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From: tdn@cmu-cs-spice.ARPA (Thomas Newton)
Newsgroups: net.abortion
Subject: Re: \"Words mean what I pay them to mean . . .\"
Message-ID: <415@cmu-cs-spice.ARPA>
Date: Tue, 6-Aug-85 13:30:34 EDT
Article-I.D.: cmu-cs-s.415
Posted: Tue Aug  6 13:30:34 1985
Date-Received: Thu, 8-Aug-85 00:38:53 EDT
Organization: Carnegie-Mellon University, CS/RI
Lines: 53

> 1. Do you propose that the fact that a fetus is or is not alive
>    has any bearing on whether or not abortion is/should be moral or
>    legal?  If not, I really don't see what difference it makes
>    HOW one defines "alive" as far as this debate is concerned.
>    If so:

Yes, the fact that a fetus is alive does have some bearing on whether or
not abortion is/should be moral or legal.  In particular, if something is
not alive (in the biological sense), it is obvious that it does not have
any rights.  Do you think that a rock, a piece of metal, or a TV set has
rights?  Rich Rosen was claiming that a fetus is not alive and thus does
not have rights.  If true, this claim would end the abortion debate.  But
it's not true if he's using the biological definition of life; and if he
is using any other definition, the second part does not necessarily follow
from the first (suppose one defined ALIVE(X) to be FALSE for all members of
some random minority group -- would this cast doubt upon their rights or upon
the definition of ALIVE being used?)

Before you start flaming, note that I never said that ALIVE(X) is a SUFFICIENT
condition for HAS_RIGHTS(X).  It's a NECESSARY condition--not ALIVE(X) implies
not HAS_RIGHTS(X).  Thus showing that ALIVE(fetus) does not automatically give
HAS_RIGHTS(fetus), but it does falsify any "proofs" of not HAS_RIGHTS(fetus)
which depend upon not ALIVE(fetus) -- such as the one that Rich Rosen gave.

> 2. If a fetus is alive, is a plant alive?  Why or why not?

Clearly a fetus is alive, a plant is alive, and you are alive.  Each of the
three is composed of one or more living cells.  Very simple, basic biology.

I'm surprised that you'd even ask the question "is a plant alive?"  It seems
very obvious to me.

> By the way, I think nearly every word you could possibly think of has
> ambiguous meanings. In the context of this debate many words (like
> "human" and "alive") are VERY ambiguous, mainly because you ar using
> them in a different sense than I am.  You can't just say "there is
> only one definition of word X and it is the one that I am using"
> unless everyone agrees to it.

But there is a well-defined, objective meaning for ALIVE(X), and at least
outside of net.abortion, it seems to be in common use.  People do refer to
plants and animals as "alive" or "dead", not as "not-living".  It seems to
me that you need to justify any OTHER definition of ALIVE.

> So why don't you let us know your definitions of "human" and "alive"
> and we'll tell you what we think.

I've told you which definition I use for ALIVE; let's have yours.  Then the
group can tell you what they think of your definition.  After that, perhaps
we can trade definitions of "human".

                                        -- Thomas Newton
                                           Thomas.Newton@cmu-cs-spice.ARPA