Philosophy Now Forum

Gary Childress wrote: ↑Mon Jul 15, 2024 2:56 am

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jul 15, 2024 2:42 am

Dubious wrote: ↑Mon Jul 15, 2024 2:35 am

None of these was ever prohibitively absolute, certainly not slavery, rape or even pedophilia...even on occasion attempted genocide.

Okay, then. I happen to think rape, to take one example, is objectively wrong. Maybe you can explain the circumstances under which you would regard rape as okay by you. Then we can maybe explore some of those others.

And yet, if a woman is impregnated through rape, you'd accuse her of "infanticide" if she had an abortion.

We can talk about that afterward, if you please.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jul 15, 2024 3:17 am

Gary Childress wrote: ↑Mon Jul 15, 2024 2:56 am

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jul 15, 2024 2:42 am
Okay, then. I happen to think rape, to take one example, is objectively wrong. Maybe you can explain the circumstances under which you would regard rape as okay by you. Then we can maybe explore some of those others.

And yet, if a woman is impregnated through rape, you'd accuse her of "infanticide" if she had an abortion.

We can talk about that afterward, if you please.

Good evasion. When is "afterward"? Does it have a calendar date?

Gary Childress wrote: ↑Mon Jul 15, 2024 3:19 am

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jul 15, 2024 3:17 am

Gary Childress wrote: ↑Mon Jul 15, 2024 2:56 am

And yet, if a woman is impregnated through rape, you'd accuse her of "infanticide" if she had an abortion.

We can talk about that afterward, if you please.

Good evasion. When is "afterward"? Does it have a calendar date?

No evasion. "After" is after we get an answer to the question I've been asking.

P.S. -- What you'll find out is that it isn't a very good question anyway.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jul 15, 2024 3:58 am

Gary Childress wrote: ↑Mon Jul 15, 2024 3:19 am

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jul 15, 2024 3:17 am
We can talk about that afterward, if you please.

Good evasion. When is "afterward"? Does it have a calendar date?

No evasion. "After" is after we get an answer to the question I've been asking.

P.S. -- What you'll find out is that it isn't a very good question anyway.

Do you think a rape victim ought to be allowed to have an abortion or not?

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jul 15, 2024 2:42 am

Dubious wrote: ↑Mon Jul 15, 2024 2:35 am

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jul 15, 2024 12:09 am
So...nothing is absolute? Slavery, genocide, rape, pedophilia...sometimes okay by you?

None of these was ever prohibitively absolute, certainly not slavery, rape or even pedophilia...even on occasion attempted genocide.

Okay, then. I happen to think rape, to take one example, is objectively wrong. Maybe you can explain the circumstances under which you would regard rape as okay by you. Then we can maybe explore some of those others.

So do I which is the reason if it results in pregnancy, abortion is completely admissible, understandable and likely even preferable!

Also, where have I stated that rape is ok...or put another way, you still haven't learned how to read and quote correctly - which, of course, never has happened and after all this time is not ever expected to happen. Who do you think you're still fooling with your age-old techniques of purposeful distortion?

It's always the same with theists: Behold the honesty of the absolute god believers!

From the beginning of time, theism has been the legitimate platform for the most egregious lies and liars; good of you to carry on the venerable tradition!

Peter Holmes wrote: ↑Sun Jul 14, 2024 3:56 pm

Veritas Aequitas wrote: ↑Sun Jul 14, 2024 8:00 am

Peter Holmes wrote: ↑Sun Jul 14, 2024 6:41 am The thing about what we call facts and objectivity - and why we value them - is because they liberate us from the delusion that believing, thinking and saying something is so makes it so. And I guess that's an evolved attitude - if only very lately and variably - in human societies. For example, consider this claim:

Water is H2O because I/we/all of us believe/think/say it is.

I think most of us would say that's wrong. I/we/all of us may well believe/think/say something is the case - but that can never be the reason why it's the case. (For now, I want to leave aside VA's and other so-called anti-realist arguments against this prejudice or assumption in favour of facts and objectivity.)

Given the above, consider the following claim:

X is morally wrong because I/we/all of us/my cult's god/God believe(s)/think(s)/say(s) it is.

The point is this. If we think there are such things as facts and objectivity, we can't then offer subjective reasons - what anyone believes, thinks or says - for something being a fact. That road is closed.

PS: I use the word 'cult', because a religion is just a big old cult with good PR.

You got it wrong because you are relying on whatever is fact and objectivity that is grounded on an illusion.
The road is not closed.

What is morality is conditioned upon a moral Framework and System [FS].
In say the Christian moral FSERC, God commanded killing of humans is forbidden, thus immoral.
So, if X kill humans, then X is morally wrong as qualified to the Christian moral FS.

A Christian can insist 'whatever is fact is contingent upon a Framework & System [independent of a subject's opinion, beliefs and judgments] which is objective.
The Christian moral FS from an independent God is factual and objective.
Therefore the command thou shall not kill human is an objective moral fact as qualified to the Christian-moral FS.

However, a rational, critical thinking person will insist the objective moral fact as qualified to the Christian-moral FS, is merely of negligible credibility and objective relative to the scientific FS as the gold standard.

My presentation above grounded on rationality and critical thinking is reasonable.

What tripe. Whether or not any cult's god exists is a fact that has nothing to do with beliefs. You've got this completely back to front. Beliefs don't make facts.

You are stuck in the primitive and old paradigm.

Note Facts are justified true beliefs [ignoring Gettier].
To justify beliefs as true, we need a framework and system [FS] of truth.
The scientific truths from a scientific framework and system of truth is the gold standard.

The belief in God is a belief by theists who claim it to be 100% true and is a fact.
Surely the theists would have justified their true belief within framework and system of truth, i.e. the theological FS of truth.

So, to theists, God exists is true and a fact because their human-based theistic FS said so.
You cannot stop or neither will theists stop [obey you in] making their justified true beliefs as facts of reality.

Thus we have to accept the theists qualified claims of facts and truths.

The only recourse to insist what is reality and reliably true is to turn to critical thinking, rationality and wisdom.

This is why we will rate the credibility and objectivity of the claims of truth from the different FS in contrast to the gold standard, i.e. the scientific FS.
I have already explained the methodology of the rating elsewhere.

Based on the rating, the theological FS has negligible credibility and objectivity for what they claimed as truths and facts grounded on a God [illusory].
As such, no critical thinker, rational and wise person will rely on their 'facts' and truth to make decision in life and reality.

My above paradigm and human-base-FS-approach is more effective.

Your complaining and condemnation of theistic beliefs and claims is of the old paradigm not effective and leaving the theists thumbing their nose at you.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sun Jul 14, 2024 5:32 pm

LuckyR wrote: ↑Sun Jul 14, 2024 7:20 am

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sun Jul 14, 2024 2:59 am
It's only "minority" because only a vast "minority" of babies survive the abortion mill. If we were able to poll the hundreds of thousands or millions murdered worldwide every year, I think we could arrive at much higher numbers. Unfortunately, killing people does rather end their chances to cry out in their own defense.

You bring up an important point, though not perhaps the one you were supposing. Namely, that opinions differ on when "personhood" should be conferred.

Personhood isn't "conferred" at all. It's intrinsic. A person is a person, whether or not some other group of persons decide to agree she is.

You're acting casually as if fetuses (which are not "babies" as you know) equate to people.

If they don't, then to what do they "equate"? To fishes? To dogs? To emus? Obviously not. And there's nothing casual or even extraordinary about the realization that that is the case; the whole point of abortion is to cut off the existence of a person...not of a dog or emu. It's only because the baby will necessarily make the demands of a mother that any child, any fully-fledged person would, that they are even treated as problematic in the first place. What the woman is fearing is having to have a baby, a toddler, a child, and eventually, a teenager and adult. She doesn't fear the presence in the world of just another emu.

Most view fetuses as potential people (not emus). That is, not granted the rights and priveleges afforded to adults, or even minors. That is certainly their legal status.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sun Jul 14, 2024 7:21 pm

Alexiev wrote: ↑Sun Jul 14, 2024 5:58 pm

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sun Jul 14, 2024 5:32 pm
Personhood isn't "conferred" at all. It's intrinsic. A person is a person, whether or not some other group of persons decide to agree she is.

If they don't, then to what do they "equate"? To fishes? To dogs? To emus? Obviously not. And there's nothing casual or even extraordinary about the realization that that is the case; the whole point of abortion is to cut off the existence of a person...not of a dog or emu. It's only because the baby will necessarily make the demands of a mother that any child, any fully-fledged person would, that they are even treated as problematic in the first place. What the woman is fearing is having to have a baby, a toddler, a child, and eventually, a teenager and adult. She doesn't fear the presence in the world of just another emu.

This is nonsense. A fertilized cell is not a "person" by any normal definition of "person".

Who's doing the defining? What makes it "normal"?

What about having a truthful or accurate definition: that would be better, would it not?

What's very clear, though, is that the aborter is trying to prevent a person. Not an ovum. If she would stay merely an ovum, then there would no great concern, and there would be no alleged threat to lifestyle or demands, no need that a potential mother should be delivered from the expedient of loving and caring for her as she grows up.

But what the aborter wants is precisely to cut off a person from existing...nothing less. And every aborter knows exactly that fact.

Exactly. Glad you agree. Persons are "prevented" (because fetuses haven't yet reached personhood) by abortion according to most.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sun Jul 14, 2024 7:21 pm

But what the aborter wants is precisely to cut off a person from existing...nothing less. And every aborter knows exactly that fact.

They not only know it, it is the very reason for doing it. What do you think is wrong with preventing a person from existing?

Dubious wrote: ↑Mon Jul 15, 2024 5:32 am

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jul 15, 2024 2:42 am

Dubious wrote: ↑Mon Jul 15, 2024 2:35 am

None of these was ever prohibitively absolute, certainly not slavery, rape or even pedophilia...even on occasion attempted genocide.

Okay, then. I happen to think rape, to take one example, is objectively wrong. Maybe you can explain the circumstances under which you would regard rape as okay by you. Then we can maybe explore some of those others.

So do I which is the reason if it results in pregnancy, abortion is completely admissible, understandable and likely even preferable!

Also, where have I stated that rape is ok...or put another way, you still haven't learned how to read and quote correctly - which, of course, never has happened and after all this time is not ever expected to happen. Who do you think you're still fooling with your age-old techniques of purposeful distortion?

It's always the same with theists: Behold the honesty of the absolute god believers!

From the beginning of time, theism has been the legitimate platform for the most egregious lies and liars; good of you to carry on the venerable tradition!

WELL SAID Dubious.

IC has NO backbone in any "philosophical" debate - I won't bother with the coward again. *My sage\God confirmed on a couple of occasions that he is not well rated as a Christian and he continuously proves Y. (not that an atheist would be interested in my esoteric comprehension)

That he seems to think there should be no ethical standards in a philosophical debate is astounding.

..as I get tapped on my right knee "RIGHT" on re-read of that last sentence

Gary Childress wrote: ↑Mon Jul 15, 2024 4:10 am

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jul 15, 2024 3:58 am

Gary Childress wrote: ↑Mon Jul 15, 2024 3:19 am

Good evasion. When is "afterward"? Does it have a calendar date?

No evasion. "After" is after we get an answer to the question I've been asking.

P.S. -- What you'll find out is that it isn't a very good question anyway.

Do you think a rape victim ought to be allowed to have an abortion or not?

We'll answer that after I get an answer to my question. I'm not going to "jump tracks" for you here.

Dubious wrote: ↑Mon Jul 15, 2024 5:32 am

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jul 15, 2024 2:42 am

Dubious wrote: ↑Mon Jul 15, 2024 2:35 am

None of these was ever prohibitively absolute, certainly not slavery, rape or even pedophilia...even on occasion attempted genocide.

Okay, then. I happen to think rape, to take one example, is objectively wrong. Maybe you can explain the circumstances under which you would regard rape as okay by you. Then we can maybe explore some of those others.

So do I

Then your former claim was simply untrue. You admit of no exceptions to the rule that rape is wrong. So it is not the case, as you first said, that "nothing is absolute." At least one thing, for you, is absolute: the prohibition on rape.

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jul 15, 2024 12:27 pm

Gary Childress wrote: ↑Mon Jul 15, 2024 4:10 am

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Mon Jul 15, 2024 3:58 am
No evasion. "After" is after we get an answer to the question I've been asking.

P.S. -- What you'll find out is that it isn't a very good question anyway.

Do you think a rape victim ought to be allowed to have an abortion or not?

We'll answer that after I get an answer to my question. I'm not going to "jump tracks" for you here.

Now I'll answer your question, Gary.

Before I do, let me test your question. Are you asking because you think there's an important difference between a rape-induced pregnancy and one induced by careless or wavering choice?

If the answer is that, for you, there is no difference between a rape-pregnancy abortion and other abortions, then your question is really about ALL abortions, not merely about rape ones, and is not specially-testing. But if your question is about rape-pregancy abortions as a specially-egregious case, then whatever we decide does not transfer to other abortion cases, to the extent of the special-egregiousness of the rape-pregnancy case.

Is that truism now obvious enough to you?

LuckyR wrote: ↑Mon Jul 15, 2024 7:28 am

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sun Jul 14, 2024 5:32 pm

LuckyR wrote: ↑Sun Jul 14, 2024 7:20 am

You bring up an important point, though not perhaps the one you were supposing. Namely, that opinions differ on when "personhood" should be conferred.

Personhood isn't "conferred" at all. It's intrinsic. A person is a person, whether or not some other group of persons decide to agree she is.

You're acting casually as if fetuses (which are not "babies" as you know) equate to people.

If they don't, then to what do they "equate"? To fishes? To dogs? To emus? Obviously not. And there's nothing casual or even extraordinary about the realization that that is the case; the whole point of abortion is to cut off the existence of a person...not of a dog or emu. It's only because the baby will necessarily make the demands of a mother that any child, any fully-fledged person would, that they are even treated as problematic in the first place. What the woman is fearing is having to have a baby, a toddler, a child, and eventually, a teenager and adult. She doesn't fear the presence in the world of just another emu.

Most view fetuses as potential people (not emus). That is, not granted the rights and priveleges afforded to adults, or even minors. That is certainly their legal status.

"Most" what? And who's doing the "viewing"? A lot of what "most people" believe has always been simply untrue. At one time, "most" believed the world was flat. It didn't make it true.

And "legal status"? Well, "legal status" is the present decision of a merely human convention, not a divine fact. So it's hard to see what "the many" and "law" have to contribute to the discussion of the actual status of a particular act.

The answer would be that they are both after-the-fact judgments, and not at all guaranteed to be right, especially if the opinion of some "many" and some "law" fail to line up with truth -- as they have done in cases like slavery and racism, for example.

LuckyR wrote: ↑Mon Jul 15, 2024 7:34 am

Immanuel Can wrote: ↑Sun Jul 14, 2024 7:21 pm

Alexiev wrote: ↑Sun Jul 14, 2024 5:58 pm

This is nonsense. A fertilized cell is not a "person" by any normal definition of "person".

Who's doing the defining? What makes it "normal"?

What about having a truthful or accurate definition: that would be better, would it not?

What's very clear, though, is that the aborter is trying to prevent a person. Not an ovum. If she would stay merely an ovum, then there would no great concern, and there would be no alleged threat to lifestyle or demands, no need that a potential mother should be delivered from the expedient of loving and caring for her as she grows up.

But what the aborter wants is precisely to cut off a person from existing...nothing less. And every aborter knows exactly that fact.

Exactly. Glad you agree. Persons are "prevented" (because fetuses haven't yet reached personhood) by abortion according to most.

No, I don't agree. Nor did I even misspeak. Look at the quotation you, yourself selected: I said "cut off." I could have easily said "murder." But I was more neutral.