There is no justification for applying the concept of rights to cells and fetuses. They are potential human beings.

For every act of altruism there is a recipient. Those with a proper ethics would not vote to be one, and would would not support or sanction government policies that allow it. We have a disintegrating politics of collectivism because of the bad ethics.

They have the right to get up off the couch and go out and behave like rational human beings.

The capacity of the nervous system develops continuously, but in the womb there is nothing to differentiate and no way to perceive the external world other than occasional crude sensations of bumps or noise by an entity that is not using a mind to comprehend the external world as a means of living. Before birth it's not a biologically separate entity at all beyond the status, literally, of a parasite. The concepts of morality and rights do not apply to such an entity.

A simple way to look at it is that even if an unborn baby has full human rights, that does not include the right to live inside another person's body without her consent.

That's the problem: assuming this is so controversial. Rights are easy to define...no one has the right to interfere with a woman's body - period. One can't simply redefine rights to suit his emotions.

Primitive cultures have no concept of rights, including the right to life. Children have been routinely sacrificed to the gods.

The founding principles were based on the Enlightenment, not the Bible. Asserting "I read that some group once did an exhaustive study" to claim otherwise is meaningless.

Where do you think Ayn Rand said that paraplegics and those with Parkinson's don't have their individual rights?

People with abnormal, limited capacities are not capable of exercising all the rights of a normal person. They are an exception, but it doesn't make them not people. They are impaired people to different degrees in different ways and everyone knows what that means. There are legal procedures for determining what legal rights these people may or may not have under their specific, abnormal circumstances.

It has nothing to do with subjectivist racist ideologues denouncing jews and/or blacks and does not mean that we should "start allowing" people to "judge" others: We already judge others for what they are all the time and act accordingly, which is a moral responsibility -- to do it objectively. It does not mean that anyone can arbitrarily decree someone to not have rights, or claim that everyone (or whatever else he wants) has intrinsic rights regardless of context and identity. Both are subjectivist and outside the law. Rejecting the subjectivist mindset of intrinsicism is not a "slippery slope", it is a requirement of objectivity.

The history of black slaves at the time of the founding of the country was a combination of anti-Enlightenment outright racism and error of judgment: Many prominent individuals, including Jefferson, observed the blacks around them and concluded that they were in some ways inferior because of their common behavior. They overlooked the cause: that those people had been wrenched out of a primitive society on another continent, forcibly brought here, and put to work in menial tasks with no education and no chance to develop as individuals. Jefferson in particular (who never was a racist) saw the error later in life when he observed first hand how well some of them did when properly educated, demonstrating that they had the same capacity. Outside of crude racists, that is now commonly understood. It has nothing to do with judging individuals for what they are as individuals, either personally or in unusual circumstances, legally.

ok

Interesting take. I disagree mostly.

I answered you via PM. This is a hot discussion topic that would overshadow this thread.

My question to a very conservative fellow was: "By what stretch of the imagination do you assume you have any rights involving any woman's pregnancy in any part of the world?" Never got an answer.

My question was never about abortion, only at what point does a human being have Rights. For some to contend its a matter of ability to comprehend them would pretty much lump and toddler in with a clump of cells bound together. Is breathing a qualifier for rights? If so does breathing amniotic fluid, the act of breathing, count?

Vested interest. We can agree to disagree. I'm not slighting anyone's ability. Some people are more invested in the nation and should have a firm voice in its direction.

I agree with you that paraplegics and Parkinson's disease patients should have their individual rights. This is why I am in partial disagreement with Ayn Rand. In severe enough cases, such people would not be capable of self-generating a sufficient number of actions to sustain their own lives. As someone taking care of a father with Alzheimer's so advanced that it is affecting some functions that people would consider purely physical (such as forgetting that he needs to go to the bathroom), I am seeing routinely a lot of seniors who are at, near, or just beyond the point where they are as functional as one- or two-year-olds. I know that my definition of the rights of human beings would extend both earlier in life and later in life than Ms. Rand's, but her definition of life certainly makes me think.

"By what right does ANYONE assert their authority, for ANY reason, to do ANYTHING with that unborn child?" I think you just answered your own question: "the individual would have a legitimate option to abort in the case of rape or incest."

Plenty of other vocations also have a stake in the country's continued success. Voting should not be a privilege reserved for particular vocations and not others.

Hi pal,

Paraplegics? Parkinsons? You do have me at a disadvantage since I've not read Ayn Rand's reasoning on the topic of human rights, but while I concur that mechanical assistance can be needed for those who have suffered a physically debilitating injury, I do not concur that a lost of rights is the result of those purely physical disabilities. Folks who suffer diseases that impair mental process such as Alzheimer's, Dementia, or birth defects like my niece who suffered a stoke at birth would be another matter. Diseases that impact motor functions and not mental processes should have no bearing on the exercise of a their individual rights or free participation in that societies benefits.

To my way of thinking all Rights spring from the Right to Life. Obviously you cannot have the Right to defend yourself if you are not already alive. Additionally your Right to the Pursuit of happiness or any of the others are dependent on one being alive.

Therefore one might ask when does the Right to Life begin? I can see this reasonably argued as anytime between conception and self-actualization. While some argue that the former is too soon and most would argue that the latter is far to late. I have met many teenagers and Liberals that make me lean towards the latter instead of the former. I cannot possibly count the number of teenagers and Liberals that have made me wish for a Post-Birth Abortion option.

For me personally I would suggest that the Right to Life begins at the point that a fetus becomes viable outside utero without direct life support. ie. the child can breath on its own and only needs the normal care that every infant requires. My understanding is that this happens somewhere a little after 30 weeks.

In speaking of social context you're talking about relevance.

I disagree in that any person regardless of social context has certain Rights that no society can grant or take away - Locke rightly stated (and I don't agree with all I read) those rights are Life, Liberty and Property. Do you need society to have Life? No. Liberty? Maybe. Property? Maybe.

Accounted for simply mean that there are always individual circumstances that need to be, and should be, addressed. And before you harp on who addresses them? the individual would have a legitimate option to abort in the case of rape or incest.

There are more then enough methods of birth control, both pre and post sexual intercourse, to relieve abortion as an option for all but the most extreme circumstances.

This was not intended to be a abortion thread by any means.

Expectations are not the same thing as rights. The concept of rights depends upon the concept of an actual social context in which to exercise them.

Breathing is not a vested interest. All those vocations I stated have an stake in the countries continued success, they should have a voice in steering the nation. Maybe the pacifist was a farmer on rented land who sold his goods to the public?