The Morality of Abortion

Before I begin I would like to again apologize for not including a round five. I concede that in my opening argument I gave more meaning to the law of biogenesis than was there. This was a problem that I addressed in my rebuttal to the pro's argument (see below for my revised biogenesis argument). I will also concede that I used the term 'human being' a bit confusingly; I said it with the intention of meaning human person. I will better clarify my definitions this round. Definitions ----------- Human Being (or just Human): containing Human DNA Person: A human being that is alive and separated from any other human person. Law of Biogenesis: The law that states living things reproduce after their own kind It appears that the pro's main argument is that I do not distinguish between a human being and a human person. I believe that I somewhat covered a defense to this in my rebuttal to the pro's opening argument however I did not give much time to this. With that said, I will go more in-depth on what the differences are between a human being and a human person in this round. Allow me to begin by briefly restating the revised version of Argument A. Argument A (revised argument from the law of biogenesis): P1: Living human persons have the right to life P2: Requirements for being a human person are a) being human, b) being alive, c) being separate from another human person (some may argue that having a soul is a requirement but this it is impossible to point to a place where a spiritual thing is developed so I will leave it out of my argument) P3: A zygote fills the biological requirements for life P4: By the law of biogenesis a zygote (see R1) is a human being P5: A zygote is a separate entity from the mother C: A zygote fills all of the requirements for personhood and therefore has a right to life. Let me defend my definition of human personhood because it seems to me that if my definition for personhood stands, then the pro's argument falls apart. If someone contends that people have intrinsic value then that person must believe that intrinsic value flows from some non-physical quality (i.e. a soul). If this quality is not a physical thing (this is widely agreed upon), then it is not physically developed (such organs, appendages, hair, etc). Because personhood is not a physically developable thing, people must have it since the beginning of their existence. I would say that a living being starts existing once it is alive and separated from any other living being (i.e. a zygote being a separate creature from its mother). In other words a being cannot gain intrinsic worth. So if a being has intrinsic worth, then it must have always existed with it. One might respond saying that a spiritual thing such as personhood is developed later as the embryo develops. This is not possible to prove and is therefore not relevant. Because a non-physical thing, such as personhood, can not be detected, one can not prove when a non-physical thing starts to exist. If, however, that non-physical thing were tied to a physical thing (i.e. a human being) then the earliest point at which the non-physical thing can come into existence is the point at which the physical thing comes into existence. Now lets apply this to a zygote. It would be morally impermissible to kill it because there is that possibility that it's personhood has already been developed. In other words, in order to be morally safe, we must assume that personhood exits at conception. In the name of clarity, I will put my argument into a logical syllogism. Argument D (argument for my definition of personhood): P1: A being with a non-physical quality (i.e. an intrinsic value) must alway have existed with that quality. P2: Personhood is a non-physical quality P3: All people on the planet have the quality of personhood P4: A being begins to exist when it is a) alive and b) it's own creature (i.e. separate from another being) C: Anything that grows into a human person must have been a person since the moment of its existence Using the conclusion from Argument D we can conclude that a zygote fits the requirements for personhood since it grows up to be a human person and is alive. I believe that this conclusion is enough to successfully defend both Argument A and Argument B. I would like to take the time now to thank my opponent, philochristos, for debating with me despite his personal views on the subject and those who have read through this entire debate. I know I have had fun debating this subject and I look forward to more debates like this one in the future.