There are times both in which abortion should and should not be allowed

(Sorry for the late response, I just got a spike of homework so I didn't have much time to do debating) As Con has taken the Pro-life side, I will assume that I no longer need to argue that there are cases in which abortion is not ethical, as we are in agreement on that; so I will not rebut any of your rebuttals to my statements saying that abortion can be unethical. Part I: Rebuttals to Arguments 1: "From this stage onward a new human exists" To rebut this I will begin with an analogy. Imagine that there is a line, one end is red and the other end is blue. The colour gradually fades, creating shades of purple in the middle. The point at the far red side is still the beginning of the line that ends as blue, but the line is clearly not blue. The same principle can be applied to a fetus, in the beginning it is just a clump of cells, then grows into a few body parts, gradually progressing to a point at which it is obviously human. However, I do agree that after only a few weeks (once the fetus or embryo can feel pain) it is indeed a human, otherwise I would think that there is absolutely nothing wrong with abortion whatsoever. 2: "One cannot pursue happiness... ...to do so to an unborn child for the same reason" These entire premise of these two paragraphs is that a zygote is already a human, as I have proven above is potentially false, and I will prove later that it is actually false. Part II: Rebuttals to Rebuttals It is unnecessary to rebut the rebuttals to argument 1 and the two statements before it, because both sides are in agreement that there are at least some cases in which abortion is immoral. 2: Study of rape victims The study that Con mentioned was too small to accurately describe overall if it is more painful to give birth to the child or abort it, as there were effectively only 33 participants, and especially since only 5 chose to abort. Not all women can be summarized by a comparison of 28 to 5. However, the odds are still in favour of it being correct (in general), so I will provide an example of a situation in which abortion would be best for both mother and child in my arguments section. Part III: New arguments 1: A situation where abortion would be an act of mercy Up until now my rebuttals have seemed to concede. If I was arguing for total Pro-Choice, I would have searched for vague answers that are not accurate and would be more of a last-ditch effort to prove my point. However, I am arguing that there are cases in which abortion should be allowed and cases in which it should not, so the fact that I did not disprove some of your points does not cost me the debate. Birth defects such as neural tube defects can be identified while the baby is still in the first trimester[1]. These defects, along with several other kinds[2], are impossible for the baby to survive when born. My examples, neural tube defects, occur when the skull doesn't form correctly and often causes the brain (or parts of it) to be outside of the skull. It is untreatable and not survivable. In a case where an embryo or fetus has a lethal birth defect, it only makes sense to abort it, rather than forcing it to be carried for 9 months with this, and then be born only to have their brain painfully destroyed. For the mother as well, it is arguably more traumatizing to see your baby die in its first minutes of being born, in a very graphic manner, even than abortion. An abortion in the case of this or another defect that a baby cannot survive out of the womb with would save both mother and child much suffering. 2: Humans are sentient For something to be a human and have rights as one, it must be alive, and it must be self-conscious. Nothing can be self-conscious without a brain, as the electron signals through the brain are what cause thought, and self-consciousness requires thought. Therefore, even though we can't read minds and so don't know the exact time that a baby is conscious, we do know that a baby definitely has no consciousness until it has a brain that is at least partially developed. Although the exact time that the baby is capable of thought is unknown, by 8 weeks the brain is sufficiently developed to allow some movement[3]. To avoid any guessing over the time, I will assume that the baby is conscious at a little past 8 weeks, since the parts of the brain for thought and emotion are more complex than the parts for motor control. As this source[4] clearly testifies, an abortion is possible to be done before this time. Although I have not proven all of Con's rebuttals incorrect, I have proven that there are cases in which abortion will be a better alternative to giving birth. For this reason I encourage you to vote Pro! Sources: [1] http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov... (Mainly the end of the second page and beginning of the third) [2] https://www.dshs.state.tx.us... [3] http://www.whattoexpect.com... [4] http://www.pregnancychoicesdirectory.com...