now. See, more semantics.
"Nothing is more usual than for philosophers to encroach on the province of grammarians, and to engage in disputes of words, while they imagine they are handling controversies of the deepest importance and concern."
David Hume
As you know, I would trust a doctor to tell me that my relative is "effectively dead" while you would prefer to ask a priest or a book.
Real Life perhaps you can respond to my question about miscarriage. Why do you think your god "murders" one out of every six "children" before 12 weeks?
To suppose that God murders children is to neither understand God, nor murder, Eorl.
Now it is too bad that you could not answer a simple question like the one I posed. I would hope that you would hold yourself to the same standard that you hold others. But perhaps not.
If you had been following this thread you would know that it is not a trap at all. You would see the question, the answers posed by various members and how I responded. Perhaps that would allay some of your fears.
So when a god causes a miscarriage it's not murder but when a doctor causes a miscarriage it is? Man, you dance around language like the Fred Astaire of rhetoric.
As for your simple question....Yes, I have seen you spring that trap already, or "paint into corners" was one way of putting it. The problem is you've made the question a yes or no question when the correct answer is "The question is not valid"
Quote:Will you admit the possibility that the unborn could indeed be a living human being?
There is no possibility involved ...it is a thing or it is not a thing. Like I said it's all about the language you use. A living human being is whatever you decide a living human being should be defined as. It all comes down to drawing a line in the sand...when is abortion appropriate? You are at one extreme end due to your religious view of the situation, husbands who just found out it's not theirs may well be at the other....the generally accepted and medically, scientifically understood position falls somewhere in between, and that is the advice I would seek.
Let me try one of those "simple questions":
Would you stop the car and get out if a thief asked you to?
Do you admit the possibility that a police car could be stolen?
Would you stop if a police car asked you to, even though you admit there's a possibility it is stolen?
allay my fears?.....what fears ???
