[ST] Is abortion murder?

Anguirel · Post by **Anguirel** » Sat Jun 28, 2003 9:45 pm

Marius wrote:They become living bits of flesh that used to be part of a particular person.

...but...

Marius wrote:Whatever remains alive as part of the organism is still human.

So if only the leg survived, or the arm, or the <insert body part here> it would be the part that remains alive. So, I suppose the question at this point is what constitutes an organism?

Marius wrote:Remember, a human being is the totality of all parts comprising a single discrete individual of a group with particular basic human characteristics...

Right, but most of that totality is extraneous. A tree is not a leaf or a trunk or a root, but a combination of those elements. Completely remove one element (all leaves and all capability to produce future leaves) and what remains should no longer really be considered a tree. A human is not a leg or an arm or a heart -- but neither is it a combination of those elements. Chop off both legs, and what remains is still a human. Arms gone: still human. More in a bit...

Marius wrote:...among them being alive, being of a sort that can generally reproduce with other human beings...

So a living and functioning homo sapiens testicle in a jar is a human, particularly if there is an egg or functioning ovary around as well. Got it.

Marius wrote:The sort of idea we're looking to use to define both 'human' and 'a human' is a class-based definition. Being human is "belonging to a class of unitary things that generally have such-and-so-on properties," and individual cases of humanity can be distinguished from things which are not individual units within the class based on whether or not such things generally have the properties which identify the class of things.

My deconstruction of a human argument above was meant to identify just what those properties were. 32's definition was based on DNA and replication -- individual cells from a homo sapiens entity are capable of mitosis, ergo they replicate and have homo sapiens DNA. However, as you noted, they are not considered a human. That requires a group of cells, in fact, it requires a set of organs. In particular, I think it requires the brain. You disagree, a brainless body that is otherwise alive should be considered a human, according to you. Legs alone, however, should not. Nor any individual organ. Therefore, I pose the question to you: what minimally constitutes a human for you? Everything above that line would certainly count. Perhaps there might be a few alternative sets that could count, such as {brain, heart, lungs, nutrient broth} v {everything sans brain} v {brain, lungs, digestive tract, pumping system}, etc...

Your posts contradict each other until such time as you identify what those basic human characteristics you feel constitute a human are.

Marius · Post by **Marius** » Sun Jun 29, 2003 8:41 am

My deconstruction of a human argument above was meant to identify just what those properties were.

Yes, that's the task that remains.

32's definition was based on DNA and replication -- individual cells from a homo sapiens entity are capable of mitosis, ergo they replicate and have homo sapiens DNA. However, as you noted, they are not considered a human. That requires a group of cells, in fact, it requires a set of organs. In particular, I think it requires the brain. You disagree, a brainless body that is otherwise alive should be considered a human, according to you. Legs alone, however, should not. Nor any individual organ. Therefore, I pose the question to you: what minimally constitutes a human for you?

The fundament of analysis is always intuition. We generally know what constitutes an individual human. It is a body, usually wedded to a mind. If we approach the need to draw boundaries around outlandish dissections of a human, I suggest that we first identify a principle at stake in each particular example. It will usually be easier to reconcile principles than to explain away illustrative examples.

Cain · Post by **Cain** » Sun Jun 29, 2003 8:40 pm

However, if we deconstruct the intuition used, we end up with anthropomorphication. And, in either case, both are highly subjective processes. Which isn't to say they're wrong, or even not worth our time; I just don't think that's what 32 was going for.

DV8 · Post by **DV8** » Sun Jun 29, 2003 10:03 pm

Cain wrote:anthropomorphication

That's...not really a word.

Jestyr · Post by **Jestyr** » Sun Jun 29, 2003 10:15 pm

Wellll, no. The word is actually anthropomorphization (or anthropomorphisation, depending on how you like your Zs).

DV8 · Post by **DV8** » Sun Jun 29, 2003 11:01 pm

Hmmm...your reference.com-fu is strong.

Cain · Post by **Cain** » Mon Jun 30, 2003 1:40 am

:p:p You know what I mean.

Anguirel · Post by **Anguirel** » Mon Jun 30, 2003 1:45 am

Marius wrote:If we approach the need to draw boundaries around outlandish dissections of a human, I suggest that we first identify a principle at stake in each particular example.

Well, yes... my principle was that humans need brains, but you've already dismissed that (which I'll probably be fine with, in the end). The only subsequent step I can think of is to find some examples of valid but non-standard humans, that is a few minimal cases of human, and identify commonalities. Alternately, we could determine that human is a single-cross boundary condition... Once you become a human, you can't lose the designation at a later date (which would neatly counter my dissection).

3278 · Post by **3278** » Thu Jul 03, 2003 6:31 am

I've got to ask: when there's a clear species-level distinction drawn clearly and genetically by nature, why do we need to cut people up to see how little of them makes a person?

Cain · Post by **Cain** » Thu Jul 03, 2003 7:17 am

Because we then need to determine if dismemberment is the same as murder. An amputation might end up as murder, under some of the definitions proposed.

If we simply say: "An intact member of the species", then we risk eliminating those who are not physically complete, for whatever reason; the amputee example again comes up.

While the species standard is good, the question then becomes-- is a still-living but detached arm or leg considered a "human" under the definition? What about a living brain in a jar? (If you'll forgive my descent into sci-fi.)

None of this is a sign you're on the wrong track, 32; but you did ask to see if we could come up with a full and complete description that is both subjective and 100% accurate. I'm not trying to be unnecessarily nitpicky, but I think this is what you asked for.

3278 · Post by **3278** » Thu Jul 03, 2003 7:24 am

Not at all. These are exactly the sort of objections I'm looking for. Time to go bioethics-mining.

3278 · Post by **3278** » Mon Jul 07, 2003 10:28 pm

Hmm. I discovered a major aid to the discussion, only to find Marius already had:

[Modified by me.]
Remember, a living being is the totality of all parts comprising a single discrete individual of a group with particular basic characteristics, among them being alive, being of a sort that can self-replicate, and so on. The sort of idea we're looking to use to define both 'life' and 'a life' is a class-based definition. Being alive is "belonging to a class of unitary things that generally have such-and-so-on properties," and individual cases of life can be distinguished from things which are not individual units within the class based on whether or not such things generally have the properties which identify the class of things. A fingertip in a jar sort of would not.[/marius]

By which I mean, you can't define life by the exceptions. A mouse with no gonads cannot self-replicate, but that's only because /that mouse/ has no gonads. It is not not-alive, it is a defective member of a living class. If you cut the arm off a monkey, the arm is not alive, because it instantly begins seeking equilibrium with its environment.

As for viability, here's an honest question: if you pull a parasite from its host and don't allow it to join with another host, it dies. Does this mean parasites aren't alive?

Cain · Post by **Cain** » Tue Jul 08, 2003 8:21 pm

By which I mean, you can't define life by the exceptions. A mouse with no gonads cannot self-replicate, but that's only because /that mouse/ has no gonads. It is not not-alive, it is a defective member of a living class. If you cut the arm off a monkey, the arm is not alive, because it instantly begins seeking equilibrium with its environment.

Here's the tricky part, though. We're not defining life, we're defining "human". If we had a human with no arms or legs, would the rest be considered human? What about a brain on life support? Let's go for a sci-fi example again-- if we remove an intact human brain from the body, is the brain dead becaue it instantly begins seekign equilibrium with it's environment? What if the brain is then placed into a life-support system, and connected to communication gear, enabling the brain to communincate as if it were still in a body?

The reason why the amputation argument is important is to consider at which stage do we distinguish between a "human part" and a "human being". And rather or not a given kind of cells is worth more than others in that determination, and why.

Tyra Durden · Post by **Tyra Durden** » Tue Jul 08, 2003 9:10 pm

Here's the tricky part, though. We're not defining life, we're defining "human".

Actually, we're defining both.

3278 wrote:In order to answer the question of whether or not abortion is murder, we need to answer, in my mind, two questions:

1. What is life?
2. What does it mean to be "human?"

Cain · Post by **Cain** » Tue Jul 08, 2003 11:20 pm

True enough, although I think 32 had a different thread somewhere that more specifically dealt with life.

Still, I can't seem to find anything better to define "human" than intuition/anthropomophisation. I'm honestly hoping 32 can find the hole in my argument; wile that definition works well, it doesn't help the original issue at all.

3278 · Post by **3278** » Wed Jul 09, 2003 4:14 am

Cain wrote:
3278 wrote:By which I mean, you can't define life by the exceptions. A mouse with no gonads cannot self-replicate, but that's only because /that mouse/ has no gonads. It is not not-alive, it is a defective member of a living class. If you cut the arm off a monkey, the arm is not alive, because it instantly begins seeking equilibrium with its environment.
Here's the tricky part, though. We're not defining life, we're defining "human".

Actually, because you're initiating a condition onto an already-living thing, what /you're/ defining is death. Do you see what I mean? "Life" and "death" aren't opposites, or at least not exclusively. "Life" and "not-life" are the opposites we're looking at. We're asking what makes life different from air, or rocks. You're defining at what point it /stops/ being alive.

Cain · Post by **Cain** » Wed Jul 09, 2003 5:11 am

Point acknowledged; I'm focusing more on the "human" aspect rather than the "life" part.

Anguirel · Post by **Anguirel** » Thu Jul 10, 2003 2:57 am

I'll admit that my examples are purposely directed towards the eventual goal of this thread. We are purposely attempting to define a borderline case -- and, in fact, a borderline for it.

The problem with a class definition is exactly the exceptions. Whereas that sort of definition is fine in everyday life and very workable for the purposes of general activity (and, in fact, the one most people intuitively use for just about everything), it fails miserably for science and legal purposes. It is not a strict definition and cannot delineate "X" and "Not X". It can delineate "Obviously X" and "Not Obviously X". It defines an ideal, and allows you to create shades of definition surrounding that ideal case. It allows for fuzzy elements, but there is no way you can definitively (hah!) say "This is not an element of that class" unless you have distinct negative traits or required positive traits. Thus saying "most have this trait" is useful information, but not a definition. It's an aid for classification, not the classification scheme itself.

To appeal to the math-side, use set-builder notation here, and you'll see what I mean. Every classification eventually has a few hard definitions in it which you can bend but not break. Although you might say "a mouse without genetalia remains a mouse," if the definition requires it then you should say "technically this is not a mouse, but it is close enough that we will consider it such for these specific purposes -- which do not include the need for reproduction." Else you could list it as a mouse and someone else might expect it to be able to breed due to your well-meaning but incorrect classification.

For the purposes of this conversation, I'm going to withdraw my previous arguments and restate them as "born without" rather than "removed through surgery / injury" as injury/removal should be separately handled from the base definition (though still potentially useful for the purposes of arriving at the base definition).

3278 · Post by **3278** » Thu Jul 24, 2003 12:45 am

3278: Hey, Ang, what's up?
Ang: You forgot about the abortion thread.
3278: Naw. I'm just waiting for some other people to comment.
Ang: Yeah? How's that working out for you?
3278: Not all that well, actually.
Ang: Thought so.

JetPlane · Post by **JetPlane** » Thu Jul 24, 2003 6:10 pm

1. What is life?- I have a very "governmental" "Roe vs. Wade" view of life. A thing has a life if it has a birthday. A fetus doesn't have a birthday until it leaves the womb. Most (I can't say 'all', since I can only shudder at the fact that some actually survive the process) babies that are aborted are dead before they leave the womb. A parasite has a life once it crawls out of its dead carcass of food and begins doing what parasites do.

In this sense, it's easy to attribute "life" itself to plants, animals, etc. Things that have certain "processes" that lead for them to be born, through mitosis, meiosis, celll budding, et cetera, and eventually die.

A rock cannot be "born" in the sense that its "mother" pops it out or it buds off. Bacteria and other unicelluar lifeforms reach problems being considered in the category of the "living", obviously, but they do start living, and they can begin dying.

2. What does it mean to be "human? -To be a "thinking", "imaginative" biped. I watched this Discovery Channel the other day of the evolution of humans from homo erectus up to the bright sapiens we are now. Sapiens were placed apart from their Neanderthal and other relatives, by their ability to "think ahead", which past "humans" were unable to. They found this gourd in the middle of Africa buried in the sand, hollowed out with a strap of hide strapped to it like one to hold a purse. Since humans in Africa would have to cross the desert for long periods of time, they needed something to hold water.

Therefore, they made something to hold water. Past humans weren't smart enough(dumb enough?) to travel for long stretches when food supplies weren't guaranteed. Past humans were very unwilling to do certain things because the risk could be too great for them. Homo sapiens, instead of the Neanderthals, traveled long periods and survived because they preserved food and water as best they could for the long
stretches ahead. Neanderthals were expected to have merely eaten all they could have, waited until they were hungry again, and then begin hunting for the "tribe" again.

My views of abortion: It's a choice no one should make someone else make. It's a choice no one should stop someone else from making. I'm pro-choice, but I am not pro-abortion. There is a difference which many people refuse to notice. I am not telling everyone to run out, get pregnant, and then get an abortion. I merely want the choice. I know there are situations were an abortion is better than sending a child off to adoption(and I should point out that not many orphans in the U.S. are adopted if they are not ethnic and/or very young), dying by giving birth to a child, or having a physically deformed child that will never lead the life of a normal human being.

Maybe I'm cold and heartless, but /I/ don't want to have a rapist's child. /I/ don't want to have a child I can't support. Therefore, /I/ will not put myself in a situation where that could happen(the latter, the former I may never be able to help). I also don't believe God is giving /anyone/ a penance or a cross to bear by giving them a child that is deformed, as in it has brain damage, Fetal Alcohol Syndrome, or some other kind of deformity that came about because the father of the child was a drug addict or alcoholic(or both), or because something just happened. Bad genes or whatever. I don't have to have that child, and neither should anyone else have to /if they don't want to/.

We live in a society today where we have /enough/ of a growing population. We don't need mentally retarded people /voting/. We don't need people not taking or using some type of birth control. We don't need religions advocating for families to have as many children as possible and we don't need religions advocating that God is giving them a test when they find out that their child has spine bifida.

We live in a society today where each child we have should be precious, because we don't need to have many in case 3/4ths of them die of a plague or falling off a horse. We don't have to worry about that anymore, so why should we have to worry about taking care of children we can't support? For children we'll have to spend millions of dollars of medical treatment on who will never live life like a normal person because of it?

But, maybe you're right. Maybe I /am/ cold and heartless because I see a society where families live happily with two children and can get them through college and their future without straining the pocketbook to the point of near ripping. Maybe I /am/ heartless because I don't think families should have to have deformed children if they know in advance they can't provide for the needed medical support. Maybe I am because I don't think anyone should have a rapist's, their father's, or anyone else's child that they don't want.

I'm pro-choice, but I am not pro-abortion. The choice should be there, but no one should abuse that.

*EDIT: Removed unneeded code.

JetPlane · Post by **JetPlane** » Fri Jul 25, 2003 5:36 pm

*Bump*

You made this thread, 32. I want some debate going on.

3278 · Post by **3278** » Fri Jul 25, 2003 5:51 pm

JetPlane wrote:1. What is life?- I have a very "governmental" "Roe vs. Wade" view of life. A thing has a life if it has a birthday... In this sense, it's easy to attribute "life" itself to plants, animals, etc. Things that have certain "processes" that lead for them to be born, through mitosis, meiosis, celll budding, et cetera, and eventually die.

I challenge this definition on the grounds that it's not consistant. Mitosis is life for bacteria, but not for humans? It seems like this definition is, again, geared specifically for supporting the pro-choice viewpoint, and isn't objective.

JetPlane wrote:A fetus doesn't have a birthday until it leaves the womb.

Something I keep wondering about is whether or not there'd be an abortion debate at all if humans laid eggs. Would it be legal to smash your eggs, your developing, fertilized child, if it were outside your body?

JetPlane wrote:A parasite has a life once it crawls out of its dead carcass of food and begins doing what parasites do.

This is an especially interesting comparison, given that a foetus is effectively a parasite. On the other hand, it's a strange judgement call, since many parasites never leave their host, or do so only after the majority of their life is over. Is a maggot not alive until it becomes a fly?

JetPlane wrote:2. What does it mean to be "human? -To be a "thinking", "imaginative" biped.

I challenge this definition on the grounds that it's inappropriately selective. What about thinking beings who aren't bipedal? Most "higher" animals imagine; if you teach a dog to walk on two legs, is it human?

Plus, there's just a much simpler, much more accurate division given to us by nature itself; why shouldn't "human" just be Homo sapiens? I understand that there's some dissent over what is life and what isn't, but it seems like "human" should be pretty clear-cut.

3278 · Post by **3278** » Fri Jul 25, 2003 5:54 pm

Anguirel wrote:For the purposes of this conversation, I'm going to withdraw my previous arguments and restate them as "born without" rather than "removed through surgery / injury" as injury/removal should be separately handled from the base definition (though still potentially useful for the purposes of arriving at the base definition).

Welll, then I'll restate my previous response: a mouse born without legs is a defective mouse, but still a mouse. A mouse born without a brain is still a mouse, it's just defective. It doesn't stop being a mouse because it deviates from the norm; it just stops being normal.

Szechuan · Post by **Szechuan** » Fri Jul 25, 2003 6:26 pm

JetPlane wrote:*Bump*
You made this thread, 32. I want some debate going on.

The accepted term is to *fluff*, to keep a thread up. It's derived from pornography.

As far as abortion goes, I don't think I can add much beyond the fact that I'm pro-choice, provided it doesn't become so widespread as to be an alternative form of birth control.
I feel that case-by-case is the best way to look at it. Many people are against third trimester abortions, as I would generally be, but if they discover a potentially fatal problem, I don't see a reason not to abort the pregnancy.

As far as my reasoning, I can't say much beyond the fact that I don't care whether or not the baby dies, if there's a reason for it. *shrug*

Marius · Post by **Marius** » Fri Jul 25, 2003 7:21 pm

3278 wrote:
JetPlane wrote:1. What is life? - I have a very "governmental" "Roe vs. Wade" view of life. A thing has a life if it has a birthday... In this sense, it's easy to attribute "life" itself to plants, animals, etc. Things that have certain "processes" that lead for them to be born, through mitosis, meiosis, celll budding, et cetera, and eventually die.
I challenge this definition on the grounds that it's not consistant. Mitosis is life for bacteria, but not for humans? It seems like this definition is, again, geared specifically for supporting the pro-choice viewpoint, and isn't objective.

Actually, it seems consistent with the class-based definition we worked over earlier. A bacterium experiencing mitosis would be expressing a property of a discrete individual organism used to classify it as 'alive.' It would be reproducing. A human, or rather a human cell experiencing mitosis is not displaying a property integral to our classification-definition of life. So mitosis would be 'life' for a bacterium, but not for a human.

3278 · Post by **3278** » Fri Jul 25, 2003 8:54 pm

Marius wrote:Actually, it seems consistent with the class-based definition we worked over earlier. A bacterium experiencing mitosis would be expressing a property of a discrete individual organism used to classify it as 'alive.' It would be reproducing. A human, or rather a human cell experiencing mitosis is not displaying a property integral to our classification-definition of life. So mitosis would be 'life' for a bacterium, but not for a human.

Wait, why? Aren't you kind of begging the question by saying that mitosis isn't a property integral to our definition of human life? What, exactly, about our definition of life excludes the mitosis of a human cell, when that single cell is the entire human organism?

I think, for what it's worth, that once it's got a full set of DNA - excluding defective members of the class - and it divides, it's alive. It's got human DNA, and it's growing and - more importantly - developing. It is the whole of the organism, and not a part, and it is behaving in a fashion consistent with life. It even survives on its own during the earliest stages of development, before it /attaches itself/ to the wall of the uterus [six days after conception]. It then becomes an endoparasite [and an embryo].

It divides, it grows, and it takes action to influence its environment. That influence is passive, because it doesn't alter the environment directly, but rather, like a tree moving toward sunlight, alters itself.

Cain · Post by **Cain** » Fri Jul 25, 2003 9:50 pm

Ok, I'm going to try and bring this back to 32's questions.

If murder is the unnecessary killing of a human being, then the standards for bacterium do not apply. You can't "murder" a planaria worm, by the definition we're working under; you can only murder a human.

So, the question of "whole" or "part" again comes into play. In theory, at the blastocyte level of development, I could split the cells apart and form two complete viable embryos. But it was only "part" and not the "whole" of the original organism.

There can be no argument that an embryo is alive. The question is, is it human?

3278 · Post by **3278** » Fri Jul 25, 2003 9:58 pm

Cain wrote:If murder is the unnecessary killing of a human being, then the standards for bacterium do not apply. You can't "murder" a planaria worm, by the definition we're working under; you can only murder a human.

Although, of course, you can /kill/ a planaria. [But you shouldn't, because they're cool.]

Anguirel · Post by **Anguirel** » Tue Jul 29, 2003 12:21 am

3278 wrote:Welll, then I'll restate my previous response: a mouse born without legs is a defective mouse, but still a mouse. A mouse born without a brain is still a mouse, it's just defective. It doesn't stop being a mouse because it deviates from the norm; it just stops being normal.

Ok, so a mouse born without a head, 3 legs, tail or body (a mouse leg) is still a mouse, albeit a defective one. In fact, any individual cell of an organism is a member of that species, albeit a defective one. Now bringing in surgery again, all surgery kills defective members of a given species. I think what we're encountering here is a core problem of philosophy of identity. How do you handle a problem like the Ship of Theseus (scroll down to find that story)? Which portion of the surgery is the "original" human who went under the knife?

A few other random questions for you (mostly theoretical / hypothetical) to test your previous definitions (particularly the DNA based ones):
In the case of truly genetically identical twin homo-sapiens (beings that would otherwise be considered obviously a full human individually), are they the same human split into two lumps and thus would killing one not technically be murder since the original "human" survives?

How do we assign identity to a species that can reproduce both sexually (changing genetic material and swapping it around) and asexually (usually producing and exact copy)?

How do you handle the case illustrated here where a single organism might share qualatatively different DNA?

Anguirel · Post by **Anguirel** » Mon Feb 09, 2004 9:26 am

So this ends up a double-post. So sue me. I figured since we were discussing Serious Topics elsewhere, I'd see if anyone wanted to try an old one that kinda died out (but never devolved into "bullshit"). So, I'll revive and try to synthesize some of the past stuff.

3278 wrote:
JetPlane wrote:1. What is life?- I have a very "governmental" "Roe vs. Wade" view of life. A thing has a life if it has a birthday... In this sense, it's easy to attribute "life" itself to plants, animals, etc. Things that have certain "processes" that lead for them to be born, through mitosis, meiosis, celll budding, et cetera, and eventually die.
I challenge this definition on the grounds that it's not consistant. Mitosis is life for bacteria, but not for humans? It seems like this definition is, again, geared specifically for supporting the pro-choice viewpoint, and isn't objective.

You're right. Mitosis is life for all cells. Human cells, Bacteria, Hydras, whatever... If a human's cells stop performing mitosis, that human will die relatively quickly as individual cells give out. But then... is a bacteria cell incapable of mitosis no longer alive? It's still performing respiration and converting energy into whatever... It's still... alive, in the common parlance. It just can't reproduce. Reproduction is something living things do, and this particular cell can't. Is it dead before it stops functioning?

The second problem you had -- that it was good for one but not another -- is an artifact of having two questions. A single human cell -- let's say a liver cell, I think those survive well in lab conditions -- is hanging out in this nutrient broth. It has access to oxygen, glucose, everything it needs. It performs mitosis on a regular basis. It's definitely alive. It's performing all those "life" things. So question 1 is answered here: Alive. Is it human? Well, it has human DNA. It reproduces -- kinda. But I don't really think I'd call it a human, not even a defective one. I certainly wouldn't consider killing it as murder.

Organisms -- that is, living things that have organs -- are more than just a cell. They're collections of cells, collections of collections of specialized cells all working in harmony. One could say that all organisms are simply highly symbiotic communities of cells that share large chunks of DNA -- post differentiation the DNA isn't exactly the same, but it's close; it's certainly possible to tell whether a given cell came from a specific community or not.

So what constitutes a human is a collection of cells, a collection of organs all bearing one particular sequencing of DNA originally from the same pre-differentiated set. And not all of those organs are required to maintain a human as human. Certain muscles -- the calf, for example -- can be missing entirely and an organism could still be human. Defective, but human. Perhaps what is necessary to continue this is to ask if it would be possible to obtain separate definitions for "biologically human" and "murderable human".

Let us imagine, for a moment, a biological and murderable human that has just had it's head crushed. The majority of the organs continue to function just fine -- and even if the organs aren't working quite right, the cells themselves are perfectly fine, for the moment. Biologically, this is a very defective living human. Realistically, it shouldn't be considered a living human at all. Even though the cells live, for the moment, they will not survive long because a requisite element has been destroyed. Even on life support (somehow), the body of this ex-human will never recover, although it could continue living as a defective biological human for a long time. Whatever presently ineffable quality it is that makes a human into a murderable human is gone. Soul, sentience and sapience, imaginative ability, whatever it is, it is gone and will not return. So this husk, this biological human is no longer really human -- a murderable human. Killing the remaining body would not usually be considered murder. As I noted in one of my earlier posts, the most obviously requisite element for a murderable human is a functioning brain. The rest of the body is just there as effectors and support systems.

UncleJoseph · Post by **UncleJoseph** » Mon Feb 09, 2004 10:14 am

A day late and a dollar short.

Murder is a legal term stemming from British common law. At least by definition in Michigan, murder is the illegal killing of a human being.

Homicide, on the other hand, is simply the killing of a human being, without attaching blame, morality or anything. A soldier who kills in combat (legally) commits a homicide, but not murder. But I'll use 32's definition...

My thoughts:

Unborn people, at whatever stage, are alive, and can be considered partly human. There is no way to determine consciousness, soul, etc. Thus, an unborn human is simply another part of it's host (i.e., the mother). An unborn person then, is an organ or sample of tissue of the mother. To abort a fetus is no different than to have your appendix or gall bladder removed. Therefore, abortion is not murder, it is a fetusectomy.

Now, personally, I don't believe that arbitrary abortions should be commonplace. You wouldn't elect to have your appendix out unless it was necessary. And your appendix will not grow into a separate organism, so due consideration should be given for a fetusectomy, but I don't believe it's murder/homicide.

UJ

Anguirel · Post by **Anguirel** » Thu Oct 07, 2004 9:25 am

I fluff for 3278.

Szechuan · Post by **Szechuan** » Thu Oct 07, 2004 12:56 pm

Anguirel wrote:So what constitutes a human is a collection of cells, a collection of organs all bearing one particular sequencing of DNA originally from the same pre-differentiated set. And not all of those organs are required to maintain a human as human. Certain muscles -- the calf, for example -- can be missing entirely and an organism could still be human. Defective, but human. Perhaps what is necessary to continue this is to ask if it would be possible to obtain separate definitions for "biologically human" and "murderable human".

Let's throw this out. Perhaps a 'murderable human' would be one who:

1) Has/had the biological components needed to function, be they defective or not.
2) Maintains brain activity at some defined level. (Profound retardation versus Vegetable)

#2 is used to mitigate using 1 to justify a leg as murderable because it once had a connection to a heart and lungs.

For example:

A person is paralyzed from the neck down. They are on life-support systems, fed intravenously, but maintain a minimum level of consciousness. They would be defined as a murderable human being.
A leg, lacking any of its own biological maintenance systems and maintaining no degree of brain activity whatsoever, is human only in the biological sense; it is just a human leg.

Comments?

Marius · Post by **Marius** » Thu Oct 07, 2004 1:35 pm

A person who attacks me with an axe meets both of those criteria, and yet he is, for a time at least, not murderable.

Szechuan · Post by **Szechuan** » Thu Oct 07, 2004 1:52 pm

Well, I was focusing more on the context of abortion and the 'what is life?' thing. Clearly self-defense and other mitigating factors can be taken into account. I just wanted to help get things rolling again.

Anguirel · Post by **Anguirel** » Thu Oct 07, 2004 6:28 pm

Marius wrote:A person who attacks me with an axe meets both of those criteria, and yet he is, for a time at least, not murderable.

If you aren't going to participate usefully this time around, don't bother at all. Make it "homocidable human". You can still commit homocide against the axe-wielder, it will simply be considered justified homocide. The exact term doesn't matter to me. And legal definitions suck. The net effect remains. If a doctor takes a live tissue sample, he is not considered to be commiting homocide. "Biological humans" are dying - cells capable of reproducing, containing human DNA, and so on, die when he does that. If they were not all of that, then it wouldn't exactly be a live tissue sample.

So individual cells are not homicidable. Amputation is not a homocidable act, legs aren't homocidable humans. Kidney removal is not homocidable. Shooting a person in the kidney is homocide (unless they get appropriate treatment, in which case it may be some lesser crime). Unplugging life support is a homocide even though that body "instantly begins seeking equilibrium with its environment" and therefore should not be considered alive?

So we have a lot of stupid contradictory cases using homocide. But what is the act? Causation of system-wide failure. Allowing all parts of the system to die off? No, a pinky in a jar doesn't count, even though it is a human by our previous biological definition - i.e. can still reproduce (via mitosis) and contains human DNA. A human is more than a living collection of cells containing human DNA. That biological definition sucks. A human is more than any subset of organs, evidently, since almost any can be removed without eliminating the object form the class of human. A class-based definition, however, also sucks. We can keep people who are brain-dead technically alive. Therefore, we could have a baby born without a brain and immediately placed on life support. As long as the rest of the organs were forced to function, it'd be alive and a human, and killing it would be homocide, according to Marius. Why? Why is that lump of cells that should instantly begin seeking equilibrium with the environment if not for the life support be considered either human or alive?

Alive, I can answer... It does reproduce - via mitosis - and that should be the necessary component in our current definition of life as we know it. Without mitosis our cells decay and eventually collapse. That would be not alive. Therefore regular mitosis is a necessary component of living. Other forms of reproduction are necessary for the continuation of some forms of life, but are not prerequisite for any given being. Thus the lopped off arm is alive until the cells within have all ceased functioning.

3278 wrote:As for viability, here's an honest question: if you pull a parasite from its host and don't allow it to join with another host, it dies. Does this mean parasites aren't alive?

Which brings me to parasites. We're all effectively parasites of some sort, just not as obviously so. Dandelions are good for this, I think... Say I lived in a field of dandelions. Nothing else around. Just about every part of a dandelion is edible, I think... if not, pretend it is. Now, I can eat dandelions all day and not do a thing to help them grow. I'm, in fact, killing lots of them. That makes me a parasite, effectively, on that field. Remove me from the field and put me on a barren rocky planet with appropriate atmosphere and all... and I begin to die. Does that make me not alive? Just because a parasite's food source happens to be another living being doesn't make it less alive. It is simply adapted to survival in specific conditions, just as humans are, just as all living beings are.

32 actually got us closer, I think, to defining alive by questioning JetPlane's definition. Life is as its simplest form does. Is there anything considered alive that does not perform mitosis or exist within a cellular construct? Jestyr, I'm looking your way, you know your biology stuff...

Virii are the only possible examples, and they aren't always considered alive. If we want our absolute borderline cases, I think we'll need to explore how a virus works and whether we want to consider it alive or not. Everything else on up from bacteria to humans has cellular systems and DNA and performs mitosis. There's our base definition of life (as we know it) - use the other thread to determine if that's really what it should be, this is simply stating what is presently the case.

So now we get back to what is it to be a human. I think it has to do with the brain. I do not think that the above scenario of the homo sapien baby born brainless is a human in any but the most basic biological sense. It is incapable of... well... thought. Action. Intent. Purpose. Even the most severely mentally retarded human is capable of some thought... some action... some intent. As far as I know. And I still maintain that is what makes a lump of cells with homo sapiens DNA in it human. Homocidable human, if you prefer, with the acknowledgment that the current legal definition of homocide probably also sucks.

Marius · Post by **Marius** » Thu Oct 07, 2004 8:49 pm

If you aren't going to participate usefully this time around, don't bother at all.

Suck my dick.

The exact term doesn't matter to me.

Then use one that's precise. Precise terms do matter.

And legal definitions suck.

Murder is a moral definition as well as a legal definition. Because we're having a moral argument, I'd say that's the proper usage for it.

"Biological humans" are dying - cells capable of reproducing, containing human DNA, and so on, die when he does that.

Cells containing human DNA which are capable of reproducing are not "biological humans," unless you intend to stipulate a rather unusual definition. That term suggests an entirety of entity of the sort typically considered human.

A human is more than any subset of organs, evidently, since almost any can be removed without eliminating the object form the class of human.

Well yes.

A class-based definition, however, also sucks. We can keep people who are brain-dead technically alive. Therefore, we could have a baby born without a brain and immediately placed on life support. As long as the rest of the organs were forced to function, it'd be alive and a human, and killing it would be homocide, according to Marius.

Not neccessarily. It's rather possible - and, in fact, I'd argue strongly - that anencephaly entirely excludes an organism from the class of human being.

Thus the lopped off arm is alive until the cells within have all ceased functioning.

Indeed, it is 'alive.' It is not 'a life.'

3278 · Post by **3278** » Thu Oct 07, 2004 9:00 pm

This is another one of those threads where I feel like anything I could say, I already have. I think we've already established a clear, class-based series of definitions which are all-encompassing and consistent...but because we like to talk about this stuff, people keep coming up with exceptions, despite the fact that the entire class of exceptions - like the "cut an arm off" exception - have been clearly dispensed with. At this point, it's basically just communal intellectual masturbation.

TheScamp · Post by **TheScamp** » Thu Oct 07, 2004 9:37 pm

At this point, it's basically just communal intellectual masturbation.

Sometimes known as a circle-nerd.

Cash · Post by **Cash** » Thu Oct 07, 2004 9:42 pm

Anguirel · Post by **Anguirel** » Fri Oct 08, 2004 1:58 am

3278 wrote:This is another one of those threads where I feel like anything I could say, I already have. I think we've already established a clear, class-based series of definitions which are all-encompassing and consistent...but because we like to talk about this stuff, people keep coming up with exceptions, despite the fact that the entire class of exceptions - like the "cut an arm off" exception - have been clearly dispensed with. At this point, it's basically just communal intellectual masturbation.

We have a functional definition what a human is? Where? Does it include a fetus or not? I don't think we ever answered anything usefully here... I certainly never saw anything even approaching a real definition from Marius or you outside of the incredibly vague and utterly useless "we all sort of know what a human is. A pinky sort of is not." Why not? Why is an arm alive but not a life? How is a single cell of a homo sapien liver in nutrient broth any different from a bacterium in a nutrient broth. Why is the homo sapien liver cell simply alive, but the bacterium is alive and a life? We touched nothing of substance in the fashion initially asked for by the thread author (psst, if you've forgotten, that was you).

3278 · Post by **3278** » Fri Oct 08, 2004 2:13 am

Anguirel wrote:We have a functional definition what a human is?

Yes. The definition I've been using the entire time, the one granted us by nature: a member of the species homo sapiens.

Anguirel wrote:Does it include a fetus or not?

I believe it does. Certainly, a human foetus is a member of the same genetic class, the same biological division. The question, then, is if a foetus can be said to be a living human, which requires definition as to whether or not a foetus is alive. I believe it is, since the biological definition of life granted us by our nature includes developing members of the class. A foetus is as alive as an adolescent, or an adult.

Anguirel wrote:I certainly never saw anything even approaching a real definition from Marius or you outside of the incredibly vague and utterly useless "we all sort of know what a human is. A pinky sort of is not."

Those definitions were never mine.

Anguirel wrote:Why is an arm alive but not a life?

An arm is not alive. If an arm is attached to a living human, it is part of a living human. If it is detached, it is a detached portion of a living human, which will immediately begin to seek equilibrium with its environment, as all things will when no longer fed fuel to overcome that tendency. A fire will behave the same way, for instance.

Anguirel wrote:How is a single cell of a homo sapien liver in nutrient broth any different from a bacterium in a nutrient broth.

It is only different in substance, inasmuch as bacterium are different from human cells on a physical level; they also share differing histories, of course.

Anguirel wrote:Why is the homo sapien liver cell simply alive, but the bacterium is alive and a life?

The homo sapiens liver cell is not alive, in any biological definition of life I have used. The bacterium is alive and a life because it is an organism; the liver cell is a portion of an organism, in fitting with its history. [I should note I don't draw a strong differentiation between "alive" and "a life." That would be Marius. While we agree strongly on the biology involved, we do possess certain differing opinions on the ramifications of those facts, as well as the semantics. The differences are not significant enough for us to quibble over, but they are enough that you should not take his comments as always being in accord with mine.]

As you can tell, the moral issues are meaningless to me. Only the biological issues are, in my opinion, significant; the moral issues should be derived from them, if at all.

3278 · Post by **3278** » Fri Oct 08, 2004 2:34 am

I'm sorry: I should point out that not all of those conclusions are from this thread; many are from the "What is Life?" thread. I tend to think of them as a unit. I'm sure many of them are from neither place, but only from my head! The discussions I've had on this issue have primarily taken place there, though sometimes with some of you.

Cain · Post by **Cain** » Fri Oct 08, 2004 3:28 am

I believe it does. Certainly, a human foetus is a member of the same genetic class, the same biological division. The question, then, is if a foetus can be said to be a living human, which requires definition as to whether or not a foetus is alive. I believe it is, since the biological definition of life granted us by our nature includes developing members of the class. A foetus is as alive as an adolescent, or an adult.

A fetus is clearly alive, but it may or may not be a living human being. I've said it before and I'll say it again, something only becomes human when it is percieved to have a sufficient amount of humanity. I know you dislike subjective standards, but that's the truth of it.

The homo sapiens liver cell is not alive, in any biological definition of life I have used. The bacterium is alive and a life because it is an organism; the liver cell is a portion of an organism, in fitting with its history. [I should note I don't draw a strong differentiation between "alive" and "a life." That would be Marius. While we agree strongly on the biology involved, we do possess certain differing opinions on the ramifications of those facts, as well as the semantics. The differences are not significant enough for us to quibble over, but they are enough that you should not take his comments as always being in accord with mine.]

A liver cell has the ability of self-replication. Given the proper environment, it can continue to thrive. I think AH chose the liver as his example because the human liver has amazing regenerative properties; sure, it'd require the proper environment, but so does a full human being. In theory, a single liver cell can replicate itself into an entire liver, something that is distinctly not true for many other cell types.

Anguirel · Post by **Anguirel** » Fri Oct 08, 2004 11:00 am

Cain wrote:A liver cell has the ability of self-replication. Given the proper environment, it can continue to thrive. I think AH chose the liver as his example because the human liver has amazing regenerative properties; sure, it'd require the proper environment, but so does a full human being. In theory, a single liver cell can replicate itself into an entire liver, something that is distinctly not true for many other cell types.

I'm Ang, not AH, and that is precisely why I chose the liver cell. I thought about this a bunch at work (mindless jobs allow you to do that), and I've come up with a few things that I think both 32 and Marius will completely hate.

Humans are not singular lives. A life is something only an individual cell has. Bacterium through homo sapiens, each cell is a life. They are alive and each one is a life. They can survive within their chosen environment. This is totally fucking key. If you take any organism out of its selected environment, it begins to die. I hinted at this earlier, but now I'm going to expand on it. Plop a fish on land - it dies. Pour salt on a slug - it dies. Put a freshwater fish in otherwise identical water with salt - it dies. Sneeze hard enough to eject some bacteria - they die. Take a liver cell out of a human - it dies. Lop off a pinky - it dies. Kick a human into outer space - it dies.

Now explain to me the difference between a highly interconnected ecosphere and the human body. Let's say you go into the forest and yank out all of the nitrogen-fixing plants. The whole forest dies. Go into a human and yank out all of the oxygen-fixing systems - the whole human dies. A human is simply a mobile micro-ecosphere of single-celled organisms that have become so interconnected that they share their DNA and have a secondary reproductive system. That is, in addition to the system everything has - mitosis - some of the elements of the system also engage in meiosis and two ecospheres can engage in sexual reproduction.

That humans are something above and beyond a forest is a polite fiction. It's an easy way to help us feel special, and it makes science a lot easier. Just like biology is just a nice polite fiction that makes chemistry a lot easier. And chemistry is a nice polite fiction that makes physics a lot easier. In the end, they're all physics. Every single chemical reaction is explicible in terms purely derived from physics. Every single biological principle can be derived from physics (generally via chemical reactions). Unless I misunderstood something in one of those classes... Which is possible, I suppose.

The fact that our particular community shows emergent behavior from complexity is nice for us, certainly, but it voids the concept of us having "a life". We have many lives within us, and as long as the community survives, "our life" is maintained. So what makes some community a human?

3278 wrote:The definition I've been using the entire time, the one granted us by nature: a member of the species homo sapiens

Being generally a member of the genus homo spaiens is a crappy answer. Nature didn't grant us that definition. Humans made it up. Genus, species, phylum - all crap. My liver cells in a nutrient broth are generally alive, each is a life in the same sense that each bacterium in a similar broth is a life, those liver cells are capable of reproduction and contain homo sapiens DNA. Mis-classified species and poorly designated genus have plagued biology for years. Nature grants no such definition at all... In short, your definition sucks. It is entirely insufficient for handling even the barest modicum of use for which it is intended.

I thought the point of this thread was to develop a good definition, one which would withstand useful and rigorous questioning. One which could, say, delineate between a lump of cells with homo sapiens DNA in them, regardless of their propensity for reproduction (which I don't necessarily consider a human by any stretch), and a human.

To wit - I have previously created several hypothetical examples of lumps of cells which are of the species homo sapiens - of particular note are those involving brain death or lacking a brain entirely, but otherwise fully functional up to and including sexual reproductive abilities as long as they remain within the environment which allows life to continue (namely, under life-support) - but I do not consider all of them to be humans.

Edit - Apologies - did a quick search for a definition of homo sapiens and evidently a brain of 1400 cc is included in the definition - those with partial lobotomies are no longer human. Sorry.

Marius · Post by **Marius** » Fri Oct 08, 2004 12:29 pm

That humans are something above and beyond a forest is a polite fiction.

It sure is, and bully for you for recognizing it. Among the other immediately relevant polite fictions is morality in its entirety.

In addition to being polite fictions, human individuality and morality as a whole are also very real, rather important realities. So while your biological reduction is truly heartwarming to people like myself and 3278, it's really quite immaterial to our discussion here.

3278 · Post by **3278** » Fri Oct 08, 2004 2:37 pm

Cain wrote:A fetus is clearly alive, but it may or may not be a living human being. I've said it before and I'll say it again, something only becomes human when it is percieved to have a sufficient amount of humanity. I know you dislike subjective standards, but that's the truth of it.

No, it's not. Neener-neener. I mean, c'mon! What kind of argument is this?

Cain wrote:A liver cell has the ability of self-replication.

Sure. So? How does that matter in any way?

3278 · Post by **3278** » Fri Oct 08, 2004 2:46 pm

Anguirel wrote:Humans are not singular lives. A life is something only an individual cell has. Bacterium through homo sapiens, each cell is a life.

This may be true, depending on how you define "a life." How do you define "a life?"

Certainly, by any biologically-derived definition, this is not true, but "words are our servants, not our masters." I'm certainly willing to alter definitions if you feel strongly that the biologically-derived one is less-than-useful in this case.

Anguirel wrote:That humans are something above and beyond a forest is a polite fiction.

Depends on the way you mean this, but certainly, they possess differences. Now, you could say with some justice that humans and a stand of aspen are the same, but "a forest" is not an organism, whereas "a human" is. Unless you're redefining "organism," too.

Anguirel wrote:Just like biology is just a nice polite fiction that makes chemistry a lot easier. And chemistry is a nice polite fiction that makes physics a lot easier. In the end, they're all physics. Every single chemical reaction is explicible in terms purely derived from physics. Every single biological principle can be derived from physics (generally via chemical reactions). Unless I misunderstood something in one of those classes... Which is possible, I suppose.

Well, "polite fiction" is one way to put it. I would consider it "hierarchical reductionism." The behavior of an automobile depends completely on physics at its base, but if I asked you how a car worked and you started talking about quarks, we'd be sitting there for a long time. What happens is we split reality into different fields, assume the people in the "physics" field have their shit straight, and use their beliefs to fuel our "biology" field.

There's actually about half a chapter in Blind Watchmaker about this, and if /he's/ wrong, you're in good company. Anyway, what I'm saying is, while I think "polite fiction" is a strange way of putting it, no, you're not wrong.

Anguirel wrote:Being generally a member of the genus homo spaiens is a crappy answer. Nature didn't grant us that definition. Humans made it up. Genus, species, phylum - all crap.

No. Species is a clear, biological division derived from genetic properties. I'm not making this up. For that matter, when talking about class-based definitions, "organism" is a clear, biological division, too.

Anguirel wrote:My liver cells in a nutrient broth are generally alive, each is a life in the same sense that each bacterium in a similar broth is a life, those liver cells are capable of reproduction and contain homo sapiens DNA.

Right. But they're not humans, because they are liver cells. Two different things.

Anguirel wrote:Mis-classified species and poorly designated genus have plagued biology for years.

That's not nature's fault. Don't blame her! She didn't do nothin' to nobody!

Gunny · Post by **Gunny** » Fri Oct 08, 2004 4:51 pm

I love these kinds of threads when the core of "What /is/ life?" comes into play. Because I have no idea, it's so facinating for me to watch people like Cain & 32 beat their heads against each other.

Truely educational. I get squirmy for science! ...just not math. Math is like a cold shower and sewing up my vagina.

Anguirel · Post by **Anguirel** » Fri Oct 08, 2004 5:22 pm

Gunny wrote:I love these kinds of threads when the core of "What /is/ life?" comes into play. Because I have no idea, it's so facinating for me to watch people like Cain & 32 beat their heads against each other.

Truely educational. I get squirmy for science! ...just not math. Math is like a cold shower and sewing up my vagina.

{voice class="tribute"}I get no respect.{/voice}

Actually, I'd call the part we're in now more philosophy than science.

Right... So we have Marius. Yes, what a human is above and beyond a collection of cells is important. So, why not answer the interesting question I proposed - what makes it important. When does the lump of cells cross the line? What delinieates between "lump of cells that is not a human though it shares some human traits," and "lump of cells that is, in fact, a human"? I state it is the brain. You disagreed but have yet to propose more than a general alternative decision.

3278: Yes, I looked it up - homo sapiens does have, evdiently, a reasonably rigorous definition with definite qualities that can be measured. Any lump of cells with DNA matching homo sapiens DNA needs to have language, be able to craft tools, and contain a 1400cc brain, evidently. Tools and language are harder to measure, but brain size... hey, that's easy... How large is a fetus' brain? I guess as long as the brain size is measured pre-abortion, we're ok. Is that what you meant by the question being answered, or do you have a different definition of what qualifies something as being a member of homo sapiens? Please recall that lumps of cells, even those with the capacity to create a full member of homo sapiens (such as a testicle and an ovary in a vat of nutrient broth) are probably insufficient. If it is not the brain size, what makes a lump of cells a member of homo sapiens that would exclude, say, a testicle and an ovary from a hermaphrodite (to eliminate minor variances in the DNA - it's a mutant testicle with only x chomosomes)?

[ST] Is abortion murder?

Jet's personal reply(long)

Re: Jet's personal reply(long)

AGAIN!