Celevia “I emotionally feel that there should be a link between the viability of the foetus and the time limit for abortion but only in situations where women have free choice.”

Let me ask

A woman remains pregnant for, say, 30 weeks.

Her choice,

Something happens, I don’t know what nor is any specific event particularly important but it is important enough for her to decide to terminate.

For someone 30 weeks pregnant to decide to terminate, I figure, whatever her reason, it must be extremely “significant” for her to contemplate.

In short, the further into any pregnancy, the “bond” developed between the woman and the fetus is developing, the later the termination, the greater the breaking of that bond and the harder it is to do.

That remains, to me, a reason for greater sympathy from other people, not a reason for the woman to be denied her personal sovereignty.

Stickman “speaking in plain English” are my words, in quotations for emphasis, not because you used them.

However, in “lunar right” terms many might describe me as such, although not in this debate. It is a stupid term because it generalizes an untruth.

Politically, I am of the “right”.

I am likewise, because of how I interpret my “libertarian right wing” values, absolutely pro-choice.

“Well that's just silly isn't it”

No, it is absolutely consistent with valuing the rights of the sentient individual (over the rights of something, non-sentient, developing through use of the resources of that sentient individual).

“And furthermore, who is going to perform terminations that late in the term, without any medical indication”

That is a matter of convenience, the solicitation of medical services is much a free market and I am sure, excluding statutory prohibition, not something which is insurmountable.

Finally, the term “pro-choice” is wholly apt to those who share my values.

Nothing I or people like Celevia, have ever posted promotes the idea that any woman should have an abortion.

Every word I and people like Celevia write supports the right of a woman to choose, for herself, whether to have an abortion

Hi Col,
Quite profound! I totally agree with you that abortion should be a woman’s choice at any time.
From a rational perspective, I support the woman’s right to choose.

However, I do struggle with the idea of late-term abortion emotionally. I find it, personally, hard to justify emotionally.
Of course emotion alone is no good enough reason to deny a woman the right to control her own fertility/body.
That's why I support her sole right to choose.

The abortion debate is always hard because both sides can be seen as immoral.
Although the killing of a 24-week-old foetus can be seen as immoral, it would also be immoral to force a woman to carry a pregnancy full term and to make her give birth.
I believe that the latter is more immoral than the former.

With my previous post, I just wanted to point out that I can see Stickman’s perspective and reasoning as well.
I can’t help feeling sad when it comes to late abortions.

I don’t think I have a problem with the term ‘pro-choice’ because it describes someone who supports that women should have free choice.
Not too keen on the term ‘pro-life’, I prefer to call them anti-choice, but that’s a personal preference.
Sometimes these terms can be a bit black-and-white but not sure what would be a better quick description of the opposite stances.

Col rouge said: "However, in “lunar right” terms many might describe me as such, although not in this debate. It is a stupid term because it generalizes an untruth."

Not sure why you have your knickers in a twist about the term, as I have made abundantly clear, I wasn't talking about you.. I was talking about those to whom you are dimaetrically OPPOSED on this issue. 'Lunar right' gets across exactly the meaning I wanted in terms of people whom most would consider extremely socially conservative.

Sentience: The definition I found of "sentient" focuses on ability to perceive through senses and conscious experience. 24 weekers in a NICU crib are quite obviously capable of perceiving through their senses, so I fail to see how you can argue that 30+ weekers aren't.

Anyway, while clearly we will never agree on this issue, I would venture to say that VERY few people would agree with your "termination on demand up to delivery" philosophy, though that is an intuition rather than anything I can point to evidence on.

Celivia, the problem I have with the term "pro-choice" is that, in arguing against absolute freedom of choice on this issue, I am by default cast as "anti-choice". I am not - I just acknowledge a competing fetal interest. But you are right, they are convenient labels and thus widely used. I am a libertarian also in that I would always support moral philosophies that allow people to act as they please, PROVIDED THAT ACTION HARMS NO OTHER.

Celivia said: "Not too keen on the term ‘pro-life’, I prefer to call them anti-choice, but that’s a personal preference."

Thank you for your honesty :)

As I said previously, I don't like either term.

Hi Stickman
“we will never agree on this issue”
I usually find the process of debating just as interesting without having the goal to come to an agreement especially with a difficult topic like this.

Terms
Yes Stickman, I think that these terms –pro-choice and anti-choice- bother me more than they have in other debates.
They are not distinctive enough. I do also not view you as ‘anti-choice’ because you don’t oppose abortion perse. Besides, I still have trouble supporting say, 30 week abortions myself; but as I said, only for emotional reasons.
Whenever I try to think of a rational argument to oppose it, I can always debunk it myself, then there’s nothing left to go on but emotion.

For example:

The sentience argument.
If we rely on the presence of sentience as an argument why aborting a 24-week foetus is unethical, then is it also unethical to slaughter animals that are sentient to the same degree as a 24-week-old foetus?
Perhaps both are unethical, but we slaughter animals anyway without much thought. Not many people are vegetarians.
Either both are ethical or both are unethical if both have the same degree of sentience.

The “PROVIDED THAT ACTION HARMS NO OTHER” argument.
How would you define “other”?
I would define “other” as a "person", and because a foetus is not a person, no person is being harmed by the act of abortion.

Viability.
A 24-weeker may have a 50% chance to be viable, but of that 50% there’s a quite high occurrence of physical and mental health problems- some of which would be reason for parents to consider abortion and for doctors to support it. Viability alone doesn’t say that the survivor is going to live a reasonable quality life.

I don’t know what the death rate of these initial survivors is after a year, five years, or ten years.
Is there a higher than normal rate of child mortality amongst 24 weekers than amongst full-term children?

Hi Celivia

Re: sentience - yes, the question of sentience brings a whole other argument into it, which is why I never brought it up. If you read Peter Singer on "speciesism" then he makes that exact argument (we should ethically all be vegetarian). Most of us though, rightly or wrongly, value human life above all other (and eat meat!), presumably for reasons other than sentience.

Celivia said: "Either both are ethical or both are unethical if both have the same degree of sentience."

Well.. only if you agree with Singer's views that sentience should determine ethical bases for dealing with fellow creatures :)

You could also argue (as the author does and I would tend to agree) that it is ethically inconsistent to treat a 24 weeker differently depending on whether it is in or ex utero.

Re: harm to others - yes you are right, legally anyway, personhood in this country is never conferred to a fetus. My point is that such a distinction (for late term fetuses) is one of convenience and underscores the arbitrariness of treating the same thing (eg 30 week fetus) differently, depending on whether or not it is "out" yet.

Viability: here is a really good link I posted earlier on, with some data for you Celivia, outcomes for 24 weekers are surpisingly good. (http://www.mja.com.au/public/issues/185_09_061106/lui11142_fm.html)
Around 60% have no functional disability discerned on examination at 2-3 years. Not sure about later on. It is a really good paper to read, it makes it clear that, as you say, major impairment is possible, and depending on the clinical status of the baby, decision may be made to not treat actively, in the grey zone between 23-26 weeks (the abstract is a good summary).

Stickman,
“Most of us though, rightly or wrongly, value human life above all other for reasons other than sentience.”
True. I only discussed sentience because it was brought up and thought that sentience is no good argument against abortion.
Anyway, after dumping sentience we’re back to why we should value human life at 24 weeks but not at 23.

“You could also argue that it is ethically inconsistent to treat a 24 weeker differently depending on whether it is in or ex utero.”
I don’t think I agree that it’s inconsistent because a 24-weeker in utero completely depends on its host, hasn’t had contact with outsiders and isn’t autonomic, while a 24-weeker ex utero isn’t depending on a host- he/she is autonomic, can be cared for by and has contact with outsiders.

Why should the host be the only one on the planet to be forced to provide for the foetus? Every other carer can quit.
An autonomous 24-weeker has rights, a non-autonomous one does not.

Back to viability
Thank you for the link, I read just the abstract for now but I’ll keep it for future reference.
If viability at 24 weeks is going to be an argument for forcing a pregnant woman to give birth against her will, then it should be a very strong argument.
But we’re only talking about a potential functionality rate of 30% since survival rates of 24 weekers are 50%, and of the ones surviving, 60% are expected to be functionally able- which is a total of 30% of ALL (100%) 24-week premature babies.

That means that 100% of women who seek abortion at 24 weeks would be forced to give birth because there happens to be a potential functionality rate of 30% amongst 24-weekers, who in fact only made it this far with the aid of specialist treatment.
I still don’t find it ethical to deny women the right to terminate their pregnancies at 24 weeks and don’t see a need for too much drama about it since it happens very rarely.