Dear JP,

<<Shadow Minister – you claim that “the cornerstone of this debate is the right of every person to have control over one's own body”. This is just a raw assertion that such a “right” exists – how do you justify it?>>

An excellent question, so I was pondering it:

Yes, a person does not have such right to control one's own body.

But if one has no right to control one's own body, then surely others have no such right either over somebody else's body!

So in the context of this discussion, abortion is wrong, but throwing someone in jail for that is even more wrong.

If however it was somehow right to throw someone in jail because they interfere with the body of another, than surely those who eat meat should be jailed first because the life they interfered with was more developed, more intelligent and more attached to their body than a foetus.

Dear Stezza,

<<I enjoyed reading the book 'the selfish gene'>>

I read it too.

Yes, the genes are selfish - but that doesn't mean that you should reduce yourself to their level.

JP

"Stezza –Would you appeal to them that they are going against the trend of genetic selection within our society? Yes, that should work."

I suspect it would work as well as threatening them with eternal damnation....

"But really, on your own terms, you have no value and they wouldn’t be doing anything wrong in murdering you."

You don't understand, to myself, I do have great value. To someone trying to murder me I don't have value. That was the differences in value judgements I was talking about. Personally I value the lives of murderers less than non-murderers. Don't you?

"We surely have no responsibility to abide by any apparent trends in mindless, unintentional, genetic selection."

No we don't "have" to "do" anything. That's not how genetic selection works. If you lived in a city with lots of murderers, you would probably move, right?

I think what you are looking for is absolute rights and wrongs. I'm sorry they don't exist, never have, never will. Now, can you honestly say you value the live of a serial rapist/murderer equally to a small child

It's interesting that some US Conservative politicians and evangelical Christians still believe that it's not possible for a woman to become pregnant from rape.

In cases where others concede that it may be possible in some circumstances, they claim that babies - even those conceived via a violent sexual assault - are "a gift from God".

God certainly works in mysterious ways.

In any case, all are speaking out of self-interest and none bear any responsibility for any consequences that may follow for those affected.

Divergence – you suggest that Peter Singer’s views are extreme. By what standard are you making that judgment? - your own personal preferences? – what you perceive “society’s” standard happens to be at this time? Why should those standards matter?

I don’t know where you live, but in Australia there is no legal restriction of abortion to the first trimester. In the ACT abortion on demand has been legal up to birth for over ten years. In Victoria, since 2008, abortion on demand up to 24 weeks is legal. Elsewhere, in practice, there is no restriction on when abortions are done.

As far as twinning goes, all that shows is that there is more than one way that new life can come into being. As far as two embryos merging into one goes, I have not heard of that before, but perhaps one embryo dies in the process. You say that the vast majority of zygotes die before the woman even realises she is pregnant. Can you please substantiate that claim. From what I have read on this, such claims are based on extrapolations from animal studies, and if that is so then we don’t know that this is necessarily the case with human beings. Besides there is an enormous difference morally between an unintentional and an intentional act.

Human cloning may happen one day, and if it does, it will merely demonstrate that human lives can be brought into being by a new means. It will not show that skin cells or sperm or ova are human beings.

You say that you want abortion to be rare, but you don’t say why. If you think sentience matters, the large majority of abortions are done in the first trimester when there is no sentience

davidf

'Don't you care for truth at all? ' It is obvious that you are very loose with it when defining a life.

JP,

The question of a person's right to privacy and liberty originates as far back as the 14th century with the Habeas corpus which restricts the actions the state can take against an individual without due cause.

Further to this are laws against torture, laws controlling privacy etc. Police cannot even force you to take a blood test for drunk driving.

This is not unlimited, and one can lose one's right if one commits a crime or threatens others. If one reads Roe vs Wade, the rational is clearly laid out, and while obviously not as simplistic as my one line statement, the right of the state to intervene in a woman's control over her person is front and center.