[Freak_NL]

> That's clearly already a child and I will object.

Not your body, not your choice.

Late stage abortions in order to protect the live of the pregnant woman happen. Unviable pregnancies happen. You know what happens in countries where abortion laws are so strict that even a medical emergency will land the doctor in legal trouble? The pregnant woman dies during or before childbirth.

> Hang on, how is listening to the heartbeat mental torture?

It's guilt-tripping based on an unscientific view of pregnancy. A foetus' heart starts beating way before it is even remotely close to being a child rather than a lump of cells.

> If it was so clear-cut the issue wouldn't be so polarising.

It's polarising because the topic is so very useful to get religious people who want to impose their holy book on everyone else to vote for you.

[nateb2022]

> Not your body, not your choice.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Begging_the_question

> unscientific view of pregnancy

As of 2018, a study found that 95% of all biologists affirm the biological view that a human's life begins at fertilization.

> being a child rather than a lump of cells

A child is an individual organism of the species Homo sapiens. Since the majority of biologists (who are the de facto subject matter experts here) affirm that human life begins at fertilization, your opinion is patently unscientific.

You may argue, as some do, that there are cases, including abortion, where it is permissible to take a human life, however your opinion as expressed is in fact unscientific, and I would encourage you to question the cogency of your conclusions.

[0]: https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3211703

[mullingitover]

Of all the debate tactics, citing a paper that is very much not in support of your view point as a trump card is certainly one of them.

[nateb2022]

I produced a citation, you're just handwaving. Dismissing evidence simply because you find the conclusion inconvenient is telling.

[mullingitover]

The whole point of this paper you're citing is that the scientific definition isn't relevant to the ethical debate.

You're taking this paper and saying "Aha! See but the scientific definition (which the paper points out is irrelevant) agrees with me!"

[nateb2022]

> The whole point of this paper you're citing is that the scientific definition isn't relevant to the ethical debate.

I don't think we have the same reading of the paper. Scientific facts inform ethical decisions, they are antecedent to them. We can't decide whether something is good or bad if we don't understand what it is.

But to the point, the comment I was responding to wanted to assert that pro-life arguments rested on some "unscientific" premise that a "lump of cells" is a "child," which is actually scientific consensus; my citation of that paper was to refute that claim.

Whether or not it is ethical to end a human child's life under certain circumstances is a moral question, but the fact that it is in fact a human child is scientifically settled.

[mullingitover]

> I don't think we have the same reading of the paper.

Strong agreement here.

> Scientific facts inform ethical decisions, they are antecedent to them.

Sometimes, as your paper is saying is the case, they're orthogonal to them.

> but the fact that it is in fact a human child is scientifically settled.

From your article, emphasis mine:

"While this article’s findings suggest a fetus is biologically classified as a human at fertilization"

The problem you have is that this paper doesn't discuss children at all, merely that a fetus is of the human species. It's basically tautological so of course it's essentially unanimous. A human fetus is a human fetus and not, say, a chicken fetus.

[Freak_NL]

Ah yes, conception. The magical moment a body gets 'ensouled'. Wanting to protect literal embryos is considered a rather extreme view outside of Gilead though.

[nateb2022]

Convenient strawman, but you're the one bringing "Gilead" into this discussion. My argument is scientific, and I would appreciate it if your counterargument was too.