From: nyikos@math.scarolina.edu (Peter Nyikos)
Subject: Re: Is Peter going to be enrolling at NCSU? (Was: Badges of Honor)
Keywords: You expect me to mark my deletions? Dream on... 
Organization: USC  Department of Computer Science
Date:  9 Sep 92 21:28:12 GMT

In <1992Sep8.024945.29380@mnemosyne.cs.du.edu> kcochran@nyx.cs.du.edu (Keith "Justified And Ancient" Cochran) writes:

>[Now, where did I put that "clue fairy" outfit???]

>In article <nyikos.715886268@milo.math.scarolina.edu> nyikos@math.scarolina.edu (Peter Nyikos) writes:
>>In <1992Sep6.204246.28271@midway.uchicago.edu> eeb1@ellis.uchicago.edu (e elizabeth bartley) writes:

>[Ah, here it is...]

>>
>>>In article <nyikos.715464590@milo.math.scarolina.edu>
>>>nyikos@math.scarolina.edu (Peter Nyikos) writes:
>>
>>WRONG!!! The fetus, umbilical cord, placenta, and bag of waters all
>>come from the original fertilized ovum.  [Can't blame you for not
>>knowing this, I didn't know it a month and a half ago either.  It was
>>only established well after the start of this century, and most books
>>and articles on fetal development don't make it at all clear.]

>Clue Time, Peter!  (Zing!)  I would assume that you'll agree that the uterus
>_IS_ part of the woman, right?  And that she has a unilateral right to do
>what she wants to with her uterus, right?  Well, if she has her uterus
>removed, the z/e/f inside is going to die.

>As for your paragraph above, please don't attribute your own ignorance to
>others on the net.

Elizabeth thought the umbilical cord was a part of the mother's body. So
far, she has seemed a lot more intelligent than most people on the net,
especially you.  Or are you about to enroll in the University of Chicago,
perhaps the premier institute of higher learning in the U.S.A.?

>  Also, who cares?  Or is this going to turn into that
>stupid "topologically, the fetus isn't inside the woman, so she can't have
>an abortion" argument?

Whatever made you think I'd say anything like that?  Topologically, a
doughnut is the same as a coffee cup, and I have never tried to eat
a coffee cup, nor drink coffee out of a doughnut.

>>
>>I'd 
>>wager less than 10% of all PRO-LIFERS know this much, which is why
>>they are so uncomprehending when women say that a fetus looks like
>>a "clot," "clump of cells", and "mass of tissue," when only contact
>>of these latter women with
>>embryology might be a miscarriage where the chorionic sac is expelled
>>whole, with the embryo/fetus hidden inside.

>Peter, I defy you to explain how something with gills "looks exactly like a
>human". 

Well, if you subscribe to Elizabeth's contention that even the sperm
and egg are human life, you have your answer from her already, provided
you disbelieve my statement that follows this:

> I checked two nights ago, and neither myself, Charles, or Lee had
>gills.  I checked last night, and Kent doesn't have them either.

Nor does an embryo.  It has little bumps that look like gills, but they
are not gills.
>>
>>>  Presumably it can then be removed.  On the flip side, unless
>>>the woman has the right to control the fetus's body (whether directly
>>>as in a modern-day abortion, or indirectly by controlling her own body
>>>as above), she loses the right to control her own body to avoid the
>>>effort and effects of being pregnant.
>>
>>This is a rather pointless tautology that you have just made.  Of course
>>I wouldn't give absolute rights to control over a person's body, just
>>as I wouldn't give a fetus (or anyone else) an absolute right to life.

>Maybe not, but you sure do seem willing to remove bits and pieces of women's
>rights.  After you get some rights of the woman removed, are you then going to
>start campaigning to remove "some" of the rights of the Gays, or the Blacks?

Ask Mr. Loomis and Steve Chaney whether I am at all threatening to them.

>>The right to self-defense sometimes involves abrogating that right.  But
>>the right to self-defense is not absolute either.  Despite what a lot of
>>people think, one does not have the right to kill any old intruder in 
>>one's home; one must have real reasons for thinking that intruder poses
>>a threat of grave bodily harm to one or more people living in one's home. 

>Sorry.  Check out the Colorado "make my day" law.  You're wrong, again.

Where can I look it up?  I assume it is not catalogued in the law 
library under that name.

>>
>>>In the *real* world, either the woman can control both her own body
>>>and the fetus's during pregnancy, or she can't control either.
>>
>>True to a degree.  She does not abdicate all, or even most, control to
>>her body.  

>Do you have reading comphrension problems, Peter?  You've just "waved away"
>most of a woman's control over _HER_ body when you "wave away" her right
>to obtain an abortion.

I never waved it away under all circumstances.  And what sort of 
units of measurement do you use in your "most"?  My mother hid her
last pregnancy up to the day she went into labor, and went on teaching
in public school all the way up to that day, despite a rule that
pregnant women must quit teaching long before their due date.

Peter Nyikos

Newsgroups: talk.abortion