A new human life begins at conception. I doubt anyone would seriously argue that an unfertilized egg or a non-implanted sperm qualifies as an individual human life.
I fail to see how your argument invalidates my position or makes it "a mistake to say that life begins at conception."
It's a mistake because it assumes a difference where it is arguable at best. What does the zygote have that the two gametes did not have a moment before?
Human life. A soul. The right to live. Take your pick.
About 2/3 of all zygotes die naturally before birth under the best of circumstances; the average death rate has been estimated to be 3/4.
Although I think you are more or less correct on this statistic, I fail to see the relevance of this statement to the debate. Simply because a large proportion of zygotes die before birth has no bearing on my contention that life begins before such birth, indeed at conception.
I do not consider a unicellular lifeform with odds that poor to be a human being by any stretch of the imagination. It may someday become one (and achieve the status of "a citizen born or naturalized"), but potential is not actuality.
What do you consider a human being? Just when, exactly, does a person become a person? I suggest that any answer besides "conception" bears serious problems.
The easiest way out of this is to mind your own business. The people who agree with you will do things your way. The people who disagree with you will do things their way.
Perhaps this is the easiest way out for you or even for me in our "can't everyone just get along" culture. However, your solution surely is not the easiest way out for the millions of babies aborted each year.
If you feel you have to tell other people how to deal with some of the most important issues which will ever face them, you deserve to be told to fsck off.
This is a cop-out. People tell other people how to deal with such important issues all the time and many such things are legislated. It is not legal to murder someone (even if someone's "choice" to do so is thus so egregiously trampled upon) no matter how much easier such an action may make the life of the murderer. If I "deserve to be told to fsck off" because I choose to stand up for those who cannot stand up for themselves, so be it.
Well, it's a mistake to say that life begins at conception, because technically, a sperm and an egg are alive before they form a zygote. So, if you really believe that early abortions are wrong, that's not much different than being upset because a man jerked off and allowed millions of sperm to die of starvation outside of his body.
Let me clarify. A new human life begins at conception. I doubt anyone would seriously argue that an unfertilized egg or a non-implanted sperm qualifies as an individual human life.
In any case I fail to see how your argument invalidates my position or makes it "a mistake to say that life begins at conception."
I don't mean to be flippant, but the closest modern equivalents of ancient monasteries are modern monasteries. Although not as numerous as they once were, real monasteries certainly still do exist.
>This is DEJA's site and DEJA can do whatever the hell that they want on thier site.
For a forum that is usually so concerned with privacy, copyright issues, etc. I am surprised at the frequency that the position of this poster and similar opinions are being voiced concerning deja.com's new "feature." Yes it is Deja's site and as such they can do what they wish with their *site*. However, the messages that I post to usenet are *mine* and therefore Deja may not do whatever they wish, even if my messages are housed or made accessable through their site.
Of course, by sending a usenet message and thus entering it into the public domain Deja certainly has the right to store and make my message, provided that the message is unadulterated, available through their site. The important point here is that my message not be altered.
An obvious parallel that may make this more clear is the standards of academic citation. In academic writing I may quote another person's work, whether it be public domain or fully copyrighted, for a variety of purposes, provided that I not alter the person's work. If I do happen to alter it in even the slightest way, even to correct spelling, I must clearly state that the text has been altered.
Deja's new "feature" uses messages that do not belong to them in an unacceptable fashion becauses it distorts the message in such a way that can imply support for a product or service that the writer of the message may not have intended.
Moreover, such distortion is not allowable, even if the message is considered to be in the public domain. Being in the public domain only opens up the distribution of material, it does not allow for the willful distortion or misrepresentation of the actual content of that material.
I realize that Deja wants to make money for their services (even though they already have banner ads on every page). I would think that an acceptable solution would be for Deja to still provide these product links, just not in the actual body of the usenet messages. They could put the links at the bottom or side of the page but just keep them separate from the original message. This way they get their ad revenue while at the same time preserving the integrity of the usenet message. The change here would be to their property--their website, not to my property--my message.
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It's a mistake because it assumes a difference where it is arguable at best. What does the zygote have that the two gametes did not have a moment before?
Human life. A soul. The right to live. Take your pick.About 2/3 of all zygotes die naturally before birth under the best of circumstances; the average death rate has been estimated to be 3/4.
Although I think you are more or less correct on this statistic, I fail to see the relevance of this statement to the debate. Simply because a large proportion of zygotes die before birth has no bearing on my contention that life begins before such birth, indeed at conception.I do not consider a unicellular lifeform with odds that poor to be a human being by any stretch of the imagination. It may someday become one (and achieve the status of "a citizen born or naturalized"), but potential is not actuality.
What do you consider a human being? Just when, exactly, does a person become a person? I suggest that any answer besides "conception" bears serious problems.
The easiest way out of this is to mind your own business. The people who agree with you will do things your way. The people who disagree with you will do things their way.Perhaps this is the easiest way out for you or even for me in our "can't everyone just get along" culture. However, your solution surely is not the easiest way out for the millions of babies aborted each year.
If you feel you have to tell other people how to deal with some of the most important issues which will ever face them, you deserve to be told to fsck off.This is a cop-out. People tell other people how to deal with such important issues all the time and many such things are legislated. It is not legal to murder someone (even if someone's "choice" to do so is thus so egregiously trampled upon) no matter how much easier such an action may make the life of the murderer. If I "deserve to be told to fsck off" because I choose to stand up for those who cannot stand up for themselves, so be it.
Well, it's a mistake to say that life begins at conception, because technically, a sperm and an egg are alive before they form a zygote. So, if you really believe that early abortions are wrong, that's not much different than being upset because a man jerked off and allowed millions of sperm to die of starvation outside of his body.
Let me clarify. A new human life begins at conception. I doubt anyone would seriously argue that an unfertilized egg or a non-implanted sperm qualifies as an individual human life.
In any case I fail to see how your argument invalidates my position or makes it "a mistake to say that life begins at conception."
I don't mean to be flippant, but the closest modern equivalents of ancient monasteries are modern monasteries. Although not as numerous as they once were, real monasteries certainly still do exist.
>This is DEJA's site and DEJA can do whatever the hell that they want on thier site.
For a forum that is usually so concerned with privacy, copyright issues, etc. I am surprised at the frequency that the position of this poster and similar opinions are being voiced concerning deja.com's new "feature." Yes it is Deja's site and as such they can do what they wish with their *site*. However, the messages that I post to usenet are *mine* and therefore Deja may not do whatever they wish, even if my messages are housed or made accessable through their site.
Of course, by sending a usenet message and thus entering it into the public domain Deja certainly has the right to store and make my message, provided that the message is unadulterated, available through their site. The important point here is that my message not be altered.
An obvious parallel that may make this more clear is the standards of academic citation. In academic writing I may quote another person's work, whether it be public domain or fully copyrighted, for a variety of purposes, provided that I not alter the person's work. If I do happen to alter it in even the slightest way, even to correct spelling, I must clearly state that the text has been altered.
Deja's new "feature" uses messages that do not belong to them in an unacceptable fashion becauses it distorts the message in such a way that can imply support for a product or service that the writer of the message may not have intended.
Moreover, such distortion is not allowable, even if the message is considered to be in the public domain. Being in the public domain only opens up the distribution of material, it does not allow for the willful distortion or misrepresentation of the actual content of that material.
I realize that Deja wants to make money for their services (even though they already have banner ads on every page). I would think that an acceptable solution would be for Deja to still provide these product links, just not in the actual body of the usenet messages. They could put the links at the bottom or side of the page but just keep them separate from the original message. This way they get their ad revenue while at the same time preserving the integrity of the usenet message. The change here would be to their property--their website, not to my property--my message.
--Eric