Abortion Before a Fetus Has a Functioning Brain is Not Wrong

1. Brain function is inadequate in determining one's personhood. "How can one be a person without a developed medulla, pons, or forebrain? " Now we are getting closer. For two rounds I asked my opponent to provide clear criteria as to what kind of brain development constitutes personhood. We now have better criteria than the function/no-function criteria, but there is still a hole. We still have the problem of gradual development, which I will tackle in the next contention. 2. Brain development is too gradual to make an effective diagnosis. "Again, at some point in time there is a point where the fetus becomes a viable organism - where the brain is capable of supporting the entire organism. This is medically recognized as the point in time where the fetus can be removed from the mother and survive. " My opponent seems to agree with the gradual development of the fetus and is now offering a criteria: the brain must completely support the organism. However, there is still this troubling notion of a "magic moment," this time in which the fetus is dead tissue one nanosecond and a life the next. The brain takes on more and more function, gradually, until it controls everything. Why is it wrong to kill a baby whose brain supports 100% of the body and okay to kill a baby whose brain supports 99.99% of the body? By this logic, an adult with 99.99% brain function is not "meaningfully alive" and can be killed without moral consequence. 3. Life emerging does not correlate with life departing. "He somehow pretends that brain activity the merely keeps the organism alive is sufficient to support personhood. " My opponent is putting words in my mouth. My contention is that pulling the plug on a brain dead adult patient with no self-sustaining brain activity does not correlate with aborting a fetus in a similar state because the fetus will grow to sustain it's own life if left on that life support. "Again, my opponent makes the disanalogy between a patient on life support and a fetus. .. Consider a timeline. .. " "Meaningfully Alive----------Brain Dead---Life Support----------Known To Be Never Normal Again----- X -----" "Meaningfully Alive----------Brain Dead---Life Support----- X -----Known To Be Normal Later----------" "Not Meaningfully Alive----- X -----Life Support----------Birth" I must object to the term "Meaningfully Alive" as it begs the question. My opponent must win the debate before he can state when the fetus is Meaningfully Alive, which I assume means one's right to life. I submit alternative (and more logically consistent) timelines: 1. Person----------Brain Dead/Life Support----- X -----Person---------- 2. Person----------Brain Dead/Life Support----- X -----Not a Person 3. Brain Dead/Life Support----- X -----Person---------- 4. Brain Dead/Life Support----- X -----Not a Person The fetus is in a very similar state as the brain dead patient (by my opponent's logic I might add). The only difference is that it was not previously a person when it entered into the life support state. Timelines 1 and 3 are immoral for the same reason, that the "patient" will be person. If option 3 can be considered moral, then so must option 1. Options 2 and 4 are moral if and only if the "Not a Person" outcome is reasonably certain. ******************************** "Sub-humans wouldn't have sub-human rights? Animals are sub-humans - do they have human rights? " Semantics. Sub-humans are human beings considered less worthy than other human beings. Animals are non-humans and do not have human rights. We are arguing definitions here instead of the debate. "Human would be a member of the homo sapien species and ALIVE. Homo Sapiens without functioning brains are not alive. For part of gestation, a fetus has no functioning brain. Ergo it is not ALIVE. Ergo it is not human. " Plants are ALIVE. Being ALIVE is not at issue, being a person with inalienable rights is. My opponent argues against personhood one second and this notion of being "alive" the next. The scientific definition of life includes an entity having most or all of the properties: homeostasis, multi-cellular, metabolic, growth, adaptation, responds to stimulus, reproductive. (. http://en.wikipedia.org...) The fetus qualifies as alive. "Incorrect - brain ACTIVITY and brain FUNCTIONALITY are totally different. If you take the processor out of my computer and boot it up, there is activity, but no functionality. " This does not help my opponent's case. We have equipement to measure activity in the womb, but not functionality. At best, we have scientific knowledge of how functionality increases based on how much of the brain is developed. But we still have the problem of identifying that magic moment in which the fetus becomes a person. If my opponent cannot specify how to scientifically identify that moment, he has no case. "Incorrect - A functioning brain is a prerequisite for meaningful life and personhood. Plants and ants do not have meaningful life. " There's that term "Meaningful life" again: circular reasoning. "I have said several times that this [zero brain functionality] could be considered the threshold of viability. A nonfunctional brain will yield a non-viable organism. This would differ on a per-case basis, but still be determinable by medical science. " If this is the criteria, then my opponent at best can justify killing the embryo, but even the fetus has very minimal brain function, even if only a few firing neurons. He must choose between zero function and X function, and he bounces to and fro, thereby weakening his case. "The process may be gradual, but if it is not STARTED, there is no need to consider degrees of activity at all. Furthermore, it is analogous to considering how many degrees past boiling you heat your coffee. If the coffee is not boiling yet, further consideration is pointless. " Now my opponent compares the fetus to a pot of boiling coffee. This is question begging. He already assumes the fetus has no value, yet that is the issue at debate. "My opponent's point here rests on the delusion that an organism without a functional brain is alive in a meaningful way. " No, my point rests on the knowledge that the organism is becoming more of a person each day. It's my opponent that is under the delusion that a magic non-person-to-person moment occurs. "Yet again - activity and functionality are completely different. A computer with no processor is active, but not functional. " The computer analogy is erroneous. A computer doesn't GROW a processor. If it did, would a computer be functional even if it's only instruction was "increment a value? " If not, how many instructions become necessary? 10? 100? My opponents case rests entirely on ambiguity. ********************************** My opponent struggles to make his case in any direct way. He uses ambiguous terminology and criteria. In the end, his motive is clear: the fetus is a non-human because he thinks it to be so. He wants to justify killing tissue rather than a person, even though killing an adult patient in similar circumstances is abhorrent. If he truly wants to abort on the basis of brain function, his criteria must be clear, rigid, and agreed upon consensus. He cannot do this. It's zero activity one moment and partial activity the next. It's alive like a plant one moment, then not "meaningfully alive" the next. I have shown that, on the basis of brain function alone, revoking the fetus' right to life is not morally justified. There may very well be other avenues to explore, but they are not in question in this debate. My opponent was burdened to show this case alone, and he cannot do so consistently. I have cast sufficient doubt on his assertions and his resolution, which is my task in this debate.