Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 6/24/83; site cbscc.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!burl!ulysses!mhuxl!cbosgd!cbscc!pmd From: pmd@cbscc.UUCP (Paul Dubuc) Newsgroups: net.abortion Subject: Re: Whether the Fetus is Human Message-ID: <1986@cbscc.UUCP> Date: Tue, 13-Mar-84 14:53:48 EST Article-I.D.: cbscc.1986 Posted: Tue Mar 13 14:53:48 1984 Date-Received: Wed, 14-Mar-84 19:15:50 EST References: <1788@rlgvax.UUCP> Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories, Columbus Lines: 39 from Jack Waugh >This is how I see the question, posed in this forum by anti- >abortion arguers, of whether the fetus is human. You can >call it (or her, if you please) human or not, but so what? I >believe in taking its life if that's what the mother chooses. >You seem to hold human life sacred. I beleive, rather, that >the correct action is that that leads to the greater Good >(which is to say, less Evil). In most of the possible sets >of circumstances, different people will disagree on which >route is correct on even that basis, because different people >will place different valuations on the evils and advantages >of the alternatives. So what is this really saying as far as who can be killed and who can't? From whose perspective is the choice involving the "lesser evil" to be determined? You seem to be saying that one person may decide whether or not to kill something, and it doesn't matter whether or not that something is a human being. Can this ethic be applied consistently? Is the mother also justified in killing her 1 year old if, from her perspective, it seems to involve a lesser evil than any alternatives? I think that proscription of killing must be rooted in the *identity* of the victim (i.e. human being), not in someone else's judgment of whether or not the victim should live. What is to prevent such subjective judgement from being applied in an arbitrary manner? When would we be justified in interfering in a person's attempts to kill another? (usurping their judgement as to what is the "lesser evil"). The question of whether or not the fetus is a human is not irrelevant to whether or not the mother has the right to kill it. If it is, then whether or not you or I are humans is also irrelevant to one who may wish to kill us. Paul Dubuc