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!cbosgd!cbsck!cbscc!pmd
From: pmd@cbscc.UUCP (Paul Dubuc)
Newsgroups: net.abortion
Subject: Re: Society has already decided what a legal human being is
Message-ID: <4230@cbscc.UUCP>
Date: Sun, 2-Dec-84 22:27:25 EST
Article-I.D.: cbscc.4230
Posted: Sun Dec  2 22:27:25 1984
Date-Received: Tue, 4-Dec-84 07:37:09 EST
References: <215@looking.UUCP>
Organization: AT&T Bell Laboratories , Columbus
Lines: 116


>From: brad@looking.UUCP (Brad Templeton)
>Let's talk about the real topic - what a legal human being, worthy of
>rights and freedoms, is. 

I think the real topic consists of a specific human right.  The right
to live. 

>Point 1: All this talk about the humanity of the fetus is meaningless.
>Of course the fetus is an example of genus homo species sapiens.
>That's not what we're discussing.  We are discussing legal status.
>
>Point 2:  Membership in the species is not equal to full legal status.
>As a simple example, dead people.  A more interesting example, children.
>While clearly members of the species, children are denied what we in society
>consider our fundamental rights.  The younger they are, the fewer rights they
>have.  For example you don't get franchise until 18.  The right to engage in
>sex until 16.  To drink at 21 in some states.  Young children don't even have
>the right to property or self-detirmination.

They all have the basic right to live, however.  Certain rights that you
mention are not given because they can't be handled responsibly.  Is the
right to live based on the attainment of a certain ability.  If so, what
level and what is the reasoning for drawing the line?

>Point 3: Society has officially stated that legal status is lost with the
>loss of brain activity - "brain death", as it is called.  Thus mental capacity
>is the official quality that gives legal status to a human.   Now it's
>clear that a fetus has less mental capacity than, say, an adult pig.
>(You may try and dispute this, but the point is that there is no REAL SOLID
>EVIDENCE for your disagreement, and so you can't try and put it into law)

(Let's use some of Ken Montgomery's argument here.  It cuts both ways.)
Society who?  All this talk about society "deciding" things puzzles me.
Society is not a reasoning being, it makes no "official statements".  To
personify society in this way seems to me to be invoking the mandate of
a non-person.  This is convienient because opponents can't examine the
reasoning of "society" to see if it is faulty, if it is wrong it is a
convienient thing to blame but it is not culpable as a person would be.
When one invokes society as an authority there is no arguing against it.

It is fair to speak of society having laws that express certain values but
It does not thereby make "decisions"--which implies a reasoning process--
and certainly does not make it an authority to appeal to.  When we speak of
society we speak of what is (i.e. what most people tolerate--perhaps ignorantly
or grudginly) not necessarly what ought to be.  Brad seems to be arguing
that "is" implies "ought".  But society is not a figment of our imagination,
as Ken says, it is a term used in describing the general state of affairs.

Anyway, given that "brain death" or the Harvard Criteria are a good rule
for deciding the legal point of death, how does it follow that it is also
good for deciding the legal beginning of human life?  Everything that is
already living we expect to die.  If a "brain dead" person is being
artifically sustained and we remove the apparatus total death follows to
confirm our judgement (presumably we have good reason to believe that the
patient would not recover with continued treatment).  

But here you are advocating the use of the same criteria at the other
end of life's spectrum--on a human that we have every reason to believe
will live and develop (to "recover" from its lack of brain activity, so
to speak).  How do you justify this?  With the "brain dead" person we
simply cease our efforts to preserve his life and let him pass naturally
on to inevitable death.  But with the fetus you would use it to justify
actively and intentionally killing it.  You are saying that because
we use the criteria to justify non-intervention resulting in death we may
also use it to justify intervention resulting in death.  Does this really
make sense to you?

Also when the "brain dead" person passes from one "legal status to another"
he passes out of existence.  This makes your example above of dead people
having less rights than live ones seem totally irrelevant.  Yet, in the case
of the fetus, you're using the same criteria to say when it passes from
something on the level of a pig to more of a human.

>
>Point 4: All that's left that a fetus has is the potential for mental
>capacity.   That's all the ground anti-abortionists have to stand on.
>They have to prove that the potential for mental capacity is sacred and must
>be protected at all costs in law.

Here you're treating the fetus as if it were in its fully developed state 
(comparing it to an adult pig) as if it will never be anything more.  If your
going to say that a humans right to life depends on their mental capacity
at a certain point in time (knowing full well it will develop in the future)
you could run into problems.  Suppose a physical condition (sickness, whatever)
impares you mental ability for a time.   At that point in time you might
fall below the threshold and by your criteria you could be killed rather
than treated no matter how likely the treatment would make your future
recovery.  If the future state of the mind is not a consideration for the
fetus why should it be for you?  You see, we do recognise the right for
people to live in such cases and when we do we are taking their future
condition into account.  Why should your potential for recovery from sickness
be recognised if the potential for mental capacity isn't for the fetus?

>
>Point 5: Recent developments in medical technique allow for an arbitrary
>sperm and ova to be combined in the lab and then inserted in a womb.  Degree
>of success is within an order of magnitude of that for the ore enjoyable
>methods.  This elevates indivudal sperm/egg cells to within close range
>of fertilized zygotes.  They have almost the same potential, and as medicine
>advances, they will have the same potential.   When each sperm and egg has
>the same potential as the fetus, one must either abandon all arguments based
>on potential, or go insane trying to enforce the obvious crazy laws that
>ensue.

I still don't buy that argument.  It all depends on if fertilization ocurrs
or not.  Sperm and ova don't have that potential in themselves.

>Point 6: Abortion must be made legal.

I think it should be made both illegal and unnecessary.  Making it legal has
done little to make it unnecessary.
-- 
The "resurrected",

Paul Dubuc	cbscc!pmd