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Politics : Sharks in the Septic Tank -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Neocon who wrote (7122)	3/3/2001 9:34:42 PM
From: E	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 82486

<<It is unnecessary to drag in the soul. When the gametes unite, it is a human organism at a particular stage of development, an individual that, if able to gestate uninterruptedly, will come out as an infant in swaddling. Thus, it is a human being. Only someone who believes in "ensoulment", and thinks he can pinpoint it, could think it disposable without qualms....>> I think it is necessary to postulate, or "drag in," a soul, to be able justify your vocabulary, which, it seems to me, is designed to avoid the use of "child" and "human being" and "person" and "individual," all of which defy a certain innate sense we call "common," and which can be wrong, but sometimes isn't. I say that it feels like a defiance of "common sense" to invest the "united gametes" with a value greater than that of not forcing gestation against her will on a female adult person, human being, woman, individual, who may desperately desire not to gestate and bear a child of that male at that time, or to gestate ever. "Common sense" might not feel so defied if the vocabulary used could be subtly modified so that "cells" or "gametes" or "embryos" became "child," as per Greg. Or "individual," or "human organism," as per Neocon. Or "human being," as per Neocon. But I suggest that there is less to the phrase "human organism" than meets the eye. A kidney is a human organism. So is a tumor. The difference between them is one has a potential that the other doesn't. For an "organism" that is not a person or child or human being, but merely a "human organism" with a POTENTIAL BUT NOT EXISTING status (so do the separated two gametes have the potential to become a human individual; why should a thin rubber membrane be allowed to frustrate it?) to take precedence over the adult female, it is necessary, imo, to invest it with something. Some feel comfortable calling that a "soul." Those that don't, or see that "soul"-evocation is a dangerous rationale for forcing gestation on women who don't buy it, look around for language to obfuscate the difference between potential and existing reality. With vocabulary that makes cells sounds like people -- "human organism," with the fillip, "thus, a human being," -- instead of "potential human beings." "Organism" doesn't mean human beings. United gametes are blueprints for human beings. Only someone who believed a potential existence was an actual existence would think "without qualms" of forcing a woman to gestate a potential person until it became an actual person. Potential \Poten"tial\, n. 1. Anything that may be possible; a possibility 2. Existing in possibility, not in actuality; in prospect Potential existence means merely that the thing may be at some time; actual existence, that it now is. --Sir W. Hamilton.*

To: Neocon who wrote (7122)	3/3/2001 9:44:05 PM
From: E	Respond to of 82486

<<It is unnecessary to drag in the soul. When the gametes unite, it is a human organism at a particular stage of development, an individual that, if able to gestate uninterruptedly, will come out as an infant in swaddling. Thus, it is a human being. Only someone who believes in "ensoulment", and thinks he can pinpoint it, could think it disposable without qualms....>> I think it is necessary to postulate, or "drag in," a soul, to be able justify your vocabulary, which, it seems to me, is designed to avoid the direct use of "child" and "human being" and "person" and "individual," all of which defy a certain innate sense we call "common," and which can be wrong, but sometimes isn't. I say that it feels like a defiance of "common sense" to invest the "united gametes" with a value greater than that of not forcing gestation against her will on a female adult person, human being, woman, individual, who may desperately desire not to gestate and bear a child of that male at that time, or perhaps not to gestate ever. "Common sense" might not feel so defied if the vocabulary used could be subtly modified so that "cells" or "gametes" or "embryos" became "child," as per Greg. Or "individual," or "human organism," as per Neocon. Or "thus a human being," as per Neocon. But I suggest that there is less to the phrase "human organism" than meets the eye. A kidney is a human organism. So is a tumor. The difference between them is: one has a potential that the other doesn't. For an "organism" that is not a person or child or human being, but merely a "human organism" with a POTENTIAL to become a human being (so do the two separated gametes have the potential to become a human being; why should a thin rubber membrane be allowed to frustrate it?) to take precedence over the adult female, it is necessary, imo, to invest it with something. Some feel comfortable calling that a "soul." Those that don't, or see that "soul"-evocation is a dangerous rationale for forcing gestation on women who don't buy the rationalization, look around for language to obfuscate the difference between potential and existing reality. With vocabulary that makes cells sounds like people -- "human organism," with the fillip, "thus, it is a human being," -- instead of "potential human beings." It's a big "thus," slipped in as if it were enough to make potential into existing. Throw in the "swaddling" the fetus will arrive garbed in, and you might have a foggy thinker believing potential existence was the same as existence, that an organism with the potential to become a baby were a real, existing baby a woman should be forced by the state to gestate. "Thus" doesn't do that, though. "Organism" doesn't mean human beings. United gametes are an organism, they are not a person, all the "thuses" in the world notwithstanding. Only someone who believed a potential existence was an actual existence would think "without qualms" of forcing a woman to gestate a potential person until it became an actual person. Potential \Poten"tial\, n. 1. Anything that may be possible; a possibility 2. Existing in possibility, not in actuality; in prospect Potential existence means merely that the thing may be at some time; actual existence, that it now is. --Sir W. Hamilton.*