Invalid Arguments in the Abortion Debate

Nothing is more vexing than have to debate dishonesty and disinformation, or a combination thereof. It’s supremely annoying.

To illustrate, the debate of communism versus capitalism. That right there is an honest debate. No semantic games, just very different values and perspectives on society.

But the minute you enter the abortion debate, you’re greeted with a wealth of misinformation and a good measure of dishonesty, from people who are often otherwise intelligent.

The Argument From God

First, Abortion is wrong because the Bible says so.

Oh really? And you would enact a law based on what your Bible says?

The absolute invalidity of the argument is beyond description. There are no words to describe just how wrong that argument is. Seriously, the Bible also tells you to put to death your disrespectful children, and if enacted a law based upon that America’s population would be decimated overnight.

The Argument Against God

Another argument in the abortion debate is the one against God. That is:

Religious people oppose abortion. (premise)

Religion can play no part in legislation. (premise)

Therefore abortion must be allowed. (conclusion)

The conclusion here is not supported by the premises. In addition, the first premise is misleading in its underlying suggestion that abortion is opposed only by religious people.

Let’s apply this logic elsewhere:

Religious people oppose rape. (premise)

Religion can play no part in legislation. (premise)

Rape must be allowed. (conclusion)

Yup, not a real sound argument.

Now we could discuss dozens of popular arguments for and against abortion, but due to the transparent weaknesses of the arguments, you’d accuse me of straw-manning.

So I want to focus on one popular argument. By popular, I mean popular, as in “amateur”, although that would also be a less than accurate description of the argument, because there is no “professional” argument. How about “unscholarly”, or uneducated.

Why would somebody address an uneducated argument? They wouldn’t, unless it was hugely popular, and that is why I want to address this particular pro-abortion argument.

The Argument Which States the Fetus is Not a Human

There are certain terms in abortion debates. Most intellectually inclined folks are already aware of these terms and their nuances. One big term is the abortion debate is “human”, another is “life”, and the whopper of a term is “person” (and “personhood”.)

Let’s start off with what we know.

1. The embryo is Alive; it is a life (Premise One)

This is not really debated anymore.

In the dark ages of knowledge, people wanted to define “life” by random attributes of the living. If somebody is alive, they move. If somebody is alive, they experience emotions. If somebody is alive they breathe, yearn for knowledge, seek human companionship, or some meet some other random criteria.

The problem with all those definitions were, they invariable excluded more than the first trimester fetus, and were based, not on biology, but on religious, spiritual, social, or “old wives’ tale” order.

These days, the biological definition of life is accepted by enlightened people. That is, life requires a cell with genetic material and the ability to reproduce.

By the biological definition, the zygote is alive.

According to Professor Hymie Gordon of the Mayo Clinic, “By all the criteria of modern molecular biology, life is present from the moment of conception.”

And according to Professor Micheline Matthews-Roth of that two-bit Harvard University Medical School, “It is scientifically correct to say that an individual human life begins at conception.”

As Dr. Eugene Diamond of Loyola University Medical School, states, “We no longer need to belabor the question of when human life begins? it begins incontrovertibly at the union of sperm and ovum.”

So without further ado, premise #1 is accepted. Let’s move on to premise #2.

2. The embryo/fetus is human

Once we’ve established that the organism known as a “human embryo” is alive, the second step would be to determine whether or not it is a human. Some folks suggest it isn’t. Let us recall that “human” is defined as “a member of the species Homo sapiens”.

I guess it’s not impossible for an intelligent person to think that the embryo is actual another species. Canine, perhaps. In some ways, the embryo does resemble a frog, so maybe they think it is a species of frog?

In all seriousness, the when scientists call it a human embryo, I really do want to take them at their word that they know which species of embryo they speak of.

So, for now, let’s accept premise #2.

I know, you’ve still got a nagging question or two, and that’s what I’m going to address right now.

The Cause of the Confusion: Personhood

Most folks, when they deny that the unborn child is human, are actually denying the personhood of the embryo or fetus.

The simple fact is, the Supreme Court in Roe v Wade did not deny the humanity of the unborn child. The Supreme Court denied the personhood. This is evident by the statements they offer is support of the argument:

A fetus can’t think for itself.

A fetus has no thoughts or emotions.

A fetus does not breathe air.

A fetus has no social interaction.

A pig has more right to life than an embryo, insofar as it has a much richer mental life.

These criticisms do not speak to species. They address the “personhood” of the unborn child.

So what exactly is personhood? Well, there’s a good question. Technically, we would like it to be a human being. But that would be scientific, and that definition has been rejected by the Supreme Court. Actually, not “rejected” so much as simply “not adopted”.

Most definitions of personhood - in fact, all of them - seem to come not from science but from philosophers, theologians, lawyers and other mischievous evil doers.

The Supreme Court sought a definition of personhood, but did not find one.

The Constitution does not define “person” in so many words. Section 1 of the Fourteenth Amendment contains three references to “person.” The first, in defining “citizens,” speaks of “persons born or naturalized in the United States.” … … in nearly all these instances, the use of the word is such that it has application only postnatally. None indicates, with any assurance, that it has any possible pre-natal application.

I know what you’re thinking. I’m not even in US jurisdiction, so why am I quoting the US Supreme Court? Good question, but other courts make similar decisions. They do not deny the embryo is human; nor do they deny it is alive. For the most part they deny the human embryo is a person. That is, that the human embryo has attributes we would expect to see in an individual person.

It’s somewhat of a circular argument. Abortion proponents just think of attributes that they have, which an embryo doesn’t, and name that attribute as a criteria for not granting personhood to the unborn child.

The intentional ignorance of the existing human life really is grotesque, but well intentioned. The typical pro-abortionist believes that a ban on abortion would cause millions of women to have unsafe (for the mother) “back alley” abortions, and force many more to give birth to children that they do not want and thereby destroy their lives.

There are many assumptions in that position. Does unplanned pregnancy destroy lives? Not necessarily. I know several women who found themselves pregnant, feared the worst, gave birth and were pleasantly surprised to find new meaning in life. I know single women who struggle to make ends meet, but claim that their happiness is due solely to that child.

Credibility Lost

Is abortion murder or not? The truth is never dependent upon the consequences of admitting the truth. If admitting that abortion is murder meant the melt down of society as we know it, the truth would not change.

If we define murder as “the taking of innocent human life”, then yes, abortion is indisputably murder. Does that mean it cannot be allowed? That is the question we should be asking, not the dishonest question of whether or not the unborn human is human.

The Japanese almost universally admit that abortion is murder, but claim that it is a necessary evil. The entire tone of the discussion in Japan is different from the American tone. In America, it’s a heated discussion. In Japan, the tone is honest, civil and entirely dispassionate. Yes, abortion is murder, but it’s unavoidable (Sh?ganai - “no other way”).

The honesty here in Japan is refreshing. The human life is seen as valuable, but not “sacred”. The Japanese are, after all, very pragmatic. Anti-abortion laws are rightly seen as not pragmatic.

In America, many pro-choice people correctly recognize the loss of credibility that arises from the argument that unborn children are not human.

Judith Arcana, a pro-choice activist who performed first, second and third trimester abortions, claims that the pro-choice movement is losing the ethical high ground by not informing women that abortion kills a human life.

Arcana argues that, “it is morally and ethically wrong to do abortions without acknowledging what it means to do them”. She believes it is necessary to inform pregnant women that they are carrying a child but that it is a legitimate choice to kill that child.

Perhaps the most highly regarded pro-choice argument was offered by Judith Jarvis Thomson.

You wake up in the morning and find yourself back-to-back in bed with an unconscious violinist. A famous unconscious violinist. He has been found to have a fatal kidney ailment and the Society of Music Lovers has canvassed all the available medical records and found that you alone have the right blood type to help. They have therefore kidnapped you and last night the violinist’s circulatory system was plugged into yours, so that your kidneys can be used to extract poisons from his blood as well as your own. If he is unplugged from you now, he will die; but in nine months he will have recovered from his ailment and can safely be unplugged from you.

While recognizing the right to life of the unborn child, she argues that the right to life does not include a right to impose upon the womb of another individual. Instead of murder being the intent of abortion, it is seen as a by-product of removing the child from the womb.

A very cogent argument indeed, and one that demands respect on the basis of its honesty alone. I won’t offer a counter argument because it is not my intention to debate abortion. It has been my intention to debate the dishonesty within abortion arguments.

This entry was posted on Sunday, December 2nd, 2007 at 9:51 am and is filed under Abortion. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.