An argument for full human personhood from the moment of conception:
- An adult human being is the end result of the continuous growth of the organism from conception.
- At no point, from conception to adulthood, is there a change in the essential nature of the fetus from non-person to person.
- Therefore, one is a person from the point of conception onward.
Adapted from Moral Choices by Scott Rae.
February 18th, 2012 | 5:08 pm | #1
I think (2) kind of begs the question (playing devil’s advocate here). That is the conclusion we’re trying to reach first and foremost. I think a better syllogism would involve proving the second premise first, and then having a separate syllogism for the conclusion here. Because as it stands, any pro-choicer can argue that even if scientifically there is a clear continuity from fetus to adult, they can argue (a) that there is something different about being in the womb or (b) they’ll question the notion of an “essential nature.”
Unfortunately, though, no matter how good we make our arguments few will listen. As it stands, all of our talks about abortion are two ships passing in the night.
February 18th, 2012 | 5:23 pm | #2
Fair enough. I am content to let the burden of proof lie on the pro-choicer to furnish a point of change that is (a) neither arbitrary nor vague, or (b) unrelated to the “essential nature” (that is, “human”) of the fetus.
February 18th, 2012 | 7:18 pm | #3
The argument is entirely sound. All of the counterpoints, brought up by the prochoice side, such as the size of the unborn, its location, its level of development, etc., can be reasonably answered. an excellent book, that had a profound impact on my view concerning the unborn, is by the philosopher Stephen Schwarz, called THE MORAL QESTION OF ABORTION, (Loyola University press, 1990). He provides the acronym “SLED”, to effectively answer the objections of the prochoice side. “S” stands for size. Why should the fact that the embryo/fetus is smaller than other humans mean that it shouldn’t have rights? “L” stands for level of development. Why should the fact that the embryo/fetus is less developed than a born human matter to its moral status? “E” stands for environment. the embryo/fetus is located in a different place. Why should this be morally relevant? “D” stands for dependency. The embryo/fetus is more dependent than other humans. Why should this be an argument for it not having rights?
February 18th, 2012 | 7:24 pm | #4
There is, unfortunately, so much muddled logic and emotionally charged name-calling in this debate that this syllogism is going to fly way over the heads of most pro-choicers and even many pro-lifers. But for those pro-choicers who actually understand the syllogism, the answer is going to be (as I recently discovered after addressing this issue to the pro-choice camp via my blog) that “personhood” does not actually exist except as a social construct or a legal fiction. Thus, if the Supreme Court rules that personhood begins at birth, then that is when personhood begins, by definition. (How some of them deal with this definition of personhood when it comes to the Jews in WWII Germany, for example, is another question. Were they persons if they stepped across the border into Switzerland but truly and definitively *not* persons if they were stuck inside the German border? But I digress.) The point is that a truly consistent pro-choice advocate is going to be a materialist/atheist for whom “personhood” is nothing more than a fiction we dreamed up at some point in our evolutionary history as a means to preserve the species, and therefore ALL definitions of personhood will be seen by them as arbitrary. As one commenter on my blog put it, “There is no TRUTH to be discovered. We choose to protect the elderly and disabled. Not all human societies have/do that…. If someone else wants to commit genetic suicide, I don’t see why I should care.” Thank God for morally inconsistent atheists.
February 18th, 2012 | 8:20 pm | #5
I think Hannah touches on the most critical point about abortion in our society. As sad as it is, the state of affairs that exists now won’t be changed by us making really rational arguments. There are rational arguments for abortion (namely Judith Thomson’s famous “violinist” example in her essay “A Defense of Abortion”), yet those haven’t swayed pro-lifers. (And rightly so; Thomson’s argument, while the best argument I’ve heard for abortion, is still not a very good one). The currency of society now is power, backed by positive law. The fact that the Supreme Court is unlikely to define personhood at conception means that abortion will likely remain a legal act in the states. While it’s unfortunate that this decision remains at the whims of the government and not that of the will of the people, we must be realistic when trying to save those lives we believe to be innocent and deserving of life.
That’s why, though I disagree with Obama’s stance on abortion, I applaud him for arguing that we need to create the circumstances wherein women won’t need to get abortions. Trying to radically overhaul our legislature on the subject poses to greatly a risk of loss; we need to make it so that abortion won’t have to be an option for pregnant women.
February 18th, 2012 | 8:53 pm | #6
Certainly we’re all exposed to the same empirical data, concerning the embryo/fetus. The biological traits that it manifests are well established. From these facts, we can deduce what its proper moral status is. And the only logical conclusion that one can derive, is that it’s a human person, deserving of our legal protection. Facts are facts. I think, if I remember correctly, it was Ronald Reagan who said that, one is entitled to one’s own opinion, but not to one’s own facts. And it’s also a fact that the embryo/fetus is no different than a post born human, except it’s younger. Therefore, if one chooses to deny it rights, but not deny postborn humans rights, one is being logically inconsistent. Reagan could have also pointed out the corollary, of his statement regarding facts, that one is not entitled to one’s own logic either.
February 19th, 2012 | 10:05 am | #7
Possible rejoinder to point 2: Early in development, an embryo can be split in several pieces, forming multiple, viable embryos. Two embryos can be aggregated, forming a single viable embryo. These procedures can be perfomed artificially and also occur naturally. Later in development, splitting or aggregating embryos will kill them. This characteristic impinges on “personhood,” because it means that an early embryo is potentially more than one person or, perhaps, only part of one person.
Conclusion: The totipotency of cells in early embryos constitutes a unique feature of the early embryo and distinguishes its essental nature from that of both unfertilized gametes and fetuses later in development.
Since this characteristic is only present in very early embryos, it wouldn’t have a practical effect on the morality of later abortion (though it might affect morality of contraceptive methods that prevent implantation). However, I think it is sufficient to invalidate the syllogism.
February 19th, 2012 | 11:09 am | #8
Very interesting comments, all.
However, when Hannah G. suggests, “The point is that a truly consistent pro-choice advocate is going to be a materialist/atheist for whom “personhood” is nothing more than a fiction we dreamed up at some point in our evolutionary history as a means to preserve the species, and therefore ALL definitions of personhood will be seen by them as arbitrary” I wonder if she realizes that she accuses the likes of Jerome, Augustine, Aquinas, Pope Innocent III, et. al. of being “materialist/atheist”?
Peace.
February 19th, 2012 | 2:47 pm | #9
Rae’s argument is nice because it resembles a type of sorites paradox:
1. A large pile of sand is a heap of sand.
2. Starting with the large pile of sand, and subtracting one grain at a time, there is no point at which the subtraction of a single grain turns a heap of sand into a non-heap of sand.
3. Therefore, it is possible to have a heap of sand without any grains of sand.
Whatever resolves the sorities paradox likely also undermines Rae’s argument.
February 19th, 2012 | 6:55 pm | #10
Nikolai Volk is correct that Mr. Omelianchuk’s second premise is question begging. But, perhaps more interestingly, his first premise negates the second.
When he writes, “An adult human being is the end result…” he necessarily means that the “human-ness” of this being comes at the end. This premise says nothing about the nature of the being at the beginning or even the middle.
Therefore, his conclusion – i.e. “Therefore, one is a person from the point of conception onward”- does not follow.
Peace.
February 19th, 2012 | 7:29 pm | #11
He necessarily means that?
Nice try–but no.
February 19th, 2012 | 7:55 pm | #12
“When he writes, “An adult human being is the end result…” he necessarily means that the “human-ness” of this being comes at the end.”
This is erroneous. An adult human being is a particular, not a universal. The essential properties (humaness, personhood) of that particular can be possessed at every stage of its development.
February 20th, 2012 | 9:40 am | #13
[...] An Argument of Personhood from Conception – A very brief, easy-to-understand argument defending the stance that personhood begins at conception. [...]
February 20th, 2012 | 11:06 am | #14
Why should we assume that the relevant notion of “person” isn’t vague, in the sense of admitting of borderline cases? I would have thought that “person” is at least as vague as “child”. So here’s a similar argument as Rae’s:
1. A one day year old human being is a child.
2. If an n day old human being is a child, then that human being is also a child when it is n + 1 days old.
3. Therefore, a 36,500 day old human being is a child.
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/vagueness/
February 20th, 2012 | 11:34 am | #15
“…personhood” does not actually exist except as a social construct or a legal fiction”
This in fact assumes that social constructs have less of an existence then “non-social constructs” and in any case it is hard to think of a human function that is “non-social” .
February 20th, 2012 | 3:37 pm | #16
@ Tom Gilson
I guess it depends on what your definition of “is” is.
An oak tree is the “end result of the continuous growth of the organism from conception” but who would argue an acorn is an oak tree? The “is-ness” of the oak tree is in it’s current state and not in it’s past states. (There is, to be sure, a “was-ness” in past states, but Mr. O describes the current state.)
So Mr. O errs when he reproves me thusly: “An adult human being is a particular, not a universal. The essential properties (humaness, personhood) of that particular can be possessed at every stage of its development.”
But, an “essential property” of an “adult” human is exactly that “adult-ness”. (Surely Mr. O doesn’t maintain that “adult-ness” is evidenced in embryonic form, does he?) So, yes, it necessarily follows that when Mr. O states, “An adult human being is the end result…” the “result” of which he speaks is at the “end.” (Now he might very well mean that an adult human being is part of a continuum of “human-ness” which begins at conception and continues eternally. But that is rather not what he said.)
The unfortunate thing of Mr. O’s position (I take it that the syllogism he offers is his position) is that it is not the historic Christian position and it introduces an anthropology that has been previously discredited. That is to say, he relies on a 17th doctrine of preformationism which has been discarded as well as a Cartesian dualism which the church has likewise abandoned.
All in all, a worthy discussion. Tom, you bring back memories of the Clinton years!
Peace.
February 20th, 2012 | 3:48 pm | #17
@Adam Omelianchuk
Hi Adam,
You wrote, “An adult human being is a particular, not a universal.” Ok, but I may have missed your meaning.
You further wrote, “The essential properties (humaness, personhood) of that particular can be possessed at every stage of its development.”
But that is surely further question begging. The question is not what “can” be possessed but what “is” possessed. I might just as easily assert that the essential properties can not be possessed at every stage. Then where are we? (Please see my earlier response to Tom Gilson for an example.)
That seems to be the nub of the discussion. What “can be” and what “is” possessed by an embryo or adult and how can we “know”. That’s the issue.
And as I mentioned to Tom, the position asserted in your syllogism seems to me, at least, to contradict church history and anthropology.
This is always a fun discussion. Thanks for starting it.
Peace.
February 20th, 2012 | 4:15 pm | #18
Constantine — a germinated acorn is in fact a member of the species “oak tree,” though we feel odd saying that because instinctively, when we think of a “tree,” we think of “great big tall thing with wooden stem.”
But biologically, the thing IS a tree, just a very immature one. Don’t confuse common-sense connotations of words (a tree is a big thing you can climb) with biological realities (any member of the species oak is biologically equivalent to an oak tree.)
February 21st, 2012 | 9:03 am | #19
[...] Logic and personhood. [...]
February 21st, 2012 | 9:03 am | #20
[...] Logic and personhood. [...]
February 22nd, 2012 | 9:04 am | #21
Dear Constantine: You wrote, “I wonder if she realizes that she accuses the likes of Jerome, Augustine, Aquinas, Pope Innocent III, et. al. of being “materialist/atheist”?”
Well, I can’t speak in the others’ cases, but in the case of Aquinas, he thought that any human being is thus also a human person. He just didn’t think an embryo became a human being for a time, due to his faulty Aristotelian embryology.
Today, if he knew of human DNA and other considerations, I think Aquinas would concede his error and think of a human being (and thus a human person) as existing from conception.
February 23rd, 2012 | 7:12 am | #22
1. An adult human being is the end result of the continuous growth of the organism from conception. [TRUE]
2. At no point, from conception to adulthood, is there a change in the essential nature of the fetus from non-person to person.[FALSE]
[A fertilized egg has no brain. Therefore, it has no mind and can't think, see, hear, comprehend, speak or do any of the things that make a person. These are all essential parts of the nature of a person and they only start to develop at birth.]
3. Therefore, one is a person from the point of conception onward.[FALSE]
February 23rd, 2012 | 7:31 am | #23
I’m sure some people will jump up and say, “A blind man can’t see, but he’s still a person.” You’re right. Thinking is the only ESSENTIAL part of a person, whether that person is you, me, C3PO or an intelligent blue furry thing from a different planet. I added the rest to show some of the many things a fertilized egg or even a very late term fetus can’t do which persons generally can.
Adam, the ability to think is the point of change between a non-person and a person and learning to think only starts at birth.
February 23rd, 2012 | 7:45 am | #24
So David,
Someone who is severely mentally disabled/cognitively impaired — unable to “think” is not to be granted personhood?
February 23rd, 2012 | 8:06 am | #25
Hi David M. & fellow commenters,
Here’s a Web page I set up a few months ago that will (I hope) answer all your objections regarding the personhood of the embryo and/or fetus:
http://www.angelfire.com/linux/vjtorley/prolife.html
It’s designed for atheists, by the way. It’s meant to show that even if you don’t believe in God or an immaterial soul, it still makes sense to be pro-life. Enjoy!
I’ll be a little busy tonight with other engagements, so for the time being, I’ll leave you to argue about the merits of my case. I’ll probably be back in about 24 hours or so.
Best wishes,
Vincent
February 23rd, 2012 | 9:22 am | #26
Dear David Mullenix: The older definition of a “person” is “an individual substance of rational nature.” (Boethius, by way of Aquinas.)
The emphasis is on the nature, not on the abilities. Nor is the emphasis on whether or not the individual can even exercise that nature (as in the case of a conceptus with no cortex).
The problem with your saying that “thinking is the only ESSENTIAL part of a person” is that there is no firm reason for thinking that–nor is there any firm reason for insisting on any particular functionality for the definition of “personhood.”
It seems more logical to think of human persons as persons because of their nature–a nature that is instantiated at conception, regardless of abilities.
February 23rd, 2012 | 9:24 am | #27
David M,
And to follow on: “C3PO” (if it were real) is a “person” because it can think? But a child in the womb at 39 weeks is not?
Does personhood (under your rubric) endure?
ie. Does a loss of cognitive function reduce or eliminate the subject’s personhood? What are the parameters? Say you were in a car accident and had to be placed in a medically induced coma. What would the status of your personhood during that time?
February 23rd, 2012 | 11:29 am | #28
“Adam, the ability to think is the point of change between a non-person and a person and learning to think only starts at birth.”
David, others have already answered you on this point, but “the ability to think” is a pretty vague notion. If you mean “reasoning” then those who are severely mentally retarded, those who are in comas, and those who are infants are not persons. Say person A gets into a car accident and goes into a month long coma. By virtue of the coma, A has lost the ability to think. Therefore, A is not a person. But when A comes out of the coma A is able to think again. Therefore, A is a person. I suppose one could take a view that personhood is contingent upon one’s ability to reason but that would be an odd view to take on human personhood!
If you mean “self-awareness” or “the ability desire one’s interests” then infanticide is permissible on your view. Again, this is defended by the likes of Michael Tooley so it’s not a philosophically indefensible position. But most people think babies are people too, because they are persons who are in the process of developing their abilities. Not the other way around.
February 23rd, 2012 | 11:39 am | #29
Adam O. again seems to assume that vagueness disqualifies. But why?
(Adam, I think your criticism in #27 would be more clearly put in terms of ambiguousness, not vagueness. I personally suspect that we may actually need vagueness to deal with various hard cases in morality. But, if you really do think that vagueness and not ambiguity is a problem, as you #2 comment suggests, I’d love to hear your reasons.)
February 23rd, 2012 | 1:00 pm | #30
Anicus, fair enough. The ability of “the ability to think” is ambiguous. But it is also vague in the technical sense. David M thinks “the ability to think” is present at birth. But why not a day before birth? Such borderline cases make it hard to see the break that is purported to be there.
February 23rd, 2012 | 1:45 pm | #31
Adam, your challenge “but why not a day before birth” is the very sort of sorities style of thinking that leads to all kinds of paradox–and not just in morality. The idea of vagueness, or of borderline cases, is the usual way of dealing with these paradoxes. That is, it would seem entirely appropriate for someone like David M. to say that a highly developed fetus the day (or millisecond) before birth (or, a fetus half-way birthed) falls on the borderline between person and non-person. That there should be such borderline cases is only to be expected–at least I would have thought.
February 23rd, 2012 | 6:46 pm | #32
Ancius, the problem is that the point at which a heap comes into or goes out of existence is an interesting philosophical problem, and really nothing more.
But if you guess wrong about the baby, you’ve licensed murder. That’s why ambiguity is actually paralyzing — you can’t take that risk.
February 23rd, 2012 | 7:37 pm | #33
You’ve been invited to the firing range, where before you stands a cardboard figure in the shape of a small human being, with a curtain shrouding everything around it. You’re handed a gun, and then you are informed, “You will have that gun for nine minutes. Sometime during that nine minutes your daughter will step behind that cardboard, and she will stay there until the nine minutes are over. None of us knows when she will step back there; in fact, she could be there right now.
“Feel free to shoot when you think it’s safe.”
Your daughter is in your womb; or at least there’s some entity in your womb that may already be your daughter, or will become your daughter (in the sense that matters) at some time during nine months. You may deny personhood at the moment of conception, but that denial should not be confused with real knowledge. In particular you have no principled way of knowing when that’s really your daughter in your womb. You have no principled way of knowing that what’s in your womb is not your daughter already.
Feel fee to shoot when you think it’s safe.
February 23rd, 2012 | 11:43 pm | #34
We shouldn’t assume that vagueness arises from a limitation of knowledge. After all, in the case of the sand grains, isn’t it odd to think that the real problem is that we simply lack knowledge about the precise point at which one less grain of sand turns a heap of sand into a non-heap? Likewise, don’t assume that borderline cases of fetal/neonate personhood result from our lack of knowledge–as if we simply don’t know whether or not a zygote is a person. In philosophical jargon: don’t just assume that the vagueness here is epistemic.
February 24th, 2012 | 12:08 am | #35
The vagueness need not arise from a lack of knowledge to be significant for decision-making purposes. Lack of knowledge is lack of knowledge, and if one does not know what it is that one is forcibly removing from the womb, then one does not know.
If it’s possible you’re killing your daughter with the gun, it doesn’t matter what the reason might be for that ambiguity, you don’t shoot regardless. If it’s possible you’re killing your daughter (in the relevant sense) with an abortion, why would that be any different?
February 24th, 2012 | 12:45 am | #36
Except now you’ve got to give a new argument, one which doesn’t appeal to a line drawing problem, or anything like Rae’s premise 2.
Moreover, on the personhood question, your suggested tactic leads to new problems: if you can’t be sure that a zygote isn’t a person, how can you be sure that a chimpanzee isn’t a person, or a dolphin, or a dog?
February 24th, 2012 | 6:35 am | #37
Let’s take this topic from the start: By the sixties it was known scientifically that mental activity in humans and other animals takes place in the brain. Some theologians and philosophers still disagree, but their belief is emotional and religious in nature and rational evidence is not going to change their minds. I’m hoping here that we are all open to evidence and rational argument, else why bother discussing anything?
It was equally well known there was no mental activity of any kind at the start of human gestation because there was no brain present. This was the basis for Roe v. Wade and it’s reflected in the decision: First trimester, abortion is up to the doctor and the patient and then more restrictions in the second trimester when a rudimentary brain is present and still more in the third trimester when it was felt at the time that a consciousness might be present.
Roe v Wade was 1973. Nearly four decades of continuing research have amply confirmed what was known then about prenatal mental development and vastly added to our knowledge of how our minds form. We now put the beginning of mental development at birth, when the baby starts to interact with the environment and neuronal wiring starts to change based on the baby’s experience.
Given the above, personhood, which is entirely mental, requires a functioning brain in animals or the equivalent in robots, space aliens or anything else you might put up for consideration. (Angels? Demons?) In the abortion argument, that means after birth.
Now to specifics:
David c, how mentally impaired are you talking about? Nobody says you have to be a genius to be a person.
Craig: As you say, a person is “an individual substance of RATIONAL nature.” What is the “nature” of a person if not the ability to think. And if thought is the hallmark of a person, why would you deny personhood to C3P0? To do so would be reminiscent of the judges in Dred Scott. A fertilized egg doesn’t have the hardware to have any kind of mental activity and a fetus, even at the 39th week, is still building the hardware. Training the hardware can’t begin until birth. It takes months of neural growth AND interaction with the world for thought to begin. Neither Boethius or Acquinas had access to the the study of fetal and child development so their opinions are not trustworthy here.
Adam at 11:29 “Thinking” is just the tip of the mental iceberg. 99% of thought is beneath consciousness and uses stored data that are generally still present when you’re in a coma. If the coma lifts, thought will return. Unless you’re Terri Schiavo and most of your cerebral cortex has died and is no longer even there. I agree with Tooley in the case of a newborn. I forget exactly when a child was presented to the tribe in the Old Testament, but 8 days sticks in my mind, which leaves a good safety margin.
Adam 1:00 pm – I do NOT think that the ability to think is present at birth! It BEGINS to DEVELOP at birth. Interaction with the world is absolutely crucial to the development of a mind. The “borderline” is somewhere between birth and a few months after.
Pentamom and Tom, that’s why there’s no guessing about abortion. We know there’s nobody there until some time after birth.
Ancius, what makes you think that a chimpanzee isn’t a person? In intelligence tests, adult chimps generally surpass humans up to about age three, then humans pull ahead. Except that a four year old human would never survive on its own in the woods while adult chimps do pretty well. Think of chimps as children +. Then think of what we do to them and shudder. Dolphins may be persons too, I don’t know enough about them to say. Ditto too, in a dim way, for adult dogs. Most mammals probably have some degree of personhood in them. Certainly, from mice on up, they have emotions, feel pain and fear, and (generally) love their children, at least the females do. We humans are arrogant about reserving personhood for ourselves.
I don’t generally get on the internet on weekends, but I will answer any replies Monday morning.
February 24th, 2012 | 6:53 am | #38
Except, Dave (this applies to Ancius’s question too), you’ve left one assertion laying bare and unsupported: “personhood is entirely mental.” I think you’re saying that personhood is entirely a matter of the subject’s experience. That strips personhood of all ontological reality: there is no such thing as personhood, really, except as a shorthand phrase for “having mental experiences.” You might add some qualifiers to that: “having a mental experience and experiencing self as self, or experiencing pain as pain,” but with all your qualifiers you end up with personhood being shorthand for something of that sort.
Could you explain why we ought to equate that with morally significant personhood, please, and why you are certain that personhood must not, cannot possibly, be anything else whatsoever?
“There’s nobody there until some time after birth…” So it’s okay to abort them in the womb, and it’s okay to slay them right after they cry their first cry?
February 24th, 2012 | 6:55 am | #39
Ancius, I don’t see why I’ve got to give a new argument.
February 24th, 2012 | 10:45 am | #40
The lesson of the sorities paradox is that we should be highly suspicious of arguments that, like Rae’s premise 2, challenge us to identify the precise moment at which a developing embryo/fetus becomes a person. The challenger then asks: why not a second before or after? This sort of reasoning leads to all sorts of absurdities in morality and elsewhere. Likewise, we should be highly suspicious of pro-lifers who, because of this form of thinking, feel that they have to conclude that personhood begins at conception.
When we’re careful to avoid the sorities type thinking, we can simply say that, as in the case of heaps, so in the case of persons: there are clear cases person, clear cases of non-persons, and a lot in between. A brick is a clear case of a non-person. But how about a third-trimester human fetus, or an intelligent and emotionally complex adult chimpanzee which has been socialized among humans? Perhaps these are borderline cases. Now beware: the concession (if we make it) that these are borderline cases needn’t lead us to also concede that a human zygote or a mouse is also a borderline case.
It would probably also clarify matters greatly if we gave more thought to the concept of “person” and the role that it is supposed to be playing in these discussions. In these discussions, “person” seems to be a quasi-technical term for entities possessing a certain bundle of rights (probably poorly defined) which we typically ascribe to things like normal adult human beings and 5-year old children, and which we would be willing to ascribe to highly intelligent beings that were a lot like us, even if they didn’t belong to the same biological species (think, perhaps, of Clark Kent, or of incarnated angels forced by God to live among us). If this is indeed how we are using the term, then it should be no surprise that we encounter hard cases when we try to determine precisely where to apply the concept. But, then, suddenly, we also might begin to realize that there are probably more reasonable ways to approach the abortion issue–ways that don’t insist on seeing everything simply in terms of the person/non-person distinction.
February 24th, 2012 | 11:29 am | #41
“Now beware: the concession (if we make it) that these are borderline cases needn’t lead us to also concede that a human zygote or a mouse is also a borderline case.”
So what? You still have to provide a criteria for your judgment. You think premise two is false, so that means you think there is a a point of change. What is it?
“But, then, suddenly, we also might begin to realize that there are probably more reasonable ways to approach the abortion issue–ways that don’t insist on seeing everything simply in terms of the person/non-person distinction.”
So far I have seen none from anyone in the comments. What is your more “reasonable” way?
February 24th, 2012 | 11:39 am | #42
Adam, I think you are still failing to grasp the problem posed by the sorities paradox. Suppose I were to ask you for the precise point at which a heap of sand becomes a non-heap. In other words: precisely how many grains of sand are necessary to constitute a heap of sand? What does your failure to answer this question, as asked, reveal? Does your failure reveal (or even suggest) that there is no point at which the difference of a single grain of sand turns a heap into a non-heap? And does it thereby suggest that a heap of sand can contain no sand (see the parallel argument in comment #9).
February 24th, 2012 | 12:05 pm | #43
Ancius: do you know at what point a fetus becomes a morally significant human being? Do you know it with certainty?
Those are yes/no questions. Either you know (with certainty) or you do not.
Do we have to know how many grains constitute a heap of sand before you can know whether you know the answer to those questions?
February 24th, 2012 | 12:35 pm | #44
Tom, I would refer you back to comment #41, the lesson of the Sorites paradox. What do you take that lesson to be? Or do you think that it is not instructive at all?
February 24th, 2012 | 1:30 pm | #45
Anicus, I grasp it just fine. I claimed that one has the property of personhood at conception. You don’t. I ask you at one point does the fetus change from non-person to person? You don’t give an answer. I think it’s because you know that vagueness is a problem, but for some reason you think it is for me, and not you. I find that baffling. So back to my question. You think premise two is false, so that means you think there is a a point of change. What is it?
February 24th, 2012 | 1:43 pm | #46
Adam, So back to my question. You [presumably] think premise two is false, so that means you think there is a a point of change. What is it?
1. A large pile of sand is a heap of sand.
2. Starting with the large pile of sand, and subtracting one grain at a time, there is no point at which the subtraction of a single grain turns a heap of sand into a non-heap of sand.
3. Therefore, it is possible to have a heap of sand without any grains of sand.
Do you fail to see the close parallel?
February 24th, 2012 | 2:39 pm | #47
Ancius, I had already read #41, and I don’t see it as instructive. All it does is tell us in different language that the transition from non-personhood to personhood (in the morally relevant sense) is ambiguous; but that’s already been said often enough by abortion proponents.
Further, the paradox turns on the word “heap.” Do you know for sure that that is the correct “close parallel”? What if the real parallel is sand? Either there is sand there, or there is not; there is nothing ambiguous about it. On what basis do you know this is not the more accurate way to view it?
Anyway, do you have an answer to my questions in #42? They are very short.
February 24th, 2012 | 2:41 pm | #48
I don’t see a parallel, because there isn’t one to see. Here is the original argument again:
1. An adult human being is the end result of the continuous growth of the organism from conception.
2. At no point, from conception to adulthood, is there a change in the essential nature of the fetus from non-person to person.
3. Therefore, one is a person from the point of conception onward.
Let’s restate your argument in terms of this argument:
1. A heap of sand is the end result of continuous additions of one grain of sand from t1 when one begins with one grain of sand.
2. At no point, from t1 to the end result, is there a change from non-heap to heap.
3.Therefore, there is a heap of sand from t1 onward.
The problem: a human being is a deep unity of properties whereas a heap of sand is not. I would say the same about a dog or a cat or other natural kinds. The bearer of those properties is present at conception and its essential properties develop over time. My claim: at no point, from conception to adulthood, is there a change in these essential properties such that the bearer of those properties changes from a non-person to person or non-human to human for that matter.
A second problem: one grain of sand is not a bearer of the property of “being a heap” because one grain of sand does not develop over time into a heap. You have to keep adding grains of sand. That is why I think the first argument is true and the second argument is false.
February 24th, 2012 | 3:05 pm | #49
Tom, you seem to be confusing “ambiguity” with “vagueness.” As to the parallel, I encourage you to closely re-read #41. And again, note the distinction between ambiguity and vagueness. It wouldn’t harm you to read up: http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/vagueness/
http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/sorites-paradox/
February 24th, 2012 | 3:12 pm | #50
Adam,
A child, or a baby, is also presumably “a deep unity of properties.” And, as you should have noticed, the same paradox can be run in terms of these (re-read #14). We speak of heaps to keep things really simple, to help focus the mind on the basic pattern of thinking–a pattern of thinking that seems to have a deep grip on the pro-lifers here.
February 24th, 2012 | 3:41 pm | #51
I’m sorry, but I don’t see your paradox, and you are not seeing my point. We will have to agree to disagree.
You said “But, then, suddenly, we also might begin to realize that there are probably more reasonable ways to approach the abortion issue–ways that don’t insist on seeing everything simply in terms of the person/non-person distinction.”
What is your more “reasonable” way?
February 24th, 2012 | 3:55 pm | #52
Adam, if you can’t see the sorites paradox, we probably won’t see eye to eye. (It should, however, bother you that its status as a paradox is well established.)
To see the more reasonable way to approach these issues, we would have to begin by closely considering the concept of “person” as it is being used in these discussions. We would consider what work or function the concept is supposed to serve. These considerations would reveal underlying assumptions. We could then, I think, productively question those assumptions.
But this sort of stuff requires careful thinking, and philosophical skill. Your failure to see the Sorites paradox isn’t promising.
February 24th, 2012 | 3:59 pm | #53
Anicus, I know about how the paradox works, but I do not see that it applies to my argument. I explained why in 48, and I don’t understand why you think it does. Please don’t misrepresent me by claiming I don’t understand it at all. Your insult of my intelligence is not called for.
February 24th, 2012 | 4:05 pm | #54
Anicus,
You wrote: “A child, or a baby, is also presumably “a deep unity of properties.” And, as you should have noticed, the same paradox can be run in terms of these (re-read #14). ”
This is irrelevant. In either case the personhood endures throughout.
February 24th, 2012 | 4:11 pm | #55
Adam, even if I did think that you were unintelligent – or ill-trained or overly hasty – you needn’t worry that I’d also think that such things would disqualify you from being respected as a “person”. And anyhow, as pro-lifers go, I think your intelligence is at least average. But such assessments, I think, are neither here nor there.
Your explanation in #48? (Perhaps our numbering isn’t the asame? #48 appears on my screen as one of my comments.) If you meant your point about the “deep unity of properties,” I noted the inadequacy of that in my 3:12 p.m. comment. Can you not see how a Sorites paradox can be generated in terms of “child” or “baby”?
February 24th, 2012 | 4:12 pm | #56
Ancius, your sense of your own superiority here is duly noted. Be assured that the message has been communicated, and feel free to switch to another topic.
You might try answering my questions in #42, or responding to my challenge concerning the proper parallel in the paradox. Or you might answer Adam’s questions.
It is easy to play the game, “Here’s my point, and if you didn’t get it, re-read it; unless you’re too stupid to understand it, in which case I can’t help you.” It’s easy to use that game to evade questions directed toward you. It’s a good way to get across the message that I have just now indicated you can feel free to relax on. It’s not a good way, however, to conduct reasoned discourse.
February 24th, 2012 | 4:14 pm | #57
P.S. I can see how a Sorites paradox can be generated in terms of child or baby. Adam can too, I’m sure. We’re both wondering why you think it’s relevant. The more you keep asking us the same question rather than answering ours, the longer it will take for you to get around to communicating what’s relevant about it.
February 24th, 2012 | 4:16 pm | #58
I find that people too often read blog comments to hastily–perhaps because they’re blog comments. It hinders productive discussions. Does my pointing this out indicate superiority. Perhaps, but only on this point. Not a big deal. The more important point: go back and re-read. Slowly and out-loud perhaps!
February 24th, 2012 | 4:20 pm | #59
No thanks. I’m not playing your game. Adam, you can stay in if you want, but I think it’s clear what you’re engaging in is not reasoned discourse. It is a sham.
February 24th, 2012 | 4:22 pm | #60
I can’t help you Tom. Sorry.
February 24th, 2012 | 4:24 pm | #61
Anicus,
Sure, but how is that relevant? Children shouldn’t be killed. Babies shouldn’t be killed. Why not? Because persons shouldn’t be killed. Non-persons? That’s what matters. The stakes are high for whoever (or whatever) we are deciding personhood. The tacit claim behind premise 2 is that a sorites paradox applies to any point suggested after conception. The pro-choice side can’t ignore this. This is so simple even I, one who has “at least” average intelligence can understand this!
February 24th, 2012 | 4:26 pm | #62
Thanks, Ancius, but you’re still playing your game. I guess you missed the point that you have already successfully communicated your own sense of superiority, and that you can relax on that message.
I wasn’t asking for “help.” For a while I was asking you to justify your position in light of challenges Adam and I had raised against its relevance. Since you’re not going to do that, then I have nothing to ask of you.
February 24th, 2012 | 4:28 pm | #63
Adam, again, what’s significance is the pattern or form of thinking that generates the Sorites paradox. Try to abstract away from the particular content, and you’ll see that your objection about “a deep unity of properties” misses the mark.
February 24th, 2012 | 4:34 pm | #64
Wow, hot topic. A lot of debate has ensued since I last checked in, but I’ll attempt to jump back into the fray at this late stage anyway.
As much as I believe in the personhood of the unborn from the point of conception, I think it’s safe to say that the syllogism at the beginning of this post is really not sufficient for making that case.
As I stated in my original comment, for the consistent atheist/materialist ALL definitions of personhood (applied to any group, whether born or not) are completely subjective and arbitrary. In other words, for the materialist there is no higher court of appeal than that of human opinion in order to determine what personhood is, because personhood is strictly a matter of perception. One might even call it a matter of collective taste. For the Christian, this is obviously an untenable position.
If some human institution (the Supreme Court, Parliament, the “majority”, the tribe, the American Medical Association, etc.) is the ultimate bestower of personhood, then there is no real case to be made about the “true” personhood of anyone suffering the consequences of officially sanctioned dehumanization. If the buck stops with us as regards the definition of personhood, then if a particular society officially decides that “pets are people too” (as the name of our local pet store claims), then your goldfish is now, by definition, a person. In our current situation, the non-personhood of unborn humans is, according to common atheistic dogma, nothing more nor less than a legal status as determined, in this country, by the accepted authority of the Supreme Court. That definition can be neither right nor wrong in any ultimate or objective sense. It simply IS. Slip outside the womb, and voila! A person! Stuck inside the womb, and alas! Just a bunch a human cells to whom no rights belong.
Personhood, for the consistent atheist/materialist, has absolutely no objective existence beyond what we humans decide to give it. Personhood is a purely subjective category that may be defined however a particular society sees fit at any given point in history. Thus, a Jew living in Hitler’s Germany was, by definition, not a person. Human, maybe. But a person? Nope. Step across the Swiss border, and congratulations, you’re a person! Stuck inside Germany, and no, sorry, you’re not. That’s how personhood must function in that moral universe.
When science replaces deity, and when rational thought becomes the ultimate standard for personhood because it is (allegedly) measurable in some scientific way, our definition is no clearer. Instead we are stuck with numerous grey areas regarding the personhood of mentally disabled persons(?) or those in a coma or suffering from Alzheimer’s or dementia, or even those under temporary anesthesia. Sleep might even (at least given the totally irrational nature of some of my dreams) be considered a non-personal state, potentially making it acceptable to kill someone who is simply asleep. This standard for personhood also does, as one commenter suggests, bring the non-personhood of animal life into question as well. I’ve known intelligent dogs who at times behave far more rationally than my own beloved five-year-old. What then?
Ultimately, this is not a question that logic alone can answer. The question is whether personhood exists as an objective reality beyond human laws and opinions. Is it merely a legal fiction? Merely a scientific category? Merely a social construct? Or is it something much more? I believe it is something much more.
I make no claims to being either a logician or a theologian. (I’m a stay-at-home mom with five kids and a degree in graphic design.) But I believe I am well within my rights as a Christian to say that personhood is an attribute of God and that this is a belief beyond the scope of natural law; it requires the eyes of faith. Human life, because it is made in the image of a personal God, also bears the attribute of personhood. This, again, is a premise that is spiritually rather than rationally discerned. Human life—whether as a tiny, shapeless cluster of cells or a 6-foot-tall, walking, talking cluster of cells—is life made in God’s image. And because it is human life, it is utterly unique among all creatures and uniquely protected under the laws of Him who created it. That is why we are in no way permitted (aside from clear divine mandate) to snuff out human life—at any stage of development.
This is not to say that a human zygote is a *complete* person. But neither am I a complete person. We are, up until the very day of our death, growing in our personhood, growing in our humanity. Personhood finds its completion only in Christ, who himself, in his humanity, “grew in wisdom and in stature and in favor with God and man.” We are not perfect in our personhood, but we bear God’s image, and that is enough.
Ultimately, the syllogism in the original post is insufficient proof for the personhood of the unborn, because the definition of personhood is, in the end, a religious and theological question. Logic can get us part of the way there, but to believe in objective personhood at all, so it seems to me, would require belief in an authority that supercedes all human opinion. It would require, in other words, a belief in God.
February 24th, 2012 | 4:35 pm | #65
Ho so? The deep unity of properties that is a human person endures through time and develops from an embryo, to a baby, to a toddler, to an adolescent, to an adult. Being a baby isn’t essential to being human. Only when the person dies is it no longer a person.
February 24th, 2012 | 4:37 pm | #66
@Pentamom, who wrote, “But biologically, the thing IS a tree, just a very immature one.”
Then why do you call it an acorn? Do not words have meaning to you?
@Craig Payne, who wrote, “Well, I can’t speak in the others’ cases, but in the case of Aquinas, he thought that any human being is thus also a human person. He just didn’t think an embryo became a human being for a time, due to his faulty Aristotelian embryology.”
Hi Craig, why did the Catholic Church at the Council of Vienne (1312) make this view official? In fact, the church forbade, for centuries, the baptizing of any prematurely born “babies”. So it seems it was no just Aquinas but also the Catholic church that held this “official” view.
Peace.
February 24th, 2012 | 4:39 pm | #67
Let’s not beg the question here Adam. That is, don’t simply rule out the possibility that personhood, like babyhood, isn’t “essential to being human.”
February 24th, 2012 | 4:42 pm | #68
Well, you will have to give some good reasons why I shouldn’t rule that possibility out. So far you haven’t offered any. Your’s is the last word.
February 24th, 2012 | 4:44 pm | #69
Here’s the good reason: to rule that possibility out obviously begs the question!
February 24th, 2012 | 4:59 pm | #70
And we’re back to comment 2. Done.
February 24th, 2012 | 5:20 pm | #71
Well, I still have a couple of comments, I guess.
Dear Constantine: I thought the 1312 Council merely ratified the view that the soul was the form of the body, and that both made up a unity of the human person. If there is a living human body, there is a human soul. Again, not knowing about DNA, they would not know that the zygote and embryo are the earliest expressions of the human body, and are thus informed by the human soul from conception. However, the philosophical principle would still be accurate and still stand, as it also does in Aquinas. I am not sure about your other information, about not baptizing premature babies. Aquinas even allowed for baptizing babies in the womb, if the mother had just died!
On the other hand, if I am wrong about the 1312 Council, I appreciate the tip. I will check into it further.
My second comment: Regarding this whole other discussion with Ancius: Obviously the Sorites paradox does not apply. The unfertilized human ovum does not develop into a human person over time, by adding a little bit at a time. The change to a fertilized ovum (and thus a developing human) is both ontological and radical in nature. At that point, the Sorites paradox might apply in terms of the increasing functionality of the human person, but it does not apply in terms of changing a non-person (the egg) into the developing person (the zygote).
February 24th, 2012 | 8:11 pm | #72
Hi Craig,
What I know of the Council of Vienne comes from the writings of two Catholic professors, Dobrowski and Deltete from Seattle University. Their take is that Vienne overturned the previous held notion that the soul and body were separate entities and that the soul – at some point – entered the body – Cartesian dualism. They maintain in order to support the doctrine of the Incarnation, this view was jettisoned for, well, yes you guessed it – Incarnationalism. They describe that as being the same as Thomas’s “hylomorphic” view of human development.
(Hylomorphism is the doctrine, according to D&D, that states that “the human soul is to the body like the shape or form of a statue is to the actual statue…The shape of the statue cannot antedate the actual statue, since the sculptor can only conceptually, but not physically, first make the shape and then introduce it into a block of marble.”)
So it seems (at least) two things were going on at Vienne: the first is the protection of Christ’s Incarnation and the affirmation of hylomorphism in humans.
One of the fascinating effects of that, according to these authors, was “that for centuries the church forbade baptizing any premature births.” They go on to cite that the Roman Ritual of 1617 said, “Nobody enclosed in the mother’s womb should be baptized”, a formula that remained unchanged until 1895”.
I guess my point is that the history of this topic is based on much more than “faulty Aristotelian logic”. The church has, for more centuries than not, held the view that the fetus was not a human which is why they fobade their baptism. Therefore, the current style that “life begins at the moment of conception” is simply a modern invention.
Please let me know if I am relying on faulty research.
Thanks for your questions.
Peace.
February 24th, 2012 | 8:12 pm | #73
In my previous post, the first scholar’s last name is “Dombrowski” and not “Dobrowski”. My apologies.
February 24th, 2012 | 9:28 pm | #74
Dear Constantine: No, your info is not faulty, but I still think it’s a case of the philosophical principle being correct while the application was not. The principle was that the fetus was not a person because its body could not organically support the human soul until a certain point of development–the point at which the fetus was recognizably a human. At that point, the body was ready to be infused with the human soul, which could be expressed through the developing organs. Aquinas placed this at about six weeks of development.
However, given today’s science, we now know that the fetus is “organically” human from conception–not only human, but a separate and uniquely expressed human. Ontologically, it never changes, which I think is the central point from the original article: “2. At no point, from conception to adulthood, is there a change in the essential nature of the fetus from non-person to person.”
The philosophical principle, then, is correct: a fetus would not receive a recognizably human soul without a recognizably human body, since the soul is the form of the body and the two must form a unity. However, the application has now changed, since thanks to DNA, we now know that the zygote itself is recognizably human and nothing else. It would thus be animated by the human soul, from conception.
A good response to Dombrowski and Deltete’s work was written by Anne Barbeau Gardiner and published in the New Oxford Review, but I don’t remember the date.
February 27th, 2012 | 6:28 am | #75
Tom Gilson #37 – “Experience”, i.e. “thought” or “thinking” – is the smallest part of our mental activities. EVERYTHING about you is mental except your physical body. Your personality, your memories, your realization that your arms are part of you, your ability to understand language, your ability to see and hear, your ability to do just about anything besides digest food fall under “mental”. And none of your mental activities can start to form until you are outside of the womb and interacting with the world.
TG # 42: “Ancius: do you know at what point a fetus becomes a morally significant human being? Do you know it with certainty? “
The answer is “Never” and “Yes.” In the first three months after birth, brain synapses multiply 20 times. That’s the baby’s brain taking the first basic steps towards become a person. Google “infant mental development”.
Adam @ #44 & #52 You claim “that one has the property of personhood at conception.” What do you define as “personhood”? I’m using something like this definition at dictionary.com: “the actual self or individual personality of a human being”. This definition is a bit vague but that’s because we’re just starting to get a grasp on what a person is – what is involved in becoming a personality, what it takes to have one. If it’s not the “self” or “personality” or some other mental capacity that makes a being, then please tell us what does.
Adam @ #47: You’re leaving out step 1.5: “I declare that the fertilized egg is a person.” I’d like to see you justify that step. What exactly about the fertilized egg makes it a person? I would restate the last paragraph of #47 as “One cell is not a bearer of the property of “being a person” because one cell does not develop over time into a person. You have to keep adding cells (and connecting them in an extraordinarily complicated way that can only be done with the assistance of interaction with the world).”
Tom Gilson #46: It’s not that the transition from non-personhood to personhood is ambiguous, it’s that it’s not a step function. You’re not a non-person one instant and a person the next. Instead, you start at zero and gradually acquire more and more of the mental characteristics of a being. At one point you are indisputably not a being, at a later point you indisputably are and in between it’s disputable. The important thing about abortion is that the entirety of pregnancy is spent in the “indisputably not a person” territory.
Hanna G @ #62 There’s nothing subjective or arbitrary about defining a “person” by their mentality. What other criteria would you use? Something from your religion? Then what do you say to someone whose religion gives them different criteria? There are grey areas where we lack knowledge. Is this coma permanent? Has this Alzheimer’s victim lost the last traces of his personhood? Even Pat Robertson thinks there are times when they have. At least with reality-based criteria we have a basis for investigating the problem.
Adam @ #63 “Being a baby isn’t essential to being human.” Babyhood is when we become beings. It’s when the most basic parts of our selves are laid down.
February 27th, 2012 | 9:21 am | #76
“You claim “that one has the property of personhood at conception.” What do you define as “personhood”?”
Dear David Mullenix: I feel so left out, so let me re-post this, from Boethius via Aquinas: a person is “an individual substance of rational nature.”
The emphasis is on the nature, not the abilities or functionality.
February 27th, 2012 | 3:22 pm | #77
“Then why do you call it an acorn? Do not words have meaning to you?”
For the same reason I call my husband a “man” when it is clear that he is a “human,” or my son a “child” when it is also clear that he is a human. Or refer to my automobile as a “minivan,” rather than simply “automobile.” “Germinated acorn” means a very, very young member of the broader category of “oak tree.” Words of greater specificity do not contradict acknowledged membership in a category.
The word “tree” has two meanings — a big, tall thing you can climb, and a member of a species that, given sufficient air, sunlight, and water and no undue violence, will grow up into a tall thing you can climb — even when it is only one day into its germination. To insist that the word “tree” only means a big, tall thing you can climb is both technically absolutely wrong, and a use of folk speech to try to prove a complex point. Neither is convincing.
February 27th, 2012 | 11:31 pm | #78
Thank you, Craig, for your usual thoughtfulness.
It seems to me a dangerous course to put science in the driver’s seat of theology. What if it changes in the future as it has in the past?
Secondly, what are we now to do with all those souls, damned to hell, for committing a mortal sin based on what we now know but what could not possibly have been known to them during their lives? Worse yet, the church told them that early abortions were venial sins, if that. What a cruel, cruel thing to have a church first absolve one’s decision and now come back, centuries later and renege on their eternal reward because of some scientific discovery.
I’m more secure in the bibilical admonition: “As you do not know the path of the wind, or how the body is formed in a mother’s womb, so you cannot understand the work of God…. (Ecclesiastes 11:5)
Peace.
February 28th, 2012 | 1:48 am | #79
My dear Pentamom,
Actually, the word “tree” has more than seven meanings, none of which, interestingly, is “acorn”.
(Please see here: tree. (n.d.). The Free On-line Dictionary of Computing. Retrieved February 27, 2012, from Dictionary.com website: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/tree)
And of further interest the definition for “acorn” shows only that it is the fruit of an oak tree and not an oak tree itself.
(Please see here: acorn. (n.d.). Dictionary.com Unabridged. Retrieved February 27, 2012, from Dictionary.com website: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/acorn)
So you must really get your meanings straight if you are to make your case.
One of the fascinating things that militates so strongly against your position is that “personhood” requires eternal singularity. For example, you are a human because you never have been, and never will be more than one person. But that cannot be said of a zygote. Given the predictably high rate of “twinning”, one cannot know whether or not any fertilized ovum will become a single person or more. So, at that very moment of conception (whatever that moment really is!) it cannot be said that the embryo is human because it cannot be said if it will result in a single person.
To accommodate Adam O’s methodology, we might say:
1. If a being is human, it can only ever be a singular entity.
2. A fertilized ovum may be two (or more) entities,
3. Therefore, a fertilized ovum cannot be human.
To disprove this syllogism you would have to prove that 1 is wrong; there are humans who are more than one person. Or you would have to deny the scientific fact that an ovum may separate into twins which proof cannot be offered. Or you would have to prove that the conclusion (3) does not necessarily follow from the premises, which it does.
While I appreciate your fervor, the fact remains that Adam O’s case cannot be made on any of a number of different bases.
Peace.
February 28th, 2012 | 8:14 am | #80
“It seems to me a dangerous course to put science in the driver’s seat of theology. What if it changes in the future as it has in the past?”
Constantine, excellent point. This is why the Catholic Church has never actually taken a fixed position on when a “person” arrives (as far as I know; someone correct me if I’m wrong on this). The Church’s position, in my paraphrase, is something like this: It seems that a person exists from conception, but it doesn’t matter so much, since it is definite that human life exists from conception, and human life is to be protected.
The whole “personhood” thing has erupted because some writers argue that persons have rights, but mere human life can be killed at will. The Church rejects this argument completely, no matter what the scientific outcome of “hominization” and “personhood” turns out to be.
Peace to you also, brother, and to all writing here.
February 29th, 2012 | 7:30 am | #81
Pentamom, we distinguish between “acorns” and “oak trees” because they are different. You can’t do the same things with an acorn that you can do with an oak tree. Try to build a dining room table out of an acorn some time. You can’t do it because an acorn is not the same thing as an oak tree.
Similarly, try to have a conversation with a fertilized egg some time. You can’t do it because fertilized eggs are not the same thing as a human person.
February 29th, 2012 | 7:32 am | #82
Adam @ #47 – I’m still waiting for you to tell us why the fertilized egg is a human being. What facts justify this claim? Are we supposed to just take your word for it?
February 29th, 2012 | 8:29 am | #83
David,
That particular question is hardly in any doubt. The fertilized egg is a discrete individual organism, and it is human.
February 29th, 2012 | 8:34 am | #84
The facts that justify a fertilized egg being a morally significant human person (is that what you meant to ask about?) are summed up in this: personhood in that sense is an essential characteristic of human beings. It is of the essence of being a human being that human beings are morally significant persons.
I do hope, now, that you won’t come back and ask for “scientific” proof of that. It’s not a question of science, so it’s not susceptible to proof or disproof by science.
February 29th, 2012 | 8:42 am | #85
I’m also counting on you, David, to know that the burden of proof rests upon you, not me or Adam or any other pro-life person. Here’s why. Suppose we can’t prove our case, and suppose you can’t either. Then the moral status of the fertilized egg is unknown or indeterminate; which means that every abortion might be the murder of a morally significant human person. Whether it is or not is unknown, under the terms I’ve just outlined. But every deer hunter knows you don’t shoot at just any large animal that moves in the woods: you have to know that it’s not a human.
The case against abortion stands even if our case for the personhood of the zygote is unproved. The case in favor of abortion requires that you prove your position.
So go ahead. It’s your turn.
February 29th, 2012 | 9:40 am | #86
David,
Your reply to pentamom was on the basis of functionality not nature. Just because you can’t build a dining room table out of a germinated acorn doesn’t mean it is not oak. My infant children could not drive, talk, go to the bathroom on their own etc. By your lights they were not fully human? Not persons?
That’s the problem with using functional descriptors to determine nature. When that descriptor is absent the nature is compromised.
Or to return to your example — if “being made into a dining room table” is the essence of being an oak, then not just germinated acorns “aren’t oaks” — neither are saplings etc…
And the same applies to your example of “having a conversation”. I can’t have a conversation with you if you are in a medically induced coma (after a car accident, say). What of your personhood then? Is it lost? On hold?
February 29th, 2012 | 11:07 am | #87
Maybe we should distinguish “human,” “human being” and “person.”
Fingernails and corpses may be human, but not a human being and not a person. A person needn’t be a human being; and a human being needn’t be a person – at least in one important sense of these terms. “Human being” is ambiguous between “person” in the legal/moral sense (see comment #39) and simply “member of one of the human species”, especially Homo sapiens.
Although I’ve come to think that the use of any of these terms is unnecessary and counterproductive, let’s at least try to be clear if we decide to use them.
February 29th, 2012 | 11:40 am | #88
So now consider the mosquito activist:
“The case against the massacre of mosquitos stands even if our case for the personhood of the mosquito is unproved. The case in favor of mosquito extermination requires that you prove your position (that mosquitos aren’t persons).”
Two questions: what would constitute a sufficient proof? Why?
February 29th, 2012 | 12:37 pm | #89
Ancius,
Your question there is of course leading to an argument that my principle proves too much: that if we were to apply it consistently, it would make it impossible to justify killing anything whatsoever.
It’s a good point, and I’m willing to concede it. I don’t think my argument has any force for anyone who doubts that humans at any stage of life or development are ontologically distinct from any other species at any stage of life or development.
February 29th, 2012 | 12:58 pm | #90
The problem seems worse. The mosquito activist may happily accept that humans (members of one of the human species) are “ontologically distinct” from mosquitos. Such a mosquito activist simply asks you for a proof for why the ontological distinctiveness of mosquitos disqualifies them from a similar right to life. (She might ask you to define your notion of “ontological distinctiveness” and, once defined, to prove why this should make such a moral difference. She is understandably suspicious of “speciesism,” suspecting it to be fundamentally similar to racism and other debased grounds for justifying the differential treatment of entities which are dissimilar from one’s own kind, “ontologically” or otherwise.)
February 29th, 2012 | 2:47 pm | #91
Ancius,
I have already conceded that my argument has no force with the mosquito activist. If someone thinks that the choice to let a mosquito live or die is morally equivalent to the same choice for a human, then I am sure I won’t be able to convince them that letting a very young human live or die is different from letting an older human live or die.
February 29th, 2012 | 2:53 pm | #92
Let me add this to that. You might then ask whether I have a good reason of my own to support life as I do, seeing that I don’t have an answer for the mosquito activist. The answer is yes. My reasons are grounded in my biblically informed knowledge of what it is to be human. The argument I gave, on which you are questioning me, is one that I think would be persuasive to people who do not have that biblically informed knowledge, or who might think that it is in error.
If it is not persuasive to every such person, that is hardly any surprise to me—especially if it is unpersuasive to mosquito activists.
February 29th, 2012 | 3:00 pm | #93
Earlier you only conceded that you have no argument against someone who doubts that the human species is “ontologically distinct.” Now you only concede that you have no argument against the mosquito activist. In fact, however, you should concede that you have no argument even against someone who concedes the ontological distinctiveness of the human species (see comment #87). Moreover, as well as the mosquito activist, you would also seem to have no argument against someone who thinks that highly intelligent chimps should have at least the moral standing of a human zygote. Since this would presumably be the position of most non-pro-lifers, you may have to concede that your arguments generally have no force for anyone not already convinced of your conclusion!
February 29th, 2012 | 3:37 pm | #94
Do you think we should kill highly intelligent chimps for the sake of human preference? Just curious.
Anyway, if the argument has force with some persons, great. Not every abortion proponent buys into this very strange lack of distinction you say there is between humans and other species. I’m sure you know that.
February 29th, 2012 | 3:55 pm | #95
I think you might be missing the point and the problem here. Most non-pro-lifers probably think that chimps have at least the moral standing of human zygotes (many would in fact judge that chimps have, at least in some respects, greater standing). The problem is that your “argument” would seem to have “no force” with anyone who doesn’t already agree with you conclusion.
You also might be missing a major theme of my last two comments: your interlocutor can happily accept an “ontological distinction” between humans and non-humans (mosquitos and humans, or chimps and humans). That is, no one has to affirm a “very strange lack of distinction.” As for your particular moral distinction between humans (zygotes included) and everything else–well, almost no one except the radical pro-lifer finds the denial of this particular thesis in the least bit strange.
February 29th, 2012 | 4:09 pm | #96
I didn’t miss that point at all, Ancius. You stated it clearly enough.
Except for this: I don’t know what part of the world you live in, but it’s just not true that “almost no one” except “radical” pro-lifers thinks it strange to equate humans and everything else in the way you meant. There are even abortion proponents who think humans are relevantly different from mosquitos, relevantly different from chimps.
For those who think otherwise, I will (for the third time) concede that my argument has no force.
February 29th, 2012 | 4:13 pm | #97
What way, precisely, do you think I meant to “equate humans and everything else”? I didn’t realize I made any such equation. Perhaps you are reading into my comments something that’s not there.
February 29th, 2012 | 4:16 pm | #98
I was making a shorthand reference to the prior discussion. Note that I said “equate humans and everything else in the way you meant,” meaning in the relevant moral sense.
February 29th, 2012 | 4:21 pm | #99
So I ask again: in what way, precisely, do you think I meant to “equate humans and everything else”?
While it’s true that your argument doesn’t have force for many sorts of people, the challenge for you is to give an account for how it can have force for anyone who doesn’t already accept your assumptions about a very particular (and peculiar) kind of moral distinction between humans and non-humans. (It’s not your opponents, against whom you have no argument, who are must be making a particularly strange denial; it’s rather you who seem to be assuming a particularly question begging distinction.) But to clarify matters, try just answering the first question I asked above:
In what way, precisely, do you think I meant to “equate humans and everything else”?
February 29th, 2012 | 4:27 pm | #100
Ancius, you may think that is my challenge, but you’re asking me to support a point I have already conceded. I don’t feel very much constrained to do that.
I don’t even feel constrained to argue against your opinion that there is something peculiar about seeing relevant moral distinctions between humans and animals. That’s your opinion. I think it’s peculiar that you think what you do, and especially that you think virtually all abortion proponents would agree with your position on this. But I think I’ve made the point I came to make, and with your help I have had opportunity to clarify with whom I can expect that point to be persuasive. Thank you.
February 29th, 2012 | 4:35 pm | #101
Since it’s a loose end, I’ll explain in what ways I think you equate humans and everything else. Note that I did not say that you equate them in every sense, just that there is some sense in which you do. That sense is a moral sense illustrated by:
That was what I was referring to, in shorthand, as I have already said.
February 29th, 2012 | 4:45 pm | #102
So, I take it, you should now concede that your argument has no force against someone who affirms that highly intelligent chimps have at least (or, at least in some respects, great moral standing) the moral standing of human zygotes. Do you see how such an affirmation would be widely shared by non-pro-lifers of a great variety of views on the moral differences between humans and non-humans?
The basic problem, it seems to me, is that your explicit concessions fail to acknowledge the full extent of your argument’s impotence. There’s a danger of concealing an argument’s deeper flaws by conceding only its more superficial ones.
February 29th, 2012 | 4:55 pm | #103
Ancius,
To probe this adequately would require exploring the validity of your position and mine concerning the essential nature of humans, or whether there is such a thing as an essential nature of humans. I do not propose to get involved in that argument with you here, thank you.
If there are people in the world (and there are, and some of them are abortion proponents) who share my belief that there is a moral difference between humans and “everything else,” then on that point they are correct, in my studied opinion. I need not worry as you might that there could be some flaw in their thinking so. Therefore with them my original argument may well have force (it need not be as impotent as you think), and it is fine with me if that is the case, for I consider it valid and sound, and I have no need to talk them out of agreeing with me on what I consider a good argument.
You disagree with me concerning the relevant distinction between humans and other species. You are concerned to ensure that I recognize that others besides you disagree with me. Of course I do. The reasons for our disagreement are such that to explore them would (as I have said) start us down another trail that I do not care to go on this thread.
February 29th, 2012 | 7:47 pm | #104
It looks like you’re still not appreciating the basic problem here. For your “argument” to succeed, it’s not simply that you need others to share your “belief that there is a moral difference between humans and ‘everything else’”. After all, the person who thinks that an intelligent chimp has, in some respects, greater moral standing than a human zygote may also consistently share that belief. Your “argument” appears to be impotent even against those who share your belief that there is a moral difference between humans and everything else.
February 29th, 2012 | 9:46 pm | #105
Ancius, there is another thing I have been trying to communicate here, which I don’t think you have fully appreciated.
I am satisfied with the condition of my argument for the purposes I have stated, under the conditions I have stated. You are not satisfied with my argument, I am sure. You seem ready to drag it along virtually ad infinitum. Here, for example, you seem to want me to state again what I have already said in so many words earlier—and what ought to be old news, and plain to you if you have any experience in debating this topic—that “a moral difference” is not just any old moral difference, but a moral difference stemming from a difference in essential nature, such that humans have unique moral worth that no animal has.
I think it’s likely you already knew that about my position. I don’t know why you would press me to state something so obvious, as if there were a terrible hole in my argument while it remains unstated (I mean, unrepeated; I have said it, in different words, already).
Maybe I’m wrong about you on that. Whether I am or not, I am ready to disengage with you on it now. Good day.
March 1st, 2012 | 4:57 am | #106
Tom Gilson @ #80
“That particular question is hardly in any doubt. The fertilized egg is a discrete individual organism, and it is human.”
I agree that the fertilized egg is a discreet individual organism and it is human. My thumb is also human and if I cut it off and keep it alive in a vat, it’s a discrete individual organism.
But neither the egg or the thumb is a person and it’s personhood that counts. That’s why we can’t kill C3PO or an intelligent alien just for kicks.
If you think a fertilized egg is a person, please tell us why and I’ll agree that abortion should be banned.
Here’s another way to think about it. It’s possible, in principle, to dissassemble my cut-off thumb into it’s constituent cells and turn every one of those cells into a newly cloned Dave Mullenix.
Assuming that I lost my thumb and I could afford to do the dissassembling / cloning, would I be killing millions of human beings if I decided to sew the thumb back on instead?
Are you a mega-murderer if you don’t cut off your thumb and clone millions of brand new Tom Gilsons from it?
And if you do clone those millions of new Tom Gilsons, are they mega-murderers if they don’t cut off their own thumbs and clone millions of new new Tom Gilsons?
March 1st, 2012 | 5:05 am | #107
Amicus @ #84: Maybe we should distinguish “human,” “human being” and “person.”
Amen! “Human” has a lot of different meanings. One meaning is “of or pertaining to” a human. My thumb is a human thumb, not a chimp thumb.
“Being” and “person” are identical when it comes to abortion: “Self-conscious or rational” or “the actual self or individual personality” as dictionary.com puts it.
A fertilized egg is “human”, but it’s not a “being” because it doesn’t have the hardware to be conscious.
March 1st, 2012 | 5:13 am | #108
David C. @ #83: “Your reply to pentamom was on the basis of functionality not nature.”
The key to the abortion debate is whether a fetus has the functionality required to produce a mind and thus become a person.
We’ve known beyond a shadow of a doubt that a first trimester fetus doesn’t have that functionality since the mid 20th century.
We’ve since learned that it can’t even begin to develop that functionality until birth.
There’s nothing immoral about abortion, but putting a mindless fetus above a human being is sinful.
March 1st, 2012 | 5:27 am | #109
“The key to the abortion debate is whether a fetus has the functionality required to produce a mind and thus become a person.”
This fallaciously assumes that the mind is what defines a person, which is a statement based on faulty scientific rationalism. I think that consciousness is a part of us, but to assume that consciousness (not as in being awake, but as in having a distinct being) doesn’t exist in a fetus is false. Yes, the fertilized egg doesn’t have cognitive processes, but that doesn’t mean it’s not human, which is the crux of the abortion debate.
“I agree that the fertilized egg is a discreet individual organism and it is human. My thumb is also human and if I cut it off and keep it alive in a vat, it’s a discrete individual organism.”
Except the fetus has entirely distinct DNA and chromosomal makeup than the mother. While the fetus does reside in the body of a woman, it does not share her genetic makeup. The cells in your thumb have your DNA and chromosomal makeup, as your thumb is part of your body.
And I’m not putting a “mindless” fetus above a human being. I’m saying that fetuses are human beings, and that at the most basic level their lives deserve to be respected.
March 1st, 2012 | 6:39 am | #110
David, before I answer your #103, I’d like to see a wee bit more evidence you read my second and third comments to you, #81 & #82.
I’d be grateful, too, if you would refrain from silliness like calling a thumb a discrete individual organism. Even one that’s alive in a vat.
March 1st, 2012 | 7:05 am | #111
Tom Gilson @ #82
Prove a fetus can’t be a person:
1. “Persons” or “beings” have minds.
2. Minds (in humans) are the results of the information stored in brains and the activities of those brains.
3. Brains are multi-cellular, which absolutely rules out a single cell from being a person.
4. At the time of Roe v. Wade, we couldn’t absolutely rule out a late term fetus from being a person, since it has a multi-cellular brain. Hence the restrictions against abortion in later stages of pregnancy.
5. Since Roe v Wade, we have learned that interaction with the world is necessary to generate the information that makes a person and store it in the brain.
6. Therefore, it is proven that a mind is not present before birth and therefore a mind is not present until after birth.
March 1st, 2012 | 8:08 am | #112
David,
So we have this straight. From your perspective science and the Supreme Court have “proved” that a fetus is not a person at any stage prior to birth and that even after birth there is some period of tie where the child does not reach the full status of personhood? That and that there is no distinction in your mind between a human limb and a human being, an organ and an organism?
Is that a fair statement of your position?
Additionally I would be interested to know who the “we” is in this statement: “…since Roe v Wade, ~we~ have learned that interaction with the world is necessary to generate the information that makes a person….”
March 1st, 2012 | 9:28 am | #113
No, they are substances with rational natures. That is, they are of the nature to develop rational minds, should they be allowed to live.
Good Lord, I quit. Bye, everyone.
March 1st, 2012 | 9:33 am | #114
Sorry about post 110. For some reason, the quotes got deleted. So here it is again:
“1. “Persons” or “beings” have minds.”
No, they are substances with rational natures. That is, they are of the nature to develop rational minds, should they be allowed to live.
“If you think a fertilized egg is a person, please tell us why.”
Good Lord, I quit. Bye, everyone.
And now, having re-done the post, I really do quit. But I think this discussion demonstrates well that, once people begin to define personhood by functionality, they will come up with ANY arbitrary function (even something as nebulous as “interaction with the world”) as required for personhood, in order to justify abortion.
March 1st, 2012 | 10:22 am | #115
David Mullenix:
Prove, without begging the question of course, that “‘persons’ or ‘beings’ have minds” is a comprehensive and adequate definition of persons.
March 1st, 2012 | 10:24 am | #116
Craig,
Thanks for giving it a good try. I gave up with Ancius for reasons similar to what you stated. I don’t blame you for pulling out. I’m about to do the same.
March 1st, 2012 | 2:20 pm | #117
Tom, to presuppose that the only “moral difference” of relevance here must stem from a difference in “essential nature” seems a bit strange to say the least. Apparently your argument is impotent for anyone who doesn’t share your particular (and evidently quite peculiar) views about essential natures, and even about the particular kinds of essential natures–and their moral relevance!–that you believe belong to ever members of every human species!
So I’d say you’ve got at least as much to defend as someone who simply characterizes persons in terms of minds. Indeed, if anyone here owes a “comprehensive” definition of persons, it’s you and not David M. Even a quick glance at his argument should tell you all he needs is the necessary condition.
March 1st, 2012 | 6:26 pm | #118
Let me suggest here that the issue of defining “personhood” is contentious only because of the work that this concept is expected to do: to refer to the entities which bear of the kind of right to life we ordinarily ascribe to prototypical “persons,” like normal, human adults, etc. Many red herrings would lose their deceitful appeal if we simply discarded the terms “person” and “personhood” and more straightforwardly ask this: at which point, and on what grounds, should we begin to ascribe to the developing human embryo/fetus the kind of right to life we ordinarily ascribe to prototypical persons? Isn’t this, after all, the real issue?
If, however, anyone does thinks that this re-focused question requires us to first settle on a definition of “person,” then you should try to explain to us why. What, for example, is it about personhood that it supposed to ground the aforementioned right? (And if you can specify that, then we can presumably still discard the term “personhood” and speak rather directly in terms of whatever we’ve identified as grounding the relevant right!)
March 1st, 2012 | 11:11 pm | #119
Hello Craig Payne!
Have we yet won the contest for the longest thread at First Things?
Thank you for the tip about Anne Gardiner’s refutation of Dombrowski and Deltete. Owing to the wonders of Google I was able to find and the year was 2004. I must confess to you, that I found it unconvincing but am glad to know about it anyway.
I am fascinated about your comment about the “fixed position” of the Catholic Church with regard to personhood. Because we hear the constant drumbeat of “Life begins at the moment of conception!” I rather naively assumed that was their fixed position. Maybe the difference is between “personhood” and “human life”. I have to tell you, though, if that is it, it certainly wreaks of the parsing that the Roman Magisterium is so noted for. One might justly call it a “distinction without a difference.”
Thank you for your kind wish of peace. I return to it to you adding mine with it.
Peace.
March 2nd, 2012 | 5:53 am | #120
Tom Gilson @ #107: In #81, you wrote::
” The facts that justify a fertilized egg being a morally significant human person (is that what you meant to ask about?) are summed up in this: personhood in that sense is an essential characteristic of human beings. It is of the essence of being a human being that human beings are morally significant persons.
So you declare that personhood is an essential characteristic of human persons. You also declare that a fertilized egg is a human person.
I declare that you’re wrong. So much for our opinions. As far as the facts are concerned, personhood means having a mind, in humans and other animals minds require a multi-cellular brain that has spent a lengthy period reacting with the outside world and a fertilized egg doesn’t have one of those.
You also wrote, “I do hope, now, that you won’t come back and ask for “scientific” proof of that.”
I do ask for that. An opinion is not sufficient.
You also wrote, “It’s not a question of science, so it’s not susceptible to proof or disproof by science.”
It IS a question of science and all you have is an opinion.
March 2nd, 2012 | 6:14 am | #121
Nikolai Volk @ #106: If a mind doesn’t define a person, what does? Having elbows? And how does a fertilized egg have a mind if it doesn’t have cognitive processes?
Big deal on DNA. Identical twins have identical DNA. In fact, they are a single organism until they split in very early pregnancy.
A fetus has no soul, a woman does, so you ARE putting flesh above spirit.
david c. @ #109: No, you don’t have it straight. Science had established that the mind requires a functioning brain by the mid 20th century. This meant that a fertilized egg could not have a mind and therefore was not any kind of a being. The Supreme Court recognized this in Roe v Wade. They didn’t know for sure that this was true for the latest stages of pregnancy, which was reflected in their decision. In the ensuing half century, science has learned that the process of forming a mind doesn’t begin until birth and there is an appreciable time after birth (months) where there’s still nobody home.
There is a BIG difference between a human limb and a human being – limbs don’t have brains and hence don’t have minds, so they aren’t persons.
“We” means the people who have investigated fetal and infant development and those who have followed their work. This obviously excludes anybody on the pro-flesh side of the question.
Craig Payne @ #111 Before you leave, tell us more about these “substances with rational natures”. I’m betting nobody can do that.
What is ARBITRARY about having a mind??
Tom Gilson @ #112: If not a mind, what would you suggest for a definition of “person” or “being”?
Would it help if I said “soul” instead of mind?
How’s this? “A fertilized egg has no soul, so it’s not a being.” Is that better?
March 2nd, 2012 | 6:15 am | #122
It’s Friday and I’m out of here for the weekend.
March 2nd, 2012 | 6:23 am | #123
David Mullenix, with respect to the question of whether the embryo is a person, you assert that one needs to have a mind, in order to be a person. And since the brain is essential for the mind to manifest itself, and since the embryo does not have a brain, it doesn’t have a mind and hence is not a person.
But when one sleeps, or is under general anesthesia, one doesn’t have a mind either. Of course, only someone completely under the spell of some philosophical view utterly divirced from reality would therefore conclude that the sleeping or otherwise unconscious human is therefore not a person, but isn’t this the logical implication of your view? It certainly won’t do to assert, something to the effect of, well, yes, but he/she will be conscious and therefore manifest his/her mind when he/she wakes from sleeping or the operation, because one could assert that the embryo will be conscious and therefore show its mind eventually as well. It will merely take longer. But why should a longer time interval be morally relevant? After all, in the sleeping adult and the embryo consciousness will manifest itelf, it just takes longer in the latter.
So why should length of time be relevant morally, here?