Okay, now I'm getting all politicall on your asses and talking about abortion.
I don't know why I've been thinking about the the issue lately, but I have been...and I'm confused. I think this is one of those areas that my philosophy training has destroyed me, or at least thrown me into the arena of confusion and ambivilence. See, the thing is, my heart tells me that it's wrong...that it's murder, that life begins at conception and that it is an evil that must be made illegal for anyone to commit. Religiously, I want to believe that life is precious and that once it starts it should be protected at all costs. Analyzing that a bit and trying to figure out when, exactly, life begins (and therefore becomes a crime to inhibit) if it's not at conception, I can't come up with anything. Obviously we are alive at birth, and it seems to me wrong to kill a child in the womb ala "partial-birth abortion" that would survive outside the womb as a premie. But there is little that changes in the physiology of the child from the time a fetus is seven or eight months developed and four or five months developed except survivability and maturity and operationality of internal organs and the like.
But that is where it all gets confusing to me.
If life is life in the second trimester, as I believe, then what would make it not life in the first? I don't know. I definitely belive that abortion is wrong in the second two-thirds of a pregnancy, but what can I use as an excuse in the first third? I want to believe that life is precious from the time that sperm meets egg, but the problems start arising then...
Okay, if a woman miscarries in the eighth month of pregnancy, there is often a name given to the child, a funeral even, and a memory that continues throughout that child's family's lifetime. But what happens when a fetus is miscarried after two months? It's not the same. There is sadness, there is often depression, but the funeral is lacking, the name is usually not given, and those women that I know that have gone through such a thing -- a tendancy to forget in time. It is an unfortunate occurance. Psychologically then, we do not inately put as high regard on the "life" of an immature fetus as we do on a mature one. I can't help but feel that that means something. Doesn't it? There just seems to be a higher inherent value in the life of the older fetus and a lesser, more "routine" feeling towards the loss of the younger. The earlier miscarriage is seen more as a "medical mishap" than as a death...even by those that believe more strongly than I do in the conception definition of human life. And that is where I am lost in the issue.
Philosophically, however, I tend to take a Pascalian view of the issue. That is there are two causes to which there can be two effects: Either abortion is murder or abortion is not and therefore it can be illegal or legal to commit. Obviously, if life begins at conception and abortion is therefore murder, then it should be made illegal. However, if life does not begin at conception then it is not murder and should therefore not be considered illegal. But, the things is, we do not know. Therefore, we have to make our best judgement based on the other two combinations: abortion is murder but not illegal and abortion is not murder and illegal. Because we do not know which is the case, we must look at these two options through the blindness of our ignorance:
If abortion is murder (and I use that to abbreviate the idea that life begins at conception and the termination of life is murder) then by keeping it legal we are, in fact, sanctioning mass murder, albeit ignorantly. If, however, abortion is not murder, then the worst that we would be doing is preventing women from terminating an unwanted pregancy and doing to her body what she wants. In our ignorance, these are the two possible wrongs that could come of whatever choice we make (the two right being described in the above paragraph), both are wrong, but which is more wrong?
So we take the two possibilties and simplify them to their basic sin: The first -- that abortion is murder and we allow it -- leads to mass murder through our ignorance. The second -- that abortion is not murder and we do not allow it -- leads to denial of personal rights through our ignorance. Somehow, mass murder seems worse to me than denial of personal choice.
But that is such a shakey leg to stand on...philosophical mumbo-jumbo and a bunch of "what ifs". I wish there was something more, answers of some sort, but there aren't. So I am left with these conflicting views that my heart presents, my psycological intuition presents, and my philosophical analysis presents. I don't like it. Not at all.
I don't know why I've been thinking about the the issue lately, but I have been...and I'm confused. I think this is one of those areas that my philosophy training has destroyed me, or at least thrown me into the arena of confusion and ambivilence. See, the thing is, my heart tells me that it's wrong...that it's murder, that life begins at conception and that it is an evil that must be made illegal for anyone to commit. Religiously, I want to believe that life is precious and that once it starts it should be protected at all costs. Analyzing that a bit and trying to figure out when, exactly, life begins (and therefore becomes a crime to inhibit) if it's not at conception, I can't come up with anything. Obviously we are alive at birth, and it seems to me wrong to kill a child in the womb ala "partial-birth abortion" that would survive outside the womb as a premie. But there is little that changes in the physiology of the child from the time a fetus is seven or eight months developed and four or five months developed except survivability and maturity and operationality of internal organs and the like.
But that is where it all gets confusing to me.
If life is life in the second trimester, as I believe, then what would make it not life in the first? I don't know. I definitely belive that abortion is wrong in the second two-thirds of a pregnancy, but what can I use as an excuse in the first third? I want to believe that life is precious from the time that sperm meets egg, but the problems start arising then...
Okay, if a woman miscarries in the eighth month of pregnancy, there is often a name given to the child, a funeral even, and a memory that continues throughout that child's family's lifetime. But what happens when a fetus is miscarried after two months? It's not the same. There is sadness, there is often depression, but the funeral is lacking, the name is usually not given, and those women that I know that have gone through such a thing -- a tendancy to forget in time. It is an unfortunate occurance. Psychologically then, we do not inately put as high regard on the "life" of an immature fetus as we do on a mature one. I can't help but feel that that means something. Doesn't it? There just seems to be a higher inherent value in the life of the older fetus and a lesser, more "routine" feeling towards the loss of the younger. The earlier miscarriage is seen more as a "medical mishap" than as a death...even by those that believe more strongly than I do in the conception definition of human life. And that is where I am lost in the issue.
Philosophically, however, I tend to take a Pascalian view of the issue. That is there are two causes to which there can be two effects: Either abortion is murder or abortion is not and therefore it can be illegal or legal to commit. Obviously, if life begins at conception and abortion is therefore murder, then it should be made illegal. However, if life does not begin at conception then it is not murder and should therefore not be considered illegal. But, the things is, we do not know. Therefore, we have to make our best judgement based on the other two combinations: abortion is murder but not illegal and abortion is not murder and illegal. Because we do not know which is the case, we must look at these two options through the blindness of our ignorance:
If abortion is murder (and I use that to abbreviate the idea that life begins at conception and the termination of life is murder) then by keeping it legal we are, in fact, sanctioning mass murder, albeit ignorantly. If, however, abortion is not murder, then the worst that we would be doing is preventing women from terminating an unwanted pregancy and doing to her body what she wants. In our ignorance, these are the two possible wrongs that could come of whatever choice we make (the two right being described in the above paragraph), both are wrong, but which is more wrong?
So we take the two possibilties and simplify them to their basic sin: The first -- that abortion is murder and we allow it -- leads to mass murder through our ignorance. The second -- that abortion is not murder and we do not allow it -- leads to denial of personal rights through our ignorance. Somehow, mass murder seems worse to me than denial of personal choice.
But that is such a shakey leg to stand on...philosophical mumbo-jumbo and a bunch of "what ifs". I wish there was something more, answers of some sort, but there aren't. So I am left with these conflicting views that my heart presents, my psycological intuition presents, and my philosophical analysis presents. I don't like it. Not at all.
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