57. "God wants us to be fruitful and multiply, even to the extent that sperm should not be wasted upon the ground; therefore abortion should be banned." UNPROVED. The Bible, after all, was written by humans. They merely claimed to have been Inspired by God, but it is a fact that humans are known to be able to lie, when they can benefit from it. And most certainly Moses, who started the Bible-writing project, created a government of the people, by the preachers, for the preachers -- with himself at the top of the heap.
As a thought-experiment, suppose you encountered this statement:
"God has Inspired me to write, 'Thou art gullible fools!'"
OK, actually you just did encounter that statement. Is it true? How do you know it isn't? If you ever in your life, even once, felt like a gullible fool, then might the statement be true, regardless of whether God Inspired it? That's the problem of the Bible (and all other Holy Works) in a nutshell! The Bible definitely contains things that cannot be literally true (the global Flood would have salt-poisoned every freshwater fish, and drowned every plant, on the planet, including olive trees, after 40 days of rainwater mixing with salty ocean water).
However, the Bible also contains some things that are definitely true (archaeologists have found the city of the Philistines, for example, so we know they actually existed, regardless of whether or not anything else written about them is true --and some of those writings aren't anything more than propaganda written by victors).
But much of the Bible is unproved. One thing that is known, however, is that, preachers directly benefited from promoting population growth by every means possible --including banning homosexuality, masturbation, and any type other of sexual activity that can't result in pregnancy. Even the tale of Onan could simply be a distorted description of someone who had, say, a heart attack or stroke during sex (quitting in the middle because he was already falling-down/dying).
Preachers got more tithes from the larger "flock", for one thing. And they also acquired the manpower to attack and defeat neighboring tribes, thereby increasing the territory controlled by the preachers. Best of all, since they wrote the Bible, they could blame God for that greedy policy!
fs That greedy policy has been followed by most descendant Religions for thousands of years. One result was, for centuries the Catholic Church was the richest organization on the planet, besides being one of most influential.
bibliotecapleyades.net/vatican/vatican_billions
Another aspect of that policy was horrific, because it caused wars whenever preachers disagreed with each other. Many Europeans finally said "Enough!" after the Thirty Years War, and emigrated to America (in the Middle East that greedy Religious policy is still going strong, benefiting the preachers and no one else). Today, at least in the USA, we have "Separation of Church and State" specifically to prevent that horrific policy from being implemented here. But, have you noticed how Religions these days are trying harder than ever to acquire political power here? It's not only about abortion, at all!
Can you be certain therefore, that God was the one who wanted the people to multiply? Even if God did, there are also associated statements such as "replenish the Earth". Well, why isn't it obvious that we have done that thing, when humanity these days is the something like the third-most populous mammal on Earth, after rats and mice?
stuff.co.nz/ ... /Humane-rat-trap-goes-global
Now, if you study what the Bible claimed God actually did instead of what the Bible claimed God said, you find a different policy. The claim is, God spent several "Days" Creating the Universe, and, afterward Created humanity, who thereby qualify as a sort of "God's offspring".
A straightforward "be fruitful and multiply policy" would, if followed by God, mean that humanity should have been created first. That policy is only about reproduction, see, and not about ensuring the offspring can survive afterward!
But God didn't do it that way, God followed a "be fruitful, then multiply" policy, in which "fruitful" refers to ensuring that future offspring could survive. We would do well to ignore the greedy Religions, and copy God's actions, in this matter. And if that means allowing abortions, because the parents aren't able to provide for offspring, so be it.
58. "Ban abortion and kill old people instead. Most of them are no better than babies --or even unborn humans-- at contributing anything to society, while most babies will grow up and become contributors to society. This also solves the Medicare and Social Security problems." BAD DATA, because while not stated, that argument includes the faulty assumption that unborn humans are people. Otherwise the argument might perhaps make some sense (kind of like applying "triage" rules in a major crisis), but as it is, it promotes killing people instead of killing mere animals.
59. "Abortion is wrong because it results in the loss of a future of value." IRRELEVANT AND UNBALANCED, partly because it involves "potential", and partly because it makes unwarranted assumptions about "value". Every time someone commits suicide, that person is declaring that there is insufficient value to be experienced in living any longer. Just because others disagree, that doesn't make those others right. For example, in prior centuries slavers certainly opposed the idea of their slaves committing suicide, yet they eventually gave up on enslaving Native Americans, because there were so many revolts and suicides (when escape was sufficiently blocked) that there just wasn't enough "future value" in it.
infoplease.com/ce6/bus/A0861124
Meanwhile, an unborn human lacks the brainpower to make any valuations whatsoever about the future (understanding that aspect of Time is another generic characteristic of personhood). There is again no reason to assume the valuations of others, about the future, is automatically superior to the valuation that any specific individual might make, based on available data.
For example, nowadays there are things like overpopulation and business-controlled resource restriction, to make future life far from valuable.
Here, since we are talking about an organism that only potentially can make a valuation about the future, we need to accept that the valuation it might make could be either positive or negative. So, like the Einstein/Hitler comparison made previously, this part of the argument becomes Neutral with respect to the Overall Abortion Debate. All in all, an aborted unborn human isn't going to "miss out", either positively or negatively, on what it doesn't understand.
Here again we can mention those small "growing" electronic machines, which potentially have futures of value as person-class machine-beings. Either their vandalizing must be accepted for nine months, or some other way must be found to let them acquire parts. Perhaps, most simply, abortion opponents should be required to pay for those parts!
60. "Abortion makes it more difficult for childless people to adopt a baby." FALSE, because politics and prejudice are what make adoption difficult; the world is over-full of adoptable babies, as proved by so many of them starving to death every year. If the politics regarding international adoptions was simplified, then anyone who wants to adopt will be able to succeed at it. And any who dislike the available choices will be exhibiting prejudice, such that they probably don't deserve to adopt.
In closing, it can be concluded that not only are abortion opponents wrong, they often distort the truth, exhibit prejudice, stupidly outright-deny various scientific facts, and could use their own logic to equate themselves with dead non-persons. Also, many lack compassion and/or are hypocritical and/or greedy, and/or cruel, and/or immoral, and/or unethical, and/or foolishly short-sighted, since their so-called "pro life" policy is actually genocidal, toward all of humanity, in the long run. Tsk, tsk!
As a thought-experiment, suppose you encountered this statement:
"God has Inspired me to write, 'Thou art gullible fools!'"
OK, actually you just did encounter that statement. Is it true? How do you know it isn't? If you ever in your life, even once, felt like a gullible fool, then might the statement be true, regardless of whether God Inspired it? That's the problem of the Bible (and all other Holy Works) in a nutshell! The Bible definitely contains things that cannot be literally true (the global Flood would have salt-poisoned every freshwater fish, and drowned every plant, on the planet, including olive trees, after 40 days of rainwater mixing with salty ocean water).
However, the Bible also contains some things that are definitely true (archaeologists have found the city of the Philistines, for example, so we know they actually existed, regardless of whether or not anything else written about them is true --and some of those writings aren't anything more than propaganda written by victors).
But much of the Bible is unproved. One thing that is known, however, is that, preachers directly benefited from promoting population growth by every means possible --including banning homosexuality, masturbation, and any type other of sexual activity that can't result in pregnancy. Even the tale of Onan could simply be a distorted description of someone who had, say, a heart attack or stroke during sex (quitting in the middle because he was already falling-down/dying).
Preachers got more tithes from the larger "flock", for one thing. And they also acquired the manpower to attack and defeat neighboring tribes, thereby increasing the territory controlled by the preachers. Best of all, since they wrote the Bible, they could blame God for that greedy policy!
fs That greedy policy has been followed by most descendant Religions for thousands of years. One result was, for centuries the Catholic Church was the richest organization on the planet, besides being one of most influential.
bibliotecapleyades.net/vatican/vatican_billions
Another aspect of that policy was horrific, because it caused wars whenever preachers disagreed with each other. Many Europeans finally said "Enough!" after the Thirty Years War, and emigrated to America (in the Middle East that greedy Religious policy is still going strong, benefiting the preachers and no one else). Today, at least in the USA, we have "Separation of Church and State" specifically to prevent that horrific policy from being implemented here. But, have you noticed how Religions these days are trying harder than ever to acquire political power here? It's not only about abortion, at all!
Can you be certain therefore, that God was the one who wanted the people to multiply? Even if God did, there are also associated statements such as "replenish the Earth". Well, why isn't it obvious that we have done that thing, when humanity these days is the something like the third-most populous mammal on Earth, after rats and mice?
stuff.co.nz/ ... /Humane-rat-trap-goes-global
Now, if you study what the Bible claimed God actually did instead of what the Bible claimed God said, you find a different policy. The claim is, God spent several "Days" Creating the Universe, and, afterward Created humanity, who thereby qualify as a sort of "God's offspring".
A straightforward "be fruitful and multiply policy" would, if followed by God, mean that humanity should have been created first. That policy is only about reproduction, see, and not about ensuring the offspring can survive afterward!
But God didn't do it that way, God followed a "be fruitful, then multiply" policy, in which "fruitful" refers to ensuring that future offspring could survive. We would do well to ignore the greedy Religions, and copy God's actions, in this matter. And if that means allowing abortions, because the parents aren't able to provide for offspring, so be it.
58. "Ban abortion and kill old people instead. Most of them are no better than babies --or even unborn humans-- at contributing anything to society, while most babies will grow up and become contributors to society. This also solves the Medicare and Social Security problems." BAD DATA, because while not stated, that argument includes the faulty assumption that unborn humans are people. Otherwise the argument might perhaps make some sense (kind of like applying "triage" rules in a major crisis), but as it is, it promotes killing people instead of killing mere animals.
59. "Abortion is wrong because it results in the loss of a future of value." IRRELEVANT AND UNBALANCED, partly because it involves "potential", and partly because it makes unwarranted assumptions about "value". Every time someone commits suicide, that person is declaring that there is insufficient value to be experienced in living any longer. Just because others disagree, that doesn't make those others right. For example, in prior centuries slavers certainly opposed the idea of their slaves committing suicide, yet they eventually gave up on enslaving Native Americans, because there were so many revolts and suicides (when escape was sufficiently blocked) that there just wasn't enough "future value" in it.
infoplease.com/ce6/bus/A0861124
Meanwhile, an unborn human lacks the brainpower to make any valuations whatsoever about the future (understanding that aspect of Time is another generic characteristic of personhood). There is again no reason to assume the valuations of others, about the future, is automatically superior to the valuation that any specific individual might make, based on available data.
For example, nowadays there are things like overpopulation and business-controlled resource restriction, to make future life far from valuable.
Here, since we are talking about an organism that only potentially can make a valuation about the future, we need to accept that the valuation it might make could be either positive or negative. So, like the Einstein/Hitler comparison made previously, this part of the argument becomes Neutral with respect to the Overall Abortion Debate. All in all, an aborted unborn human isn't going to "miss out", either positively or negatively, on what it doesn't understand.
Here again we can mention those small "growing" electronic machines, which potentially have futures of value as person-class machine-beings. Either their vandalizing must be accepted for nine months, or some other way must be found to let them acquire parts. Perhaps, most simply, abortion opponents should be required to pay for those parts!
60. "Abortion makes it more difficult for childless people to adopt a baby." FALSE, because politics and prejudice are what make adoption difficult; the world is over-full of adoptable babies, as proved by so many of them starving to death every year. If the politics regarding international adoptions was simplified, then anyone who wants to adopt will be able to succeed at it. And any who dislike the available choices will be exhibiting prejudice, such that they probably don't deserve to adopt.
In closing, it can be concluded that not only are abortion opponents wrong, they often distort the truth, exhibit prejudice, stupidly outright-deny various scientific facts, and could use their own logic to equate themselves with dead non-persons. Also, many lack compassion and/or are hypocritical and/or greedy, and/or cruel, and/or immoral, and/or unethical, and/or foolishly short-sighted, since their so-called "pro life" policy is actually genocidal, toward all of humanity, in the long run. Tsk, tsk!