Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site pyuxn.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!floyd!whuxle!spuxll!abnjh!u1100a!pyuxn!rlr From: rlr@pyuxn.UUCP (Rich Rosen) Newsgroups: net.abortion Subject: Re: The Embryo a Parasite? (metaphysical ?) Message-ID: <500@pyuxn.UUCP> Date: Thu, 8-Mar-84 11:00:44 EST Article-I.D.: pyuxn.500 Posted: Thu Mar 8 11:00:44 1984 Date-Received: Sat, 10-Mar-84 07:21:26 EST References: <7053@watmath.UUCP> <1354@druxv.UUCP>, <492@pyuxn.UUCP> <1936@cbscc.UUCP> Organization: Bell Communications Research, Piscataway N.J. Lines: 62 re: Paul Dubuc's article --- some points: > Also, I do not think you can compare pregnancy to a parasitic infection > because it is not that. It is a normal biological function. Define normal. Is a virus abnormal? What about cancer? What *objective* conclusion can you come to about what is *normal*? Even a tapeworm's life cycle is a normal biological function, no? > Again, you avoid the contention that the embryo is a human individual by > saying that is has only the "potential" of becoming human. There is nothing > that is added to the embryo (except food and oxygen -- don't we all need it?) > to make it more human as time goes on. It just takes care of itself. A > tapeworm will never be a human. It just takes care of itself? Fine. Then remove it from the person whose body it is occupying and let it "take care of itself". > I would say that anyone has the right to remove anything they want from > their body, but not when it results in the death of another human being. > (Yes I will keep calling the fetus, zygote, embryo, whatever a human > being until it is proved otherwise.) ---- > I know that this is a thought excersise on your part. But you seem > to be redefining human life in the abstract. I join these two comments together, though they were physically separated in the article, to make a point. What you call "defining life in the abstract" is an act performed every time you use the word life. There are common definitions of what is life (e.g., a virus doesn't qualify), but they are unclear enough that some bozo could make biting one's fingernails a capital crime. I'm not *redefining*, just trying in my own way to be objective. I think the burden of proof that a fetus *is* life rests with those who use that belief in their arguments. Burden of proof by assumption is not a valid argumentative technique unless you agree a priori that the assumption is axiomatic. Proof is not accomplished by simply adding "fetus" to the list of things that are considered living. Notions of life that are held in common (like physical autonomy) must be considered. > I'm not sure we can say that the > embryo is just *part* of the woman's body. It is not, in the sense that > her leg is part is part of her body. The embryo is a body in it's own > right. Its genetic makup is different. Its circulatory and nervous > systems are independent of the mother's. I'm not sure what the point is here. The same applies to a tapeworm. You make the point that some women cherish, nurture, and enjoy the entity growing inside them, but I am hard pressed to find a reason why ALL women *must* feel that way. I am, as I said, trying to take an objective stance (not to say I don't hold an opinion, just that I choose to look at it without preconceptions like "the fetus is obviously human", or "it is obviously right/wrong because..." type statements in general). If it could be proven that a fetus removed from a woman's womb could *live* (as in life) on its own as a physically autonomous being (Would it ever grow up to be truly human if it is removed at that early stage in any case?), that would certainly shed a new light on things. But if that is true, then why not do so? Why not remove a fetus from a woman who does not wish to have one in her womb and let it then live elsewhere (a surrogate mother's womb, ...). -- Pardon me for breathing, which I never do anyway oh, god, I'm so depressed... Rich Rosen pyuxn!rlr