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Bringing you atheist articles and building active godless communities takes hundreds of hours and resources each month. If you find any joy or stimulation at Atheist Republic, please consider becoming a Supporting Member with a recurring monthly donation of your choosing, between a cup of tea and a good dinner.
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Bringing you atheist articles and building active godless communities takes hundreds of hours and resources each month. If you find any joy or stimulation at Atheist Republic, please consider becoming a Supporting Member with a recurring monthly donation of your choosing, between a cup of tea and a good dinner.
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I agree, preferable ideally, but not always, and definitely not a requirement as Breezy claimed. I know single parent families where the children fair far better than children where both biological parents are present in their children's lives. Life simply isn't this simple, and human interactions are much more complex than this.
I see both of your points, that last comment of mine is purely a subjective point of view.
By no means did I say it was a 'must', but I think for the most it is better for a child to have both parents around.
unfortunately, a lot of couples have children far too early in a relationship before they have even seen if they are truly compatible and if the relationship will work in the long term.
This has simply been my experience in my short, young life so far haha! :P
I agree, unfortunately nature is against us there, and when we're young we often are in a hurry, obviously there are very good evolutionary reasons for that, but in modern post industrialised democracies there is no reason why people can't have children when they're a bit older, and of course a lot do. Life seldom measures up to our ideals, but we have to do the best we can, especially where children are concerned.
very true, it is quite a utopian ideal to have every couple remain happily together and produce children
and there is no evolutionary reason for us to remain with one partner, when another can come into the family and produce more offspring.
I've always thought people, especially the younger generations, rush into things far too quickly.
whilst I studied at university, quite a few of my friends had children. luckily most are still in the same relationships to this day.
" Likewise a child developing in the womb "
A balstocyst or foetus is not a child, and it's dishonest to keep calling them a child. Equally dishonest not to acknowledge that unlike a child a blastocyst can't experience emotional trauma, or physical pain, and isn't even sentient.
It is hard for theist to accept that a fetus is not a person, but it is only logical. A seed is not a plant or an egg a crocodile, and not even they will argue any different. Why then humans? (answer they do not want to give but is their foundation: " Because they have a soul that is created at conception" )
If you go the way that fecundated ovum is a person because it has all the potential and information to become a full human being, then every cell in the body is a potential person because they also have all the information. If then we consider stem cells (of which we all have millions), they all have the same information as the fecundated egg and have even more the potential to become a full human too (clones). It is insane.
If you approach the situation from an evolutionary point of view, a fetus is not a person, person-hood emerges with development and it is not only DNA what determines that. A human needs social interaction to become fully human. A baby raised without human interaction never achieves complete brain development and will not even learn to communicate properly or at all. In some cases, these babies can just die even if you attend their physical needs properly. That indicate that being a human being is more that DNA information, it needs other humans around and their interaction.
On the other hand, I do not want to offend anybody but the definition of a parasite is : " an organism that lives in or on another organism (its host) and benefits by deriving nutrients at the host's expense." If you accept that a fetus is not part of the body of the mother, then that definition applies, hard as it can sound. If somebody does not want to apply the definition, then they should accept that the fetus is part of the mothers body.
We should be clear that parasites play an enormous role in ecosystems and life as we know would not be possible without them. Nature has no moral rules so ascribing a moral value to a biological behavior is nonsensical. Definitions are what they are.
Great post. I really like the additional commentary about a humans need for social interaction as also essential.
The crux of the argument I been having with breezy is that: humans are made up of cell building blocks that use dna to pass instructions when they split to tell each cell what to do. It is a nearly endless cycle of cell division. The cycle of human life did not "start" at fertilization of an egg. It started with the first cells that would divide to replicate possibly over a billion years ago, our most distant ancestors.
Sure fertilization of the egg, is a momentous event in this cycle, but it was not the start. Instead for practical reasons we must decide where in this billion year long cycle do we want to elevate a particular collection of cells to the point that it has a right to live over a mother's right to her own body. Any point we pick is an opinion. I think we can all agree on certain range to where the rights of this new group of cells with a new mix of very similar dna should have increasing rights to protect them. Somewhere in the cycle of a human.
So we then argue and try to decide with the most universally accepted range. I would guess the range of fertilization to natural birth would encompass 99% of all people that seriously consider and educate themselves on the human reproduction process and accompanying relevant issues. So within that range we argue, we point out points for either side, but in the end is simply a matter of opinion.
To me, since we do not all agree for solid reasons on each side, and we yearn for universal laws, we need a tie breaker of opinion. Who better as a tie breaker then the mother at hand that faces the issue of the right to her body versus the rights of the developing human that is somewhere along the human life cycle within her?
Unfortunately, I think saying a seed is not a plant and an embryo is not an baby are true, but irrelevant. Surely a baby is not a child, and a child is not an adult. All of that is true, but ignores the continuity of the identity.
When it comes to the idea of potential, you shouldn't use it unless your boundaries are clearly established. I said earlier that sperm has potential, but that potential takes substance when a child is conceived. Skin cells do not naturally have such a potential, perhaps as science progresses its DNA does have its potential. When it comes to stem cells I mainly know about them from a neurological perspective. A zygote can be seen as the stem cell of stem cells, or the monarch of stem cells But every other stem cell that develops from that has specializations. Neural stem cells can become neurons or glial cells. Blood stem cells become red blood cells and lymph cells. They each have a specific category which they dominate. I've never heard of such stem cells going array and developing into a baby. Perhaps with scientific tampering such a thing is possible.
Although I agree DNA alone doesn't determine what is a human (I see it as an ID tag). I'm not sure I understand why you think social interactions are needed to be human. Sure a child without social interactions will encounter problems, but why would that disqualify it as a human being? It seems like you're viewing human as a synonym for an adult.
My issue with your parasite definition is that you treat it as prescriptive rather than descriptive: it fits the definition so it must be it. You're focusing on a narrow sense of what a parasite is, which seem similar to a pregnancy, but ignoring many of the things which show they're clearly not the same thing. For one, a parasite is an intrusive species. Its a completely different kind of animal from the host. That's something important that shouldn't be overlook. A pregnancy is on a completely different footing. Even in the definition you gave, it would disqualify a pregnancy from being parasitic: "benefits by deriving nutrients at the host's expense." In a pregnancy its not the fetus sucking nutrients at the mother's expense, its the mother's body providing those nutrients for the baby. Everything from the womb, umbilical cord, placenta, amniotic fluid are all produced by the mother's body for the sole purpose of protecting and nourishing the baby. I'm pretty sure hormones change to, the way the body uses up energy, even psychological changes occur, all with the goal of giving to the child.
Its just logically incoherent to see a fetus as a parasite. Its completely flipping what a pregnancy is on its head.
"Surely a baby is not a child, and a child is not an adult. All of that is true, but ignores the continuity of the identity."
Flimflam, you've offered no objective reason a blastocyst has this 'continuity of identity' with a child, that's just your subjective opinion, and it ignores the facts that a foetus or blastocyst, UNLIKE A CHILD, is insentient and therefore has no identity, can't experience pain, or emotion.
"You're focusing on a narrow sense of what a parasite is,"
Irony overload....
"Everything from the womb, umbilical cord, placenta, amniotic fluid are all produced by the mother's body for the sole purpose of protecting and nourishing the baby."
IT'S NOT A BABY....
"Its just logically incoherent to see a fetus as a parasite. Its completely flipping what a pregnancy is on its head."
Irony overload again, given you have refused to stop referring to blastocyst and foetuses as babies and children, which is equally logically incoherent.
"Flimflam, you've offered no objective reason a blastocyst has this 'continuity of identity' with a child,"
Why would one even need an objective reason? Shouldn't it be obvious there is continuity between one and the other?
Nice try Breezy, I think I must change your name to wheezy. You said continuity of identity, not just continuity, so please explain how an insentient blastocyst that can't experience physical or emotional pain has an identity remotely comparable to a fully formed human? Then explain why you'd afford the right to this insentient blastocyst to use the mothers body against her will, when you wouldn't dream of extending such a right to a fully formed adult human?
lastly tell us why you get so bent out of shape at the idea of the termination of a blastocyst, but have refused to say whether you think it objectively moral for your deity to torture a newborn baby to death over 7 days, as described in the bible, because it was angered that the baby was conceived in an adulterous affair? Since you're accusing others of logical inconsistency, and moral subjectivity.
Why do you stop at fertilization of the egg? If we are talking continuity, what about the unfertilized egg? What about the sperm? What about the host bodies of sperm and egg? Without either of those you would not have a baby, would not have continuity.
The exchange of dna and new slightly different dna creation does not happen instantly. It can take up to 12 hours after initial fertilization, (fertilized ovum) before pronuclei merge and the first normal mitotic division occurs (basically when the fertilized ovum realizes the process of of interminglings chromosomes have completed as well as many other steps.)
Also in this philosophical argument of when human "life" supposedly begins, twins (of the identical kind,), (or triplets and higher,) can occur as late a whopping 4 days after fertilization.
So if people want to use the dna swap that creates the blueprint of the human, they run into important scientific roadblocks pretty quick. Even if we want to pin the "start" of life at fertilization based on dna swap, (which is an opinion,) that is wrong, it takes a little while, up to 12 hours. And we all consider each identical twin as a full human life, and those can occur up to 4 days later fertilization (fertilized ovum.)
Again, the start of life does not at any point fit a perfectly good start point. This is not flipping on a light switch. It is muddled, and their is arguments before and after. It is all our OPINION and forcing our opinions on other is wrong, every time.
Even when we try to consider the opinion of others, a powerful majority opinion is utilized. I think it is fairly safe to say the point a human is fully human with full human rights to live, falls somewhere between fertilization of the oocyte (a fertilized ovum) and natural birth, for 95+ percent of people. We choose to exclude the opinions of people outside that range when we form our culture standards and laws that we utilize to have people coexist with each other.
John 6IX Breezy - "Unfortunately, I think saying a seed is not a plant and an embryo is not an baby are true, but irrelevant. Surely a baby is not a child, and a child is not an adult. All of that is true, but ignores the continuity of the identity. "
Also, a bunch of seeds is not a wood nor an egg a crocodile but there we can ignore the identity?
We do not ignore the identity in any case. We understand that an embryo (of any organism) is a phase and not the final product and we do not deal with it at such. We do not treat each development phase equally. We do not treat, legally, emotionally or personally an embryo of any organism as the whole organism. We do to treat even human minors like we treat adult humans. We do not have too and it is illogical to do it. Embryos depend on the mother, and the mother has the last word about them.
Author blissfully unaware that many form of birth control prevent implantation of fertilized eggs.
We've already mentioned that in my discussions with Logic. Keep up. What did I say precedes accusations? Can you remember? Starts with a C..
Author claims they have already discussed the matter; which is even more troubling that they would continue to get it wrong.
John 6IX Breezy: "As to the Morning After pill, as far as I understand its a contraceptive, not an abortion pill. It prevents a pregnancy, it doesn't end one. I could be wrong, and if I am then my answer will change."
LogicforTW: "We are both wrong/correct. Most commonly used morning after pills, (like plan B,) does a combination of things. Temporarily stops the release of an egg from the ovary. Prevents fertilization. Prevents a fertilized egg from attaching to the uterus. If you consider a fertilized egg a pregnancy, then sometimes the morning after pill ends the pregnancy.
What's that magic C word?
They tell us that murder is objectively wrong.
They tell us an abortion is murder.
Then this one tells us abortion (which the pro-lifers have spent decades telling us is murder) is OK in some circumstances.
And you can bet your bottom dollar that within a week we'll have a theist criticising atheist for having a subjective morality!
"And you can bet your bottom dollar that within a week we'll have a theist criticising atheist for having a subjective morality!"
After they have told us we're logically inconsistent. Religious apologists are Irony impaired.
Only a person afraid of being wrong doesn't ask for clarification.
Nyar is the Cathy Newman of Atheist Republic: "So you're saying"
While you're here, you never addressed my response.
Nice try Breezy, I think I must change your name to wheezy. You said continuity of identity, not just continuity, so please explain how an insentient blastocyst that can't experience physical or emotional pain has an identity remotely comparable to a fully formed human? Then explain why you'd afford the right to this insentient blastocyst to use the mothers body against her will, when you wouldn't dream of extending such a right to a fully formed adult human?
lastly tell us why you get so bent out of shape at the idea of the termination of a blastocyst, but have refused to say whether you think it objectively moral for your deity to torture a newborn baby to death over 7 days, as described in the bible, because it was angered that the baby was conceived in an adulterous affair? Since you're accusing others of logical inconsistency, and moral subjectivity.
At some point copy/pasting the same paragraphs over and over on the same thread, and even on neighboring threads, starts to be considered spamming which is against the forum guidelines.
I don't expect the moderators to stop you, nor would I want them to. I enjoy seeing it.
You could always try actually answering questions.
Indeed, if I gauge the individual to be worth having a conversation with on the subject. I have no interest in debates nor interrogations.
Re: John - "Indeed, if I gauge the individual to be worth having a conversation with on the subject. I have no interest in debates nor interrogations."
Ow. I was doing okay following all of this until that statement. Had to give Scarecrow back his brain. Started hurting too much.
@ Breezy
"I have no interest in debates nor interrogations." Really, why are you here then? Unless it is to try and make yourself look even sillier and more immature than you can possibly be.
You've been asked reasonable questions that follow on your faith/bible/conditioning inspired positions. You don't answer them.
You dodge and weave to avoid admitting that your positions are bible/faith inspired and you use every tautology and 'definition' and trick in the book including some silly "straw god" smokescreen to cover your actual theologically based position.
When cornered you ignore the question or become passive aggressive in the guise of "witty" (not) put downs that only illustrate your immaturity.
There are those in the forums who are much wiser than you and have proven they can see exactly what you are as little by little, like a second rate stripper, your bare secrets are revealed. Disappointingly, they are roughly the same position, shape and consistency as every other tired theological tap dancer who flies in and out of these debates.
If I could be bothered to exchange notes with TM and Mykcob I am sure we would get a very accurate profile of your real thoughts and motivations. We ask, are you worth the effort?
You see, when you lose the cleverness and the passive/aggressive insults and the ducking and weaving you are not at all bad at defending the theological stance you take. I consider it untenable at best but at least you are attempting a rationale for your far fetched beliefs.
If you fessed up about your true beliefs and then used the same arguments you wouldnt come across as such a callow boofhead.
Now, do try and answer the questions put to you.
Find a theologian or a pastor if you have questions on faith or the Bible.
I do agree that I'm able to defend my beliefs in a sufficiently rational manner. However, the problematic verb in that sentence is defend. The word defend has no meaning unless you're being attacked first. It shouldn't exist in a conversation. I say, let God defend Himself. He certainly doesn't need me to do it.
If I am being attacked, what do I gain from defending myself? There's no reward. No progress. Only the illusive goal of changing people's opinion of me, which I don't care to do. The only person I'm interested in defending myself against is Nyar, and only because I love the challenge of having to use precision in my words, or else they'll be taken out of context. I have something to gain by it, namely, becoming a better writer, and more meticulous speaker.
Beyond that my position is firm. Don't expect a response or an answer unless they pertain to the discussion, or you present them in an inquisitive rather than accusative manner.
@ Breezy
Terminological inexactitudes as usual, duck, weave and cover.
Then answer the simple question...if a woman loses sole control of her body at the moment of conception. who, in your view, should control her and the embryo from then on?
Who should be responsible for the embryo until maturity?
Inquisitive me.
I can keep asking every time you post.
No.
Oh dear why not?
Not an accusation in sight, merely inquisitive me asking your stance after your pronouncements and justifications for removing the control of a woman's body from her, you now don't want to answer?
Surely you would have thought this through...but maybe you have......
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