Abortions cutoffs and the Emancipation of Children cutoffs
 

*question at the bottom if you don't want to read another one of my confusing/mildly retarded posts*

I see the issue of cutoffs for when, during a pregnancy, aborion should not be legal as being analogous to the issue of when, during a child's life, they should be emancipated from other legal guardianship.

RJT made a comment in the other abortion thread..

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Abortion is either ok or it is not. To use as a metric the timetable "at the point when one finds it to be 'extremely disgusting' " is not very logical. Would late term be the last trimester? What about one day before or one hour before the last trimester starts? I’d hate to be the kid who got wacked because some doctor was off by a fraction of a second.

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I have always thought of my stance on legal emancipation age on a similar note...

the specific criteria for when a child can be considered mature enough to be emancipated isn't the problem.

the problem is that we cannot track this progress for each individual and make individual decisions..we HAVE to set an age (I guess we don't have to, but for social order in this regard, I don't see any way of getting around it.)

this age cutoff suffers the same thing that RJT talked about...

if a person who is 18 is mature enough to engage in consentual intercourse with a 30 year old...why not 17.999 years old...then why not 16, why not 13, 7, 1?

is there a leap that we could set it at? (just like with the formation of a zygote?)..maybe when a specific aspect of puberty occurs??? besides a pretty evident invasion of privacy...this might seem to be logical by RJT's standards...

or maybe that's not a big enough leap..maybe we should just push it back to birth..that seems to be a big leap?...

alright, yes, I know all of this is ridiculous...

I only mean to show one thing..that is, although in some situations, there is no defined place to put a cutoff without the effect that RJT expressed...we have to choose a place regardless of that fact.

and also, just because there is indeed a defined point present, that does not mean that we should go with that as a cutoff...

if we were to define the determining factor in our decision as something which, at that defined point is aquired or lost, then we could use it..

but if we use other factors..(which in both the emancipation situation and the abortion situation, I think we should) then choosing a defined point that is not relevent to those factors doesn't help anything....

what factors do you consider at the heart of the abortion issue? (That is, if you are in favor of abortions up to only a specific point, is it the child's development that is the most determining factor for you..is it cognitive or related to another aspect? etc.

Re: Abortions cutoffs and the Emancipation of Children cutoffs
 

I suppose I do not fit the criteria in the OP, so I must abstain from the discussion. There is no 'point,' except birth.

Re: Abortions cutoffs and the Emancipation of Children cutoffs
 

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There is no 'point,' except birth.

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why is that..is it because you consider it to be an extention of the mother (ie: property to the fullest degree) until that point...

or is it another reason?

Re: Abortions cutoffs and the Emancipation of Children cutoffs
 

[ QUOTE ]
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There is no 'point,' except birth.

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why is that..is it because you consider it to be an extention of the mother (ie: property to the fullest degree) until that point...

or is it another reason?

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The baby no longer infringes upon the autonomy of the mother after that point. She cannot kill it. She can refuse to care for it, but thats it.

Re: Abortions cutoffs and the Emancipation of Children cutoffs
 

[ QUOTE ]
what factors do you consider at the heart of the abortion issue? (That is, if you are in favor of abortions up to only a specific point, is it the child's development that is the most determining factor for you..is it cognitive or related to another aspect? etc.

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1) Is there a 'me' in there, a self-aware person that would pass a cognitive version of the red dot test.
2-5) Other common abortion factors fall much below #1.

If I were 60 and at the cognitive level of prebirth would I want them to pull the plug. I'm not equating the two situations, just trying to come up with a red-dot test example.

Since #1 is difficult to establish even postbirth and the other factors are much more predominant prebirth, birth seems a tolerable sawoff point, admittedly arbitrary but any other would be moreso.

luckyme

Re: Abortions cutoffs and the Emancipation of Children cutoffs
 

The abortion issue involves the competing rights of two parties.

Most people accept the right of the mother to control her own person, all things being equal.

The central debate is over the right to life of the human embryo.

Re: Abortions cutoffs and the Emancipation of Children cutoffs
 

[ QUOTE ]
The abortion issue involves the competing rights of two parties.

Most people accept the right of the mother to control her own person, all things being equal.

The central debate is over the right to life of the human embryo.

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The central debate is over the right to life of the human embryo.

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sure, that is what I am talking about...this is the realm of the "slippery slope" that I was talking about.

what is at the heart of deciding this...cognitive capacity?

Re: Abortions cutoffs and the Emancipation of Children cutoffs
 

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what is at the heart of deciding this...cognitive capacity?

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Though certain "civil" rights may depend on cognition, I agree with the founders of this country, who claimed the right to life comes from God. No "slippery slope" there.

Where else could it come from: the state, the marketplace?

Re: Abortions cutoffs and the Emancipation of Children cutoffs
 

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I agree with the founders of this country who claimed the right to life comes from God.

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Which country is that? Iran?
Heck, founders claim a lot of things, there's a country in the west that acknowledged 2/3 of a person or some such.

luckyme

Re: Abortions cutoffs and the Emancipation of Children cutoffs
 

[ QUOTE ]
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what is at the heart of deciding this...cognitive capacity?

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Though certain "civil" rights may depend on cognition, I agree with the founders of this country, who claimed the right to life comes from God. No "slippery slope" there.

Where else could it come from: the state, the marketplace?

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unfortunately we don't know when this god (if he even exists) "gives" life

so...we really wouldn't get anywhere anyway..I'm afraid we need another determinant.