Originakalokalo:


.

I am not pained ma'am.

I just told them the truth.

alfaman3:
op, I just read that you haven't had sex in more than a decade.

What is wrong with you?

toyosi20188:
I used to think these atheists were some sort of moral teachers or a bunch of Mahatma Gandhis. Imagine the ludicrous opinions. They accuse theists of hypocrisy meanwhile themselves are like whitewashed sepulchres with all filth within.

toyosi20188:
I used to think these atheists were some sort of moral teachers or a bunch of Mahatma Gandhis. Imagine the ludicrous opinions. They accuse theists of hypocrisy meanwhile themselves are like whitewashed sepulchres with all filth within.

HardMirror:
you are very right. Principles we live by are shaped by different factors. For some it is religion, for others it is from their culture, for some others it is self developed maybe through experiences or just because of our personality. It could also be a combination of several factors.

I would find it difficult if not impossible to about a child that is mine. Not because it is morally wrong for me but because it is subjectively wrong for me. In this case it is subjective because this choice is hinged on my perception that the child is mine and that it is human as much as i am.

On second thoughts, when does life really start?

Can i also say my sperms are babies and when i ejacullate i am wasting lives?

Does the baby have consciousness or is it self aware? At what point does the baby become self aware and i can be said to be denying it a chance at life.

If the baby is not self aware, it cannot have a desire to live and if killed i had taken nothing away from the child.

Now i am just complicating things...

In the end, do what is right based on your best judgement.

Sometimes it is better to just abort the child and save it the unfortunate realities of life

janettee:
Personally I'm an atheist and really pro choice ..No need bringing a child to this world if you know deep down you won't take care of them well. Look at Nigeria's population. Parents breeding like rabbits and giving birth to children they can't take care of...

Even the religious who preach pro life never take time to visit motherless babies home or orphanage.

They are only pro life till the child is born. Let me not even get into the fact that they have abortions too and still preach pro life.

I don't know why this question is directed to atheists specifically though. I know Christains who are equally pro choice. It has nothing to do with religion..

johnydon22:
I grew particularly interested in your comment mostly due to the use of morality and the insertion of subjectivity in a quite ambiguous context. I hope we can discuss this.

But, apart from this your subjective bias towards your own child, you do not think that abortion generally is in fact morally wrong?

Uuuuhm, when a sperm cell meets an ovum cell and they fuss to form a zygote, when else do you think?

You are made of atoms but you are not an atom. You are made of cells but you are not a cell. A fetus is made of cells but is not a cell.

A sperm is a distinct cell. So, this is grossly a false equivalence.

But consciousness or self awareness isn't really the definition of life.

You probably have seen on many occasions when you try to kill an ant or anything out there, it recoils and tries to escape from such imminent danger.

In fact even an amoeba does same.

A fetus actually also follows similar patterns.

An observable objective goal of life is to not die. This does not come necessarily due to consciousness or intelligence, it is rather more automated.

No. You are not.

That is not really how moral problems work. Morality is not based on individual judgement.

This is actually absurd. You can further extend this past the fetal stage and go on to say, sometimes it is better to just kill that human and save it the unfortunate realities of life. I do not know why we think murder is wrong then.

HardMirror:
you made a lot of good points. But in the end it is a tussle btwn the powerful and powerless. Chickens have rights to life as much as humans do. But we take their lives at will.

Same applies with abortion. The child is at the mercy of the mother.

We really cant tell her what is right or wrong.

She would use her power and there would be no consequence from the child fighting back.

Only consequence would come from the action of equally or more powerful beings such as the mother herslf

johnydon22:
.

An observable objective goal of life is to not die. This does not come necessarily due to consciousness or intelligence, it is rather more automated.

LordReed:


Interesting. In a different thread when I brought this up you objected to it.

johnydon22:
show me it could most likely you didn't understand my argument.

LordReed:


https://www.nairaland.com/4903801/what-termed-moral#73871536

johnydon22:

Show me exactly where i disagreed.

LordReed:


The link I posted is to your comment.

You clarified by saying individual not global. Meaning what exactly?

johnydon22:
lol. So, in otherwords, you can't show exactly where and how i disagreed?

As i said when you brought this up "it's most likely that you didn't understand my argument" and it turns out to be so. I am mostly extremely careful when making an argument, anyone who misrepresents my argument either didn't understand it or didn't really follow the context of an isolated statement.

Individual not global means that every organisms need to survive is an individual drive that doesn't necessary extend to them needing for others to survive too.
A man drowning would use other people as raft just to survive even though it means they would drown and die.

the very elementary natural principle connotes this, survival of the fittest, kill anything you can to survive, do what you must.

So, survival is an individual struggle.

savvy?

LordReed:


The question now becomes did I ever state that the need for survival was other than individual? That's why your "individual not global" was confusing to me, I didn't understand what you were objecting to.

johnydon22:
Because the concept of human morality is primarily based on human as the center point.

A pack of chimpanzee wouldn't have as much problem killing you as they would killing another member of their pack.

This can be applied to virtually everything. A girl i invite over to my house is at my mercy.

Actually we can, human morality is not up for individual definitions.

This doesn't really imply moral permissibility of an action. It would then be consistent to argue that getting away with a crime (lack of consequence) dilutes the moral weight of an action which isn't in fact so.

Moral permissibility doesn't really require consequences.

HardMirror:
john i dont agree with this. You cannot. See, the concept of right or wrong is an illusion we create for ourselves.

Abortion is as good as killing a chicken too.

Humans are hypocrites we think we are intelligent,

we create laws we believe favours us the most.

The illusion that all humans are equal,

the illusion that we fight wars for peace.... it is not so.

Abortion can be debated ONLY because the babies CANNOT fight!

It can be LEGALISED only because the babies have no political influence.

Take a look at the big picture. The world will fvck you real good when you have no power. There are no right or wrongs society lives by an unspoken contract of the gains of laws. All what we live by are results of the human societal evolution. Learning over time to live together in ways we believe profits us the most. The law that i should not steal is because it makes me spend less effort protecting resources i gather. We live be this mutual contract, dont steal from me so i wont steal from you.

See for get about a chimp not killing a chimp.

Do you think humans are exclusively intelligent?

The chimp needs to propagate the population of it's own species as much as the resources permit. It is an advantage.

So dont make it look like humans have a right to kill other species.

It was never about rights, it is always about POWER and advantage. The powerful will stoop for the weak if there is a symbiotic advantage to be gained.

Abortions would go on as long as people can get away with it.

No one would go to the police station to report a missing unborn baby.

The mother wont feel the same guilt as killing a born child, because the level of relationship is different, because it is a murder she can get away with. Just the way it is. No need for us pretending about it.

johnydon22:


Murder in definition simply means willful termination of a human life.

LordReed:


If we are going by definitions then you are subtly wrong:

Murder is the unlawful premeditated killing of one human being by another.

Meaning there are situations where it is lawful to kill. Those situations will be sanctioned by law. Self defense for example, there is no way the right to kill will be exclusively denied because we have learnt that extreme situations will occur that will require it. Abortion if established as lawful is not murder.

johnydon22:


I am much much aware of such definitions but if you have not noticed, I am making a moral permissibility argument not a legal one. In fact, I question the deviation from the fundamental basis of which murder is condemned on the very exemption of abortion as a crime.

From my post you quoted

I am arguing more of a moral permissibility than political and i believe this OP and your first comment which i quoted was based on a premise which is more morally based than political and i'd like to maintain that original premise.

On a political note - I'd still argue that ignoring the weak fails the fundamental principle upon which human law was built.

So abortion is just morally adorable as any premediatated murder.

LordReed:


Is this not using the very objective principles you seem to object too? How is abortion morally reprehensible when the mother's life is in danger or when the fetus have debilitating developmental defects that will ensure that the ensuing child is not more than a vegetable? Is it also morally abhorrent under such circumstances?

You can't say something is universally wrong without considering the circumstances and then tell me you think morality is intersubjective. Where is your intersubjectivity?

johnydon22:
When the mother's life is in danger, it is then an act of self defence on the mother's part to terminate the pregnancy which then is excusable under moral permissibility.

But the idea of killing due to inconvenience is not and they are hardly the same thing.

I have addressed the mother in danger part over and over again in previous threads.

Would you like me to show you where?

Humans are morally excused to kill another on the occasion of said person being a mortal threat to their life directly.

Lol. The circumstances of abortion are just as similar as the circumstances surrounding post natal murder.

So, it is quite easy to figure out.

If you kill someone because they inconvenience you, every one should agree that that is the height of moral abhorrence.

If you kill someone because they are a mortal threat to your life directly about to kill you, that is self defence and is morally permissible, in fact morally expected.

These two occassions are easily identifiable in abortion cases.

LordReed:


Very good. So you define a fetus as someone, on what basis? Answer this as well when census takers encounter pregnant women do they count the fetus in the womb?

johnydon22:


On the basis that it is a homo sapien therefore by definition human.

And the very reason humans define killing another as morally wrong is based on the imagined belief of the sacredness of human life.

LordReed:


First answer why census takers do not count fetus.

johnydon22:
Oh I do not know. Not my problem or my argument.

If I am asked to guess then I'd say probably because they are at a natal stage.

LordReed:


Its my argument, they are not considered persons yet. A fetus is a potential individual, its not yet one. So when you say kill someone, a fetus is not a someone yet.