ark@alice.UUCP (Andrew Koenig) (01/16/85)
I am still trying to distinguish two separate issues: First, do you personally think abortion is a moral act? Second, do you think it is appropriate for the government to prohibit people from having abortions, even if they think it is moral? I am trying to discuss only the SECOND issue here. With this in mind, let's look at what Gary has to say: > You are misquoting most of the people who are against abortion. > Most people are against abortion because it is the destruction > of the life of a human being, not because it is the destruction > of the life of a conscious, pain detecting organism. > I, as a human being, value the lives of other human beings more > than the lives of non-human living things. (This is not to say > that I do not value other living things at all, just that I > value human life more than non-human life.) Don't you? If > not, there is no point in proceeding. I am not misquoting, because I am not quoting at all. I have a lot of trouble with that the idea that humans have rights only because they happen to belong to a particular species. I raised what I thought was a valid objection to the "speciesist" theory, but apparently Gary missed my subtle sarcasm: >> After all, there was a time when it was believed that slaves were not >> people. After all, they have black skin, which makes them of a >> different species, doesn't it? > No. By the way, do you know what color my skin is? Who's being > racist? I was not actually arguing that blacks and whites are of different species; only trying to imagine an argument that could possibly be used to justify such an absurdity as slavery. I suppose I should have put a :-) symbol in, but I don't think slavery is the least bit funny. Incidentally, Gary, I have no idea what color your skin is. I know that if your icon were in our graphic mail system and you sent me mail, your skin would be green, because that's what color our terminal screens are. :-) My trouble with people who claim that only people have rights because they (the claimants) are people is that that argument can easily be applied to smaller groups FOR EXACTLY THE SAME REASON. Thus: only Americans have rights because I am an American, and so on. Since absurd conclusions cannot validly follow from correct premises, and since I cannot find any flaws in the reasoning, I must conclude that there is something wrong with the premise that uses species as the sole factor to determine whether an entity has rights. This matter of rights is an important one -- probably the most important. It is tangled up with another important issue: what activities the government should prohibit. Different people have different views on this, as Gary points out: > First, what does what substantial numbers of people believe or > disbelieve have to with what ought to be legal? Aren't there > things which should be illegal because they are wrong, regardless > of their popularity? Perhaps. But not everyone holds to the same moral standard. Thus there is substantial disagreement about whether certain actions are moral. Are you really saying that things YOU think are immoral should be legally prohibited just because you think so? There is a difference between things that people do even though they think they are wrong and things that people do even though some other people think they are wrong. Gary goes on to give the following summary of his position: > 1. To kill a human being, who has not harmed or threatened to > harm another human being, is immoral and should be illegal. > Various legal terms exist to describe such killings: manslaughter > (voluntary and involuntary), murder of various degrees, > negligent homicide, perhaps others. I am not saying that > every harm or threat justifies lethal force in response, > but I am saying that nothing but harm or threat justifies > a lethal response. > 2. The fact that such killing is immoral and ought to be illegal > is based on the humanity of the victim, not on the consciousness > or ability to detect pain. This is why you can't use this > argument to show that killing animals should be illegal. > 3. Abortion is the killing of a human being who (generally) has > not harmed or threatened to harm another human being. I am > explicitly leaving out the case where the pregnancy is endangering > the mother's life; it is not generally the case. I am in general agreement with point (1), except that I believe that in some circumstances a person can give up his rights, at which point it is no longer immoral to kill him. Thus, for example, I think that assassinating Hitler would have been a supremely moral act. Where we part company is on point (2). What distinguishes humans from other animals is that they live by their minds, not by their teeth or claws. I define "humanity" as "ability to think". I believe that there is a great deal of difference between the ability to think and the ability to feel pain. It is exactly this difference that leads me to the conclusion that eating animal flesh is OK but murder is not. Obviously, I dispute point (3), based on my definition of humanity. And I think my definition makes more sense than Gary's. For example, if little green creatures two feet high came over to me and started speaking English at me, I would accord them all the respect I give to any other rational creature. What's more, I think Gary would too. This provides me with a ready retort to Gary's assertion: > I repeat: what makes animals so special? If raising animals > for food might be wrong, raising plants for food might be > wrong, also. If you can take an argument against killing humans > and apply it to killing animals, then I will in turn apply it > to killing plants, at which point the only moral thing to do is > starve to death. > But to answer your question more directly, I have already stated > my preference for human life over non-human life. I think it > can be taken as a given that each species prefers its own kind > of life to other kinds, and I see nothing wrong with that. He may see nothing wrong with it, but I say it's racism, pure and simple. What gives people rights is their rationality, not their species. Since all the evidence I have seen indicates that a first- (and probably even a second-) trimester fetus does not have enough brain tissue to be able to sustain conscious thought, I conclude that there is nothing wrong with early abortions, for exactly the same reason that there is nothing wrong with killing animals for food. I believe that the legal status of abortion should be the same as the legal status of carnivorism, for exactly the same reasons.