PROOF - A fetus is a person, killing him or her murder

Today's news:

Peterson is found guilty of murder

Jury convicts him of killing his wife, Laci, and their
unborn son

The Associated Press
Saturday, November 13, 2004

Redwood City, Calif. - Scott Peterson was convicted
yesterday of murdering his pregnant wife and dumping her
body in San Francisco Bay.

Prosecutors in the made-for-cable-TV case had portrayed
it as a cold-blooded plot to escape marriage and
fatherhood for the bachelor life.

Peterson, 32, could get the death penalty. The former
fertilizer salesman was convicted of one count of first-
degree murder for killing his wife, Laci, and one count
of second-degree murder in the death of the son she was
carrying.

PROOF - A fetus is a person, killing him or her murder

PROOF - A fetus is a person, killing him or her murder

Today's news:

Peterson is found guilty of murder

Jury convicts him of killing his wife, Laci, and their
unborn son

The Associated Press
Saturday, November 13, 2004

Redwood City, Calif. - Scott Peterson was convicted
yesterday of murdering his pregnant wife and dumping her
body in San Francisco Bay.

Prosecutors in the made-for-cable-TV case had portrayed
it as a cold-blooded plot to escape marriage and
fatherhood for the bachelor life.

Peterson, 32, could get the death penalty. The former
fertilizer salesman was convicted of one count of first-
degree murder for killing his wife, Laci, and one count
of second-degree murder in the death of the son she was
carrying.

More at:

http://tinyurl.com/62dmf

Or,

http://www.timesdispatch.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=RTD/MGArticle/RTD_Basi
cArticle&c=MGArticle&cid=1031779123278

Jai Maharaj
http://www.mantra.com/jai
Om Shanti


In article <a8f80314.0411122002.37c1d158@posting.google.com>,
nmstevens@msn.com (nmstevens) posted in misc.writing.screenplays:

tjmacwrit@aol.com (TJMacWrit) wrote in message
news:<20041112031740.11818.00000543@mb-m16.aol.com>...

nmstevens said>
t the heart of the abortion debate --

"unborn" child -- is doublespeak.

Yet you apparently have no problem with people using the term

"pro-choice".

"Pro-choice" as it is generally used, accurately describes the
position of those who hold it -- they believe that, in the absence of
a societal consensus -- which I presume even the most radical
anti-abortionist who have to agree that we lack -- each individual
ought to be free, within certain reasonable limits, to act as their
own personal conscience dictates -- that is, they favor the right of
each individual to *choose* in respect to this issue.

That is not a loaded term. It is not doublespeak as it is generally
used.

"unborn child" is -- because it presumes the truth of that which is at
the heart of the issue under debate -- namely whether that which has,
as yet, not been born is, or can be, in fact -- considered a child.

NM Stevens poses as the champion of free choice, yet frequently demands

that

people in the debate use the terms that he approves of.

No -- only that we use words according to what the *words* mean -- not
twist them around and misuse them and re-define them and politicize
them -- which is exactly what you are doing -- in service of your own
agenda.

Then, after a considerable amount of typing which amounts to "my opinion
matters, yours doesn't" he says

Apparently, there seems to be something about adherence to the
anti-abortion position that not affects the mind, but also the
eyesight, as I never suggested or implied any such thing.

But there's nothing in particular about that distinct event -- other
than that, in a process mostly lacking in distinct events, it happens
to be one, that would say, "Ah hah -- here we have a human being" --
in respect to a cell so small that you need a microscope to see it.

The distinct event is that a unique DNA pattern has been formed. Human

DNA.

Until that time, it is only potentialities. Male bodies produce millions

of

sperm which are discarded in normal bodily processes, female bodies

produce

hundreds of eggs which are, again, discarded in normal biological

processes.

But if that egg is fertilized, potential ends. Barring medical problems,

ONLY

human interference will prevent that baby from emerging from it's mothers

womb

9 months later. From the very start, it's DNA is neither the mothers nor
fathers, but unique.

That's correct. A distinct pattern has been formed.

So let's try it this way:


Distinct pattern of human DNA = Person

Says who?

Why?

Especially when you consider that, for some time after that "distinct
pattern" has been formed, that the developing ovum retains the
capacity to be not only a single person but more than one person.

How then can one meaningfully declare the above -- namely that, at the
moment of fertilization that we now have *A person" -- "A distinct
individual" -- when, in fact, we might really have more than one? Who
knows?

That is, at that point, as with sperm and egg, we are still talking
not about a "realization" -- but still, in the most generous
characterization -- only a potentiality.

By the way, even your argument begs the question of second or third

trimester

abortions- by which time, what you refer to as a "clump of cells" has

fingers,

eyes, a nervous system, a beating heart

But, as I said -- would not any of those hallmarks in development --
the first beat of the fetal heart, or the development of a functional
nervous system, for instance -- be as valid a place for a declaration
of "personhood?"

But you can't have it both ways. If "personhood" occurs at
fertilization, then fetal heartbeat, fingers, nervous system -- all
the rest of that -- should be irrelevant -- at any rate -- irrelevant
to you.

That is, sucking out the baby at six months, from your perspective,
should be no different, as regards ending the life of a person -- then
would sucking out that cell at day five or day two, or an instant
after sperm enters egg.

Or, for that matter, no difference, whatsoever, between destroying
that fertilized egg and putting a bullet through the head of the baby
a moment after the mother gives birth to it.

Both acts identical because, according to you:

Fertilized ovum = person,

just as:

Baby = person.

Because the instant you start making distinctions between destroying
the fertilized egg an instant after fertilization and the baby a week
before nine months -- then you are saying that there is, in fact, a
difference between a fertilized egg and a baby -- between a single
cell and a person.

If there is no difference, then why clutter up your argument with
heartbeats and brains and nervous systems -- since clearly none of
them are pre-requisites for personhood?

Apparently, the only thing that matters is the unique DNA.

All of those other things -- they only matter to the opposition -- to
those who consider that personhood does not come in a flash, but
accrues gradually. Then you really have to agonize about those issues
-- heartbeats, and nervous systems, and viability outside the womb.

Because then you don't have a clear and precise hallmark -- an instant
where you can say, before this razor's edge -- non-person -- afterward
-- human.

According to you, there is such a razor's edge.

But to those who disagree with you, they would say that it simply
doesn't happen that way -- any more than there is a razor's edge where
you can say before this precise instant - child, afterward - adult.

In the latter case, for reasons of legality, we choose essentially
arbitrary dates to confer adult status upon our young. And likewise,
in respect to the developing fetus, our legal system, in respect to
the gradual shift from single cell toward viable human, has
essentially done something similar -- imposed the trimester division,
with differing permissable degrees of goverment interference in the
process as the developing embryo moves toward personhood. But we can't
kid ourselves about it -- the divisions, like the legal divisions
between childhood and adulthood, simply by virtue of imposing
precision upon a gradual process, are necessarily arbitrary.

It's a compromise -- but all such laws, imposing digital absolutes
upon the gradualism of nature, are inevitably going to be compromises.

We can't fix it by simply pretending that processes that are, in fact,
gradual are actually not.

And what the heck do you think will happen then? When the unattached
ovum dies. That the ovum's soul will go flitting up to heaven?>
Now, admittedly, I am an atheist -- but even if you are a believer --
doesn't that strike you as a pretty silly proposition?

What strikes me as silly is someone who doesn't share my religious beliefs
trying to tell me what I should believe.

Actually, if you'll read the sentence again -- you'll note that it's a
question -- not an instruction -- a question that you seem to take
great care in wriggling out of answering.

As to "souls flitting up to heaven" - beats the heck out of me. That's

God's

province, not mine. See, I know I'm not God. (you seem to be rather fuzzy

on

this matter, tho you mostly talk as if you think you're God)

Not likely. That's because I try to be reasonable - and the fact is,
no version of god that I've ever heard postulated by anybody ever
struck me as close to being reasonable.

I don't run the

Universe. I just try to follow his commandments as best I understand them.

And

by the way, I knew abortion was murder the first time I heard it described

in a

newspaper, as a 9 year old child.

Well, some of us continue our educations -- others don't.

I had never heard about abortion in my church

before then. I'm glad that the Church has stood strong in it's opposition

to

that, but my position on the matter is not, and has never been, based on

what

the Church says.

Finally, NM says being opposed to abortion is a try to get

-- a moral imperative (like freeing
the slaves) that endows them with the right to impose the consequences
of their arbitrary position upon everyone else.

As opposed to the right to enforce abortion on an unborn child.

Right

child: A young person, esp. between infancy and youth.

unborn: not born - not brought into life.

Therefore -- someone between infancy and youth -- not born -- not
brought into life?

No -- doublespeak.

You presume the truth of that which is in debate. Until you have
demonstrated it (and believing it when you were nine doesn't
constitute a demonstration) -- you have no right to do so.

And what exactly was it that convinced you -- when you were nine? That
stuff about the unique admixture of the DNA? Somehow I doubt it.

Generally -- you want to decide the issue based on the evidence -- not
decide the issue and then look at the evidence.

Of course - that really applies to issues that can be decided on the
basis of evidence -- which this isn't.

It is not a scientific issue. It isn't even a moral issue (it only
becomes a moral issue after you reach a certain conclusion about it).
It is a definitional one.

How do we define a human being? When do we start being human? When do
we stop?

That has to do with what we mean when we use the term "Human Being."

Clearly, there's a consensus in respect to the majority usage of term
-- all those flesh and blood bipedal things with arms and legs and
heads and fingers and toes you see walking around -- those are human
beings. And even if you cut off the arms and legs -- if it's still
alive, it's still a human being. But cut off the head. Not anymore. No
longer a human being. Now you've got something that used to be a human
being. It was one. Not any more. What you've got then is your basic
ex-human being.

Human being with head attached, on life support, but brain completely
dead -- how about that - still a person?

How about a person with a perfectly functioning brain -- but suppose
we could cut the head off the body and keep them both alive -- body
alive over there -- heart pumping, lungs breathing -- and keep the
head alive over in a different room, blood flowing in and out, brain
thinking, eyes seeing, ears hearing.

Clearly, there's a person somewhere -- but where? Is he now divided
up, in two separate rooms? Or does the "person" only reside in one
room -- the room with the functioning brain? The room with the
functioning body?

That is a matter of definition -- and we struggle now with definitions
at the end of life just as we struggle with definitions at the
beginnings of life.

That is a challenge -- and a great many people -- people of
conscience, struggle with the issues that the grey areas of those
definitions raise -- because it is by no means self evident -- and DNA
doesn't make it so. And your over-simplistic absolutism doesn't make
it so.

Because like it or not, fellow -- you happen to be the arrogant
***** around here -- not me.

I am not, and never have been the one trying to force anything on you.
You are the one trying to pass laws to force you're sweet, innocent
little nine-year-old definitions of life on me -- and the rest of the
fucking world.

I say to you -- do as your conscience dictates and let others do the
same -- and you accuse me of being god?

Well -- ***** you. ***** you now, and when you were nine years old.

Who plugged you into the fucking almighty? You want to do god's will
-- try checking out his opinion on vanity -- and then check yourself
out.

Maybe you've got it right -- then again, maybe you haven't. Maybe
instead of dismissing it you ought to think a little bit about those
countless millions of "ovum souls" -- like tadpoles adrift in the
great beyond.

I know this is an aphorism that the True Believers never want to hear
-- but if it doesn't make sense -- it isn't true.

NMS

PROOF - A fetus is a person, killing him or her murder

Today's news:

Peterson is found guilty of murder