Posts tagged argument

isaiah-50-7:

Even the video games that children play reflect the culture of death in which we live. Why should we be shocked if the kids who grow up playing those games turn into killers? 

It’s been studied and proven so many times that video games don’t cause violence and aggression that there are so many sources and I had trouble picking ones to link.

I can’t believe that people still think that.


Relevant: bread kills

zombiefuton:

Back in the day, I worked night shift at Dunkin Donuts. It was an easy job, nothing much really happened, everything was pretty slow. There would only be one other employee working with me. Needless to say, we would end up talking for 8 hours with nothing better to do. A man by the name of John was hired, and I was the lucky girl that got to work with him. 

In Connecticut, it’s pretty rare to get a straight up creationist, but here he was. A lot of people hated his preaching, but I enjoyed the banter. An athiest liberal versus a right wing born-again working together at Dunkin Donuts. That should have been a show. 

In any case I remember one day he explained the Watchmaker Analogy to me. For people who don’t know what that is, you’re probably a smart person (or at least not dumb.) The watchmaker analogy is a half-assed argument about the existence of God. If you see a watch, you know it didn’t appear out of thin air, someone obviously had to make it. Therefore, we exist, so someone obviously had to make us. This guy was so into this theory, he explained for a good half hour about it to me. He claims that was the moment he went Christian.

I let it go, because I really don’t like ruining people’s lives, but it’s hard to bite your tongue with something like this. Let me put this Watchmaker Analogy in a different way:

OK, let’s say you see that watch. You can’t REALLY say that the watchmaker MADE it. He assembled a bunch of metal bits but where did those come from? Maybe China, maybe Thailand, maybe the good ol’ USA. But it certainly didn’t come from the watchmaker. Now, where did the metal come from? Where did the alloys come from? How long have they been around? If you think the watch come exactly from the watchmaker, you’re missing at least 500 steps of the process. 

Now, watches haven’t always been watches. They first started out as sundials, then progressed into candle clocks and water clocks. Then there were pendulum clocks, mechanical clocks, and then clocks started branching out into different categories of clocks, there were astrological clocks, atomic clocks, metal Nickleback sports clocks, you get the idea. There was an EVOLUTION of clocks in order to get to that watch. There are different CLASSIFICATIONS of clocks that ADAPTED in order to fit our needs. 

OK, I made 2 points, and here’s the last one. How did that watchmaker become a watchmaker? He obviously wasn’t born all-knowing. He had to learn from someone. Someone much wiser about clock-making passed his knowledge to him, and before that, that person learned from someone else. They all COPIED INFORMATION from other watchmakers, every once in a while tweaking the information a little more, which is why we aren’t all walking around with sundials on our wrists. 

So, there you have it, I just disproved this stupid analogy in 3 different ways. I regret not spilling it on this guy (he’s a born-again…they’re not..stable…) but maybe if you find a crazy christian and they say something about it, you will know exactly what to say. It’s fun to disprove idiots.

“There is no evidence for evolution, it’s al-“

emilye:

opinionlizard:

emilye:

“The woman’s consent was in the act, not in the result.”
So I can only assume that, by demonstrating this method of thinking, you also believe that someone gives consent to be injured in a in a car accident? I mean they did commit the act of getting into a car.

“embryo is, a member of the race Homo sapiens”
And?
Tumors, parasitic twins, etc.

”Calling a human mere “tissue” or a “clump of cells” are not pet names,”
“[calling] a developing infant a worthless clot of tissue does not make it the truth”
Good thing I’m not calling it “tissue” or a “clump of cells,” eh? I like using medical terminology, like embryo.
You brought this argument of “IT’S NOT A CLUMP OF CELLS” into the ring, not me. I do not like calling things something they’re not.

“if you don’t care what an embryo is, then of course you can justify it’s disposal”
It’s not a matter of me caring what someone views an embryo as; it’s a matter of what the pregnant person views the embryo they’re carrying is.
There’s a difference between fact and philosophy. We have the facts about abortion, such as that embryos are not comparable to newborns (for many reasons) and that abortions are safe procedures. The rest, the phiosophical part of the debate, is out of fact’s hands. It’s up to the individual, because philosophical views vary from person to person. This is why choice (not being forced to abort, or not being forced to keep) is important.
To some people, and unwanted pregnancy is a burden to lessen. To others, it’s a life change that must be endured. It depends on the situation and your mindset, but because the facts tell us what we need to know, it’s up to the individual to choose. The already born and established person already experiencing what it’s like to live is always more important than an embryo. Always.

“But thanks for taking the time to demonstrate your fundamental divorce from reality.”
lol

——————————-
 

So I can only assume that, by demonstrating this method of thinking, you also believe that someone gives consent to be injured in a in a car accident? I mean they did commit the act of getting into a car.

lol, I dare say most people who get in a car know and accept that there is risk of an accident, which could potentially result in them being injured or even killed.    Isn’t that why we wear seat belts?  To help lower the risk of injury and death in the event of a crash?  Because people understand the risks associated with driving or riding in a vehicle.

“embryo is, a member of the race Homo sapiens”
And?
Tumors, parasitic twins, etc.”

Are you implying that the fact that embryos have human DNA is irrelevant because tumors also have human DNA?  A flake of dandruff has human DNA too, but surely you are aware of the difference.  A zygote has marked cellular differentiation. At fertilization the egg itself becomes asymmetric and the first two cells of the zygote are distinct, one going on to form ectoderm and mesoderm, the other to form the endoderm.  If we’re using differentiation and organization as the criteria, then it is clear that from fertilization on these traits are present. The first cell of you was not a tumor (or a flake of dandruff for that matter).

Good thing I’m not calling it “tissue” or a “clump of cells,” eh? I like using medical terminology, likeembryo.
You brought this argument of “IT’S NOT A CLUMP OF CELLS” into the ring, not me. I do not like calling things something they’re not.

Well, thank you for that.  But you also said that you accept and approve of a woman determining that her pregnancy can and will be whatever she decides it is and can be terminated for whatever reason she pleases.  If you agree that an embryo is not just a clump of cells, shouldn’t you disagree with them when they wrongly label their embryo as a clump of cells?  They could call it a unicorn if they wanted to, but that doesn’t justify the death of a human.

It’s not a matter of me caring what someone views an embryo as; it’s a matter of what the pregnant person views the embryo they’re carrying is. 

Again, just because someone wants to fictionalize what their embryo is, that doesn’t change the truth or give them the right to destroy another human. View that genetically-unique offspring/child/baby/fetus/embryo as you want, but a rose by any other name would still smell as sweet.

There’s a difference between fact and philosophy. We have the facts about abortion, such as that embryos are not comparable to newborns (for many reasons) and that abortions are safe procedures. 

No one claims that an embryo is developmentally the same as a neonate.  It is a fact that an embryo is a distinct human being, it’s simply at an earlier stage of development than the neonate.  Stage of development does not determine humanity nor intrinsic value.  A newborn is as much of a human as an adult, the immaturity of the newborn does not make it less valuable than the adult.  To the prolife person, it’s not that the embryo or fetus are the same as an adult human being.  He or she merely has a right to exist and to not be deliberately harmed by others.  

The problem with saying a woman’s will is absolute and can utterly trump anything else is that it gives the newly conceived entity a variable value, depending upon many things that each woman formulates in her own way.  If each woman has a different idea of what her unborn developing child is, according to his or her own personal vision and private values, then when a human deserves to right to live is merely a matter of opinion based off what that one other person thinks.  This turns the physical body, knowable by science, into a trivialized form of raw material.  Then being part of the human race is not morally relevant anymore; it’s like saying “we can kill these humans, but not those humans.”  Some aren’t fortunate enough to meet the right criteria according to the individual setting them and they are demoted to non-persons even though they are biologically human beings.

Use the “reblog as text” button next time, your post is very confusing because of it’s sloppy layout. It makes it very difficult to respond to, just an fyi.

“Isn’t that why we wear seat belts?  To help lower the risk of injury and death in the event of a crash”
Isn’t that why people use birth control? To help lower the risk of pregnancy from sex??
Just like how injuries from car accidents still happen even when you’re wearing seat belts (and how they will still need medical attention even though they were wearing seat belts), pregnancies while using birth control still happen (and people will still need reproductive health care regarding prenatal care or abortions).

“wouldn’t you disagree with them when they wrongly label their embryo as a clump of cells”
This is honestly one if your arguments? Poking around at what a pregnant person wants to call their embryo? Because they can call it whatever they want and I really don’t care one way or they other. It’s their embryo, not mine, and they can do what they want with it.
Anything with cells can be called a clump of cells. You’re a clump of cells, I’m a clump of cells, the carrot I just ate was a clump of cells. If someone wants to call their embryo a clump of cells, they’re welcome to if they want to, I don’t really care. I don’t have the time or patience that you do to split hairs about what someone wants to call their embryo.

“someone wants to fictionalize what their embryo is, that doesn’t change the truth or give them the right to destroy another human.”
Change the truth? What truth? That it’s an embryo? That it’s alive? That it has human DNA? Because we all know that. I see no attempt change in truth here.

Most of your arguments can be countered by my following:

Considering that an embryo not comparable to born humans (or even other born animals, none the less) by any measure other than “what it can be in the future,” an unwanted embryo does not have personal rights and can be removed if the person pregnant with it does not want it there. There will always be people who WANT to reproduce and have kids (meaning their pregnancies are wanted), so population continuation regarding removing some unwanted embryos is not an issue. Abortion has been leagal since the 70’s; it’s very obvious that this is not an issue.

People (in general) will always have sex because it’s not meant for only procreation anymore, and to try and get some people to stop having sex just because they don’t want kids is unrealistic, especially since that’s why birth control was invented. Birth control can fail, but that doesn’t mean don’t use it. Abortions will always be needed because some people either cannot carry a pregnancy, cannot afford a pregnancy or child, or they simply do not want to carry a pregnancy or have a child.

If there was a way to remove the embryo without killing it, that’d be pretty cool. But with current technology we cannot, so removal, and by proxy death of the embryo, is the option we have right now unless you have a better idea on how to stop the pregnancy without killing the embryo, because some people will need their unwanted pregnancies to go away before it results in a child.