No, I disagree, I still think that it is important that a foetus is part of its mother is important: it means that one HAS to consider the woman in this discussion, so we cannot simply prattle on about the foetus, ignoring the effects of any action upon the mother. Self-awareness occurs somewhat after birth (young babies have less self-awareness than higher apes, though that rapidly changes, obviously). In terms of brain development I disagree with you: the change between conception and birth is less than the change between birth and later, as the brain wires itself with external stimuli. Leastways, I think we can safely say that science isn’t going to definately answer this one terribly soon. Certainly nothing in the last few years has changes our views about self-awareness etc. which again begs the question as to why we wish to mess with the law?

I would love Band to go beserk with a chainsaw, as long as I can watch. Seriously, I don’t want newly-born kids to be killed at whim as they can and generally do (at least in the West) grow into adults, and don’t fuck about with their mothers bodies and mental health in the process (neccessarily, due to adoption etc.). The same cannot be said of foetuses. However, from a purely logical viewpoint, I don’t want to say that something magical happens at birth, much as something magical doesn’t happen at conception. It’s a process, starting with an egg and ending with an adult human sometime later.

But the 24-week line is not really an absolute line in the sand: later abortions are allowed in exceptional circumstances, and the fact that (at present at least) women and their doctors are imposing their own line in the sand at a somewhat earlier point. Thus changing the law would basically only have the effect of fucking over some very messed up, often teenage, women. That doesn’t seem reasonable to me: again, why not make sure these women don’t arrive in this situation in the first place?

Anyway, we seem to be arguing about lines in the sand now, and I believe Band once mentioned on this very blog that such arguments are essentially pointless (an argument, I might note, he seems to have ignored for this post).

–Matt

I don’t care that the foetus is part of the mother’s body. I’m interested in the consciousness and feelings (if any) of the foetus, which are not part of the consciousness or feelings of the mother, they are totally separate and disjoint. If the foetus was *just* part of the mother’s body, then of course she could do what the fuck she wanted with it, but it isn’t: it’s also an independent, separate, and individual conscious being (at least after a certain stage it is).

As for human babies not being human: is a baby gorilla a gorilla? Yes! Is your sperm human, well it’s not a human anyway. Your word games do exhibit grey area, but in every respect the differences between a single cell and a new-born baby vastly outnumber the differences between that baby and an adult. In other words the grey area lies somewhere between conception and birth, not after it. More awkwardly for current purposes I reckon that the grey area lies much nearer the beginning of pregancy than most people would like to admit.

Wee seem to agree with me that what we need to do is "draw a line in the sand before which we can be pretty sure that what we’re killing is not a sentient human being" – it’s just that I’m far from convinced that 24 weeks is such a line.

As for post-natal abortions: why do you give a fuck? If you don’t consider newly-born babies to be people or even humans, then I can’t see how you could have a moral problem with Band going beserk with a chainsaw in the neo-natal ward (at least the if all the babies there were unloved orphans).

I don’t think we can rightly say that, if something’s rare, it’s OK. Serial killing is rare.

Oh, and public information time: the words in the purity test are not mine, but the Anti-Nowhere League’s (as also interpreted by Metallica). If I really need to make such disclaimers, I’d also like to make clear that I have nothing against goats, sheep, old men, monarchs (aside from being a republican, natch), homosexuals, or Spock.

But maybe I’m over-interpreting.

Leave it out. Are you really trying to tell us that it’s only the middle class that has abortions?

You have ignored my point that a foetus is *part of the mothers body*: it’s not very distinct, and is very, very dependent upon the mothers body for its survival. Also, developmental science is increasingly showing how important the mother’s body is in deciding things like various gene-expressions etc.: we are much more than simply our genetic coding in this regard. I would hence say that it *is* important where a foetus is in this discussion; it’s also important to note that to get a foetus out of the womb is non-trivial, and the reverse is not possible.

…reasonable approach is to draw a line in the sand before which we can be pretty sure that what we’re killing is not a sentient human being

I think I agree with you here. However, I was arguing that using the point at which a foetus/baby could survive, with the best medical technology, is a profoundly bad way to decide the above point in time. Some people (especially in the last couple of years) seem to have been basing their arguments on precisely this point: survivability and sentience are very different things.

You say you don’t consider babies "human": well you’re wrong.

Is a human egg cell or a sperm "human"? Is some random cell in my body "human"? With cloning etc. we’re getting to the point where any of there things could be grow (with the help of a human female) into a fully formed human; surely a baby is simply just further along in this process. Of course, to some extent I’m playing a word game (what is the difference between "human" and "person"?)

namely that most of the time people wouldn’t bother with antenatal abortions, they’d just wait till the little fuckers were born, and abort them at that stage if they didn’t like the look of them.

I think, if you really believe this, then you have a fairly fucked-up view of why the absolutely vast majority of women have abortions. I cannot believe anyone sane would wish to kill a baby (espically given adoption possibilities). I can very well understand why a woman would want an early-term abortion. I can understand why, in extreme cases (which is really all we are arguing about) why some women would want latish-term abortions.

Look, my position here is that we shouldn’t change the law. We should improve sex education etc. to mean that far fewer women seek late-term abortions: very few already do, and (reading in the Indi today for example) very few doctors agree to it. It’s already pretty hard to get any abortion in this country, and women are *not* popping down the clinic at 22 weeks as a form of birth-control!

–Matt