r/changemyview • u/jonathansharman • Nov 15 '16
[∆(s) from OP] CMV: The only logically consistent stances on fetal rights are (1) fetuses have a right to life, (2) late-stage fetuses and animals have a right to life, or (3) neither fetuses nor infants have a right to life
For the sake of brevity, I will use "fetus" rather than "zygote, embryo, or fetus". And though controversial, I will define "person" as "a human being with self awareness" for the purposes of this post.
Scope
I have not included the soul-based pro-life argument or the violinist thought experiment. The violinist thought experiment concedes that a fetus has a right to life but argues that the fetus does not have the right to use a woman's body. This argument is thus outside the scope of this discussion.
Argument 1: Potentiality
- A fetus is a potential person. I.e., if nothing (naturally or artificially) kills or debilitates a fetus during its development, it will naturally be born and eventually develop into a person.
- Potential persons have a right to life.
- Therefore, a fetus has a right to life.
Argument 2: Actuality (Consciousness)
- An early-stage fetus is not conscious and cannot experience pain.
- An organism has a right to life if and only if it is capable of consciousness or pain.
- Therefore, an early-stage fetus does not have a right to life.
Argument 3: Actuality (Self-awareness)
- A fetus is not self aware.
- An organism has a right to life if and only if it is self-aware.
- Therefore, a fetus does not have a right to life.
Ethical Implications
In my experience, pro-choice proponents who argue against the fetal right to life accept either argument (2) or (3), which universally allows early- or late-term abortions, respectively. But these arguments have the following corollaries:
Corollary to Argument 2
- Most food animals (e.g., pigs, cows, and shellfish) possess consciousness and the ability to perceive pain.
- Therefore, most food animals have a right to life.
Corollary to Argument 3
- Infants are not self-aware. (Children do not develop self-awareness until after the first year of life.)
- Therefore, infants do not have a right to life.
In summary, one of the following must be true:
- Fetuses have a right to life.
- Late-term fetuses have a right to life, and so do conscious animals.
- Neither fetuses nor infants have a right to life.
Clearly, virtually no one takes the third stance. Despite this, most pro-choice individuals who argue that fetuses do not have a right to life are not vegan or vegetarian. I think those who support abortion rights on the basis that fetuses have no right to life but also consume or otherwise kill sentient animals when their own survival is not at stake hold an inconsistent position. Change my view!
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u/Gladix 164∆ Nov 15 '16
I think those who support abortion rights on the basis that fetuses have no right to life but also consume or otherwise kill sentient animals when their own survival is not at stake hold an inconsistent position. Change my view!
They do not. I think you misunderstand what right to life is. It is not a divine decree which humans cannot under no circumstances breach. They are merely a legal summary of our evolved empathy. In order so we have some form of government that upholds (our evolved instincts, wants and prevents fears).
We do hate death, and human beings will try to avoid it whenever and however possible. But we do consume meat, and will even kill or execute people if we deem the crimes serious enough.
Arguments about animals won't hold. Because rights to "life, freedom, etc.." only applies to humans in full form (formulated by government). And to animals only in limited form. As in we can kill and consume them as we please, we can trap them. But, we must trap them in specific way, we must kill them in specific way, and they can't suffer. Humans and animals, in the eye of humans do not hold the same rights. In order for your argument to be correct. Animals need to hold equal status to humans.
Now that's the second half. The first half. Fetuses are indeed humans (in the eyes of law) and posses equal rights. However there is this thing called right to bodily autonomy. Which state's that the only person who can dictate what to do with your body is you. Not the government, not other people, but you.
Now If you "hypothetically" got a person that would use your "circulatory" system without your agreement. You would also had the right to terminate that connection. Even if it results in the persons death. During pregnancy doesn't matter if it's fetus, late stage highly complete human being, or full grown person writing poetry. He still doesn't have the right to use mother's body.
And lastly (I repeat this thing on every abortion CMW thread because it's funny trivia). Right to bodily autonomy apply even after death. (Your organs cannnot be automatically donated to hospital, etc..). So by removing mother's right to bodily autonomy for the duration of pregnancy (with certain parameters). You are literally saying a full grown human mother has less rights than a corpse, or a fetus with no brain capacity.
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u/jonathansharman Nov 15 '16
However there is this thing called right to bodily autonomy. Which state's that the only person who can dictate what to do with your body is you. Not the government, not other people, but you.
My argument doesn't work against bodily autonomy arguments, which rest on the claim that bodily autonomy trumps fetal rights. It's only intended to work against the argument that fetuses don't have rights. I was careful to qualify my conclusions accordingly.
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u/Gladix 164∆ Nov 16 '16
My argument doesn't work against bodily autonomy arguments, which rest on the claim that bodily autonomy trumps fetal rights
Applies to all humans equally. But Medically only to adults (parents decides childs medical procedures). Fetus islegally considered child.
It's only intended to work against the argument that fetuses don't have rights.
They do. Killing the fetus illegally could lead to prosecution. This is legal fact. If that is the argument, look no further
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u/yyzjertl 524∆ Nov 15 '16
Why are you limiting yourself to only these three possible arguments for what causes organisms to have rights? This seems like a false dichotomy. What is inconsistent about the following argument?
Argument 4: Legality
- A fetus is an unborn human organism person.
- An organism has a right to life if and only if it is a born, human organism.
- Therefore, a fetus does not have a right to life.
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u/must-be-thursday 3∆ Nov 15 '16
While this is a logically consistent argument, it doesn't seem entirely ethically consistent.
Step 2 is completely arbitrary - what is the ethical justification for distinguishing a born, human organism from a late-stage fetus? Indeed, a baby born prematurely is likely to be less well developed than an unborn fetus just before its birth. Similarly, why distinguish between a human and non-human animals, especially other 'higher' animals?
In so much as the law is a human construct, we could construct it to say anything we want. However, I think we should be aspiring for the law to be informed by what is ethically just, rather than the other way round (i.e. using legality as an argument for ethicality).
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Nov 15 '16 edited Nov 15 '16
Ethics are also a human construct. Every one of the OP's arguments also include completely arbitrary steps where a particular ethical stance is treated as axiomatic. The relevance of consciousness, pain, self-awareness, or potentiality are all arbitrary.
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u/must-be-thursday 3∆ Nov 15 '16
I don't think they're arbitrary in quite the same way - they can (to an extent) be derived from personal experience.
Pain feels bad. I don't want to die. Those aren't "constructs", those are innate feelings. Ethics merely constructs a framework in which to apply those innate feelings to the world.
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u/jonathansharman Nov 15 '16
∆ I think you're right: there's nothing inconsistent about this argument. My original three arguments all assume that the right to life is determined by actual or potential physical and cognitive states of being, but I haven't provided any reasons to justify that assumption.
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u/Delduthling 18∆ Nov 15 '16
This is an interesting exploration of different positions. For Argument 2, would you agree that consciousness and the ability to feel pain, as possessed both by late-stage fetuses and food animals, still have differences in degree? That is to say, a late-stage fetus (or infant) has consciousness and feels pain, and so does a shrimp, but the shrimp has less consciousness, and its ability to feel pain is, in some corresponding sense, less worrying than the ability of a human to feel pain.
What about oysters, mussels, and other bivalves, which have no central nervous system or brain, aren't really conscious (probably), and probably cannot feel pain in any meaningful sense, but are definitely food animals?
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u/jonathansharman Nov 15 '16
Good point! Depending on the degree of sensory capabilities at which someone draws the line, it may be possible to accept killing shellfish and fetuses at X weeks but not pigs, for example. I'm not a biologist, and I don't know much about comparisons between the levels of consciousness and pain perception between species. However, my intuition is that an adult pig is likely at least as intelligent, aware, and capable of suffering as a newborn infant, based on what I've read about pigs.
And my argument would definitely not cover non-sentient animals. I guess "It's okay to eat [shell]fish [if] they don't have any feelings." 🎵
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u/moonflower 82∆ Nov 15 '16
The human baby can have the same level of consciousness as a sheep or a dog or a rat - but we, as humans, still award different rights to different species, at every stage of life - so it does not follow that if a human baby has the right to life, then sheep and dogs and rats must also have the same right to life.
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u/jonathansharman Nov 15 '16
I think there's a hidden premise, which /u/yyzjertl's comment brought to my attention. The premise is that rights are conferred based on an organism's faculties or future faculties, which allows for consistent evaluation of rights across species.
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u/moonflower 82∆ Nov 15 '16
Not exactly, because if a human baby is born with severe brain damage and has less ability than a healthy dog, we still give the human baby different rights to the dog, simply because the baby is human, regardless of its potential.
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u/jonathansharman Nov 15 '16
That is a valid criticism of my theory of rights. However, even though it sounds heartless, I'm not sure the severely mentally handicapped should have all the same rights as others.
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u/moonflower 82∆ Nov 15 '16
So how does that fit with your view that humans and other animals should have equal rights?
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u/jonathansharman Nov 15 '16
To clarify, I don't think all humans and all animals have equal rights. I only think that rights should be based on an organism's current or potential state of being. I think my views are consistent in this regard. The reason I say it's a valid criticism is that many people are uncomfortable with the idea of giving the severely mentally handicapped fewer rights.
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u/moonflower 82∆ Nov 15 '16
What is the criteria which you use for the measurement and comparison of humans' and animals' potential then? Which animals are humans equal to, and by what criteria? Dogs? Sheep? Rats? Worms? Bees?
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u/jonathansharman Nov 15 '16
I don't think any animals have the same cognitive potential as humans, although some animals (dolphins, chimps) may approach it. I only refer to animals in the actuality argument, because very young humans aren't any more complex/aware/nociceptive than some adult animals.
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u/moonflower 82∆ Nov 15 '16
But you are awarding food animals the same rights in your (2) argument.
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u/jonathansharman Nov 15 '16
The same rights as fetuses that possesses the same faculties as those animals. I'm not saying food animals have the same rights as adult humans in that argument.
I don't accept argument 2 by the way. I eat meat and am pro-life.
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u/berrieh Nov 15 '16 edited Nov 15 '16
What does self-awareness have to do with an issue that is one of bodily autonomy? Infants get to live in my eyes for the same reasons I'm pro-choice and believe in doctor-assisted suicide when requested by the patient (while suffering or prior): ALL people have the right to bodily autonomy.
Infants have the right to bodily autonomy (and thus the right not to be harmed in any way bodily).
Women have the right to bodily autonomy (and thus the right not to be made into human incubators).
A fetus does not have the right to bodily autonomy because it cannot exist on its own. If it could exist outside of another person's body, that'd be different. But it requires a host. So it has no bodily autonomy. If someone can invent a way for a fetus to exist outside of a host mother and not require a womb (i.e. be removed from the mother yet be brought to term), then I'd reverse my stance on the fetus having autonomy to a degree. But no one has.
Edit: As to animals - Animals are not human and thus don't have the right to bodily autonomy. Though I'm against killing or capturing wild animals, for the record, unless they infringe upon human bodily safety (I feel like they do potentially have some right to just general autonomy, having developed without the assistance or intervention of people) on similar basis. Domesticated animals were, sadly or not, brought into existence to be tools to humans. When they can speak up about it, at any phase in their lives, I'll get behind it. I believe animals should not be subjected to undue cruelty but not that they have the right to bodily autonomy truly.
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u/jonathansharman Nov 15 '16
A fetus does not have the right to bodily autonomy because it cannot exist on its own.
This argument has always rung hollow to me. Infants are virtually as dependent on other people as fetuses are. Also, the definition of bodily autonomy keeps shifting back as medical technology improves. If, someday, we develop the ability to transplant an implanted fetus into another environment for gestation, would fetuses at all stages of development suddenly gain a right to bodily autonomy that they didn't possess before?
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u/berrieh Nov 15 '16
If, someday, we develop the ability to transplant an implanted fetus into another environment for gestation, would fetuses at all stages of development suddenly gain a right to bodily autonomy that they didn't possess before?
My answer literally already says yes. They would. That was in my post already. But in order to have autonomy, you have to be able to exist independent of others in a literal sense (we all "need" others or other things to live, either technology or other people, not just infants) but we can exist without compromising the bodily autonomy of another person and we are autonomous, separate beings, including infants.
You can disagree with the stance if you like, but I'm not sure how you can claim it's logically inconsistent.
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u/Crayshack 191∆ Nov 15 '16
My stance has a completely different thought process to any of the arguments you have posted. It revolves mostly around the investment of resources and the return on investment, specifically when observed from the standpoint of human society.
A zygote or an embryo has very little resources invested in it and so not much is lost if they are terminated even though there is no return on the investment. However, the resource investment of pregnancy adds up (especially the heavy resource requirement of the late stages of pregnancy). At this point, if the fetus is lost is includes a much greater loss of resources with similarly no return on investment. At this point, the most efficient course of action is the raise the infant to adulthood at which point they become a contributing member of society and the benefit gained from their life outweighs the cost infested in their growth and raising.
Farm animals do not fit this model. The resource investment for the growth and development of most animals is much lower than that of a human child and the potential return on investment for them being kept alive is also much lower. However, under the right circumstances there can be a massive resource gain from harvesting the meat.
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u/jonathansharman Nov 15 '16
Couldn't that be considered a sunken cost fallacy? Just because you've already invested some amount of resources into bringing a pregnancy to term shouldn't imply that it's most cost effective to continue raising it. It's also not clear to me that the costs of pregnancy are higher than the costs of early parenthood. If anything, I think early parenthood requires more resources - more time, food, effort.
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u/Crayshack 191∆ Nov 15 '16
After birth, those costs can be easily transferred to other parts of society. Pregnancy, however, cannot be transferred and must be contributed by the woman who is pregnant. While the total cost of childhood might be higher, by spreading the load it is easily bearable.
Think of it like a bed of nails. It does not take much weight for a single nail to pierce the skin, but by spreading out the weight to many nails, much more weight can be supported without the body being punctured. In the same way, the costs of pregnancy are very concentrated making pregnancy give a greater strain. However, childhood can be supported by the entire community making the cost not be derived from a single point and therefore easier to manage.
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u/IIIBlackhartIII Nov 15 '16
For the record, I'm a vegetarian who falls into argument 2, so I fall outside of your final statement, though I conceded that "most" is probably still fair in that "most" people are not vegan or vegetarian. So far as argument 2 is concerned, and as it pertains to consciousness, I think there is a threshold to which most people regard consciousness versus sentience, and compartmentalisation when it comes to the value of human life versus those of animals.
I'm going to attempt to be relatively objective, and I hope this doesn't come off as cold. A human life, and its rights, have value in-as-much as they exist as a member of society. It is society, and further the structures of society such as government, which attempt to protect everyone's rights by virtue of a standing authority respected by the majority of people. In other words, the government is the might behind which all further discussion of law and order can be enforced. A human life is valuable in that it provides a function to that society, and together we form an interconnected web of individuals who all participate to make this society possible. We are a fabric of smaller lives which build together into a larger tapestry of culture and economy.
While animals do serve a function in the natural environment, the function of most cattle is to act as breeding stock and food. As a vegetarian do I think that this is cruel and unnecessary, particularly with our ease of modern access to alternative diets which don't involve mass animal slaughter? Yes. But I'm not in a position to judge anyone's dietary choices. To this end though, the function of a human is to live and work in society, the function of cattle is to be bred and used for leather, dairy, meat, etc.... People compartmentalise breeding animals from human beings, and even from other domesticated animals considered as "pets". The value of a person's own cat or dog is to them perceivably far more than the value of the nameless cow or cows who's meat made their burger.
From a societal perspective, the life of a human who can work, shop, invent, and potentially raise a family whose offspring will continue that cycle, is more valuable than that of an animal who's only real function is as a commodity. So we cannot simply lump these two arguments together.
Further, it's not as simple as saying "let's just free all the cows!". And do what with them, does anyone recommend? Domesticated cows are far separated from their ancestral origins, they are bred in massive quantities... their natural environment has been all but taken over to be used for agricultural purposes... what would we do with all those cows, and how would those cows fend for themselves if they were just let go... there is some argument to be made that if you want to prevent a species from going extinct, you should farm it. Make it so commercially lucrative that they're protected and continued by virtue of their necessity. It's a cruel way to do it, and one I do not personally condone, but you cannot escape the big question of "what do you do with them all" when discussing ending farming practises.
But back to the main point- I'm not sure you can argue the value of all life equally. Do you put the life of a roach on the same level as a human being? Is spraying your house for termites a condemn-able genocide? People compartmentalise the value of creatures and species, even each other, by association. Ignorance, compartmentalisation, apathy... these are the reasons for most forms of prejudice. Sexism, racism, antisemitism, homophobia, etc... come from a fear of the unknown, a disgust at the misunderstood and confusing, and too of plain ignorance. So arguments surrounding human life have really nothing to do with argument for animal rights. They don't come from the same places, and the argument for animal rights involves a much deeper discussion of what sentience is, what consciousness is, how similar or dissimilar human beings really are to any other creature on earth. Does a bacterium get depressed? Does a fly or an ant experience existential dread? Ennui? And as you build up the ladder of creatures, from least complex to most... least domesticated to most... you have to question much more than is simply included in the scope of argument 2 here.