Margaret Somerville on why we shouldn’t authorize killing

Margaret Somerville appears on The Source with Ezra Levant to discuss the moral and ethical problems with legalizing euthanasia and assisted suicide.

The most important question to ask is, is society either authorizing someone to kill other people or authorizing them to help them kill themselves, is that morally wrong? [...] The problem with assisted suicide is that society has to become complicit in it and society has to say, “we’ll authorize this,” and society has to change its laws to allow it to be legal, and its that complicity that I think is so dangerous and wrong… It’s a culture of despair, and the opposite of despair is hope[...] People who want euthanasia are not depressed, it’s usually not because of pain, but [...] the state they’re in is hopelessness[... having] nothing to look forward to.

Watch the whole 9 minute interview here.

Dr. Adrian Owen on TVO’s The Agenda

Danny wrote about Dr. Adrian Owen’s research on awareness and patients in a vegetative state last year, while Owen was in the UK. Now he’s the Canada excellence research chair in Cognitive Neuroscience and Imaging at the University of Western Ontario, and Steve Paikin sat down with him for a half hour interview on his work this past Spring [25min]. Very important research to keep an eye on regarding “end of life” issues.

I’m a Dad! 3D Ultrasound

I’ve recently become a father. I am sure that pregnancy was designed not only to allow for the early development of the child, but also to give parents time to prepare. Still, in this period of anticipation, waiting to “meet” our child, it’s amazing how technology makes the pre-born child more visible than ever before.

Here are some photos and a video from a 3D ultrasound around ~21 weeks after conception.

The 3D ultrasound video and photos are all licensed freely under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported licence, which means you’re encouraged to share, remix, adapt, distribute the photos and video far and wide.

Don’t worry, it’s not a baby.

Liveaction.org is running a series of pro-life graphics. This one highlights very nicely the huge gap between common sense and the pro-choice argument that it’s not a baby.

Check it out…

Another Grim Anniversary

Canada has gone another year without coming to its senses on the issue of abortion. As many of you know, January 28 is the 23rd anniversary of the Morgentaler case that legalised abortion on demand in Canada, making us the only country in the western world to have no abortion law at all. A combination of public ignorance at the state of our laws, and a series of cowardly parliaments, have allowed this decision to go unchallenged in Canada, letting millions of unborn children’s lives be tragically ended for the crime of not being able to defend themselves. However today is another anniversary, far more likely to get swept under the rug, because this is the anniversary of the day that information on abortion was swept under the rug. That’s right, today is the 5th anniversary of the last time a public report was published about the condition of abortions in this country. 5 years ago, the government of Canada decided that Canada didn’t need pesky information like how many abortions took place every year, or medical complications resulting from them, or any such information because of… you know… choice. Meanwhile, as recently as a year ago, newspaper headlines were proudly proclaiming abortion rate drops while using 5-year-old data!  Of course it’s not surprising why the government does not want us to know these new numbers. After all, in times of economic hardship, abortion rates tend to rise, as we have seen in our neighbour to the south, New York City, which this past year in its abortion study reported a shocking 41% abortion rate per live birth. But by all means, Globe And Mail, tell us that abortion rates are dropping as of 2006, and while you’re at it tell us that stock prices are skyrocketing as of 1929. This is unfortunately another situation where we are not just fighting to end abortion, but we are fighting for the right to talk about it against forces whose biggest ally is ignorance, and a government which wants us to spend yet another year pretending that abortion simply does not exist.

Roger Ebert: Remaking My Voice

I just finished watching this fantastic TED Talk by Roger Ebert on remaking his voice. Roger Ebert lost his lower jaw — and, thus, his ability to speak — to cancer. This part of his talk, delivered by his wife, Chaz, was quite emotional (text inside the quotes is what she reads from his prepared remarks, outside the quotes are her own words):

“This whole adventure has been a learning experience. Every time there was a surgery that failed, I was left with a little less flesh and bone. Now I have no jaw left at all. While harvesting tissue from both my shoulders, the surgeries left me with back pain and reduced my ability to walk easily. Ironic that my legs are fine and it’s my shoulders that slow up my walk.”

“When you see me today, I look like the Phantom of the Opera–” but no you don’t!… “It is human nature to look at someone like me and assume I have lost some of my marbles. People… People talk loudly and slowly to me. Sometimes they assume I am deaf. There are people who don’t want to make eye contact…” Believe me, he didn’t mean this as — anyways, let me just read it… You should never let your wife read something like this! “It is human nature to look away from illness. We don’t enjoy a reminder of our own fragile mortality.”

“That’s why writing on the Internet has become a lifesaver for me. My ability to think and write have not been affected, and on the web my real voice finds expression. I have also met many other disabled people who communicate this way. One of my Twitter friends can type only with his toes. One of the funniest blogs on the web is written by a friend of mine, named Smart Ass Cripple… All of these people are saying in one way or another that what you see is not all you get. So, I have not come here to complain. I have much to make me happy and relieved.”

Just… watch the whole thing.

Unfinished business part 2: Why oppose abortion

This comment was sent a couple of months ago. After the fantastic debate we had last Monday, I thought it would be good to go through the points:

What makes a cluster of cells inside a woman’s fetus any more “human” than say, a grouping of skin cells that was just scratched off my back? What makes this argument a fallacy is that a zygote does not have the ability to feel pain, suffering, or especially consciousness. What makes killing a human fetus anymore “evil” than a protist. Neither can think, and in fact I would argue that in order for a body to really be considered living it has to be able to live on its own.

The skin cells that were scratched off your back are not new human beings…just cells with the same genetic makeup as your other skin cells. Zygotes constitute a new human entity, irreplaceable and unrepeatable in time and space.

Since when does feeling pain, suffering or consciousness have anything to do with whether someone is a person or not (I assume you are attacking the personhood argument since you seem to conclude that the fetus is human)? The ability to feel pain or suffering does not determine personhood. It should never be defined based on abilities or faculties because what would we call a person in a coma? Not a person at that point?

The ability of the fetus to live on his own is not determined by his stage in life but rather by the technological advances in society. For example, an unborn child at 24 weeks can survive with the technology we have at our disposal that we would not have had decades ago. This does not mean that the present day unborn child at 24 weeks is more of a person than he would have been 40 years ago because it is technology that has changed, not the unborn.

The reasons that people come up with to support the non-choice of abortion are almost always based in religion. From a completely unbiased and non-religious view, abortion is no more wrong than squishing an ant (I would argue it’s MUCH less wrong). It would be like suggesting that no sperm or egg should ever go wasted and that it should be illegal NOT to have kids every chance you get (eg. no masterbating).
Your argument is completely fallous and deeply rooted in (very wrong) religion. There is absolutely no reason to suggest killing a fetus is evil. I personally think that it is immortal to deny a woman any choice in the matter.

You are a little all over the place in this next part but I will do my best to sift through it. Sperm and eggs have 23 chromosomes; the unborn have 46 chromosomes. I got this from a biology textbook, not the Bible. Therefore, you cannot equivocate the killing of the unborn to wasting eggs and sperm. They are different biologically. Also, read my post again. I did not mention any religious arguments so I am not sure how you can say the abortion debate is deeply rooted in religion.

To close, the fact that the fetus is human (and I’m pretty sure you agree with me on that) provides a reason as to why abortion can be considered evil. I hope you give it some more thought.

[Debate] Abortion: Human Right or Human Rights Violation?

We’ve uploaded video from Monday’s debate between Stephanie Gray and Donald Ainslie.

Unlike Stephanie’s opponent at Dalhousie, Ainslie did not argue in favour of infanticide, and in fact argued against the notion that abortion should be a morally trivial matter. Professor Ainslie affirmed that, from the point of conception onwards, there are deep moral issues at stake.

He said in his opening statement:

We think of people as one of a kind, as irreplaceable. When an egg is fertilized there is a biological creature that’s one of a kind; there won’t be another one of those. And so the loss of that person, either spontaneously or… in an abortion, makes the world somewhat less. That’s one thing that the world doesn’t have anymore. . . . [it's] the loss of something with intrinsic value, something that’s irreplaceable, something that won’t be around again.

But Ainslie’s main argument was that, although the moral status of the pre-born is not insignificant, the pre-born doesn’t have the same moral status as you or I until some undefined later point in pregnancy (between conception and birth, which he labelled as two extreme lines to draw). Therefore, he argued that abortion is justified in some circumstances, that all abortion is morally significant but not inherently wrong. He argued that, though the pre-born has intrinsic value, that value might be outweighed by other considerations which justify abortion. Further, he argued that though there may be moral questions involved, the legal questions are separate, and since reasonable people could disagree on the moral question, abortion should be legal. In essence, he affirmed the intrinsic value of the pre-born, but put it on a sliding scale of lesser significance than the intrinsic value of you or I until some undefined point between conception and birth, of a lesser moral status meaning that some abortions are justified and that the law should leave the possibility of abortion open.

In one sense, Ainslie’s argument was weak insofar as he purposefully avoided making any claim of where or why or how the pre-born child would attain a greater moral significance at some arbitrary part along the human continuum of development between conception and birth. This is a classic case for the SLED argument.

But in another sense, I believe his argument is challenging because — despite avoiding the question of why size or level of development (essentially, our age) should determine our value — many people simply agree with this type of argument. They often can’t articulate a reason for it, but they’ll deny that abortion is inherently wrong in the first trimester while being uncomfortable or opposed to it later on, because they believe there is a greater moral significance as the pre-born child gets older.

To respond, I think we must highlight the fact that our age does not increase our value or our moral significance, and make the pre-born child more and more visible, using images of prenatal development that bring to light the undeniable humanity and intrinsic value of the youngest human beings, and images of first trimester abortions that bring into the light the horrible injustice and violence of abortion even at an early stage.

Well, that’s my take. Watch the debate for yourself on YouTube in two parts (an hour each):

Reminder: Abortion debate Monday!

Just so you have no excuses, here is the time and location for the debate “Abortion: Human Right or Human Rights Violation?”:

Monday, March 14, 2011

7:00pm

Bahen Centre for Information Technology Room 1170

40 St. George Street

Toronto, ON

The Bahen Building is located near the St. George Street and College Street intersection. Seats will probably fill up fast so get there as early as you can!

This intellectual tussle between Stephanie Gray and Donald Ainslie (his course has been highlighted on this blog before) will prove to be captivating on this hot-button issue of abortion.

We at UTSFL hope you are as excited as we are! This will be a fantastic night so don’t miss it!

The intellectually honest pro-choice position

Yesterday Jennifer Derwey from ProWomanProLife wrote about a recent debate at Dalhousie University on abortion featuring Stephanie Gray (who will debate at the University of Toronto campus on Monday) and Dr. Mark Mercer.  Other than some juvenile pranks and a fit of rage, the night went without much ado.

Dr. Mercer “argued that ‘personhood’ did not actually occur until around 18 months to 2 years of age, that until a human being was able to rationalize, make plans, be a ‘locus’ of experience, and feel pain and joy, it was not in fact a person. As such, we should not be “morally troubled” by it.”  In doing so, he followed along the lines of Dr. Peter Singer.  Furthermore,  ”[h]e conceded that though abortion was killing a human being it was not killing a ‘person’ and that there was no moral difference between killing a baby in the womb and killing a baby prior to its ‘personhood’.”

Derwey notes that the pro-choice audience members felt they were not represented well by Dr. Mercer, presumably because he did not use the usual choice, freedom, and rights rhetoric.  He failed to make the usual ‘pro-woman’ or feminist arguments for abortion.  Mercer was confused by this poor reception.  After the debate Derwey spoke with him privately about the usual ‘pro-woman’ arguments, and Mercer responded that he had “written numerous times and shown how those ‘pro-woman’ arguments don’t work, [and that] they have no basis.”

This is what happens when someone approaches the question of the morality of  abortion with a dispassionate mind.  This is what happens when someone approaches the question of the morality of abortion with intellectual honesty. You quickly realize that the usual ‘pro-woman’ arguments don’t work.

Why don’t ‘pro-woman’ arguments work?

A ‘pro-woman’ argument may say something like “She can’t afford the child, so she needs to have an abortion” or “It’s her body, so she must have control over what happens to it.”  The pro-lifer response is that while these are legitimate concerns, killing an innocent human being cannot be justified thus.

In my experience, most pro-choice activists will swear at you, perhaps call you a nasty name, and stomp away at this point.  Dr. Mercer, being a more reasonable person, decided to engage the pro-life response intelligently.  Instead he asked himself “Is this really a human being we’re dealing with here?”

In the course of his investigation, he discovered what pro-lifers have been arguing for decades.  He discovered that abortion does really kill a human being.  He studied the embryology and the philosophical arguments and realized that he could not conclude otherwise.

In order to remain pro-choice, he had to go a different route.  Simply screaming “Her body, her choice” or “Women’s rights under attack.  What do we do? Stand up fight back!” was not good enough any more.  He realized that these slogans did no good if they are used to justify killing a person.  So what does he do?  He stripped the personhood away from unborn children.  He admits that they are human beings, but can’t be considered persons.

Already, unborn children are not considered as persons according to the Supreme Court of Canada, but are after they are born.  Is this good enough?   It is not.  Dr. Mercer realized the absurdity of saying that 10 minutes before birth there is no person, but 10 minutes after birth there is a person.  Absolutely nothing to that child has changed in the few minutes before birth and after.  The only difference is that it is now breathing and perhaps has opened its eyes and looked at the world around.  The environment around the child has changed, but the child has not.  According to law, this constitutes a change in legal status, but Dr. Mercer realized that there is absolutely no different in the reality of the child.

So far the ‘pro-woman’ arguments have failed, and the case that birth marks a beginning of actual personhood (as opposed to legally recognized personhood) is a dead one.  What is there to do to remain pro-choice?

Dr. Mercer looked to Dr. Peter Singer and his line of argumentation.  I will not examine his arguments, but just state his conclusion.  Following Singer, Mercer argued that “‘personhood’ did not actually occur until around 18 months to 2 years of age, that until a human being was able to rationalize, make plans, be a ‘locus’ of experience, and feel pain and joy, it was not in fact a person.”  From this line of reasoning, human life certainly begins at conception, but that human being is not a person and therefore morally irrelevant until it is able to rationalize, make plans, etc….

If one is intellectually honest and inquisitive like Dr. Mercer and Dr. Singer and wants to remain pro-choice, I believe there is no other conclusion to make.  You must say that personhood begins some time after the human being comes into existence.  All of the other arguments simply fail because they are based either on bad science or bad logic.

This conclusion makes abortion perfectly acceptable, but the pro-choicers at the debate didn’t like it.  The pro-choicers at the debate had most likely relied on the ‘pro-woman’ and ignored the science that says human life begins at conception.  They didn’t like Dr. Mercer’s conclusions because they justify infanticide.  Does your six-month old cry too much?  No problem.  Off with its head!  It’s not a person and so it’s not morally problematic to kill it.

I have tried really hard to understand pro-choice arguments and make them work, but if you are intellectually honest about it I believe  you have no choice but to come to the same or at least a similar conclusion as Dr. Mercer.

If you are prepared to bite the bullet, then go ahead and be pro-choice.  Dr. Mercer and Dr. Singer are your models.  But if this disturbs you, as it did to the pro-choicers in attendance that evening, then perhaps it is time to give the pro-life position a thought.

The intellectual journey I described above is not meant to be comprehensive in addressing the arguments.  To do so would require a lengthy book.  Instead it is meant to be an outline of how one is to remain intellectually honest and still think that abortion is okay.  It is an outline of the intellectually honest pro-choice position.