RE: Is "Pro-Life" an Accurate Label?
Though I, too, have "lost my eternity" I think it is a very real possibility that a metaphysical force we can not yet fully comprehend results in animation and the presence of a "spirit," as it were.
Of course, I have no "proof" of this, but I saw my son smile and felt a real, "otherworldly" love emanating from him at this moment when he had basically just come out of the womb. It wasn't muscles jerking around meaninglessly, nor had he really had any time to come to understand "smiling" as a concept.
I don't mean to appeal to magic or religion whatsoever, that's just my take there.
Abortion is a tough issue and you raised some great points, Luke. As such a tough issue, I think it should be left to individuals and communities to decide. Sometimes, as you said, a mother's life may be in danger. Who am I to say what she should do?
As an anarchist, I do not think this issue should be legislated by the state either way. I also disagree with those libertarians who argue (much like Rothbard did) that a mother can "evict" a foetus at will, because it is in "her property" (as if the mother had nothing to do with the being's appearance or does not understand that it is yet completely dependent upon her for its very survival).
I have heerd reputable anarchists argue that because babies are not yet moral agents (not understanding self-ownership) they do not possess natural law property rights to self.
I think this is hogwash, because it necessitates an external arbiter to decide what is and isn't consciousness and moral agency.
But yeah, whatever one's stance. The state should stay out of it.
Thanks Graham.
Well, there are chemical explanations for that which has kept reproduction going strong via evolution. :) Reminds me of this video which I love: What Is Love?
As with most things. :)
The property rights discussions concerning early term development are quite tricky indeed. I get what their point is and I've even heard people go so far as to call the developing child a parasite (there's some interesting scientific perspectives to back that up too). But I'm not there. I think it is a fully functioning human being late in the pregnancy, and I can't condone ending that life without considering the rights it (and any other defenseless human) has.
Thanks for chiming in.
As far as the chemical and genetic explanations for many things such as smiling, etc., I do not denigrate those. That said, my point I suppose is below the chemicals. The animation of the chemicals themselves.
The feeling I had had to have a receptor. Otherwise it would have been of no effect. There was a connection there that I don't find explained away so easily by current science. I think it is ALL scientific (in that I don't believe in "magic") but perhaps modern science isn't there yet.
I can totally understand that. I think it's important to emphasize from time to time that even science is inferior to philosophy.
For example, science will never be able to "explain away" theism itself. It can't, because that would require scientists to delve into the realm of philosophy in order to explain why contradictions can't exist (at which point it would no longer be "science" as such) or to provide physical proof for the nonexistence of a supposedly ever presently existing and simultanously separate from existence (nonexisting) "entity".
(this would be my argument as a past theist, as of recent years "hard" atheist and anti-theist, that try to base my claims on logic)
Agreed. As per your former comment in regard to my statement about the "external arbiter," I was referring to the danger of the claim I have heard made (by extremely prominent anarchists) that small children have no rights (not even self-ownership) because they cannot yet understand property.
The principle of self-ownership is logically unassailable in that one must engage in a performative contradiction to argue against it (i.e. the mere act of argument in lieu of brute force presumes the self-ownership of each party, as they implicitly acknowledge that they speak for party A, and the other individual speaks for party B).
These arguments that children have no rights and/or are "parasitic" are illogical in my view, because as Luke said, they neglect the fact that each being has potential and is soon to be (if all goes well) an active moral agent. To call a sapling a non-tree just because it hasn't come into full "tree-ness" yet would be a big mistake. Plus, children can understand property at a very young age, and I daresay, intuitively, from the very beginning.
Plus, the parasite argument neglects the act of procreation which must always be initiated by conscious actors (99.9% of the time). If a child is a "parasite," then it is the parents' own self-created "parasite." It is now in their charge, and is a result of their moral actions. Should they not take charge, this child suffers immensely, dies, and/or becomes a financial and psychic burden on other parties by default.
To say that "children have no rights" based on self-ownership is to make a claim not based on logic (natural law), but on arbitrary opinion.
I'm not sure you want to go there. Comparing children still developing their moral faculties to effort that resulted in "no actual good." This is exactly the type of illogical and misguided reasoning I am referring to. The two are clearly different. This sounds a lot like a utilitarian approach to society. I let logic and natural law be the arbiter. All life, by virtue of nature, proceeds along its natural growth trajectory. Of course there is predation, disease, and several other variables that can alter or cut short that trajectory.
However, if the sustenance and protection of individual life in the human species is held as a value, then it is objectively true that even the phoetus or a cluster of cells along that trajectory can not simply be viewed as such, but must be viewed with respect to the goal, which is directly derivative of the aforementioned value.
The part you quoted is just an analogy, that's far less important than the preceeding and the rest of the comment.
What I'm saying is simply that what's most important is the way things actually are when you speak of them, not what they might be in the future.
What in specific should be the most valued of all life is the autonomous individual (human or not, but in this and all cases we've had to consider so far human).
Yes, but it doesn't mean that we treat single cells the same way as we do with entire human beings. Neither does it mean that we should value and treat just any human being the same way , or for that matter that we should always try to increase the actual number of human beings currently living.
Quality of life is important. It's "life" for ourselves and for those that we love, in the objectively good sense of the word, that we want to promote; Not simply as a government statistician try to tweak the system so that an increasing/decreasing number of people barely survive.
Or perhaps it is, but many of us are ignorant to what is currently understood (myself included). The chemicals, emotions, and bonds created at the time of birth have been studied and explored. Ultimately, it's all chemicals, though our subjective experience of those chemicals my vary widely.
Science is a process. The moment we say "it has been explored" as though said exploration is somehow known beyond a shadow of a doubt to be complete, is a dangerous one. It is the unknown that drives all science. Once we say, "Oh we know everything" about this or that, we are right back to religion and the flat earth.
Good science doesn't do that though. Good science simply says here's what we know now and why we think we know it. Good science openly seeks correction.
Exactly. That is all I am saying.
Speaking as a "hard" (logical) atheist and anti-theist. Unless you have a faulty (theist or mystical) view of what the "spirit" is, you need none.
Though I'm not a Rothbardian, I don't think it does. For example, does it take an external arbiter to decide who is and who isn't a human being? And do you consider yourself moral in any instance or case whatsoever.
If you know that you are, you don't need anyone external to confirm that you are.
I'm with you on that. No previous violation of rights can make conscription (slavery) moral.