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#1031880 - 08/31/08 02:21 PM Re: The life poll rainman
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Originally Posted By: rainman
Originally Posted By: Yossarian
No, that's a different issue than just smoking. People can make the decision to smoke for themselves but they can't pollute the air in public places where others have to breathe it.


Ah, but that's the issue with abortion. It doesn't just affect the mother.

woohoo! sarah palin is awesome!

(why do you all insist on proving me right?)

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#1032013 - 09/01/08 12:05 AM Re: The life poll TheManofSteel
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Quote:
slowly introduced the concept of "personhood"


The concept of "personhood" came with the use of the term "person" in defining rights in the US Constitution.

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#1032017 - 09/01/08 12:12 AM Re: The life poll Yossarian
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The concept of "personhood" was introduced by utilitarian philosopher Joseph Fletcher, and entered into court cases that helped interpret the constitution. As his standard bearer Peter Singer cited " being human is irrelevant to moral status; what counts is whether a "being" is a "person."
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#1032019 - 09/01/08 12:15 AM Re: The life poll TheManofSteel
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Quote:
utilitarian philosopher

how dare somebody be practical!

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#1032023 - 09/01/08 12:18 AM Re: The life poll Hated By Some
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Originally Posted By: Everyman McCain
Quote:
utilitarian philosopher

how dare somebody be practical!



of all the posts you ever made, this one shows the utmost depths of your ignorance.
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#1032024 - 09/01/08 12:19 AM Re: The life poll TheManofSteel
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what, pray tell, do you think that utilitarian means?

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#1032031 - 09/01/08 12:31 AM Re: The life poll TheManofSteel
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Fifth Amendment

No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.

Fourteenth Amendment

Section. 1. All persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

The Constitution provides certain rights that are specifically
given to persons.

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#1032056 - 09/01/08 03:20 AM Re: The life poll Yossarian
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I am quite aware of the constitutional use of the terminology "person." That is a different context from what I am referring to, and what I am referring to is the concept of "person-hood" as distinguished from a "human being" for purposes of applying its moral impact, and that started with Joseph Fletcher and the modern bioethics movement. As I have stated before, just because you are not read up on a particular subject does not mean that the particular subject is not a historical fact.
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#1032059 - 09/01/08 03:39 AM Re: The life poll Hated By Some
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Originally Posted By: Everyman McCain
what, pray tell, do you think that utilitarian means?


And I will answer your prayers. Utilitarian theories of medicine and morality have to do with the "utility"or "usefulness" that a "person" can render to society, and thus judges their "worth" based upon that "utility." Rights cease to be unalienable, but rather based upon a subjective list of criteria developed by utilitarian philosophers who have counseled both the medical profession and the courts in many matters of life and death.

This is what all of those threads we discussed last year and even this year on bioethics is all about. God forbid it should happen to you or your family, but you would understand when a family member in a critical health state may be denied healthcare because doctors, using ethical models developed by bioethicists, determine that the individual has ceased to be a "person" or is not worthy (as in WORTH) the utilization of healthcare resources, such as babies with spinbifida, spinal meningitis, people in need of organ donations, emergency medical care etc. I just have no time to go through the entire morbid list of it.

You can read up on organizations like "Not Dead Yet" and see why they have been organized and what they are up against. Again, this did not happen overnight, but slowly and insidiously.
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#1032061 - 09/01/08 04:27 AM Re: The life poll TheManofSteel
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If you were just talking about the term "for purposes of applying its moral impact" then I wouldn't really care to argue about it. But you began this by saying that personhood

Quote:
eventually made it into many court decisions, abortion cases being among them


that takes it out of being just a moral argument and brings it into the legal and constitutional realm. And, as I pointed out, there have always been constitutional rights attached to personhood. Fetuses have never been treated as persons for any constitutional purposes. They have never been counted in the census, for example.

Quote:
determine that the individual has ceased to be a "person"


No one ceases to be a person until they die.

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#1032064 - 09/01/08 05:11 AM Re: The life poll Yossarian
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Originally Posted By: Yossarian
No one ceases to be a person until they die.


So you are saying they cease to be a person when they get aborted.
Last edited by Bimmer; 09/01/08 06:17 AM.
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#1032069 - 09/01/08 01:00 PM Re: The life poll Yossarian
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[quote
Originally Posted By: Yossarian
If you were just talking about the term "for purposes of applying its moral impact" then I wouldn't really care to argue about it. But you began this by saying that personhood

Quote:
eventually made it into many court decisions, abortion cases being among them


that takes it out of being just a moral argument and brings it into the legal and constitutional realm. And, as I pointed out, there have always been constitutional rights attached to personhood. Fetuses have never been treated as persons for any constitutional purposes. They have never been counted in the census, for example.

Quote:
determine that the individual has ceased to be a "person"


Prior to Roe v. Wade, the unborn child was not considered less than a person, because the concept of personhood vis-a-vis a human being was not being applied. It took applying "personhood" apart from the understanding of "human being" to arrive at such a decision.

Quote:
No one ceases to be a person until they die.


Many are not recognized as persons to begin with, much less at the completion of the dying process. And for all the protections of "people" who have not died, we have seen case after case of people denied basic human needs like food and water, dehydrating people to death because they no longer matched the criteria of "personhood."
Last edited by MagiciansNephew; 09/01/08 01:01 PM.
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#1032204 - 09/01/08 09:28 PM Re: The life poll Bimmer
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Originally Posted By: Bimmer
Originally Posted By: Yossarian
No one ceases to be a person until they die.


So you are saying they cease to be a person when they get aborted.


As far as the Constitution is ccncerned, they never became one.

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#1032206 - 09/01/08 09:35 PM Re: The life poll TheManofSteel
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Quote:
Prior to Roe v. Wade, the unborn child was not considered less than a person


Maybe not by you, but they never HAD BEEN considered a person under the Constitution. You just assume that they had.

As far as people at the end of life the decisions on their care are made by their families. They are unquestionably persons under the Constitution.

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#1032234 - 09/01/08 11:02 PM Re: The life poll Yossarian
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Quote:
Originally Posted By: Yossarian
[quote] Prior to Roe v. Wade, the unborn child was not considered less than a person


Maybe not by you, but they never HAD BEEN considered a person under the Constitution. You just assume that they had.


Evidence that they had never been considered a person please, and I do not mean a later court decision bringing it to a head, I mean during the period before Roe v. Wade.

Quote:
As far as people at the end of life the decisions on their care are made by their families. They are unquestionably persons under the Constitution.


I am afraid I do not have the time to go into the many abominable cases where the family was not provided that right, and had to go to court to fight hospitals that , applying ethical models such as futile care theory, even when it was far from such a case, chose to take those decisions upon themselves. And in no way did the families always win, though thankfully, there were cases where they did.
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#1032237 - 09/01/08 11:09 PM Re: The life poll TheManofSteel
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i guess that they need to show more personal responsibility if they don't want to be subject to the utilitarian rules governing decision making then. :shrug:

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#1032240 - 09/01/08 11:21 PM Re: The life poll TheManofSteel
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Quote:
Evidence that they had never been considered a person please, and I do not mean a later court decision bringing it to a head, I mean during the period before Roe v. Wade.


During the arguments in Roe v. Wade the state specifically claimed that a fetus was a "person" entitled to a right to life under the Constitution. They were asked to cite any cases holding that a fetus is a "person" and they admitted they were unable to do so. And also, as I mentioned before, a fetus has ever been counted as a "person" for other consitiutuional purposes such as being counted in the census.

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#1032254 - 09/02/08 12:48 AM Re: The life poll Yossarian
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Originally Posted By: Yossarian
Quote:
Evidence that they had never been considered a person please, and I do not mean a later court decision bringing it to a head, I mean during the period before Roe v. Wade.


During the arguments in Roe v. Wade the state specifically claimed that a fetus was a "person" entitled to a right to life under the Constitution. They were asked to cite any cases holding that a fetus is a "person" and they admitted they were unable to do so.


Precsely, because "personhood" did not come up prior to bioethicist arguments in academia introducing the very concept vis-a-vis "human being." It was their influence on the medical establishments and courts that set the stage for its introduction into the eventual judicial reasoning, and this is what I have pointed out all along.

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#1032255 - 09/02/08 12:57 AM Re: The life poll TheManofSteel
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This is so sad, I remember going in at 9 weeks, having a sonogram and seeing the heart beat in that life growing in me and here you are trying to tell me it was not one.
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#1032257 - 09/02/08 01:08 AM Re: The life poll TheManofSteel
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Constitutional law is dependent on precedent, not bioethicist arguments. There was never any precedent for calling a fetus a person. That would require a constitutional amendment.

By the way, I can't help but notice that you have no answer as to why if fetuses were ever persons for constitutional purposes, they were never counted in the census.

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#1032258 - 09/02/08 01:09 AM Re: The life poll kms
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Originally Posted By: kms
This is so sad, I remember going in at 9 weeks, having a sonogram and seeing the heart beat in that life growing in me and here you are trying to tell me it was not one.


You responded to my post. Did you think that was the position I take, or do you mean Yoss'?

I am arguing that bioethicists push that the pre-born child is not a person. In fact, some bioethicists argue based on utilitarian ethical models that a 2 year old baby is not a person. Thank God they have not gotten that agenda through, but plenty of things that were once absurd have become mainstream ethics, so it would not surprise me one bit if they get that agenda pushed through one day.
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#1032259 - 09/02/08 01:11 AM Re: The life poll kms
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No, that's not what he's trying to tell you, or more appropriately, not what he's trying to tell amlf.

To use your own example, had a US census taker visited your home after you came back from your sonogram, the census taker would have counted you as "1". Had you then said, "But I'm 9 weeks pregnant!" the census taker would still have counted you as "1".

amlf believes, apparently, that census takers would have, at some point counted you and your baby of 9 weeks gestation as "2".

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#1032260 - 09/02/08 01:13 AM Re: The life poll Yossarian
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Originally Posted By: Yossarian
Constitutional law is dependent on precedent, not bioethicist arguments. There was never any precedent for calling a fetus a person. That would require a constitutional amendment.

By the way, I can't help but notice that you have no answer as to why if fetuses were ever persons for constitutional purposes, they were never counted in the census.

...or why they can't be issued Social Security Numbers, deducted as dependents on income tax forms......

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#1032261 - 09/02/08 01:13 AM Re: The life poll Hrothgar Geiger
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Originally Posted By: AML-Barbarian
No, that's not what he's trying to tell you, or more appropriately, not what he's trying to tell amlf.

To use your own example, had a US census taker visited your home after you came back from your sonogram, the census taker would have counted you as "1". Had you then said, "But I'm 9 weeks pregnant!" the census taker would still have counted you as "1".

amlf believes, apparently, that census takers would have, at some point counted you and your baby of 9 weeks gestation as "2".


Aaaaa, no, I did not address the census issue, since it is really not an issue of medical ethics. Reread my posts. Yoss introduced the census issue.
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#1032263 - 09/02/08 01:17 AM Re: The life poll Yossarian
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Originally Posted By: Yossarian
Constitutional law is dependent on precedent, not bioethicist arguments. There was never any precedent for calling a fetus a person. That would require a constitutional amendment.


Bioethical arguments provided the reasoning and rationale for court decisions. The courts regularly consult medical ethicists in cases, and bioethicists no less. It was done for Roe v. Wade and a number of other cases.

Quote:
By the way, I can't help but notice that you have no answer as to why if fetuses were ever persons for constitutional purposes, they were never counted in the census.


It is not a medical ethics issue, that is why I am not addressing it
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