"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness." Declaration of Independence. Amendment 5 Protection of Rights to Life, Liberty, and Property No person shall be held to answer for a capital or otherwise infamous crime unless on a presentment or indictment of a grand jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the militia, when in actual service in time of war or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offense to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use without just compensation. These two quotes are from some of the most important documents that the United States are founded upon. You can argue that the baby cannot survive outside the womb before say 23 weeks, but the argument can be made that a child cannot survive without the assistance of an adult till say age 10. "All men are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights...life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." Now 'Creator' could be God, nature, the Mother and Father, etc. The main word here is created, when pregnant a mother has a life growing inside of her, that life was 'created' at inception. The fifth amendment says that no one can be deprived of life or liberty without due process of law. So by those definitions defined by the Declaration of Independence and the 5th Amendment to our constitution, then abortion should be considered murder. Because that life was not given due process of law. Unless you are willing to admit that a child that is already born and could not survive on its own, is not a person.
You: """You can argue that the baby cannot survive outside the womb before say 23 weeks, but the argument can be made that a child cannot survive without the assistance of an adult till say age 10"" There is a huge difference between a fetus connected to, and using a woman's body to sustain it's life and a BORN human that ANYONE CAN CARE FOR. One is biological dependency and the other is social dependency....they are very different. Once a human is born anyone may care for it voluntarily. NO one is forced to use their body to sustain another's life but you want to take that right away from pregnant women. What other rights don't you think women deserve?
No one even knows what consciousness is. It can not be defined. It isn't testable. Its nature can't be defined by quantum theories. At this time, it can't be understood in any way at all. It is all philosophical. I think I have understood what you have been saying when you use the term "activated". I just haven't agreed. You seem to be saying that the body is the "vehicle" for consciousness. The "vehicle" is what is being prepared inside the womb. When the vehicle is introduced in to the environment (oxygenated and clear of sedatives), that is when the "mind", rather than brain, is activated and consciousness begins. For you, consciousness is defined as experience that is "imprinted" on the brain that is taken forward into the future as more experiences are collected and built. Therefore, no experience can occur until the mind is activated. There are a few problems with this. One would be that a newborn shows a preference for its mothers voice immediately after birth. I concede that is open to many interpretations. Although, one interpretation is that it is evidence of a fetus having experience inside the womb. I'll try to form a more complete response on your questions regarding koko when I have more time.
I think we could agree rocks dont suffer, so people have no compassion or ethical obligation to non-living things. Plants dont have any structure that allow capacity to have a consciousness, therefore people have no compassion or ethical obligation to consider the suffering of plants. Consciousness seems to require a nervous system and brain structure. People are less concerned about insects than about apes. We have determined that apes possess the brain structure that expose them to a greater range of potential suffering. These are based on scientific observations and known to be factually true. Biological complexity and the ability to experience go hand in hand, unless, of course, we are wrong about an insects potential to suffer or be happy. The concept of personhood is a philosophical one. Its origins are centuries old. The word person comes from the latin word persona which is a word that describes the characteristics displayed. There is a current movement to extend personhood to non-human species. I dont think there is a moment of personhood, nor do I think apes should be given a moral status equal to humans based on concepts of personhood. I do, however, think moral status should be given on a gradient. Those species which have evolutionarily developed a broader range of qualities that are known to cause suffering should be given greater consideration to their treatment, and should be given greater consideration to their interests. Rights are the main reason why I dont think its reasonable to give any animal species moral status equal to humans. Rights and duties are inseparable. I do not think an ape could fulfill a duty that it can in no way be fully aware of the contract it has entered into. It is a one way, non-reciprocal, contract. That would be more like stewardship. I am most definitely a proponent of stewardship.
Rocks and plants do not have a functional brain. Some plants will "withdraw" upon touch, but that does not mean they are conscious. It is a mindless primitive reflex to the environment. Insects and lower animals like the sea slug have evolved mindless behaviors that might appear to demonstrate conscious thought (e.g. an "angry hornet" is not really thinking about how angry it is with you for disrupting its nest... it is following a programmed script in response to an external stimulus). Even behaviors we might associate with pain (e.g. thrashing about) can be seen in an earthworm. Does that mean it experienced pain when we touched it? Unlikely, since it is constantly being touched by dirt when it tunnels through the earth. It is more likely that this is a programmed response to pressure. Ancient variations of earthworms who did not have this programmed response were probably eaten by insects or other creatures before they could create much of a population. I would agree, however, that higher animals like the gorilla experience pain (when they have a functional cerebrum to begin evaluating sensory input). Without the ability to evaluate the sensory input, pain is just another signal from the sensory nerves (just like pressure). The primitive brain stem handles the programmed responses (e.g. oxygen level is dropping... need to increase heartbeat and recycle air in the lungs more quickly). The primitive brain stem does not send the signals to move your hand from the hot stove because it recognizes suffering... it sends the signals to move your hand from the hot stove because it gets a sudden, intense, sensory input. You can trick most people into thinking they have been burned if they know that you have something very hot, but (while they are not looking) you touch them with a bit of ice. The ice does not hurt them but they think (for a moment) that it did because the "hurt" comes from the cerebrum which learned of the intense signal and interpreted it to be pain. The primitive brain stem just reacts to the unexpected sensation by moving away (like those little cars that bump into the wall and go into reverse). That is why I believe you are correct in saying the more biologically complex animals (like humans, gorillas, and others with a cerebrum) are more capable of suffering. I agree that the concept of person-hood is philosophical, but can it really be divorced from the physical world? I use the term (person) primarily as a way to describe the part of a "human being" that is more than the human animal. The human animal is a biological mechanism and most of its parts can be replaced, if necessary, without changing the person (e.g. Joe does not turn into Bill because he got a heart transplant from Bill). The human animal pulls its hand back from the hot stove before it has time to think "Oh that stove is really hot!" It is a person who jumps on a live grenade to save his comrades. I would agree that there are other animals who should be considered for person-hood (but not before the individual cerebrum is functional, of course). With other animals, it is easier to see that some (like Koko) might deserve our trust (maybe a provisional person-hood), but others of the same species do not. All we can do for them is provide, as you suggested, stewardship. Part of stewardship, however, is that we sometimes kill those animals for reasons of our own. We might kill cows because we like hamburgers (but we try to do so without causing suffering). We might kill deer because an overly large herd will starve in the winter (and because we like to go hunting) but we try to make it a clean kill so the animal does not suffer. We might not object if an African explorer has to kill a random gorilla that is attacking one of the porters, but we would certainly object if somebody killed Koko. I think you are right about the reciprocity... no matter how well we think we know an animal, we will always wonder if instinct might override its persona (so we might never really consider it an unconditional person). That begs the question of whether we can consider every homo sapiens a person, unconditionally. Maybe the moment of person-hood is really sometime after birth when the mind has developed to a level that justifies that sort of trust?
A wonderful response as always. Your thoughts are enlightening and thought inspiring. Have you ever read Sir Roger Penrose? He is a mathematician and physicist. He worked with Steven Hawking in the 70s and 80s. He has written books on consciousness. He argues that it may not be possible to create a computer system that enables consciousness because consciousness has something unique that a computer system doesn't have, understanding. A computer may be able to computate but there are puzzles that algorithms and mathematical computation can't figure but human understanding develops methods to solve the problems regardless. Schrodinger expressed similar thoughts when his calculations described reality as being able to have two results occur at the same time. Perhaps sometime quantum theory will be understood well enough that consciousness will be testable and describable. Perhaps it will be understood that, as Penrose suggests, consciousness lives on outside of the body. Until then, material is all we have to understand. Philosophy is what anyone can imagination as "rings true". Every scientist is a philosopher but every philosopher is not a scientist. A scientist tests their philosophy to observe it's truth. A philosopher thinks and imagines and computes. Penrose, for example, describe a link between quantum physics and classical physics inside the brain being microtubules. That is an idea but has to be proven. Until it is tested and proven as truth, it is imagination and thought. This is why I prefer the material. If consciousness is ever going to be understood, it will require a better understanding of the physical. Humans kill for a wide variety of reasons, some not justifiable at all. Some were justifable during the circumstances that caused the need to kill. I agree with conservation management of species and hunting for population and overall health of the herd. Management of species is justifiable because they are unable to manage themselves. They behave strictly biological. Killing a gorilla is justifiable in the situation you describe because of a right to self-defense. Does a wild gorilla have the right to self-defense if a hunter goes after it? Does an elephant have the right to charge a hunter and stomp to death a person who is trying to kill it? Yes, that is one of the risks of hunting animals who have the potential to kill. An elephant mourns the death of its species. Does a gorilla mourn the death of a person that it defended itself against? People most often do. Can a gorilla feel as deeply? I think when you ask if every homo sapiens is a person, I think the answer is yes because they have the potential to understand, unlike an elephant or even a gorilla. The question is what is the reason why every person doesn't understand as deeply. Is it due to their biology? Is it due to the conditions in which that person is raised and developed? Will a gorilla develop differently due to being raised differently or is it trapped by its biology? Could an elephant even have enough of the right brain physiology to understand anything in order to overcome it's biology? I certainly think most humans expect their fellow humans to behave less biologically and more civilly. There are obvious exceptions like mental retardation etc. But how could society expect other humans to overcome their biology and how they are raised? Should we be more empathetic to the conditions in which a fellow human is raised? Would I be similar to a person that I condemn for behaving badly if the only things I were conscious of were the experiences that made the behavior of that person seem rational to them?
I question this not because I disagree**, but because I am curious. Do we humans KNOW that plants are not "conscious?" I don't know that any actual research has ever been done on the question. **I neither disagree...nor agree. I do not know.
Catching up here (I apologize for the delay). You are correctly understanding my position. I suppose I use the term "mind" more than "brain" because the brain exists, and has neural activity weeks before that activity becomes organized enough to be considered thought. The nearest observable moment (as far as I know) is the onset of global neuronal integration (there is a change in the EEG pattern at that point). I do not know if the brain is capable of thought at that moment, but there is no observation (so far) that tells us "Hey... my neurons are coordinated now" so I have to assume that moment takes place sometime in the 4-6 weeks after the onset of integration. If the fetus is still in an induced sleep state for those 4-6 weeks, the brain might as well be a blank disk on its way to be installed in the computer. And yes, I think of consciousness (or person-hood) as that imprinting of experience on the mind (or the brain) that we carry forward into the future. A "human life" (as in a person) begins when the brain begins doing exactly that (responding to experience and adapting). If the write-protect tab is still in place (Those of you who handled floppy disks in a prior century know about those) then person-hood cannot begin. If we could confirm that the fetal brain is configuring unique patterns in response to stimuli during those last few weeks of gestation (perhaps the 4-6 weeks marked by the onset of global neuronal integration), I could believe the brain is doing something to contribute to person-hood during that time (in spite of the sedatives and low oxygen levels). I suspect we do not currently have the ability to distinguish between the action of the primitive brain stem (hard-wired) and a fetal cerebrum that is truly learning from its experience (suggesting an active mind).
Since when is murder a right? When you deprive another of life without due process of the law, that is murder. The woman voluntarily laid with a man without the use of protection to prevent pregnancy, you can make all the excuses in the world for why she didn't, actions have consequences. If you are to high, drunk, to caught up in the moment to not take the precaution of a rubber, diaphragm, anal or oral sex instead of vaginal...Then you take the responsibility of those actions, at least spend the money and get the morning after pill...Abortion as a convenience is wrong. Be a responsible adult...
I am not convinced I know either. We can confirm that plants do not have cells that form organized neural assemblies in response to stimuli and although some experiments have suggested certain plants grow faster when exposed to certain types of music, I am not convinced it has anything to do with "awareness" of the music when there are so many other possibilities (maybe some music incorporates vibrations that are harmonics of a frequency that helps move fluids through the veins of the plant?). On the other hand, the formation of neural assemblies in response to stimuli could be compared to the formation of scar tissue on a limb when another limb rubs against it in the breeze. It could be argued that either the neural assembly in the brain is like scar tissue (but more of a chemical/electrical nature) or the biological response that generates scar tissue is like thought (in a physical manifestation), but they do not "feel" the same (philosophically). If we accepted them as the same, does that mean we should accept rocks as sentient objects (since a dimple in the rock might be its personal reaction to the stimulus of the repeated dripping of water from a ledge overhead)?
I'd like to know what qualifications you people have to make claims such as above when this is even controversial amongst trained medical professionals?
Thanks for the response, RO. I suppose none of us knows for sure about whether plants are "conscious" or "sentient" in the wider scope of those words. For whatever reason, it is not easy for me to dismiss the "sentience" or "consciousness" of an oak tree...although I have no problem supposing that if it exists, it exists in a form significantly different from what we humans experience.
. When you have an abortion it's not murder. If you hate the law and disapprove of our legal system I can't change your mind. , What can't you get about women don't need excuses....they don't have to explain anything to YOU ! Did you think women had to pass muster with YOU?!!! Yes, and having an abortion is the consequence of an unwanted pregnancy. So you think people who are tOO high, tOO drunk and are irresponsible should be punished for this bad behavior by forcing a child to have them as parents..... do you hate children? Would a sane thinking person PLEASE explain to me the Anti-Choicers weird fascination with the word """convenience """???? and it's relationship to abortion. I have asked these people time and time again: DO YOU DO EVERYTHING IN YOUR LIFE AS INCONVENIENTLY AS POSSIBLE? really!? But why would you expect others to do things as inconveniently as possible? That's just NUTS! WHY would a woman get an abortion IFTHE PREGNANCY WASN'T INCONVENIENT??? Be a responsible adult and answer the question. Being a responsible person means you don't bring a kid into the world that you can't afford and don't want.....do you EVER think of those kids??
While I can appreciate the point of view that experience might be the primary reason to grant any living thing a moral status, I don't agree. I think the simple fact that certain structures exist are more important regardless of the fact they aren't operating globally. An infant brain develops the biological complexity over time that excedes other species with each stage of development, basically beginning about the time it enters the fetal stage. Moral status should be given on a gradient based on biological complexity. If one considers biological complexity as I stated earlier, I will ask this question once again, “if the physiology of the developing fetus brain is more complex than some living beings with a moral status, why would we not therefore grant the fetus a moral status?” All living things have a moral-status, you can't just kill or injury living beings. I think what most people don’t often consider is that moral-interests are often in conflict. Humans tend to have a human bias and their own moral preference when considering what other things they should grant a moral status to. If you simply consider experience as a measure then that devalues life in those who have lesser quality or less full experiences. It opens the door to valuing people greater based on their experiences. Yet experiences are derived by one’s fate. Experiences with in time and space are what tell a person’s life story. No one has control over their experiences. No one controls to whom they were born. Keep in mind I am not discussing law. I understand the dilemma of granting full legal rights status to any entity other than a born person. Although, I think the fetus holds a special place when considering moral-status and indeed legal-status. The effects on society are important to consider. I would view this as an example of moral-interests in conflict. Society has an interest in the well being of its citizens. If it’s potential citizens (fetuses) are developing with illegal drugs running thru it’s veins (20% of pregnant women according to some studies) and its born citizens are being raised with experiences that are a detriment to development, I think society has a moral-interest. I think the born person has a moral-interest in the conditions in which it develops but it's unable to affect its fetal experience because it isn't born yet. The odd thing is that no one disputes that a fetus deserves a legal-status and legal protections but everyone seems to have issue when discussing it. I tend to think it must be semantics or their own moral-interests.
Single cells behave similarly in that they react to stimuli, etc. I think it would be very unlikely that single celled organisms possess a consciousness. Plants are more a collection of cells, although even the most biologically complex species are a collection of cells, but the general consensus is that the biological response at the cellular level are what gives the plant the ability to "behave" like anything that has what we consider a consciousness. Consider mindless ants who scurry about following a simple set of natural biological impulses that have no order or central command, yet the result of their work is a complex tunnel system. This is similar to how cells work to create higher complexity.
Legal abortion is not murder. Over half of women who abort were using contraception. That is opinion, not fact. I disagree. Abortion is very responsible. It is not responsible to give birth to a child you cannot/will not care for or to pawn it off on others to raise aka adoption.
I understand that you consider it unlikely that a single celled organism (or a plant) possesses consciousness (self-awareness or sentience)...but while I respect your considerations in the matter, they do not logically or reasonably answer the question, "Do plants (or, for that matter, single celled organisms) possess those traits or characteristics? I think none of us knows. I don't think it necessary that they do...but I also do not think it impossible that they do. -> square one!
Agreed. I also think none of us knows. My point was that you would have to go even deeper in to the question of why does a cell behave the way it does, ie, react to stimuli. What set of natural laws are operating inside the cell itself to cause it to "behave"?
We could! But even finding the answer to that does not help us resolve the question of whether or not it has sentience or consciousness or self-awareness. We humans seem to have all those things...but that is not to say that we do not behave the way we do at times due to some sort of "programmed" behavioral pattern. The fact that an organism, no matter how complex, reacts to stimuli...does not negate the possibility of sentience. Does this thing we humans call "the universe" have any of those traits? Is "the universe" just a speck in a larger organism? Are we?
Every court disagrees with you. (even canadian) Every medical ethics guidelines disagrees with you. They're just unsure what to do about it. I'm guessing it is a semantics issue between us as to why you so strongly dispute that I say such a thing.
The idea is that human complexity arose out of the elementary natural laws of particles that ultimately developed biological complexity thru evolutionary development. The ant tunnels are an example of simple organisms following simple laws that developed complexity, but in the case of evolution, simple cell organisms developed in to higher complex organisms. Therefore, higher complexity lead to the development of what we call consciousness. Consciousness very well could be simply interactions of cells that is organized spontaneously following basic laws in reaction to sensory stimuli (like ants building an ant hill), neural tissue connecting to form permanent impressions on the brain. In that case, it is material and nothing more. Consciousness begins and ends with the material function of the brain. When one looks deeper in to the cell, there are other ideas with quantum theory that raise all sorts of questions about what matter even is and why it behaves the way it does but no one really knows yet. The laws are still trying to be understood.
The pro-life claims I have read from medical professionals focus on things like the presence of sensory nerve cells, and postulate that the fetus can "feel pain" as soon as those nerve cells are generated. Technically that might be accurate, but it is misleading in the context of person-hood or self-awareness. By that definition, a victim of a spinal cord injury can "feel pain" because he still has living sensory nerves that generate sensory impulses... but you would never accuse the victim of lying when he says he cannot feel it when the doctor pricks his foot with a pointy object. It is commonly understood that the cerebrum must process the stimuli and distinguish between pressure and pain, in order to "feel pain." The primitive brain stem can recognize pressure, and respond reflexively, but the primitive brain stem has limited, "hard-wired," ability to analyze stimuli. I am no expert on the human brain, but I read about issues related to abortion rights. When I read about the science that describes the development of the fetal brain, it is clear that there is still a lot of work left to do before the brain can process and organize stimuli (until sometime in the last 4-6 weeks of gestation). Here is my favorite article on the subject: https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/when-does-consciousness-arise/ This suggest a fetus might not even be sentient (by some definitions) at birth, but the critical part (in my opinion) is that it is starts getting enough oxygen (and is unencumbered by natural sedatives) at the moment of birth. That is when experiences can first affect a person (becoming a part of an individual persona). When you read pro-life articles that claim the fetus can feel pain, check for yourself. Do they claim sensory nerves exist and then assume the fetus must be able to feel pain then? Or perhaps they point to electrical signals that are generated by the nerves and claim that means the fetus is feeling pain (forgetting that they would detect electrical signals from the nerves in the event of a spinal cord injury too)? Or do they point to reflexes like kicking and squirming and claim that is evidence that the fetus is moving of its own volition, so it must be thinking? If you had biology many years ago you would know the frog can respond to stimuli even after you remove its brain (such as it is), and if you ever kept chickens you probably know a chicken can do some surprising things without its head. Reflex movements are not evidence of cerebral activity. By the way, if you do find a pro-life article that addresses the facts of fetal brain development and provides some evidence that the fetus might be able to begin organizing itself and adapting its thoughts sometime before the onset of global neuronal integration, I would be interested in reading it.
That's for sure...although that "don't know" thing is a concept Internet participants seem loath to acknowledge. Well...we humans certainly are still trying to understand them.
There are lots and lots of things that aren't known. But just for the record I will be clear that there are lots and lots of things that are claimed that are known to be not true. Like that the earth is only 6,000 years old, etc. It is very clear beyond any doubt whatsoever that the earth is older than 6,000 years. But as a matter of testing hypothesis and those sorts of things, those things aren't clear until tests are proven. Lots and lots of hypothesis have been tested completely and yet some people continue to deny the truth of them.
