Slashdot Mirror
Babies Begin Learning Language In the Womb
Hugh Pickens writes "Science Daily reports findings from a new study which suggest that infants begin picking up elements of what will be their first language in the womb, long before their first babble or coo, and are able to memorize sounds from the external world by the last trimester of pregnancy, with a particular sensitivity to melody contour in both music and language. Newborns prefer their mother's voice over other voices and perceive the emotional content of messages conveyed via intonation contours in maternal speech (a.k.a. 'motherese'). 'The dramatic finding of this study is that not only are human neonates capable of producing different cry melodies, but they prefer to produce those melody patterns that are typical for the ambient language they have heard during their fetal life, within the last trimester of gestation,' said Kathleen Wermke of the University of Würzburg in Germany. Wermke's team recorded and analyzed the cries of 60 healthy newborns, 30 born into French-speaking families and 30 born into German-speaking families, when they were three to five days old. The recordings of 2,500 cries as mothers changed babies' diapers, readied babies for feeding or otherwise interacted with the youngsters show an extremely early impact of native language, with analysis revealing clear differences in the shape of the newborns' cry melodies, based on their mother tongue."
How do we know that genetics didn't play a role in the formation of their vocal cords, changing the way they utter their first cry?
Surely teaching languages like French and German to poor, defenseless, not even yet born babies breaks some law.
I'm glad we have scientific evidence to back it up, but did anyone believe this wasn't the case? Is anybody surprised by these findings?
$x='S24;r)>63/* h@<5+oZ)32"5cz';$me='phroggy'x$];
$x=~y+ -xz+\0-Tx+;print$_^chop$me for split'',$x;
Discussed here by someone who actually knows about this stuff:
http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=1869
Aberrations have appeared in my destiny prognostication engine!
Didn't it say "in the last trimester"? Abortions after 24 weeks are illegal.
cat
I thought this was a well-established fact -- I remember being taught this in one of my psych classes.
For every problem, there is at least one solution that is simple, neat, and wrong.
I will admit that this information has influenced me in my perspective of this topic.
Depends on the country you live in. Here's a chart of criteria/country.
http://www.pregnantpause.org/lex/world02.htm
Interesting to note, USA, Sweden, and North Korea have something in common. I've leave the exercise for the viewer to figure out what that is.
Life is not for the lazy.
And apparently, after they're born, they remain human their whole lives. When is the "death penalty" OK? Hate to be "off" the "off topic", but I figure if we're looking for controversy...
The CB App. What's your 20?
Didn't it say "in the last trimester"? Abortions after 24 weeks are illegal.
But this delineation is entirely arbitrary, based on "what would make a significant number of people uncomfortable" rather than on science. Are they human beings at 25 weeks? Not human beings at 23?
$x='S24;r)>63/* h@<5+oZ)32"5cz';$me='phroggy'x$];
$x=~y+ -xz+\0-Tx+;print$_^chop$me for split'',$x;
I've often wished reasonable scientific methods could determine when a life becomes sentient/aware and define that as having the same legal protections as born people. It's unfortunate that each side on the debate will not compromise and find a reasonable standard. One one side you have some pro-choice people who think nothing of killing a perfectly viable fetus and the horrors of partial-birth abortion, and on the other side you have pro-life people who are against even the day after pill because a conception may have occurred. Sorry folks, but a zygote that has no brain yet is incapable of being self-aware.
Define a time in a pregnancy when the fetus starts to develop a brain and possible self-awareness and just cut the line there.
I have a feeling that's pretty early, like 2 months in. But if abortions were illegal after that point, decisions would be made sooner.
Of course if the mother's life is in danger, that's a different issue -- as is that pre-determined "Trig" factor and whether it's ethical to abort based on parental convenience issues.
But starting somewhere using scientific reason and logic to me would be refreshing. I don't buy that a week or two old fetus is a "person" any more than a brain dead accident victim is, to whom it's legal to remove life support from and let die. The "potential" and soul argument is mainly a religious one and shouldn't be a factor. If your religious beliefs believe that, then don't have an abortion.
Uh...... hate to break it to you, but that chart is wrong. In at least the US, on-Demand abortions come with severe restrictions. Notably, they don't happen after the third-trimester.
I'm pretty sure that site isn't an authoritative source, if for no other reason that it refers to "pro-lifers" and "pro-abortionists". The chosen terminology by each group is pro-life and pro-choice. Respect it.
Those who can, do. Those who can't, sue.
Why? The experiment points out that babies may only begin to be influenced by their native language during the last trimester, and the vast majority of abortions happen in the first (late-term abortions are only ever performed when the health of the mother is in jeopardy), well before the brain is developed sufficiently to be considered "alive".
Interesting to note, USA, Sweden, and North Korea have something in common. I've leave the exercise for the viewer to figure out what that is.
And the anti-abortion set apparently think that even Afghanistan is too liberal a country. Without even looking at the rest of the site, the color scheme tells me that this list is compiled by nut jobs. I find it amazing that Angola and Egypt get yellow flags for allowing abortion if the woman's life is in danger only--respectively--in the first trimester or if the pregnancy is the result of rape.
El Salvador, Malta and Vatican City, however, all get green flags across the board.
The CB App. What's your 20?
Does that mean the girls who "talk like THIS," ending every sentence or phrase on a higher note like they're asking a QUESTION, are going to breed more people who sound like dipshits right out of the womb? Credit due Stewie for defining this behaviour.
Umm, birth happens at the end of the third trimester, so abortion is pretty much impossible after the third trimester.
But if you meant "during the third trimester", then in the USA it's just a function of what State you choose to have your abortion in, and what doctor you use. Some are more easygoing than others about what "to save the life of the mother" means.
"I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
There is a difference between when the 'vast majority of abortions happen' and my own opinion/perspective on abortions. And this information has served to inform me further on a related topic to reproduction/abortion. That is why.
I'm being vague because this topic is very controversial and I don't have the time or interest to get into it again. I just wanted to point out that this information is related and informative.
Not in the USA. Abortion rules vary from State to State, of course, but no State has been able to successfully forbid abortions based on time since conception. They can just restrict it slightly by specifying restrictions that are easily overcome of the right doctor is found.
"I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
Sorry, yes, that was supposed to read "during" the third trimester.
You're going to have to demonstrate that "to save the life of the mother" is equivalent to "i can't live with a child" in most states. Other wise, I'm going to have to assume that it is exactly as stated "to save the life of the mother", and that's definitely not a choice that the mother makes.
Those who can, do. Those who can't, sue.
And interestingly, South America, with one of the most restrictive set of abortion laws, has about as many or more abortions than the more liberal countries.
Those who can, do. Those who can't, sue.
Correct. I'm sure that depending on your situation, you could drive to the respective states for the procedure to be performed. I'm thinking that chart of the USA was based on the lowest common denominator of laws with regards to the 50 states that make up the nation.
Life is not for the lazy.
I wonder what this would imply for infants developed in artificial wombs, with no physical contact with another human until after the moment of "birth" (as in Huxley's Brave New World). How would it affect the child's linguistic development and psychology?
i am a scientist,
but i'm not sure science is the right vehicle to explore that question with.
science can provide input, such as "it develops a heartbeat at such-and-such a time" or "it first contemplates its soon-to-be navel at T = 20 weeks" or whatever, but it should obviously be up to [each] culture to interpret those data w/r/t deciding when it's human-enough-to-no-longer-be-abortable.
also, this seems like a well-trod and somewhat tedious subject, as well as totally off-topic.
Yes, that is interesting. However when looking globally, the most religious countries are the ones with the most abortion law restrictions. Seems that Islamic countries lead on this front.
Life is not for the lazy.
I actually just recently read a rather though-provoking article regarding the legal implications of personhood. http://coloradoindependent.com/41283/anti-abortion-%E2%80%98personhood%E2%80%99-measures-shrink-the-rights-of-women The problem with putting certain restrictions on abortion is it creates rights for the fetus that could lead to a reduction in the personhood rights of the mother, turning her into a complicated egg. It's an extremely complicated issue. One that, in my humble opinion, should be left to the woman, her doctors and spiritual advisers.
I remember when my daughter was born. She was 9 weeks early, so she spent several weeks in the neonatal ICU. What was interesting (and maybe somewhat relevant) is that quite often when my wife spoke, our daughter would seem to turn her head towards the sound. My voice didn't seem to have the same effect, nor did the voices of the medical staff.
The nurses at the hospital thought it was "cute" and didn't seem all that surprised - so I guess I am rather surprised this stuff is apparently new info and not settled science.
#DeleteChrome
And according to the same site, they also have it in common with:
Albania, Australia, Bahrain, Belarus, Belgium, Bosnia, Cambodia, Canada, China, Croatia, Cuba, Denmark, Estonia, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Macedonia, Netherlands, Norway, Slovenia, Vietnam, Yugoslavia.
I thought there was no more Yugoslavia.
That makes for a fairly random looking list of nations.
William of Ockham had no beard. The most likely explanation is that it was chewed off by squirrels every morning.
Blame the victim.
When homosexual homeless men become bored they begin writing. It's babylonian. It does not even matter what they write about. When homosexual homeless men become bored they begin writing.
> But this delineation is entirely arbitrary, based on "what would make a significant
> number of people uncomfortable" rather than on science. Are they human beings at 25
> weeks? Not human beings at 23?
Well, scientifically, they are developing, so if they are certainly human beings after birth, and not before conception, they are some fraction thereof (0-100% inclusive) during the interim. One could, I suppose, construct a sort of Schrodinger's baby scenario to determine percent humanity based on probability of successful birth, but what's the point? Unless abortions are categorically illegal or you're allowed to club babies on the way out you'll need to draw a firm line somewhere, and, no matter how scientific the basis, it'll be arbitrary.
Yes, and the chosen term by rapists is "practitioners of surprise sex".
The groups are pro-abortion and anti-abortion. Saying anything else confuses the issue.
Makes sense. Even without an ear, the baby is basically living in a giant fluid filled sac connected only a couple feet away from the source of the noise. A person's body is basically one giant ear (hence why you can hear something you whisper or a bone in your foot crack when you stretch despite the fact no one around you can hear it).
Ginga no Rekshiya Mata Each page.
Unless you're talking a yearling buck or veal. It doesn't do any good to point out hypocrisy, it's better to just accept it, everyone is a hypocrite.
"There are no facts, only interpretations." --Friedrich Nietzsche.
Ability of a fetus to learn in the womb has been part of Hindu mythology for a loooooong time.
Check out:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abhimanyu
Hindus have strict restricts on pregnant women because of this. Of course not everyone follows these, but it is generally the case to keep pregnant women in a pleasant and positive environment..
It is good to see that this has been scientifically validated.
The mother chose to become pregnant, assuming there was no rape. I can't invite you in my house then shoot you for trespassing.
(And yes, I consider having sex consenting to become pregnant. You know damn well it can happen, if it would be a problem, keep your damn legs shut. And if you're male, and don't want to consent to becoming a father, then keep your damn pants zipped. This is a 100% effective method of birth control. [There are second-hand reports of it failing once about 2010 years ago, but I don't buy it...])
But this delineation is entirely arbitrary, based on "what would make a significant number of people uncomfortable" rather than on science. Are they human beings at 25 weeks? Not human beings at 23?
Most morality law is entirely arbitrary, based on what would make a significant number of people uncomfortable. Is there any reason we can't kill them after they are born? Many societies have been ok with that, though ours hasn't. Is there any reason we can't kill our neighbor if he becomes sufficiently annoying? Once again, other societies have been ok with that, but it makes us uncomfortable.
There is no scientific basis for right and wrong. In essence science is merely an observation, an explanation of the natural world around us. It can tell us what the results of our actions may be, but it cannot tell us what is right or wrong. Right and wrong are entirely based on opinion.
Qxe4
Troll? Yes.
But - There is a certain poetic rhythm to the post.
It's sad when a potential artist turns to the dark side.
The creator of this post (Jacob Smith) hereby releases it, and all of his other posts, into the public domain.
Well, in the US, the constitution explicitly spells out how capital crimes are to be handled...
Maxim: People cannot follow directions.
Increases in truth directly with the length of time spent explaining them
There's a difference between being pro-abortion rights and being pro-abortion. I support the right of assholes to have freedom of speech, even if it is hate speech against blacks, jews, or gays. That doesn't make me a KKK Nazi Republican.
This country is founded on the fundamental premise that we have freedom of religion, speech, etc., up to the point at which it directly harms others. The abortion debate is about the very complicated question of whether it harms another person or not. That's not an easy philosophical question to answer, and before anyone is qualified to answer that question, he or she must free himself or herself from the tendency to reply, "That's easy, my parents said..." or "That's easy, my preacher said..." or any other answer that comes easily. Such easy answers are almost always the wrong ones, as they are generally the end of thought on the subject rather than the beginning.
For example, the easy (but wrong) answers for how to fight abortion are: 1. sue to make it illegal, and 2. try to convince people not to have them. Suing, however, is unlikely to make any real progress. Convincing people not to have abortions is slightly better; it may save a few individual children while you are actively doing this work, but it is an extremely inefficient way to improve things because it requires eternal vigilance by a fairly large number of people to be effective to any significant degree.
By contrast, a much smarter answer is to contribute money to medical research to make it possible to sustain a fetus at progressively younger ages, eventually resulting in abortion being unnecessary, and eliminating any possible justification for abortion in the minds of even the staunchest abortion rights advocates. By answering in this way, your actions are the start of further thought and discussion instead of being dogmatic roadblocks to further thought. Further, instead of just reducing abortions, you're also doing something that helps humanity outside the context of abortion. Women who can't have kids could have kids, fetuses whose mothers die would not necessarily die, mothers who are diagnosed with cancer would no longer have to choose between chemotherapy and the lives of their children, women who are victims of rape or incest could give up their children for adoption and never have to endure childbirth for a child that was forced upon them, women who get pregnant when they are too young to safely bear a child would no longer be at serious risk, etc.
Think bigger. Don't think of abortion as a problem to be solved. Think of it as a bad solution to a wide range of problems that could be solved in other ways, then try to find other ways.
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
Even as someone who's against abortion, I can't understand that opinion. The pill prevents implantation. A fertilized egg not properly implanting and therefore not becoming a viable embryo is, based on my understanding, a rather common occurrence in a woman's life. Hell, it seems nowadays we're damn lucky to even get successful pregnancies.
I'm not sure that's something that can be scientifically determined... Psychologists and Cognitive Scientists have been studying what makes something sentient for longer than you or I have been around, and they don't seem to be any closer to having figured that out than when they started.
Though it would be significantly more ideal than the current determining factor: viability. 'Viability' changes as medical technology improves, with the date for a child surviving a pre-term birth slowly marching downwards. 24 weeks (6 months) is accepted as survivable, albeit with significant risk, with reports claiming successful deliveries at 21 weeks. We're on the threshold of second trimester deliveries being regularly survivable, and yet second trimester abortions are accepted as the baby is "not viable." I have no doubt that with the way medical technology is going, we'll eventually have the ability to produce entire artificial wombs for the gestation of children, where the mother does not even have to play a part other than the donation of an egg... What then? Does that modify our definition of viability? (Never mind the huge ethical can of worms opened by having artificial baby factories...)
A friend of mine was a columnist in my Uni's newspaper and he actually used a similar example... "Should a family who's loved one is currently on life support and in a coma, upon being told by the attending physician that they expect the patient to be able to come off of life support and regain consciousness in three months, and then eventually go on to lead a normal fully functional life afterward, be allowed to have the patient removed from life support simply due to not wanting the financial burden? No? Then why is abortion legal?"
Maxim: People cannot follow directions.
Increases in truth directly with the length of time spent explaining them
Yes, and it's clearly just because the penalty is meted out even-handedly and fairly across all ethnic and socio-economic groups.
The CB App. What's your 20?
Ah, but that person in a coma still has enough brain activity to keep the thing refreshed. A comatose person may even be self-aware. But a one month old fetus certainly doesn't have a brain to even function yet. I could buy that logic at 4-6 months in though.
I don't understand the line-drawing. There is no line. Stop with the line drawing. You don't use magic numbers in your code, and you surely should use them to determine matters of life and death. If it came from humans and develops into a human, it's a human. Pigs don't develop into humans, nor do dogs, sheep, or monkeys. A human is a human at every stage of its development. No line.
The honest question each society must answer is: At what point in a human's life is it okay to murder them for your convenience?
"I know that every word that man just said is true, because it's EXACTLY what I wanted to hear." -- Space Ghost
bleh. Missed a word. "...surely should *NOT* use them to determine...".
"I know that every word that man just said is true, because it's EXACTLY what I wanted to hear." -- Space Ghost
You're going to have to demonstrate that "to save the life of the mother" is equivalent to "i can't live with a child"
How about "I'm so poor that if I feed a child, I starve to death"?
Actually even if they are not allowed to have him removed from life support I can't expect the family to be forced to pay for it. Then it's up to the state to decide for how long it is going to support these kinds of patients. After that person is revived he can sue his family to get his stuff back, not unlike when a missing person comes out to be alive after several years . The state then can sue him to pay for his medical debts. Or he can choose not pay for the bills and go to prison or commit suicide or both.
It sounds crazy and heartless but it is the way I'd hope the government managed these cases.
But... the future refused to change.
The chosen terminology by each group is pro-life and pro-choice. Respect it.
Do "pro-choice" platforms take into account the father's choice or the child's choice?
You honestly believe that the minute the spunk hits the egg, it's a murder, do you? I hope you don't believe in God, then, cos you're going to have to think he's quite the callous cunt given how many early miscarriages happen (oh, sorry, murders of defenceless little baby humans by a God with the power and intelligence to know better). And then you're going to be terrified he's going to send you to hell for thinking he's a callous cunt (even if he is, I guess)
That's what the world has come to in these PC times. Attempting to insult people by calling them a cigarette.
I thought there was no more Yugoslavia.
Yugoslavia existed until June 2006, when Montenegro declared independence. (From 2003 to 2006 it was called "Serbia and Montenegro", but it was still the same Yugoslav state established in 1992.) It may be the case that the law hasn't changed noticeably in the former Yugoslavia since then.
Give me a break with the righteous indignation. You don't understand the difference between willfully murdering someone and their simply dying of natural causes? Or are you just willfully stupid and sociopathic?
"I know that every word that man just said is true, because it's EXACTLY what I wanted to hear." -- Space Ghost
At least you're honest, and that was my point. We need to stop with the intellectual dishonesty of "it's not human until X weeks." It is human, it came from human, will be human, it doesn't magically become something else in between. If your priorities are consequence-free sex over someone else's life, that's your choice, and, while I personally think you should be psychologically evaluated for prioritizing your recreation over someone else's life, I can at least respect that you understand and accept the decision you're making.
"I know that every word that man just said is true, because it's EXACTLY what I wanted to hear." -- Space Ghost
Yes, the constitution is the epitome of wisdom. To bad such great minds will never be seen again!~
....The abortion debate is about the very complicated question of whether it harms another person or not....
Obviously, an abortion harms a person, the developing baby. When a baby is conceived, it is a person. The development of such a person is continuous into adulthood in the course of time. Birth is just the time in such a continuous development which marks the point where such a person can exist outside of the womb. The question of abortion is one of rights between a person, the mother and another person, the baby. Whether the baby is in the womb or outside has no bearing on personhood.
In order for the Nazis to justify killing Jews and others, they first declared them as nonpersons, (Untermenschen) literally under human. Abortionists do the same thing by declaring that the developing baby is only a bunch of developing cells, but not a person with rights of personhood. Justifying abortion on that basis is pure evil.
One of the reasons for existence of government, if not the major reason, is to protect one person from another. In the case of abortion, the rights of the person of the mother must be weighed against the rights of the person of the child. Most if not all governments have laws against killing another human being. Therefore it is curious to me and doesn't make sense at all, that abortionists would approve killing before the purely artificial point of birth and not afterwards. The birth of a human being does not interrupt in any way shape or form, the process of continuous development into adulthood.
All theory is gray
And that's exactly the problem with the pro-life crowd that wants to turn a fertilized egg into a person. It necessarily reduces the ability of the mother to make decisions regarding her own life. However, the same approach doesn't change the ability of the father to make decisions regarding his own life.
That's the fundamental problem right there. Personhood for a fertilized egg necessarily equates to women having less rights than men, and them becoming far more vulnerable to manipulation by men via rape.
Just because of that, I agree that abortion is left to the group of people that you mention.
On a side note: I love how the current conservative wing of the republicans decry government intervention into business, but are perfectly fine with government intervention into the personal lives of subjects... I mean, citizens.
Those who can, do. Those who can't, sue.
Use of those terms also confuse the issue... it sounds as if some people are going around advocating forced abortions or something.. The truly correct terminology would be Pro-law-against abortion and Anti-Law-against abortion. If someone could figure out a way to make that more catchy noone would have an excuse for using the terms derived from political spin.
I've always thought the term "infant" meant that they had already been born?
I'm anti abortionist, yet even I know that abortionists actually reason that it is before the brain develops that should be allowed. If you want to be treated fairly, treat people fairly. Most people would recognise that without a brain the fetus is not viable. The point is still somewhat artificial, but to build a straw man of the time of birth is not fair.
I'm sure you'll recognise the ancestry of the fair rule.
Semi-automatic amateur armchair Australian philosopher; conjecture ready at any moment...
Summary of why the reporting on this story is mostly bogus here:
http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=1869
That's a good position, but in reality keeping your legs shut can prove difficult. Abortion is a real problem, not just an ideological discussion. Illegal and unregulated underground clinics, abortion tourism, etc. are also real problems that may increase with restrictions.
True confidence comes not from realising you are as good as your peers, but that your peers are as bad as you are.
Obviously, an abortion harms a person, the developing baby. When a baby is conceived, it is a person.
FAIL.
I'm anti abortionist, yet even I know that abortionists actually reason that it is before the brain develops that should be allowed. If you want to be treated fairly, treat people fairly. Most people would recognise that without a brain the fetus is not viable.
Viability is actually defined as the capability of a baby to live outside its mother. It has nothing to do with brain development. Abortion is usually legal until 22-26 weeks (there have been premies born before 22 weeks who survived, but the survival rate is low).
The biggest killer of babies born prematurely (and the reason they struggle to survive at 20 weeks) is the development of their lungs (they thus have severe difficulty to breathe).
And yes, I consider having sex consenting to become pregnant. You know damn well it can happen, if it would be a problem, keep your damn legs shut.
And yes, I consider driving on the highway consenting to be maimed and crippled for life, or killed. You know damn well it can happen, if it would be a problem, keep your damn car off the highway.
Too easy.
Don't take it personally, but I'm not going to read your pithy response to my post.
MMmm..... Yearrrrling buuuuuuuck.
The CB App. What's your 20?
Why do you think I see things in black and white? I simply refuse to delude myself by thinking that something which very clearly is human, albeit a young one, is anything but human. That's what I'm saying, and there's no logical reason I've ever heard to compromise on that.
What you're talking about is the value placed on that human life at various stages and under different circumstances. Once we've all agreed that we are, indeed, talking about taking a human life, I think we can begin to have a reasoned discussion on the value to place on it. If everyone is running around saying "it's not human," "it's a tumor," "it's a parasite," or any other number of phrases meant to avoid the guilt associated with believing what they do, then they are intellectually unfit for the conversation.
What you're saying is that, on the value continuum as applied to unborn humans of a certain age, you place a very low value on that life, or at least value it less than you value your convenience.
I'm saying I place a much higher value on that life, which is, yes, inconvenient, but I personally couldn't live with myself otherwise.
When it comes to matters of law, our society must determine where it fits between you and me. I would say that the die is already cast, but I'm not comfortable with it because it's been cast under false pretenses, which is the entire point I'm trying to make. If our society says, very clearly, "We consider human life during the first trimester to be of little to no value, and terminating it for any or no purpose is therefore sanctioned by law," then I'd at least respect the process a bit more, even though I'd still hate it. Hell, if so many people agree with you, then make it an amendment. But word it that way. Honestly, directly, truthfully.
However, that's not what's happened. What's happened is that people have been lied to, and, having turned off their bullshit detectors for the sake of their convenience, they have believed the lies and essentially decided the above while justifying it with what they know to be bullshit.
If everyone having an abortion of convenience would have to repeat, out loud, "I acknowledge that I am willfully terminating a human life for no other reason but my own convenience" before having the procedure done, I think a lot fewer people would do it. Most people instinctively know that there's a hell of a lot morally wrong with making that statement, and even more wrong with following through with it. No one likes to be laid bare that way, but if they're going to kill someone, they could at least have the guts and common decency to own up to the reality of what they're doing.
Once we've established that it is a continuum, and that various cultures may place differing values on human life at various stages and under different circumstances, I submit that we simply make this a state matter. Let conservative states outlaw it, and let liberal states have their murder. There's no point in fighting this at the federal level to force a one-size-fits-all solution on everyone, and it's only going to continue on in acrimonious, hot-headed debate from here til forever otherwise.
"I know that every word that man just said is true, because it's EXACTLY what I wanted to hear." -- Space Ghost
You could look at animals as sort of "less-evolved" humans, in that humans are the only conscious beings we really know of for sure. I mean go far back enough and youd find an ancestor who was no more conscious than that cow you ate part of for lunch. How "conscious" are fetuses or even newborns? Relative to a cow or chicken or really insert any living thing you wouldnt make a fuss about killing if it was inconveniencing you to not kill it. I'm not a vegetarian, mostly because I dont think one person would make a difference in something that big at this point in Human culture at least, but if you're someone really really cares about that 12 week old fetus... Id think it would be consistent to also be strongly against unnecessary killing of other animals (the more like humans the animal is the moreso you should feel that way).
Because all these zealots blow their fuse once anything mentioning pregnancy is involved. This is (mainly) about the last stage of pregnancy though (the last ~14 weeks), so up to week 26. Even if there was anything interesting happening weeks before that stage it would not get into period that most women get an abortion. However, any sign of conciousness in early child development might fuel this debate.
"At what gestational ages are abortions performed:
52% of all abortions occur before the 9th week of pregnancy, 25% happen between the 9th & 10th week, 12% happen between the 11th and 12th week, 6% happen between the 13th & 15th week, 4% happen between the 16th & 20th week, and 1% of all abortions (16,450/yr.) happen after the 20th week of pregnancy."
And these stats are from a (US) pro-life site.
(I got interested enough to see if there was any merit discussing this regarding abortion, but after looking at these facts I decided for myself that this discussion is off-topic).
You honestly believe that the minute the spunk hits the egg, it's a murder, do you? I hope you don't believe in God, then, cos you're going to have to think he's quite the callous cunt given how many early miscarriages happen (oh, sorry, murders of defenceless little baby humans by a God with the power and intelligence to know better).
What's the difference between a miscarriage and any of the other bazillion ways a person can naturally die? If you blame God for miscarriages, presumably you also blame God when people die of cancer, or get hit by a bus, or whatever. Human life is lost.
And then you're going to be terrified he's going to send you to hell for thinking he's a callous cunt (even if he is, I guess)
This attitude stems from the false belief that people are generally good, and that we all naturally deserve to go to Heaven. We're not, and we don't. Only perfect people are worthy of entering God's kingdom, and none of us is perfect, so none of us deserve to go to heaven. God does not arbitrarily choose to send certain people to Hell because they're worse than the rest of us. We're just as bad - and God loves us anyway.
$x='S24;r)>63/* h@<5+oZ)32"5cz';$me='phroggy'x$];
$x=~y+ -xz+\0-Tx+;print$_^chop$me for split'',$x;
Stopping its development before it has a chance to become a full, talking, walking human being is not as bad as killing a new born baby.
Just thought I should point out, a new born baby also hasn't had a chance to become a full, talking, walking human being yet.
$x='S24;r)>63/* h@<5+oZ)32"5cz';$me='phroggy'x$];
$x=~y+ -xz+\0-Tx+;print$_^chop$me for split'',$x;
.... no matter how scientific the basis, it'll be arbitrary....
Drawing the line at conception is both scientific and non-arbitrary. After conception, at which time human development has begun, it continues into adulthood. Birth does not interrupt this continuous development, but merely means that the person is now not dependent on the mother in the same way as when that person was still in the womb. The scientific fact of the matter is that after conception there is a real developing person in existence. Destroying such a person any time after conception is homicide. The research article is another piece of evidence that this is true.
All theory is gray
Very well said.
I support abortion in certain circumstances. For example, fairly unusual cases when the mother's health is jeopardized by the pregnancy. I recognize that the life of one human being is being terminated, but since I don't value that life above the life of the mother (and there's a good chance that if the mother dies or becomes severely ill, the baby will die anyway), I believe this to be a reasonable position.
There are a few who would oppose abortion even in these cases; there are many who support abortion in many more circumstances. We should be able to have this discussion, but it's being drowned out by all the lies, deception and namecalling.
$x='S24;r)>63/* h@<5+oZ)32"5cz';$me='phroggy'x$];
$x=~y+ -xz+\0-Tx+;print$_^chop$me for split'',$x;
....Right and wrong are entirely based on opinion....
Unless you're talking about God's opinion, which in the end is the only opinion that counts. You may not want to believe that you will answer to God's judgment one day, but nevertheless you will.
Hebrews 9:27 And as it is appointed to men once to die, but after this the judgment,
You know you can't argue with the first part of this sentence, but apparently you and many others dispute the second part.
All theory is gray
...the penalty is meted out...
To unborn innocent children? Some of the same people who are willing to murder innocent unborn, will protest the execution of serial killers.
All theory is gray
Choosing which God to believe in is a matter of opinion.
Qxe4
Okay, I'll track that down. I was to understand the problem wasn't lack of particular organs (brain obviously exempt), but the lack of ability to think. This always brought the problems of at what stage of thinking is considered to be 'human'. I'm starting to get myself tangled and confused again so I'm opting out due to ignorance and wanting to learn more.
Semi-automatic amateur armchair Australian philosopher; conjecture ready at any moment...
That won't work for many reasons:
And in spite of its almost guaranteed failure to solve the problems that abortion attempts to solve, that solution also doesn't solve any of the other problems that an artificial womb could solve, all while blowing huge amounts of money on a project that is doomed to fail right from the start. Yeah, that's a better idea....
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
....trumps the rights of a fetus...
You think that you can give a description such as that to a human and then it becomes no longer human? That is what the Nazis did. They labeled Jews as subhuman and then they could justify it to themselves to murder them. You are labeling a human baby a fetus and then you justify murdering a human unborn baby.
All theory is gray
Which is which? Generally the people against abortion are anti-life and pro-baby-killing. They just like to do it after birth, preferably to people of other nationalities or different economic status.
The people who believe in freedom are usually against killing babies and killing in general.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inverted_totalitarianism
Actually convincing people to not get pregnant is probably the most successful course right now.
The trick is to educate them early and make contraceptives available. This also solves the problems of unwanted children, teen pregnancy and the glut of children out there who can't get adopted.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inverted_totalitarianism
...when a life becomes sentient/aware...
The issue is when do HUMAN rights begin. When a baby is conceived, it is a person. The development of such a person is continuous into adulthood in the course of time. Birth is just the time in such a continuous development which marks the point where such a person can exist outside of the womb.
The question of abortion is one of rights between a person, the mother and another person, the baby. Whether the baby is in the womb or outside has no bearing on personhood. It is unscientific and totally nonsensical, to use time as the deciding factor, whether or not that which was conceived is human being with all rights that we normally accord to such.
Whether or not to allow conception to happen is a religious and personal issue and should be kept as such.
If it comes down to a question of the life of the mother versus the life of the unborn child, I would let the mother, if she is able to, make that decision together with her doctor.
All theory is gray
....It necessarily reduces the ability of the mother to make decisions regarding her own life. ....
The mother can make decisions regarding her own life, but she has no right to make decisions for somebody else including her unborn baby, who is another human being with rights just like you and I.
Governments exist primarily to protect one person from another. Unborn children are persons under continuous development into adulthood. The development starts at conception. It is the right and duty of government to make sure that one person does not infringe upon the rights of another person.
There should be no arbitrary right for anyone to decide whether someone innocent should be terminated. The life of the mother weighed against the life of the unborn child should allow the mother to decide, together with her doctor what to do in such a case as well as rape and incest.
All theory is gray
....Or he can choose not pay for the bills and go to prison.....
So you are proposing that we return to the ancient practice of sending debtors to prison? How about selling them as slaves to work off the debt?
All theory is gray
An even better answer is to develop a form of contraception which is inexpensive, permanent, free of side effects, and easily reversible
It's kind of like engineering! "Pick any one."
Your brain is not a computer.
That's one rather warped view of America's politics.
Let me try to clear up your confusion. Pro-life means exactly that - life is sacred, and you shouldn't be killing ANYONE. Pro LIFE. See?
On the other side of the aisle, we have the baby killers who see nothing wrong with late term on-demand abortion. Some of the MOST EXTREME come to the defense of post-partem-baby killers, with defenses like post-partem stress.
"Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it." - Charlie Br
But so many people support abortion after the 57th trimester...
Well the constitution can be updated to bring it into line with current views on being civilized.
Remember when it was written lots of things were considered fine that are no longer tolerated with slavery being the big one.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inverted_totalitarianism
Easy enough test. Induce labor, stick the results in an incubator. If it lives, it's human. Otherwise, it counts as a miscarriage.
Some cultures with high child mortality extended this idea over all births, and until the child could speak.
Uh...... hate to break it to you, but that chart is wrong. In at least the US, on-Demand abortions come with severe restrictions. Notably, they don't happen after the third-trimester.
Ok, as a girl, reading this the glaring point that needs to be made is... ALL abortions are illegal after the third trimester... because that means that the baby has been born.
You mean that on-demand abortions aren't allowed DURING the third trimester.
WARNING! This girl exceeds the MAXIMUM SAFE standards established by the FDA for BRATTINESS
But there's not a glut of children who can't get adopted. There are many more people who want to adopt than there are children, and at least in the U.S., the rules on who can adopt keep getting tighter. There's a bureaucratic wall preventing adoptions from happening, not a lack of people willing to adopt. In fact, I've been told that a significant percentage of foster parents do so because it helps work around that bureaucracy.
Also, there's a substantial racial divide in adoption, with most people preferring to adopt someone of the same race and a significantly larger number of caucasian adoptive parents and a significantly larger number of non-caucasian (particularly Asian, IIRC) children waiting for adoption. Thus, reducing the number of kids doesn't really solve the problem. The places where people would be likely to take steps to have fewer kids are actually the places from which we need *more* kids to be put up for adoption (because they're already making extensive use of contraception), and the places where people are unlikely to take those steps are the places from which we need fewer kids put up for adoption.
Check out my sci-fi/humor trilogy at PatriotsBooks.
By contrast, a much smarter answer is to contribute money to medical research to make it possible to sustain a fetus at progressively younger ages, eventually resulting in abortion being unnecessary, and eliminating any possible justification for abortion in the minds of even the staunchest abortion rights advocates.
Justification? So you think that abortions for convenience won't continue if all pregnancies are viable? The justification for such abortions is the same justification for newborn babies found in dumpsters.
With those artificial wombs you'll have to keep this article in mind so you don't deprive those children of their early language development.
My webcomic
Actually I don't know what the government does to you if you refuse to pay your debts when you could afford to pay them if you sued your family, isn't it like tax evasion? Can the government sue your family in name for your old possessions? Ideally you could simply declare yourself bankrupt I guess.
But... the future refused to change.
Obviously, an abortion harms a person, the developing baby. When a baby is conceived, it is a person.
FAIL.
Only failure in terms of legal definition. I assume you also contend that before the Emancipation Proclamation, in the U.S.A. a black slave wasn't a person but a free black man was person just because that was the legal definition. Lawyers play silly word games with reality all the time to get the results they want, but they have to rely on the definitions that others laid before them. Thus the current (and prior) dissonance between common and legal usages of "person".
That would be explaining the joke.
William of Ockham had no beard. The most likely explanation is that it was chewed off by squirrels every morning.
Without even looking at the rest of the site, the color scheme tells me that this list is compiled by nut jobs.
So, simply disagreeing with you about abortion automatically makes people a nut job? Would it be less of a nut-job by switching the green and red color-scheme to match your preferance? The site isn't exactly hiding its allignment.
How would you prefer to color-code that chart? Apart from avoiding color altogether, there aren't that many other primary/secondary colors to choose from that makes a chart readable when you remove green, yellow, orange and red. Black and white can hold bias. And purple/magenta is a bit too close to red... That pretty much leaves blue, and using only shades of blue brings us back to the issues with black and white...
A friend of mine was a columnist in my Uni's newspaper and he actually used a similar example... "Should a family who's loved one is currently on life support and in a coma, upon being told by the attending physician that they expect the patient to be able to come off of life support and regain consciousness in three months, and then eventually go on to lead a normal fully functional life afterward, be allowed to have the patient removed from life support simply due to not wanting the financial burden? No? Then why is abortion legal?"
Your friend makes a crappy analogy.
I can't legally pay you to have sex with me. But, I can legally pay you to have sex with my friend, film that sex act, burn it to a DVD, make 1 million copies of that DVD and sell those copies to strangers.
So why is making pornography legal? Or why is prostitution illegal?
Because, while they share traits, they are different in ways that we have decided are important. We decided early on in the USA to be damn careful about limiting freedom of expression. It's hard to say how a law against prostitution treads on one's freedom of expression, but it's easy to argue that a law against pornography does so.
We haven't decided yet when a fetus becomes a person. This is a hot topic, and it stays hot because there is no objective way to say that a bag of cells is a person. Conception, heartbeat, brain function, viability, birth: these are all just arbitrary choices we make because we think that they somehow indicate that the bag of cells has become a person.
Until we do decide, the rights of the person carrying the fetus will outweigh those of the fetus itself. It's really the only sensible way to proceed.
OTOH, we all agree that a person in a coma is still a person. Just because we may want to protect hir rights, and give less protection to something we don't agree is a person, does not mean our thinking is flawed.
In fact, it kinda means our thinking is consistent.
Your friend would be better off arguing that the boundary between being a person and not being a person is arbitrary, that there is no magical moment when a fetus becomes a person. But we all agree that after the fetus has been born, it is certainly a person. So since we know that the fetus at some point becomes a person, but we don't know exactly when, we should pick the earliest time at which it is reasonable to suspect that the fetus is a person. And that time is conception [insert reasoning here]. So, since a conceived fetus is a person, we can't kill it because we have a law against killing persons.
The latter argument, while still deeply flawed, is less transparently so. :)
I've always thought the term "infant" meant that they had already been born?
Infant comes from a Latin word meaning "speechless". So I guess anything that can't speak (a young baby, an unborn baby, a wet piece of string, a sloth, a carp, an orangutan, a breakfast cereal, a fruit bat) is an infant. :)
Of course you will. You just have to wait a few years then frame them for a crime.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
After the child is 13.75 years old? I think you meant 75th trimester...
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
Hate to shatter your illusions about the awesomeness of the US legal system, but being on death row is only loosely correlated with guilt.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
An entirely different situation. A slave is only not a person if you specifically define them as such. You can not qualitatively distinguish a slave and a free man by scientific means without knowing which is which (even medially - a house slave may be in a better state of health than a free field labourer). You can easily distinguish between a human and a collection of cells with no developed brain stem.
You are defining a single cell which has the potential to become a human child with (a lot of) outside assistance from the mother as a person. Why draw the line there, and not define every egg and every sperm as a person too? The difference in the amount of effort required to turn an egg or a sperm into a human and the amount of effort required to turn a zygote into a human is tiny. Why not regard every non-foetal undifferentiated stem cell as a person too? You can grow each of these into a clone with a certain amount of technical help.
Most people regard thinking as the distinguishing feature of humans - it's even where the name that we gave our species, Homo Sapiens, comes from. Do you feel less kindred, then, with a dog that demonstrates some intelligence than with a bundle of cells with no brain but some human DNA?
I am TheRaven on Soylent News
Numbers 15:35
And the Lord said unto Moses, The man [who was found picking up sticks on the sabbath] shall be surely put to death; all the congregation shall stone him with stones.
1 Samuel 15:2-3
Thus saith the Lord of hosts ... go and smite Amalek, and utterly destroy all that they have, and spare him not; but slay both man and woman, infant and suckling, ox and sheep, camel and ass.
So gods perfect opinion is killing people for picking up sticks and killing babies and pretty much anything that breathes is A-OK!
There's a huge difference between a fertilized egg not implanting on its own and taking a pill to ensure that it doesn't implant.
Toddlers are hit by buses every so often in this country without intent of the driver to kill them, but that doesn't make it right when a driver decides to intentionally hit one.
Sorry, I should have been willing to type the extra words. The phrase that is most often used in the assorted laws is "to save the life or health of the mother".
And there have been cases where the courts have ruled that the mental health of the mother qualifies.
So, yes, "I can't live with a child" has worked as an excuse for an abortion in some places.
Note that this is by no means universal, of course. Nor is it even common.
What I was trying to point out was that "abortion during the third trimester is illegal" just isn't so in the USA.
"I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
I'm glad we have scientific evidence to back it up, but did anyone believe this wasn't the case? Is anybody surprised by these findings?
I'm extremely surprised, and in fact very suspicious of this finding, for the simple reason that newborns are unable to control the noises they make. They're not even aware that that sound is coming from their own tiny mouths, or even that they have a mouth.
Babies have to learn what their senses mean and what their bodies can do. They don't know they have hands, and may be frightened of those little things wiggling in their field of vision, or their grasping reflex might cause them to claw their own eyes, which is unpleasant and makes them cry, but it doesn't occur to them that they can stop doing it. They may be scared of the sound of their own crying, but it doesn't occur to them that they can just stop. It's not until about 6 to 8 weeks after birth before they slowly start to realize that the weird sensation in their ears happens every time they cry, and that they have some control over this process. Gradually over the course of months they discover new sounds they can make, and like to practice those for hours on end, until they discover a new one and start to practice that.
The suggestion that newborns immediately after birth have the ability to control their vocal cords enough to imitate what they hear, be it on a conscious or subconscious level, not only goes against the literature I've read about the subject, but also against my own observations. My English 'speaking' baby cries just like my brother and I did when we were German 'speaking' babies. Not surprising, since he looks just like me as a baby, and I looked like my brother as a baby, so all three of us probably had a similarly shaped mouth and vocal cords.
Oh, come on. Aren't we techies? We could do random colors each time. Or let the visitor decide.
But yes, anyone who feels like abortions should not be legal even in the case of rape or danger to the woman's life is, in my book, a nut job. You don't have to agree; you can even think that I'm a nut job, but you'd be wrong.
The CB App. What's your 20?
I dunno, have you ever thought about why you value human life?
...So gods perfect opinion is killing people...
So is a cancer surgeon's opinion in killing every last cancer cell?
That's because you and I live in sin soaked world and have no idea what a perfect and holy God might be like. We are all, without exception infected with the cancer of sin.
The wages of sin is death and because we have all sinned we all die. You can argue with that all you want, but you're going to die.
However, God offers his grace to those who BELIEVE. It's not those who are smart like you, or smooth talkers, good-looking or beautiful, strong and muscular, tall or able to run fast, educated or unschooled, but simply to everyone who believes. Everybody can believe, so that leaves nobody out. Can you think of another criterion that God could have used OTHER than simply believing him?
All theory is gray
The chosen terminology by each group is pro-life and pro-choice. Respect it.
The aborted don't get a choice. The term pro-choice therefore seems misleading. I would also note the lack of choice for a male who has no say in the life of his child but that one is less direct since he isn't physically involved at that point.
Cancer treatment is crude so far with our current technology. Can you imagine how crude it was a thousand years ago? It was nowhere as close as effective as modern medicine. Don't get me wrong I am extremely saddened with our current level of medicinal ingenuity. Killing cancer by poisoning it slightly more than normal human cells is absolutely ludicrous in every aspect, but it's what we are able to accomplish in our current technological age. Sin is a poor excuse for the troubles that plague humanity in our current age. If people truly cared about each other, and truly cared about our own well being we would be able to overcome our genetic and environmental detrimental effects that cause cancer and much of Homo sapien suffering. This causes me a disturbing amount of sadness because if we only looked after one another instead of following old, superstitious beliefs we would be so far ahead in curing all our primitive diseases such as cancer or any communicable disease. Sorry for the run on sentences but I've had a bit to drink and I truly wish humanity would get over arbitrary differences and work together with at least the effectiveness of ants. Be honest, can you imagine if Homo sapien were as loyal and willing to work for the common good as ants? It brings tears to my eyes to think of the beauty humans could accomplish if we simply looked beyond skin colour, belief, sex, nation, or any other arbitrary distinction and truly helped every single human on the face of planet Earth. Perhaps one day we will accomplish such a thing, I am absolutely afraid that that in my life time no such revelation will come to pass. Will humanity be destined for arbitrary distinction? God forbid...
Did you really just compare a method to get food with killing an unborn baby? Really?! *sigh...*
The real fact behind this is of course, that for women, it often does not matter all all, what the actual words say. It's the emotions that she receives. This is perhaps the single biggest misunderstanding in relationships. So men, try to listen to the emotional content of your communication for once, when you notice a lack of harmony. And women, try to look at it with plain emotionless logic, in those cases. (Who am I telling this to? Everybody knows there are no women on /. ^^)
I'm not saying that any of those forms of communication is better or worse. (If you thought that was was I was saying, that says more about your own views and biases. :) :)
I think it's pretty great that we have those two highly advanced forms of communication, adapted to the specific needs. Just as we have specialized genders. You will never be able to do alone, what you can do with teamwork. So yay to genders and their differences!
Any sufficiently advanced intelligence is indistinguishable from stupidity.
By definition if you have produced a child you have gone through childbirth, even if they take out the egg the instant it is fertilised.
In cases of rape or incest, it is not the physical discomfort of giving birth that is the issue, it is the utterly horrifying thought that your attacker has gained victory by propogating his genes through you, the victim.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
Yeah, and a nocturnal emission is murder by omission.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
So, in essence, all women over the age of eleven are murderers? I really think something should be done about this.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
Our actions have consequences. I wouldn't want the girl punished, but I would want the girl to take responsibility for her choice to have sex. At no point does religion enter into my thought process.
If you don't want to risk having kids, don't have sex. It's pretty simple, really.
Maxim: People cannot follow directions.
Increases in truth directly with the length of time spent explaining them