Thursday, August 19, 2010

If you believe death is the end of your consciousness, surely you then believe fertilisation is the beginning?

I'm not religious, but why is abortion, embryo research etc allowed, %26amp; those who are against them are thought of as religious nuts? Even though some embryos were going to be thrown away as clinical waste, how does that make it right to take their consciousness, cause them suffering %26amp; defile them further, often for mere financial gain? More diseases etc just come about, so what's the point? Humans are not made with suicidal or heroic tendencies, they aquire them after living in the outside world. They are made with a driving force to live. Science seems more of a fairytale than religion. Why are humans seen as lower life forms until 24wks of existance, when it's fact they are human %26amp; very much alive. At least until some doctor gets hold of them anyway. How can people use the nobody is perfect line, to even attempt to justify murder?





How do most people not give a cr*p, I desperately want to feel that way. How can I? ps I don't want to be religious, that won't change the way I feel.

If you believe death is the end of your consciousness, surely you then believe fertilisation is the beginning?
You are forgetting that people will make any excuse that may seem plausible to justify immoral acts.





It is murder. If not, then I should be able to beat up my pregnant girlfriend to kill the BABY and only be criminally liabel for the aggression toward the mother.





Try to pin these people down to a time when life begins. They can't, because they will claim it doesn't exists until birth which is different for every child. Also, they will say that it has to be a self sustaining life; well I have a 3yr old and if I left him he would not be able to sustain himself.
Reply:Honestly, I don't really understand your question. I just want to say that my feeling is that you seem to mix everything and are unable to find nuances and subtleties that life's beauty holds. I have my own set of beliefs. I am not catholic or anything else. Anyway, no matter what, I believe that there is no end nor beginning. Consciousness is consciousness because it is eternal. Now, when it comes to abortion, medical research, ... Well, I am pro-choice, I am for the advance of medicine and science. However, I don't justify murder and I do not see science as more of a fairytale than religion, when you realize the progress that have been made in just the last twenty years in neuroscience alone. All I could advise is for you to look at these advances and find the "magic" in humanity once again while giving up the "desire" to no longer give a cr*p
Reply:Consciousness begins with the development of the brain or some point thereafter. It doesn't begin with fertilization.





Read a science book sometime.
Reply:I am a Christian. But there are many people against abortion and many are atheists, Muslims, pagans, Buddists. LOADS ARE CATHOLICS. Your gut feeling is that it's wrong and I think when you look into development you will find that feeling is right. I don't know how people can shout choice when the baby about to be aborted has no voice. People like you are a voice for the unborn. Please keep it up. You're lovely.
Reply:They don't have consciousness because the part of the brain that has self awareness is not developed yet. Where are you getting the information that an embryo has consciousness?


I think you have been misinformed. It certainly has life, and if you object to the loss of life, that's one thing but it you are concerned about what the embryo feels or experiences you should understand that it is not a self aware being.
Reply:How the hell can a zygote be conscious? It doesn't have any brain cells!
Reply:No, I don't think fertilization was the beginning of my conciousness. That's crazy talk.





Second, not everyone against abortion is a religious nut, I am against abortion, but I'm more pro-freedom. I don't want the government telling someone they can't have an abortion, it's as simple as that.





If you think the cure and treatment of disease is pointless, then stop taking any antibiotics, washing your hands, and cooking your food thoroughly. With any luck, you'll be dead before having children, and your idiotic genes will be removed from mankind.
Reply:Consciousness requires a brain. Embryos do not have this key equipment.
Reply:My earliest memory is seeing my Nana at the end of a long path. My mama told me I would have been about 1 to 18months old. If I had died before then, I honestly would not have been aware of it..
Reply:I am very pro-life and believe that the mothers who abort thier children should be treated the same as Scott Peterson. Scott Peterson was charged two counts for murdering his wife and unborn baby. What makes the mothers who abort thier children any different than him. They are murderers as well! Shouldn't we all be treated equal? HMMMMMMMM!!!!
Reply:Actually, seeds die before they are fertilized. Man has an appointed time to die and then the resurrection. Think about it.
Reply:the whole abortion thing...





IMO you need to take a test to drive but not to have kids,WTF?





abortion should not be birth control for your slutty 14 year old kid, but i feel it is needed. say your raped and get pregnant, do you want this child? no you should have the right to not have it unfortunately its a harsh way to end a problem but this is life.





hell i think it should be in forced... look at all the stupid crazy poor people in the world, most of these people have not 1,2,3,4 but sometimes more then 5 kids!!! living in poverty on welfare with under educated parents. where is this pointing these children to end up when there grown? the SAME PATH! its a cycle of poor stupid people being poured into this world and we should stop it.
Reply:Your feelings seem very justified as far as I am personally concerned. But, social opinions, in any concerned land, can be aligned with your (and my) way of thinking, through organizations like CARE, or by filing and winning public interest litigation (PIL) suits, in the highest courts of law (in sample countries), with help from suitable organizations, like the one above ( http://www.care2.com ).
Reply:U sound really religious...and doing scientific research like on stem cells could help find the sure 2 diseases that kill many people
Reply:There's a difference between a hospice and a grave. Just because you're on your death bead, you're not dead yet. Fertilization, isn't the same as birth.
Reply:Fertilization is not the beginning of consciousness because the neural structures necessary for consciousness do not spring into existence at fertilization.
Reply:First to know is to separate religion with cristianism. The Cristians are not the only religious people yet they are against tech. They are against cloning, use of fetusmeat etc. They are against suicide, avortion and killing. Yet not always use to be that way, in the past religion was used to intech the countries, to enlighten and enschool people. With religion people use to do in the anticts something that they haven't done till now. I tell you that religion is to give hope, logic to see things that you couldn't see elsehow while this religion (cristian) is in my opinion to hold the world back with some years. (Mail me and I will tell you more of godless religion and polytheism.)
Reply:You're making a lot of assumptions about a lot of people. I think death is the end of everything, not simply consciousness. I believe fertilization is the beginning of development, not necessarily consciousness.


"Humans are not made with suicidal or heroic tendencies"...that's simply false. Your genes determine a lot about you. Some people develop suicidal tendencies as a result of chemical imbalances in the brain.


You say "what's the point" when it comes to attempts to cure diseases. That's a very naive way to look at things. So you would say stop trying to fight any disease because more are going to come? If that's the way you feel, fine, but I hope the rest of the world doesn't develop this attitude. And I certainly hope you are not taking, nor have you ever taken, any medication including Tylenol. Wouldn't that go against your beliefs?


Finally, another straw man you have set up is the whole 'if you are for abortion it's because you don't care about life". That's a stupid dead end argument. It deserves no answer because it is true of basically no one.
Reply:You're right, they are alive from the point of fertilization but it has more to do with the nervous system. An embryo before 24 weeks doesn't have a nervous system advanced enough to feel pain. They also can't think and realize that they're being killed and feel sad. They're not advanced enough to suffer. In exchange for taking a life that does not suffer, a teen mother can get a second shot at life. And the human race can advance much much further due to stem cell research and embryonic autopsies. HIV, avian flu, SARS, etc. New advances are happening in all these fields because of research on embryos. There have been many breakthroughs.


The human race is benefited and the embryo doesn't feel or know a thing.
Reply:Think of it this way. The research that cost thousands of unborn fetuses their lives will eventually save millions or even billions of people.


Even religious people can't argue that. When we have cures for things like Parkinson's or AIDS, they will have been found through stem cell research.
Reply:I won't argue for or against the morality of abortion, but the argument you present makes no sense.





Death is the end of consciousness, as far as we know. But that does NOT mean that fertilization is the beginning of consciousness. Death is also the end of the ability to read. That does not mean that embryos can read. Death is the end of the ability to see. That does not mean that embryos can see from the moment of fertilization.





Abortion is a serious issue that deserves a serious discussion. Bold but nonsensical suggestions like yours do not help your cause and will only make others ridicule you. Good luck!!
Reply:no, i believe that consciencess begins when the brain is formed. i can tell you havent heard of miscarriages, where they usually have to do a D%26amp;C ''abortion'', or of horrible birth defects, like when the baby never grows a brain, or the spine grows outside of the body. where even if the baby did live (and the mother, its very dangerous) it would need multiple surgeries and be mentally "vegged" its whole life, and paralyzed. Yes, i forgive you, you didnt know, but now, you do, so, your ignorance is no more.
Reply:This one is for J.p.: what your telling me is that you DONT care even if its for rape?You are a sick, sick person. That women went through the emotional damage of being forcibly raped, which is bad enough, but now YOU are going to tell HER that she cant abort the child of the man that ruined her life because you dont think its right. It would be better for her to abort it while it still has no feelings or cognitable thought to speek of, rather than give birthh to it and let it starve to death in a dumpster.Also, if your antichoice, hows about this: you cant eat after 7 o'clock, you cant talk to your family before 8 A.M, you cant go get stitches for that its not that big of a cut anyways, if you have a cold your not allowed to go get medecine and you DEFINETELY cant do anything to alter your body. thats what you should do if your anti choice, because THAT is what your basically doing to women when you say that your antichoice.
Reply:Is a being lacking in consciousness going to suffer? Imagine excruciating pain, and then having absolutely no reaction to it one way or the other, beyond neural impulses.
Reply:Would you be so sad for the excised tumor, which is also very much alive until removed. Without a developed neurophysiology, no human consciousness. So what argument do you have left - potential to be human. I guess that means masturbation, condoms, fertility treatments, etc., should be illegal. What about a woman choosing not to have sex when she's ovulating. You have decided (rather arbitrarily), and many disagree with you on when life begins.
Reply:Um,no.





The single-celled zygote does NOT have consciousness.





Nor do they have nervous systems.





Thus, they do not suffer.





The point is to alleviate suffering: to allow the paralyzed to recover, to reverse Parkinson's, and other conditions.





Science seems a fairytale to you because you don't understand it.





That's not the fault of science.





If you were willing to understand science, you could.
Reply:I'm an atheist. I'm also Pro-Life/Anti-Choice.





I don't even make most of the allowances a number of Pro-Lifer's do. I don't make the exception for rape or incest, and make exception for the mother's health ONLY if she could not sacrifice her life to bring the child to viability.





Careful with those generalizations, hm?
Reply:There are two lines of though on abortion;


1-That human life, in the form of an ovum and spermatozoon, becomes a human person at the time of conception.


2-That human life becomes a human person after conception -- perhaps when the fetus looks human, or becomes sentient, or when it has half emerged from its mother's body, or is born, or is functioning completely independent of its mother.


It is an interesting question and a difficult one to answer.


Consciousness may begin with fertilisation but abortion rules seem to be based on whether the embryo resembles a human being or not.


In 2003, from data collected in those areas of the United States that sufficiently reported gestational age, it was found that 88.2% of abortions were conducted at or prior to 12 weeks, 10.4% from 13 to 20 weeks, and 1.4% at or after 21 weeks.


I understand why abortion exists,but I can also see why some might say it is legalised murder.
Reply:It is your conviction. If you think that life is precious, then you will protect it no matter what. Once the egg is fertilized by the sperm, there is life already. However, death is not the end of your consciousness. Your consciousness or your soul live on whether in heaven or in hell. That is why coming to the issue of marriage, it takes responsible people to get married and have a family. Responsible here means a lot including pregnancy, protecting the pregnancy, making sure the children grow up healthily, seeing that they have a future and so on and so forth. And yes, the word murder can be used even though there are a million reasons why the fertilized egg has to be experimented on, why there is a liberate abortion and so on and so forth. However it does not look like a murder because it is not a baby borned into the world and it is not a living human being. People think that just because it is a fertilized egg with no forms and structure of a human being, they think it is not a human being. But actually it is. What you can do is not to be involved in situations whereby these scientific things are being carried out because you might have a mental breakdown if you cannot handle what is really going on. Actually it is also very cruel to experiment on animals even if it is a rat. On the excuse of helping mankind, other living things have to be sacrificed.
Reply:You make a rather grand assumption about the start of life. How can consciousness exist in a single cell? At what point does that mass of tissue become sentient?





You assume that the moment an egg merges with a sperm cell that you have a conscious human being on your hands, but that cell is not viable, it can't survive outside the womb and it cant even draw nutrients without the aid of the mother's body. It can't think and it doesn't even HAVE a nervous system yet, let alone a brain capable of containing a thinking mind.





Using your logic, there would never be a point in treating any illness, since another disease would just "Come around" anyway. If that's your point of view, then please cancel your health insurance and never see a doctor or dentist again. After all, if you get injured or sick, why bother treating it? Sooner or later, you'll just get something else anyway.


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