When Conscience Clauses Can Kill

^^^ You have a point, Karalora. However, whereas a typical parasite will do little mroe for it's entire lifespan aside from sucking nutrients from the host (and maybe laying eggs to spread some more), an unborld child (or whatever you wish to call it) has the potential to be something far greater, and that's why I greatly dislike calling the unborn a parasite.

Or should we ignore potential and go strictly with what's in the here-and-now? Such thinking strikes me as short-sighted.

Anyway. Not sure what to think of this law here. Lawyer-speak gives me a headache.

edited 15th Feb '11 2:44:31 PM by pvtnum11

Happiness is zero-gee with a sinus cold.

Wait, does this mean it's legal to kill people who you suspect of file sharing? I hope the RIAA doesn't find out.

Blind Final Fantasy 6 Let's Play

This somewhat reminds of how, when Christianity still had restrictions on moneylending, they simply hired Jews to do it instead, rather than not let it be leant at all.

You can't even write racist abuse in excrement on somebody's car without the politically correct brigade jumping down your throat!

The problem is that "parasite" has an extremely negative connotation of a free-loader who takes from the host while giving nothing in return.

Children who are wanted can deliver something positive in return to the parent. To call them parasites is going to usually make them angry.

"Who wants to hear about good stuff when the bottom of the abyss of human failure that you know doesn't exist is so much greater?"-Wraith

A fetus is a parasite if an individual woman thinks it is, and isn't if her mind decides at any moment that it's another kind of organism?

The solipsist metaphysics behind that claim are staggering.

edited 15th Feb '11 3:03:04 PM by Rottweiler

“Love is the eternal law whereby the universe was created and is ruled.” — St. Bernard

This only applies to children who are wanted...in this case, chances are the mother isn't going to have an abortion anyways, so it doesn't apply to them.

Mother who want to have their child wouldn't want an abortion.

We're talking about when they are unwanted. To a mother who doesn't want it, the fetus IS a parasite.

edited 15th Feb '11 3:06:01 PM by Signed

"Every opinion that isn't mine is subjected to Your Mileage May Vary."

Whether you want a parasite or not, it's still a parasite. If you want something and someone gets rid of it, of course you're going to be upset, parasite or no parasite.

Sure, there are negative connotations, and a woman who wants the thing growing inside her will probably get upset if you just out and say it's a parasite. But someone taking offense to your choice of terms doesn't change the reality of the situation.

the dice are loaded, the deck is stacked, the game itself will hold you back

I'm just saying that most people are going to have an aversion to calling a fetus a "parasite".

And Signed, if they really didn't want that baby, they shouldn't have been dumb enough to get knocked up (obviously excluding rape victims or other people impregnated against their will).

"Who wants to hear about good stuff when the bottom of the abyss of human failure that you know doesn't exist is so much greater?"-Wraith

"Parasite" is an ontologically objective category of biological species, unless solipsism is true. Assuming there's an external world, a woman can't change a fetus from a parasite to a baby to an olive tree by changing her mind.

“Love is the eternal law whereby the universe was created and is ruled.” — St. Bernard

^^ Birth control and contraceptives doesn't always work as planned.

edited 15th Feb '11 3:19:53 PM by pvtnum11

Happiness is zero-gee with a sinus cold.

^^^ Broken condoms. Just plain no-strings attached sex in general. Forgot to buy condoms. Defective pills. Drunk sex. etc. Plenty of reasons for unplanned pregnancies.

Also, I know that fetuses aren't parasites by the scientific definition...just like how genocidal dictators aren't actually "monsters".

But for the purpose of their situations, fetus are parasites.

edited 15th Feb '11 3:22:47 PM by Signed

"Every opinion that isn't mine is subjected to Your Mileage May Vary."

I was unaware that Parasite was a biologically defined clade.

The difference between a parasite and a symbiote is that a symbiote provides something of value to the host. A wanted fetus will provide the host with a child. An unwanted fetus will do the same, but that is not something of value to the host, or at least not of enough value. Therefore, the status of parasitism as regards unborn children actually is dependent on the mother's attitude.

Share it so that people can get into this conversation, 'cause we're not the only ones who think like this.

@Rott: Yes, parasite is a well defined class of organisms, and the class is "a symbiote that harms the host".

Obviously the fetus is a symbiote. If the mother doesn't want it it's clearly a harmful symbiote as well.

I don't really like that line of logic that well myself, because there are also lots of unfun side-effects to pregnancy even if you do want the baby, which should make it a parasite no matter what. Still, the idea is that if the mother wants it, it's not harming her, and if she doesn't want it, it is. It's not anything as silly as you seem to think it is.

I'm convinced that our modern day analogues to ancient scholars are comedians. -0dd1

An individual woman's whim (want) changes absolutely nothing about the empirical world, unless solipsism is true.

If there's an external world, a Homo sapiens fetus has objective qualities. One possibility is that a mother who believes unborn offspring to be parasites is wrong.

Indeed, the fact is that parasitism is defined as a symbiotic relationship between organisms of different species where one organism, the parasite, benefits from without aiding the other, the host.

“Love is the eternal law whereby the universe was created and is ruled.” — St. Bernard

Wrong as usual, Rott. Mistletoe is still considered a parasite even when it's attached to another mistletoe plant, as occasionally happens.

As noted on The Symbiote, apparently symbiote applies to mutualism, commensalism, and parasitism, even them symbiotic only means the first one in common parlance.

Explains why the Symbiots of Spider Man are called that whey are mostly parasitic.

Hodor

@Karalora: Well since the standard reference around here is Wikipedia, do you want to provide a better citation?

“Love is the eternal law whereby the universe was created and is ruled.” — St. Bernard

You know, whether a fetus is technically a parasite or not is 100% irrelevant to the topic at hand. Even if it was possible to conclusively prove this one way or the other, I don't think anyone involved in the debate would change their mind.

the dice are loaded, the deck is stacked, the game itself will hold you back

@Lull: I'd still like the record to show that fetuses, like Jews, are not parasites.

“Love is the eternal law whereby the universe was created and is ruled.” — St. Bernard

Symbiotic relationship is only one of many types of parasite/host relationship...

^^ Like I said, not all fetuses are parasites. Only the unwanted ones are....and I only mean it in a sense that genocidal dictators can be called "monsters" even though they're just humans with lots of money.

...how did jews suddenly get into this?

edited 15th Feb '11 6:56:47 PM by Signed

"Every opinion that isn't mine is subjected to Your Mileage May Vary."

Thanks for the vote of confidence.

I don't like pro-choice choice people who use the term parasite because of the very negative implication of the term, but it seems relatively scientifically accurate.

Hodor

No Signed, the definitions I've read is that parasitism is a subset of symbiotic relationships in which an individual of a host species sustains one or more individuals of a parasitic species without benefit in return.

You have things exactly backwards.

And just stop the claim that a woman's emotional state changes what ontological categories a fetus belongs to, or admit you hold to solipsist metaphysics.

They too were victims of a language game that suddenly defined them as non-human parasites after the state had previously considered them people.

edited 15th Feb '11 7:00:22 PM by Rottweiler

“Love is the eternal law whereby the universe was created and is ruled.” — St. Bernard

The thing about definitions is that they're not ontologically basic. Ever hear the expression "one man's trash is another man's treasure"? Well, one woman's future bundle of joy is another woman's parasite.

edited 15th Feb '11 7:02:30 PM by LullTheConqueror

the dice are loaded, the deck is stacked, the game itself will hold you back

If the host does not want the end result of a fetus, then the fetus is not aiding the host. There's no solipsism in this statement. The objective reality of it is that the host's decisions and future actions determine the nature of the fetus-host relationship.

This is a key point over the whole abortion debate: The woman's choice matters. Indeed, it defines the nature of the act.

Jews don't occupy the bodies of others (unless you apply ethnic/religious group membership to unborn fetuses, which is kinda weird). Please don't derail the topic.

Share it so that people can get into this conversation, 'cause we're not the only ones who think like this.

And were the Jews physically attached to other humans and sustaining themselves by taking nutrients from those other humans?

No?

Then I guess "parasite" in that case was just emotive rhetoric with no basis in fact.  ^*

Whereas when I refer to a fetus as a parasite, I am merely pointing out something entirely factual about the way its life is sustained. I am not trying to engender hatred for fetuses. That you take it as such says more about your use of the word "parasite" than mine.

The strict biological definition of "parasite" may very well specifically exclude fetal placental mammals, but you can't deny that their lifestyle is extremely parasite-like.

edited 15th Feb '11 7:10:26 PM by Karalora