"Personhood"

[Sucumbio]

Hello Debate Hall!

It's been awhile since I made a topic, and of all the things going on lately, this subject seems to keep finding itself at the forefront of my daily thinking. It has taken the form of debates/arguments/conversations with several of my friends and family members and co-workers, and I think it's time we had it out here.

First, a little background.

What is a person?

According to the "naturalist" epistemological tradition, from Descartes through Locke and Hume, the term may designate any human (or non-human) agent which: (1) possesses continuous consciousness over time; and who is therefore capable of framing representations about the world, formulating plans and acting on them.

This definition may seem too rigid for some, so of course there are several alternatives:

What is crucial about agents is that things matter to them. We thus cannot simply identify agents by a performance criterion, nor assimilate animals to machines... [likewise] there are matters of significance for human beings which are peculiarly human, and have no analogue with animals.

Or perhaps this:

Boethius gives the definition of "person" as "an individual substance of a rational nature."

Peter Singer defines a “person” as being a conscious, thinking being, which knows that it is a person (self-awareness).

Philosopher Thomas I. White argues that the criteria for a person are as follows: (1) is alive, (2) is aware, (3) feels positive and negative sensations, (4) has emotions, (5) has a sense of self, (6) controls its own behaviour, (7) recognises other persons and treats them appropriately, and (8) has a variety of sophisticated cognitive abilities. While many of White's criteria are somewhat anthropocentric, some animals such as dolphins would still be considered persons.[10] Some animal rights groups have also championed recognition for animals as "persons".

So what do all these have in common (if anything)? Well... it seems that at the very least, they all include some indication of consciousness. Self-awareness. Capacity for motives.

Okay, so what about people who are brain-dead? Or... heck, just asleep? Food for thought, anyway.

Roe vs Wade:

In RvW it was determined that a right to privacy under the due process clause in the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution extends to a woman's decision to have an abortion, but that right must be balanced against the state's two legitimate interests for regulating abortions: protecting prenatal life and protecting the mother's health.

Women's Rights:

Today's Personhood amendments are dangerously vague.

Let's take the one up for voting in Mississippi:

Amendment 26: What it says?

Amendment 26 - The Mississippi Personhood Amendment-- is a citizens initiative to amend the Mississippi Constitution to define personhood as beginning at fertilization or "the functional equivalent thereof." Its purpose is to protect all life, regardless of age, health, function, physical or mental dependency, or method of reproduction. The entire proposed Amendment is as follows:

Be it Enacted by the People of the State of Mississippi: SECTION 1. Article III of the constitution of the state of Mississippi is hereby amended BY THE ADDITION OF A NEW SECTION TO READ: Section 33. Person defined. As used in this Article III of the state constitution, "The term 'person' or 'persons' shall include every human being from the moment of fertilization, cloning or the functional equivalent thereof." This initiative shall not require any additional revenue for implementation.

(NOTE: Please understand that the inclusion of the word cloning in the proposed Amendment does not in any way condone cloning. There will be an entire section on the web siteposted soon explaining why this wording is necessary and answering any questions.)

We the people of Mississippi were required to collect and certify 89,285 certified signatures from registered voters (equally divided throughout the state of Mississippi). We far exceeded this requirement - collecting well over 130,000 and having over 106,000 certified.

Now, in November of 2011, we have the opportunity to vote on the question. If the majortiy of the people voting in vote YES on Amendment 26, abortion will be outlawed in our state; cloning and other forms of medical cannibalism will be effectively stopped; and a challenge will be set up to Roe v Wade.

Heh. Challenge RvW.

How does this effect women's rights? Well for starters, it completely eliminates hormonal birth control. Either the people who drafted this have no idea how birth control works, or they want women to stop using it.

It means that a woman who gets ***** and is impregnated cannot take the Plan B pill the morning after.

It means that if a woman has a miscarriage there could be potential for a criminal investigation.

It means that if a woman's life is in jeopardy and medically speaking the best course of action is an abortion, she might have to die for the child's sake.

----------------------------------------------------------------------

I recall a ways back here in the DH AltF4 proposed a question that ended up around this issue, and way back then I proposed a Personhood amendment (of sorts). What I said was, that there needs to be two things: 1.) Yes, agree that life does in fact start at conception. 2.) Draft a -separate- set of laws governing pre-born children.

Why? Because as we can see, doing the first and not the second results in total crap. You can't grant the same rights to all forms of life, it's not equitable, it's not feasible, and it's not even justified. Opening this can of worms will lead to all sorts of horrible hypocrisy. Can you both support pro-life and the death penalty? And why stop at Human life? If life is so sacred, then should not -all- life be protected? No more eating animals!

Tangent aside, this is a tough issue, and it will make a lot of under qualified people think. Many will side with the Catholic Church, Pro-life. It was Pope John Paul II who said "A nation that kills its children has no future." They believe that life starts at conception, and they do not believe in using any form of birth control or abortion. On the other hand, you will have an increase in Feminism as the rights of women are slowly stripped away in the name of ****-shaming.

Solution: Put this on hold. It's folly to suggest that unborn children should have the exact same rights as you or I. We need to draft appropriate and specific rights for those who are unborn, but who are conceived, and therefore -will- be born, eventually.

Either that, or say to hell with the Bible-jerks, yay to Women's Rights, and do things the way they should be done, safely and with the aid of modern medicine. Use birth control, it's your body, if you want to indulge in carnal pleasure and not have a kid as a result, power to you. If after a few weeks of pregnancy you decide however selfishly that you don't want the kid after all, and you don't want to throw yourself down a flight of stairs, hit the abortion clinic. You'll be depressed, people will hate you if they find out, but at least you don't have a burden on your hands, who never asked to be born in the first place.

 

[Suntan Luigi]

This sort of question is, among other things, very relevant to the topic of Free Will. Are we nothing more than a series of predetermined, complex chemical reactions? Or is there more to us then our physical makeup?

Also, I think that our essence as a person comes from our actions and from our character. After all, that is exactly how we judge other people with regards to moral conduct. We don't look at someone and say, "He has such a good body, what a good person!".

 

[Dre89]

I don't see why it's so folly to grant an unborn child a right to life, but grant one to a born child. If you do, then what you're adopting the utilitarian notion that consciousness is what gives something a right to life, and then you would have to give equal rights to animals, and be allowed to kill those in a coma. Consciousness can't be the deciding factor, yet that is pretty much the only non-arbitrary factor between an unborn and born baby.

I agree though that not all forms of life should have equal rights, but only in the sense that animals shouldn't have the same rights as us. As for unborn babies, I think they should be the most protected, seeing as in any situation they are the most innocent party, so they're not the ones who should suffer. Yes, even in the case of **** they are still slightly more innocent than the mother, because the mother physically (not intentionally, or immorally) has caused the baby's state of dependency. The baby only exists in this state, or at all, because of events relating to the mother.

If X lends Y a grand, then Z steals it off Y, Y still has to pay X back. Y can't say "well it was stolen off me, I was innocent, therefore I don't have to pay the money back". Being innocent doesn't change that there is now another dependent party (X, or the baby). The reason why Y has to pay the money back, is because the theft happened to Y, not X, Y is physically responsible (not morally) for the state of dependency (the loss of money).

The thing with **** abortion is that we never apply that logic anywhere else, where an innocent person, who due to events that have happened to them, have then caused another innocent agent to be in potential trouble, has the right to sacrifice the secondary innocent person (the baby) for themselves.

 

[AltF4]

This is the classic shades of gray problem. It's easy to see why a lump of a few dozen cells shortly after conception doesn't constitute a human being. But it's equally easy to see that a screaming baby shortly after birth definitely is. So when does one turn into the other?

If you're looking for a queue from biology, you're going to be sorely disappointed. There's no obvious point in development you can point to and say "This is where consciousness occurs". Or even "This is where high level brain function occurs". It sure would be nice (in terms of solving this problem) if all the brain development in a child happened in one swift period. But that's just not how it is.

Sure, you can come up with a definition if you want. But biology doesn't care about your definition. It will just be an arbitrary line in the sand along the gradual developmental path. No matter where you choose to make the definition, the edges will always be awkward and morally unintuitive. So it seems to me like there should be some cutoff point after conception but before birth where it makes sense to call the unborn child a human, deserving of at least the right to live. But I don't have sufficient knowledge of physiology to venture a guess where this would take place, or how (in practice) you would tell when you've reached it.

EDIT: Dre, I don't like your "person lending money" analogy because it begs the question. Once you've established that the developing fetus is a human, then the right to live follows naturally. The point of the thread (as I see it) isn't to show that humans should have the right to live. (That should be obvious) But rather discuss when the developing fetus becomes a human. The whole abortion debate is really all just about that: timing. Some will say from the moment of conception. Some will say right up until birth. Some say somewhere in between.

 

[Dre89]

True, the analogy assumed life, but it was only meant to address the claim that **** justifies abortion even it is human.

I think the idea of right to life at conception is the the least arbitrary. Firstly, there is no significant distinction between a fetus and a born baby, as neither have them have achieved the rationality that makes us distinct from other animals.

The other thing is that that if we treated them as non living, there'd be no issue with aborting every single fetus that comes into existence, but there's a clearly a problem. the fact that will probably neve happen doesn't change the fact there's a problem with the principle.

 

[Sucumbio]

I agree that this issue is about timing. The proposed law suggests that "life" (or what you've coined as "Human") begins at conception.

As we discovered in our last DH discussion on this topic, the Blastocyst is the fertilized egg attached to the Uterine wall, and is considered the second phase of pregnancy, occurring between 5 and 8 days after fertilization.

These amendments would have us believe that essentially because the fertilized egg naturally attaches itself to the mother's Uterus, that there must be some life-mechanism involved; a drive towards development. Therefore, the fertilized egg is alive.

Even if we decide that indeed life, or more poignantly Human Life does begin at conception, at which point does this life deserve rights? Is it before or after consciousness? Before or after it is a person? You see I really dislike these amendments because they've swapped words all over the place, such as "person." Making it synonymous with "life" which is synonymous with "human" or "human life"... it's too vague. But a question that reels in my mind over and over... Are the rights of... any of us, there because we're alive to feel the consequences of those rights being diminished or removed? In other words, just because the thing is alive, and human, why does it necessarily deserve any rights?

This goes to Dre.'s comment, in a way. Why should the un-born child's rights be greater than that of the mother? Her choice to have an abortion of a rapist's baby is for any number of reasons. Should the State be allowed to force her to have to look her rapist's child in the face day after day for the rest of her life? A constant reminder of her terrible ordeal? Should the child be subject to her abuse if she's unable to objectively raise the child because of this?

And what of medical necessity? Should a pregnant woman be doomed to die if her giving birth will cause it? Imagine if it was a rapist's baby! Could he be charged with murder?

 

[Budget Player Cadet_]

@Alt: it was not begging the question; it was addressing a different topic going out from the previous assumptions. He wasn't using it to prove his point, he was taking his point and applying it to a related topic. That said, I disagree with that point.

I don't see why it's so folly to grant an unborn child a right to life, but grant one to a born child. If you do, then what you're adopting the utilitarian notion that consciousness is what gives something a right to life, and then you would have to give equal rights to animals, and be allowed to kill those in a coma. Consciousness can't be the deciding factor, yet that is pretty much the only non-arbitrary factor between an unborn and born baby.

I agree though that not all forms of life should have equal rights, but only in the sense that animals shouldn't have the same rights as us. As for unborn babies, I think they should be the most protected, seeing as in any situation they are the most innocent party, so they're not the ones who should suffer.

So what exactly do you believe? Life begins at conception? Before? What is our definition of life to begin with? I mean, what about individual sperm/egg cells? They have the potential to become a fully functional human. Hell, what about individual any cells? I do not believe it is reasonably possible to claim that any point can be logically determined as correct, even birth. You kinda have to wing it.

That said, there are a few things worth noting here. For one, the idea of a soul being involved from conception is stupid, especially seeing as twins end up splitting long after conception, and seeing as sometimes one twin reabsorbs the other. Secondly, there is no evidence to believe that an infant below 24 weeks actually has any indication of pain or consciousness at all. Thirdly, miscarriage is possible, even given the best possible situations.

Also, one more thing that caught my eye... How exactly is the baby guaranteed to be more innocent than the mother? Is the mother guilty of getting *****, or of dressing like a ****, or of not fighting back harder, or...?

Yes, even in the case of **** they are still slightly more innocent than the mother, because the mother physically (not intentionally, or immorally) has caused the baby's state of dependency. The baby only exists in this state, or at all, because of events relating to the mother.

Have you ever heard of the Violinist Analogy?

Judith Jarvis Thomson provided one of the most striking and effective thought experiments in the moral realm. Her example is aimed at a popular anti-abortion argument that goes something like this: The fetus is an innocent person with a right to life. Abortion results in the death of a fetus. Therefore, abortion is morally wrong.

In her thought experiment we are asked to imagine a famous violinist falling into a coma. The society of music lovers determines from medical records that you and you alone can save the violinist's life by being hooked up to him for nine months. The music lovers break into your home while you are asleep and hook the unconscious (and unknowing, hence innocent) violinist to you. You may want to unhook him, but you are then faced with this argument put forward by the music lovers: The violinist is an innocent person with a right to life. Unhooking him will result in his death. Therefore, unhooking him is morally wrong.

However, the argument does not seem convincing in this case. You would be very generous to remain attached and in bed for nine months, but you are not morally obliged to do so. The parallel with the abortion case is evident. The thought experiment is effective in distinguishing two concepts that had previously been run together: "right to life" and "right to what is needed to sustain life." The fetus and the violinist may each have the former, but it is not evident that either has the latter. The upshot is that even if the fetus has a right to life (which Thomson does not believe but allows for the sake of the argument), it may still be morally permissible to abort.[1]

In her introduction to her "Famous Violinist Problem", Thomson notes that much of the inadequate debate on abortion was getting lost within the issue of whether the fetus is a person or a mass of tissue.

Just sayin'.

 

[Dre89]

I used the violinist analogy in an essay, and it is flawed because of one detail which is very significant.

I explained how the baby is technically more innocent than a ***** mother, and I'll explain that, and how the VA is flawed at the same time.

The reason why the VA is a fallcious analogy, is because unlike in a **** case, the violinist is in a state of dependency independent of the woman. The woman didn't put the violinist in that state.

However, in a **** case, yes the mother is innocent, but it is because of her that a baby has been conceived and put into a state of independency. The baby's SoD revolves entirely around the events surrounding the mother.

This is why the mother is technically less inoccent. She's obviously not morally responsible, but she's physically, or causedly responsible. If a child happens to run out infront of a car and get killed, if the driver was being cautious, they are not morally responsible, but they're still physically responsible.

So the mother is slightly less innocent in that between her and the baby, she had more involvement leading up to the events. A philosopher made a good point in that if someone dumps garbage in your yard, that doesn't give you the right to then go dump it on someone else's yard.

What the VA is trying to make you believe is that is the equivalent of a stranger coming up to you and asking for a grand, otherwise they'll die. That's not the same, because you were not the one who put the stranger in that SoD.

What **** abortion is equivalent to is the money analogy I illustrated in a previous post. X lends Y money, then Z robs Y of the money. Y still has to pay X back, Y can't say "well I'm innocent, therefore I don't owe you anything, and you're the one that's going to have to pay the price".

Also, just a general point, the science of the topic is irrelevant, because I doubt anyone here will actually challenge any of the science. What is relevant is the ability to set prescriptive morals/laws that are consistent with other morals/ laws.

For example, giving a right to life to a born baby and not a fetus is not consistent to me, because neither has achieved personhood (in that they are not self-aware rational beings) and we do not give rights to life to other animals, which don;t have this personhood. So to be consistent, either we say anything without personhood has no right to life, which then includes animals, fetuses and born babies. Or, we say that any organism with the potential to personhood deserves a right to life, which then includes born babies and fetuses, seeing that at the moment of conception, it becomes a unified organism with the potential to achieve personhood.

Also, just to clear up any terminology confusion, when I say human I mean conception onwards, and I use personhood as a distinct notion, something which a human achieves at a certain point. So by my terminology, pro abortionists are saying it should be ok to abort a human until it achieves personhood.

 

[Budget Player Cadet_]

Fair enough, I accept your rebuttal of the analogy and I'll try to get back to the rest of your post.

 

[Dre89]

I respect the maturity in that posts. I think that sort of behaviour should be acknowledged and commended, behaving like that is a rare trait in debaters.

Although it's going to be less fun to stir you if you're mature...

 

[Budget Player Cadet_]

No worries, I'll still be the same petulant little **** as ever in god, evolution, and smash ruleset debates.

 

[Dre89]

You know for someone who fires up pretty much whenever someone disagrees with him, I don't understand why you come to the DH, where pretty much the only thing people will ever do is disagree with you.....

 

[blazedaces]

You know for someone who fires up pretty much whenever someone disagrees with him, I don't understand why you come to the DH, where pretty much the only thing people will ever do is disagree with you.....

He enjoys getting fired up... and he enjoys discovering the truth.

-blazed

 

[Budget Player Cadet_]

I used the violinist analogy in an essay, and it is flawed because of one detail which is very significant.

I explained how the baby is technically more innocent than a ***** mother, and I'll explain that, and how the VA is flawed at the same time.

The reason why the VA is a fallcious analogy, is because unlike in a **** case, the violinist is in a state of dependency independent of the woman. The woman didn't put the violinist in that state.

However, in a **** case, yes the mother is innocent, but it is because of her that a baby has been conceived and put into a state of independency. The baby's SoD revolves entirely around the events surrounding the mother.

This is why the mother is technically less inoccent. She's obviously not morally responsible, but she's physically, or causedly responsible. If a child happens to run out infront of a car and get killed, if the driver was being cautious, they are not morally responsible, but they're still physically responsible.

So the mother is slightly less innocent in that between her and the baby, she had more involvement leading up to the events. A philosopher made a good point in that if someone dumps garbage in your yard, that doesn't give you the right to then go dump it on someone else's yard.

What the VA is trying to make you believe is that is the equivalent of a stranger coming up to you and asking for a grand, otherwise they'll die. That's not the same, because you were not the one who put the stranger in that SoD.

What **** abortion is equivalent to is the money analogy I illustrated in a previous post. X lends Y money, then Z robs Y of the money. Y still has to pay X back, Y can't say "well I'm innocent, therefore I don't owe you anything, and you're the one that's going to have to pay the price".

So far I agree with the logic behind it. It makes sense, overall.

Also, just a general point, the science of the topic is irrelevant, because I doubt anyone here will actually challenge any of the science. What is relevant is the ability to set prescriptive morals/laws that are consistent with other morals/ laws.

For example, giving a right to life to a born baby and not a fetus is not consistent to me, because neither has achieved personhood (in that they are not self-aware rational beings) and we do not give rights to life to other animals, which don;t have this personhood. So to be consistent, either we say anything without personhood has no right to life, which then includes animals, fetuses and born babies. Or, we say that any organism with the potential to personhood deserves a right to life, which then includes born babies and fetuses, seeing that at the moment of conception, it becomes a unified organism with the potential to achieve personhood.

First of all, just to be logically consistent, I do not support personhood for babies, if we assume that this logic is correct. This is an old position of mine, because, well, it is inconsistent to think otherwise, and I just cannot morally support the right to life for fetuses and zygotes.

Second of all... I already mentioned this earlier in the thread, but I think that drawing the line at "fetus" is equally arbitrary to drawing the line anywhere else. To explain why, I first need to know why a fetus has moral rights. I'm assuming because it has the potential to become a fully grown, conscious human. Well... Yes, it has that potential, assuming X, Y, and Z happen. Here's my argument: every cell has that potential, assuming the correct things happen to it (hell, even if you ignore cloning, you're still killing millions every time you ejaculate, be it into a woman or not!).

 

[Sucumbio]

The process of copulation is what makes fertilized eggs different than just a sperm or egg by themselves.

 

[Dre89]

As for moral rights, the discussion naturally assumes some form of objective morality, and that human beings are entitled to rights. Contesting those premises is for a topic about meta ethics, not an applied ethcis discussion such as abortion. The question here is at what point should the human get rights, what point it attains personhood, and whether it needs to have personhood to have rights.

BPC just to make sure I'm clear, I'm saying neither a baby or fetus has personhood, which is why it is inconsistent to protect babies rather than fetuses. To me, taking a Peter Singer stance and saying that neither fetuses nor babies should be protected is more logically valid than just protecting babies, and is equally logically valid to saying to saying both should be protected, so naturally I go with the latter option.


As for the potential argument, the difference between a zygote and the other cells is that at the point of the conception, it becomes a unified organism which then has the potential to achieve personhood.

You have to think of the alternate lines of reasoning. If you're going to say potentiality doesn't matter, and only things currently with personhood deserve rights, than anyone in a coma or even sleep loses their rights.

Alternatively, if you want to treat fetuses as non-living objects, then there would be no problem with aborting every single fetus that comes into existence, but clearly there is. The fact that it's likely that will never happen doesn't change the fact that there's a problem with the principle. Imagine if the government passed a bill saying that if 90% of the public voted that black people be segregated and given poorer living conditions, they would make it happen. The fact that that vote will likely never be achieved doesn't change the fact that it's incredibly immoral of the government to pass that bill.


To be honest, I think people just find it emotionally easier to abort a fetus as opposed to a born baby. I wonder how people would feel about abortion if fetuses looked like born babies from the point of conception (but still had the same limited capacities as a regular fetus).

 

[Sucumbio]

Alternatively, if you want to treat fetuses as non-living objects, then there would be no problem with aborting every single fetus that comes into existence, but clearly there is. The fact that it's likely that will never happen doesn't change the fact that there's a problem with the principle. Imagine if the government passed a bill saying that if 90% of the public voted that black people be segregated and given poorer living conditions, they would make it happen. The fact that that vote will likely never be achieved doesn't change the fact that it's incredibly immoral of the government to pass that bill.

I appreciate what you're trying to do, but your comparisons are horrible! >< It'd be more poignant if you explained why you think it's a problem. I am assuming it's because we'd cease to exist! Right? At least that seems to me the logical problem with aborting all fetuses. As for your analogy ... eh, ... ugh. I can't think of one, I just got back from a concert and my head is ringing. Bottom line is it doesn't quite work that way. "Questions" that get put to ballot arrive there by petition of the citizens by other citizens. If somehow for instance (and actually one of our republican presidential candidates has this in their platform) a petition were made to repeal the Civil Rights Act, then indeed it could spell doom for the civil rights of minorities. Would it pass? Depends, you'd think it wouldn't but in some states, scarily enough it may... Fortunately the Civil Rights Act is a Federal Law, not state, so it'd make little sense to even propose it, and for the Federal government to remove the law, they'd have to achieve a large majority (2/3rds vote iirc) in both the House and Senate, which is highly unlikely. But you'd be surprised just how many of these types of bills actually do make their way to the voting floor, such as things like this.

 

[Dre89]

The technicality of the analogy clearly isn't important. You can just imagine a dictator making the rule on voting blacks into segregation if you want.

The point still stands, the principle is bad if it conceivable to achieve a highly undesirable and virtually unquestionably immoral outcome.

 

[Overtaken]

If the question is, "when does a human being gain the right to life?", and by 'personhood', in this context we mean to say is defined as such a human who has a right to life, then I think it's naturally important that we begin with this fundamental question: What is a right?

Myself, I believe strictly in positive law rights. This is to say, essentially, social contract, or that rights are simply conditions of behaviors and forfeits established by consenting agents. We have a right to live in-so-far as we have agreed to abstain from killing one another with the condition that in violating this agreement one forfeits the remainder of their life to imprisonment or even death. This means also that I oppose the generally mistermed 'natural law' or 'natural rights', which are frequently but not always taken to mean something that would better be described as 'supernatural rights'. All rights, as they are terms of an agreement, are conditional. All behavior that we could possibly willingly exhibit, we could possibly agree to either abolish or protect. Thus, there are no 'inalienable' rights. There is however non-coincidental patterns of law and ethical theories that are inevitable, common results of our socio-biology. I think many philosophers have wrongly contrived these patterns as supernatural, divine, or extra-dimensional legislation of absolute rights, and by extension, absolute codes of morality. I say to them that this is principally either impossible or even completely meaningless. I say, all things termed "real" are, by necessity, things that exhibit self-consistent change and interaction with other elements of that reality. For this, they exhibit a trait called "logic". And when we describe things as super-natural we are describing things that cannot have meaning, since as soon as it interacts with reality in a way that has self-consistency and internal, identifiable logic, it's by definition become natural, and without those traits, it has no indexicallity, that is to say, without a consistent way in interacting with reality, it cannot have anything identifiable about it and therefor cannot be 'indicative' of anything and hence, cannot 'mean' anything.

If anyone is interesting in challenging this, or otherwise just wants a simple example to better understand what it is I am trying to say, allow me to offer this simple little question: Why can we (or would we) not say that gravity, for example, is supernatural?

So from here, and getting to the topic, it should be clear that I'm arguing that the basis of rights, and when one would achieve them, is determined by two criteria. 1. Does it have will? 2. Can it communicate that will in the form of an agreement, or contract? Not only do unborn children have no rights, it would seem born children right up to around the age of 2 or 3 perhaps don't have rights.

Now the solution to this problem isn't as hard as it would seem, but it does involve swallowing a couple of proverbially tough pills. I believe we do need to accept that technically, humans that are in infancy or younger do not have rights. They have neither developed self-awareness, established memory (continuity of a person) nor the ability to communicate. Does this mean we've licensed unlimited infanticide? Certainly, for it's perfectly within our capacity as right-carrying agents to agree not to kill such humans. Babies are valuable to their parents, I know this as well as anyone since I have one. In fact, I'm certain the vast majority of us parents would go so far, with ease, as to say our child's life is more important to us than our own. So no question, positive allow clearly allows a legitimate and quite passionate vehicle for protecting infants, even though we have to admit that what they do not have is rights. They don't have rights because they are in no way the authors of the powers of agreement that are protecting their life, and indeed until they are toddlers roughly, they don't have any interest in such a thing. Trust me, my 9 month old would crawl off the roof of a skyscraper if no one stopped her. But again, they can be protected from our behavior against them by our own expression of will and contract, however ulterior it may be.

So finally, how must this apply to abortion? It means firstly that we should technically be able to define a human's access to protection anywhere before they are able to communicate. This ability to communicate isn't so spontaneous and definitive, so I think for that and host of other reasons we should steer extremely clear from that. The value of any viable infant is recognizable too, in that families who want to adopt or must adopt to have children will have an interest in keeping unwanted children alive, so for me viability is the most sensible place to draw the line. It insures that a woman's right (or interest) to her body will be upheld at all times, for she will always have the option of removing a fetus from her womb, and allowing the fetus to gain protection by being bodily independent. I feel this is a satisfactory way of dealing with a biological problem that doesn't lend itself to easily identifiable and clear points at which a human becomes a being. We would not be murders, delving into infanticidal chaos. Our tendency is to assume that an infant is a conscious, thinking being which we know isn't true. They don't suffer, they aren't aware of themselves or others, they have no conscious will. We wrongly project our own feeling unto them just as a lot of us do to animals. We can take refuge in knowing that an abortion is not causing a being to suffer, nor it's will to be violated. But we can eat our cake too, and live with this because we also are recognizing the value our babies have to us, and affirming it in the strongest way we can. Abortion has no victim, not in any properly ethical sense. But wonton killing of infants has. This is where and why we draw a line at a functional and reasonable place.