Her if/then logic statements do not follow. Her reasoning has no connection; it fails. The terms “mother” and “human life growing insider her” may have a relationship (in this case, one is not responsible for the other). But the terms “no one” and “another” are not related in the same way. First, “no one” is a negative of a term, “someone.” If you use a negative term in a logical statement, you must also make sure to use the positive. Here, Dawn does not do so. Additionally, the term “anyone” is far too vague. Her logic does not follow here. Simply because a mother is not responsible for the human life growing inside her (”at all times,” by the way, something Dawn failed to add to her statement, making it further vague and unsupportable) has no bearing or connection to the following statement she made. She gives us, then, two unconnected statements, with no support or backup. Surely, in her attempts to convince women to go through the massive efforts and investments of pregnancy and delivery, she can come up with better support than this.

I took this as a rhetorical question — the point being that bodily autonomy says that the state can’t force the driver to give up part of his liver, and that contributing to the condition doesn’t trump that. Bizarrely and disturbingly, Paul W. took it to undermine the claim of bodily autonomy. But in fact the state does not force that sort of restitution, and Paul W. seems to be in denial. Also, he and others confuse moral judgments with legal coercion. People can view the driver as wrong and acting immorally to not make the donation while at the same time recognizing that it would be wrong to force the driver to make the donation. And the failure to consider this distinction is seen in the false dichotomy between “pro-choice” and “anti-abortion” or “pro-life”. People who are pro-choice are not pro-abortion or anti-life; they are only anti- state coercion. It’s quite possible for people on both sides to abhor abortions and desire all pregnancies to go to term, but those are personal preferences, not legal enforcement.

BTW: bring back Bluey!

A fetus is a human organism, a scientific statement. It is not a human being, which implies an existential status.

Consider one of your sperm cells. What species is it? Does that make it a human being?

As a physician, it is considered unethical for me to give a pregnant woman anesthetic medication that could harm her fetus even though she may request it. There are either two options: either this ethical principle is wrong and it is actually unethical for me to deny a pregnant woman a benzodiazepine, or the right of bodily autonomy is not inalienable.

Umm, incorrect. If the benefits of administering anesthetic to the pregnant woman outweigh the risks, it’s the standard of care. Pregnant patients can, and do, undergo appendectomies, cholecystectomies, etc. One thing that’s unethical is administering a known teratogen when you have alternatives. Which brings us to:

What about a mother who wishes to have a child but does not wish to be nauseous? She wishes to take thalidomide.

If a patient wishes to take thalidomide it has nothing to do with the right of bodily autonomy. All it means is that you haven’t done your job of discussing vitamin B6, Diclectin, Phenergan, Dramamine, Reglan, Tigan, Zofran, and Medrol with her.

Jivin J,

When engaged in a search for biological facts, it’s not enough to pull some quotes from embryo books. You need to actually be familiar with, you know, the facts.

–Fertilization is not a momentary event (it takes ~2 days).

–Once fertilization is completed, the new genotype (egg 23 sperm23= new genotype, zygote 46, or diploid) isn’t yet capable of expression (no transcription of the new genotype; its growth and development is regulated by info from the egg).

–The developing preembryo only acquires individuation (the potential to become a human person) ~14 days after fertilization.

Not to mention that the zygote divides =>blastomers. Blastomers are totipotent cells–each one retains the capacity to develop into a normal preembryo. Meaning, 1-4 days after fertilization “there is as yet no designation of an individual cell to become a specific entity or a particular part of an entity.”

Last, but not least, an abortion does NOT kill a fetus/baby/unborn/whatever; it terminates a pregnancy. Big, huge, difference. You can have a pregnancy/abortion without a fetus, but not without a placenta/uterus (or, to be more precise, any number of maternal organs).

You’ve got some good points there. Yes, there are some people out there who are bringing kids into the world that they can’t handle, can’t raise properly, abuse and mistreat - and in my mind, that’s the greater crime (child abuse, that is).

And then there’s that sticking point - what about the fathers? I guess my own view is that , in a situation where you’ve got a 1-1 tie about what to do regarding an unplanned pregnancy, you’ve got to give the tie-breaking vote to the person who’s actually going to be pregnant. But that doesn’t mean men don’t have a say - just not the final say. How he reacts to the news (”I’m excited, I’m ready to raise this child” vs. “Fuck that, it’s probably not even mine, you ho”) will no doubt have some influence. But it is, ultimately, only a woman who is capable of bringing a pregnancy to term, and therefore, it is only a woman who can have the last word.

And that’s fine that you don’t want abortion treated lightly - don’t treat it lightly. But if a woman does treat it lightly, what should be done about it? Should she be punished? If she’s treating it like getting a haircut, then she’d probably be a terrible mother anyway and is really doing the world a favour.