Pro Life and Pro Choice: Murder or Not Murder?

[ofd]

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I don't see how this disputes my point. Pregnancy is a risk (no matter what you do) implicit and well know in the act of sex.

It's not an implicit contract or agreement. Those only happen when you agree by doing what you do. They don't have to be written down or said loud.

 

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is your responsibility, including the life you have created.

Not according to the NAP.

 

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The baby now exists (by your own hand) and will become a moral agent if you don't murder it.

The fetus is not a moral agent according to the NAP. Hence, an abortion is not murder.

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You can only define evil in terms of an objective (and true) principle (or value, which is what libertarian philosophers attempt to tie the NAP to, except for Stefan.) Otherwise it's nesseccarily subjective.

In itself, the NAP is binary. Either something violates it or it doesn't. The degree of the violation has to be judged individually. That judgment can't be found in the NAP.

[Eudaimonic]

11 minutes ago, ofd said:

It's not an implicit contract or agreement. Those only happen when you agree by doing what you do. They don't have to be written down or said loud.

 

Not according to the NAP.

 

The fetus is not a moral agent according to the NAP. Hence, an abortion is not murder.

In itself, the NAP is binary. Either something violates it or it doesn't. The degree of the violation has to be judged individually. That judgment can't be found in the NAP.

I feel like we're going around in circles, so I'll stop here.

We both agree that abortion is evil and besides, as I said before, the argument is a red herring.

I'll quit while I'm ahead.

[smarterthanone]

On 7/22/2017 at 5:02 PM, Eudaimonic said:

A child (from the moment of conception) is, at the very least, a potential moral agent (i.e if it is allowed to develop normally it will become one whereas a sperm or an egg by itself could never be.)

A potential moral agent is not a moral agent.

 

On 7/22/2017 at 5:27 PM, Eudaimonic said:

The abortion argument is one of the biggest red herrings in contemporary history.

Agreed. It is impossible to enforce a ban on abortion without a government. So you obviously are a statist. If you are not, you should give up because it is impossible to enforce without a government.

[Eudaimonic]

15 hours ago, smarterthanone said:

A potential moral agent is not a moral agent.

It doesn't matter, the mother is responsible for the creation of that life. If she kills it she kills it's moral agency and places a value on it life (in the same way a murderer does.) The only difference between her and a murderer is that she did it at two months instead of at twenty-five years.

It's like if someone was in a comma and as long as you didn't pull the plug they were going to recover, then you pull the plug and say "oh but he's not a moral agent right now even though he definitely was going to be when he recovered, so it's OK." 

15 hours ago, smarterthanone said:

Agreed. It is impossible to enforce a ban on abortion without a government. So you obviously are a statist. If you are not, you should give up because it is impossible to enforce without a government.

The assumption is insulting and I'm curious as to your genuineness of the pursuit of truth in this conversation because of it.

Government is not the only way to get people to stop doing something wrong, Anarcho-Capitalism is based on that premise. Ostracism works too. The red herring here is that no matter whether it's moral or not, anyone who would be willing to commit it is not a person you would want to have in your life.

[smarterthanone]

10 hours ago, Eudaimonic said:

It doesn't matter, the mother is responsible for the creation of A MAYBE POSSIBLE FUTURE life. If she kills it she kills it's MAYBE EVENTUAL moral agency and places a value on it EVENTUAL life (in the same way a murderer does.) The only difference between her and a murderer is that she did it when it was A FUTURE POSSIBLE POTENTIAL MORAL AGENT instead of at twenty-five years, an actual moral agent.

Corrected it for you. It is a straight up lie when you admit it is not yet a moral agent, then claim it has the rights of a moral agent. I am not saying that there is nothing to your argument but you cant make a jump from potential future moral agent to moral agent without full proving that out.

 

10 hours ago, Eudaimonic said:

It's like if someone was in a comma and as long as you didn't pull the plug they were going to recover, then you pull the plug and say "oh but he's not a moral agent right now even though he definitely was going to be when he recovered, so it's OK."

Doesn't support your argument. Nobody is required to provide medical care to you in a free society. Healthcare is not a right.

 

10 hours ago, Eudaimonic said:

The assumption is insulting and I'm curious as to your genuineness of the pursuit of truth in this conversation because of it.

Government is not the only way to get people to stop doing something wrong, Anarcho-Capitalism is based on that premise. Ostracism works too. The red herring here is that no matter whether it's moral or not, anyone who would be willing to commit it is not a person you would want to have in your life.

When more than 50% of people disagree with you, and the ones that agree with you, most of them would not actually support any enforcement, you only have a small minority to enforce it.

 

Some examples, you ostracize abortion people, well 90% of business owners are not going to say goodbye to lets just say 50% of the populations business. So that isn't happening.

How do you even know who got an abortion anyways? If a woman goes in private to a doctor, nobody would ever even know. hmm so how would you actually ostracize these people? How do you know if the man wanted it or didn't want it to ostracize him?

 

Say you wanted to kill or imprison someone for abortion like I said, good luck when most of society would not allow you to do that. And people even who are anti abortion are not lining up to run around killing people.

 

Say you want to PAY people looking for abortions to not have an abortion. The cost would obviously be very expensive for just 1. There are so many, it would not be possible to pay to stop all abortions or adopt all the children and then care for them to adult hood. Lets say $5000 convinces a woman to carry the child and the kid wears $500 of clothes per year, eats about $1000 of food per year, and has $500 of medical expenses and $500 of housing expenses, all per year (This would be terrible living conditions btw) $2500 per year and lets say through age 15, you need $42500 PER CHILD. And I think 600,000 is about how many abortions per year in the US... so you would need 25.5 BILLION dollars to save 1 years worth of abortion children. Good luck raising that!

 

When something can be done between two consenting adults in private, its essentially impossible to effectively legislate or take any kind of meaningful action against.

 

[Eudaimonic]

7 minutes ago, smarterthanone said:

Corrected it for you. It is a straight up lie when you admit it is not yet a moral agent, then claim it has the rights of a moral agent. I am not saying that there is nothing to your argument but you cant make a jump from potential future moral agent to moral agent without full proving that out.

I won't debate a person who claims I'm a liar so quickly, expressing no curiosity. Again, that's insulting and untrue.

If I'm truly a liar, does it make sense to debate me?

[Boss]

On 7/23/2017 at 7:39 AM, ofd said:

The fetus is not a moral agent according to the NAP. Hence, an abortion is not murder.

 

Abortion is by definition murder. 

Feel free to expand your argument as it's not clear to me. When someone is unconscious like is knocked out, a fetus, or is in a coma, why is it when someone who is conscious and kills them not considered a murderer to you? 

[ofd]

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why is it when someone who is conscious and kills them not considered a murderer to you? 

What makes you think that? Of course that's murder.
 

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Abortion is by definition murder. 

Not under the NAP. Read the Rothbard article I posted.
 

[Boss]

13 hours ago, ofd said:

What makes you think that? Of course that's murder.
 

Not under the NAP. Read the Rothbard article I posted.
 

I am fully aware of the NAP and it is consistent with the murder of unconscious beings like someone who is knocked out, a fetus or in a coma. 

When a human kills another human who is unconscious like in a coma, that would be murder

When a human kills another human who is unconscious like a fetus, that would be murder

You are being inconsistent in claiming to murder a human being(fetus) is not murder without an argument. 

Abortion is the deliberate termination of a human, A direct violation of the NAP

[Eudaimonic]

A fetus is a comma patient that you're responsible for accidentally knocking out.

[ofd]

I could go on, and explain again what Rothbard wrote in great detail, but I won't. Here is the pertinent quote.

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Even from birth, the parental ownership is not absolute but of a "trustee" or guardianship kind. In short, every baby as soon as it is born and is therefore no longer contained within his mother's body possesses the right of self-ownership by virtue of being a separate entity and a potential adult. It must therefore be illegal and a violation of the child's rights for a parent to aggress against his person by mutilating, torturing, murdering him, etc. On the other hand, the very concept of "rights" is a "negative" one, demarcating the areas of a person's action that no man may properly interfere with. No man can therefore have a "right" to compel someone to do a positive act, for in that case the compulsion violates the right of person or property of the individual being coerced. Thus, we may say that a man has a right to his property (i.e., a right not to have his property invaded), but we cannot say that anyone has a "right" to a "living wage," for that would mean that someone would be coerced into providing him with such a wage, and that would violate the property rights of the people being coerced. As a corollary this means that, in the free society, no man may be saddled with the legal obligation to do anything for another, since that would invade the former's rights; the only legal obligation one man has to another is to respect the other man's rights.

Applying our theory to parents and children, this means that a parent does not have the right to aggress against his children, but also that the parent should not have a legal obligation to feed, clothe, or educate his children, since such obligations would entail positive acts coerced upon the parent and depriving the parent of his rights. The parent therefore may not murder or mutilate his child, and the law properly outlaws a parent from doing so. But the parent should have the legal right not to feed the child, i.e., to allow it to die.2 The law, therefore, may not properly compel the parent to feed a child or to keep it alive.3 (Again, whether or not a parent has a moral rather than a legally enforceable obligation to keep his child alive is a completely separate question.) This rule allows us to solve such vexing questions as: should a parent have the right to allow a deformed baby to die (e.g., by not feeding it)?4 The answer is of course yes, following a fortiori from the larger right to allow any baby, whether deformed or not, to die. (Though, as we shall see below, in a libertarian society the existence of a free baby market will bring such "neglect" down to a minimum.)

Our theory also enables us to examine the question of Dr. Kenneth Edelin, of Boston City Hospital, who was convicted in 1975 of manslaughter for allowing a fetus to die (at the wish, of course, of the mother) after performing an abortion. If parents have the legal right to allow a baby to die, then a fortiori they have the same right for extra-uterine fetuses. Similarly, in a future world where babies may be born in extra-uterine devices ("test tubes"), again the parents would have the legal right to "pull the plug" on the fetuses or, rather, to refuse to pay to continue the plug in place.

 

If you find a mistake in that reasoning, let me know.

[RamynKing]

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But the parent should have the legal right not to feed the child, i.e., to allow it to die.2 The law, therefore, may not properly compel the parent to feed a child or to keep it alive.3 (Again, whether or not a parent has a moral rather than a legally enforceable obligation to keep his child alive is a completely separate question.)

 

We are confusing several issues here.

1. The NAP compels us to move toward a free society. In liberty, you could not have centralized laws of any kind, and that includes abortion laws. I have no problem with that or Rothbard's above text. I'm sure the anarchists on the board, including Stefan Molyneux and Mike, would agree.

• Note: I do think Rothbard's exploration is incomplete here. We've explored that pretty thoroughly in this thread, IMO. Even reading further into the source, I think there are things he hasn't considered.

2. In the free society, you would still see abortion laws, just not central ones. You would agree to positive obligations when you entered into contracts, such as those allowing you to live in certain areas. Or you could live in an area that had none of that.

3. In our current society, under a state, we have centralized laws. Some of those laws are arguably a kind of primitive glue that we still need to keep people on the course of morality. Because people generally equate what is allowed under the state with what is acceptable or moral, we open ourselves up to the problem of overall degeneracy. If you go down that path, I believe it leads away from anarchy. The theory goes that: The more morally-robust a population is, the easier it becomes to eventually discard the state. So we are forced at this time to work within the parameters of the state, which means at least getting the law in line with rigorous philosophical morality as best we can.

[Eudaimonic]

2 hours ago, ofd said:

Applying our theory to parents and children, this means that a parent does not have the right to aggress against his children, but also that the parent should not have a legal obligation to feed, clothe, or educate his children, since such obligations would entail positive acts coerced upon the parent and depriving the parent of his rights. The parent therefore may not murder or mutilate his child, and the law properly outlaws a parent from doing so. But the parent should have the legal right not to feed the child, i.e., to allow it to die.2 The law, therefore, may not properly compel the parent to feed a child or to keep it alive.3 (Again, whether or not a parent has a moral rather than a legally enforceable obligation to keep his child alive is a completely separate question.) This rule allows us to solve such vexing questions as: should a parent have the right to allow a deformed baby to die (e.g., by not feeding it)?4 The answer is of course yes, following a fortiori from the larger right to allow any baby, whether deformed or not, to die. (Though, as we shall see below, in a libertarian society the existence of a free baby market will bring such "neglect" down to a minimum.)

This is refuted by the fact that the mother voluntarily submits to the possibility of pregnancy in the act of sex. By voluntarily creating human life that necessarily depends on you to keep it alive, you have created a positive obligation to keep the baby alive or you have murdered the child, violating NAP.

In a free society there would people those groups of people who would condone abortion and those who don't. These societies would naturally segregate. Some DRO's would provide exclusively for pro-life minded people and some would provide for "pro-choice" (what a phrase) minded. Whatever was morally superior would eventually will out, so you wouldn't need to 'create laws' except for those people would voluntarily agree to in their contracts. 

Plus, if we assume that a free society involves a post-child abuse society so to speak, there would only be a small fraction of a percent of people who would ever get one, it would be so rare I doubt it would even come up as an issue.

There's no positive obligation here except the one that the parents create for themselves, which the NAP recognizes. 

[Boss]

On 7/27/2017 at 6:49 AM, ofd said:

I could go on, and explain again what Rothbard wrote in great detail, but I won't. Here is the pertinent quote.

"Again, whether or not a parent has a moral rather than a legally enforceable obligation to keep his child alive is a completely separate question."

If you find a mistake in that reasoning, let me know.

 

Yea the mistake is this is a philosophy forum, not a law forum. We are arguing for morality so state your argument as the person you copy&paste from has nothing relevant added to the table as admitted here "Again, whether or not a parent has a moral rather than a legally enforceable obligation to keep his child alive is a completely separate question."

If you are going to argue about right or wrong then leave the state and their laws out of it. They shouldn't be even mentioned in the same sentence. Legality has nothing to do with morality.

I am yet to hear any moral argument in favor of your position. Do you have any you feel strongly enough where you have the decency to write yourself instead of copy & pasting? 

To make it clear on the irrelevancy of the copy&pasted post you had, the writer admitted it here

"Again, whether or not a parent has a moral rather than a legally enforceable obligation to keep his child alive is a completely separate question."

completely separate question? it is the question that actually matters. Especially on a philosophy forum. 

[Eudaimonic]

26 minutes ago, Boss said:

IMO that writer is a spineless coward using the LAW/State to try to make a case for such a serious moral question. If you are going to argue about right or wrong then leave the state and their laws out of it. They shouldn't be even mentioned in the same sentence. Legality has nothing to do with morality. I am tired of these statist relying on the law/state to decide whats right or wrong, so sorry if this seemed harsh.

That was a quote from Murray Rothbard, the practical founder of Anarcho-Capitalism, which is why he includes it here.

I do understand the feeling however, I get frustrated with that similarly. As if a piece of paper or the person who writes in it has a license to violence.

[Boss]

2 hours ago, Eudaimonic said:

That was a quote from Murray Rothbard, the practical founder of Anarcho-Capitalism, which is why he includes it here.

I do understand the feeling however, I get frustrated with that similarly. As if a piece of paper or the person who writes in it has a license to violence.

An Anarcho-capitalist that argues which should or should not be a "legal obligation" is quite the contradiction. Anarchism has no laws, nothing is a legal obligation. Thus, arguing about something particular on whether it is or isn't a legal obligation shouldn't have been relevant. I am unfamiliar with his work or his involvement in finding anarcho-capitalism, but, if this particular statement of his is popular I could see why the movement hasn't gained much traction 

[Eudaimonic]

42 minutes ago, Boss said:

An Anarcho-capitalist that argues which should or should not be a "legal obligation" is quite the contradiction. Anarchism has no laws, nothing is a legal obligation. Thus, arguing about something particular on whether it is or isn't a legal obligation shouldn't have been relevant. I am unfamiliar with his work or his involvement in finding anarcho-capitalism, but, if this particular statement of his is popular I could see why the movement hasn't gained much traction 

Well, the quote is out of context, but I assume that what he is saying here is that 'anti-abortion laws' are against the NAP because parents don't have a positive obligation to their child. It would be very hard to imagine Rothbard resting his hat on something being illegal or not.

I don't agree with the assertion, but he's not saying "because it's legal/illegal, X."

[Boss]

39 minutes ago, Eudaimonic said:

Well, the quote is out of context, but I assume that what he is saying here is that 'anti-abortion laws' are against the NAP because parents don't have a positive obligation to their child. It would be very hard to imagine Rothbard resting his hat on something being illegal or not.

I don't agree with the assertion, but he's not saying "because it's legal/illegal, X."

 

Yes, it may be out of context especially with the argument we are having here. I couldn't see the relevancy to this discussion. This is why I prefer when people make the argument themselves instead of relying on quotes from other people. 

[ofd]

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Yea the mistake is this is a philosophy forum, not a law forum. We are arguing for morality so state your argument as the person you copy&paste from has nothing relevant added to the table as admitted here "Again, whether or not a parent has a moral rather than a legally enforceable obligation to keep his child alive is a completely separate question."

The original question was "Pro Life and Pro Choice: Murder or Not Murder?". The common definition for murder is legal, you may like it or not.

 

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the crime of unlawfully killing a person especially with malice aforethought

If you apply the NAP consistently, you will see that there is neither a killing nor a person involved in abortions. Rothbard applies the NAP here, without going into details about more specific moralistic questions. You can do immoral acts (killing a dog you buy every day) that are perfectly within the confines of the NAP.

 

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IMO that writer is a spineless coward using the LAW/State to try to make a case for such a serious moral question.

Sure buddy.

 

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By voluntarily creating human life that necessarily depends on you to keep it alive, you have created a positive obligation to keep the baby alive or you have murdered the child, violating NAP.

At most, you have created a positive obligation with yourself because the fetus can't agree to a contract. And you can break postiive obligatoins with yourself without breaking the NAP.

[Eudaimonic]

15 minutes ago, ofd said:

At most, you have created a positive obligation with yourself because the fetus can't agree to a contract. And you can break postiive obligatoins with yourself without breaking the NAP.

But neither would a man who you've accidentally knocked into a comma, yet it would still be a violation of NAP to both kill him or let him die.

I don't understand the difference here.

[Boss]

11 hours ago, ofd said:

The original question was "Pro Life and Pro Choice: Murder or Not Murder?". The common definition for murder is legal, you may like it or not.

 

lol, it's not about liking something or not, Its about truth. Murder has been going on before the state existed so your idea of "murder is legal" is quite inconsistent. 

According to you, murder doest exist without the state/legality

didn't you quote an anarchist? so in an anarchist society with no legality, because "Murder is legal", murder won't exist? 

Claiming "murder is legal" is an appeal to authority specifically the law makers.

 

[smarterthanone]

On 7/24/2017 at 8:37 PM, Eudaimonic said:

I won't debate a person who claims I'm a liar so quickly, expressing no curiosity. Again, that's insulting and untrue.

If I'm truly a liar, does it make sense to debate me?

Don't. You aren't arguing with anyone, just repeating yourself like a broken record. You admit a fetus is not a moral agent, then say killing a moral agent is murder. You are missing a GINORMOUS hole in your logic. Either fill it or just keep spitting out commie logic. (ex. Taxes are not theft because roads... um what?)

 

On 7/28/2017 at 0:37 PM, Eudaimonic said:

But neither would a man who you've accidentally knocked into a comma, yet it would still be a violation of NAP to both kill him or let him die.

I don't understand the difference here.

If you knocked a man into a comma, you do have a contractual obligation for damages according to NAP. Which would at minimum be providing care so he would wake up. He has agency. A fetus does not have agency, as you admit. That is a big difference.

Another big difference is pregnancy is not "damages" whereas hitting someone in the head such as they are knocked out is damage.

[RamynKing]

On 7/31/2017 at 1:45 PM, smarterthanone said:

Don't. You aren't arguing with anyone, just repeating yourself like a broken record. You admit a fetus is not a moral agent, then say killing a moral agent is murder. You are missing a GINORMOUS hole in your logic. Either fill it or just keep spitting out commie logic. (ex. Taxes are not theft because roads... um what?)

 

If you knocked a man into a comma, you do have a contractual obligation for damages according to NAP. Which would at minimum be providing care so he would wake up. He has agency. A fetus does not have agency, as you admit. That is a big difference.

Another big difference is pregnancy is not "damages" whereas hitting someone in the head such as they are knocked out is damage.

damages = you put the person in an unconscious state against their will

conceiving a child = bringing a human into the world against their will

a person in a coma = not a moral agent while unconscious, but will be a moral agent when they wake up

fetus = not a moral agent while too young, but will be when they come out and age enough

 

[Gavitor]

I'm enjoying the mental gymnastics people are going through to justify murdering a human that had no say in the matter.

An unborn human is still a human. Humans cannot give birth to none humans. So we know for sure that an unborn human is still human.

But that human is inconvenient to irresponsible ass hat "parents" so they will deny their child's humanity so they dont have to feel bad about killing said child.

Perhaps its better the child be spared having such horrid parents.

[ofd]

On 29.7.2017 at 6:30 AM, Boss said:

lol, it's not about liking something or not, Its about truth. Murder has been going on before the state existed so your idea of "murder is legal" is quite inconsistent. 

That's why I wrote about the legal definition. There is a difference between murder and killing. You can't murder yourself, but you can kill yourself.

 

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didn't you quote an anarchist? so in an anarchist society with no legality, because "Murder is legal", murder won't exist? 

I did. If you had read what I wrote carefully you wouldn't have asked that question.

[Boss]

2 hours ago, ofd said:

That's why I wrote about the legal definition. There is a difference between murder and killing. You can't murder yourself, but you can kill yourself.

 

Yea it seems you dont value consistency which is expected from someone who is clearly valuing from life but doesnt want others to experience the same.

Murder has nothing to do with legality. Murder has been going on before the law and is the premeditated killing of one human being by another. Which is exactly what happens in an abortion. 

 

[smarterthanone]

On 8/1/2017 at 10:50 PM, RamynKing said:

damages = you put the person in an unconscious state against their will

conceiving a child = bringing a human into the world against their will

a person in a coma = not a moral agent while unconscious, but will be a moral agent when they wake up

fetus = not a moral agent while too young, but will be when they come out and age enough

 

Sorry but that is just stupid. Having a child is not an initiation of force such as its comparable to knocking someone out. If it is then just throw the whole concept of NAP out, its useless as an idea.

[mgggb]

Murder is wrong in every case, even if they're little babies--especially if they're little babies. 

[RamynKing]

8 hours ago, smarterthanone said:

Sorry but that is just stupid. Having a child is not an initiation of force such as its comparable to knocking someone out. If it is then just throw the whole concept of NAP out, its useless as an idea.

Sorry but that's not an argument.

And seriously, calling a sincere post "stupid?"

You're not living up to your avatar.

 

[ofd]

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Yea it seems you dont value consistency which is expected from someone who is clearly valuing from life but doesnt want others to experience the same.

The work as a mentalist won't pan out.

[smarterthanone]

8 hours ago, RamynKing said:

Sorry but that's not an argument.

And seriously, calling a sincere post "stupid?"

You're not living up to your avatar.

 

Burden of proof on the one who claims it. How is having a baby an initiation of force, such as it can be compared as equivalent to knocking someone out with physical violence?

[Boss]

4 hours ago, ofd said:

The work as a mentalist won't pan out.

Not an argument, which is expected from someone who likes to copy and paste instead of using his own critical thinking abilities. 

Anyways, enough has been said, everyone can review what was already written. 

[Cryptolized]

On 4/21/2017 at 2:58 PM, Cryptolized said:

The father/person who assaults the mother must be punished for the assault, but not for killing the baby if the mother can abort (kill) the baby and not be punished for it.

Any thoughts on this?

[mgggb]

15 hours ago, Cryptolized said:

Any thoughts on this?

It logically follows that IF abortion isn't murder that the only crime is assault, though it might be upgraded to a higher level like if you maim someone. 

However, there's still no way to justify abortion as not murder though, unless someone wants to claim that purposefully ending a human life isn't murder.