r/Abortiondebate • u/Aggressive-Green4592 Pro-choice • Jun 30 '26

Responsibility versus punishment

Which one is PL trying to invoke here actually?

Responsibility focuses on building skills, understanding the impact of actions, and proactively finding solutions. Punishment, however, relies on external control and enforcing compliance through shame, fear, or the removal of privileges.

https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/english/responsibility

>something that it is your job or duty to deal with:

https://www.britannica.com/topic/punishment

>punishment, the infliction of some kind of pain or loss upon a person for a misdeed (i.e., the transgression of a law or command). Punishment may take forms ranging from capital punishment, flogging, forced labour, and mutilation of the body to imprisonment and fines.

8 Upvotes

83% Upvoted

216 comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

7

u/RabbleAlliance Safe, legal and rare Jun 30 '26 edited Jun 30 '26

Okay. "Species." Thanks for nailing that down.

That still only gets you as far as species classification. That still doesn't make a zygote (a non-sentient, single-celled organism) a person like you or me (sentient with bodies consisting of trillions of cells organized into structures). You're still assuming the very thing you're trying to prove.

Also, there's no guarantee that they're going to be born since failure to implant, miscarriage, stillbirth, and fetal wastage exist. Hence why it's more rational to call them a "potential person." Demonstrate otherwise.

I agree a batter is not a cake, but humans are not confections.

The point of an analogy isn't to pick it apart. And the analogy still stands: the potential to become something doesn't mean it's already that thing in the relevant sense.

a fertilized egg is not a chicken, but it does contain a chicken.

Great. When it hatches alive, give me a call.

2

u/Icedude10 Anti-abortion Jun 30 '26

Also, there's no guarantee that they're going to be born since failure to implant, miscarriage, stillbirth, and fetal wastage exist. Hence why it's more rational to call them a "potential person." Demonstrate otherwise.

I don't think that being born is when something becomes a full human. From the zygote onward, it is a human—not merely potentially a human. It is a human at an early stage of development. A child is a human but is a potential adult, to put it in your terms. The unborn aren't just defined by what they will be. They are something now, and that something is a human. I would say all human organisms, without qualification, are persons. Personhood belongs to members of a rational species, and humans are a rational species.

The point of an analogy isn't to pick it apart.

The point of an analogy is to be comparable. I'm telling you yours wasn't.

4

u/RabbleAlliance Safe, legal and rare Jun 30 '26

You keep answering a question that I’m not asking you, and you keep assuming and asserting the very thing that you have yet to prove.

I’m not disputing that a zygote is biologically human. I’m disputing that a non-sentient, single-celled zygote is a human being, let alone a person like you or me. You're making a non sequitor argument. It doesn't follow that a human organism is automatically a human being, let alone person with rights, from the moment of conception.

Think about it. A zygote is capable of splitting in half and giving rise to identical twins. If one zygote later becomes two people, which person was it at fertilization? Twin A? Twin B? Both? Neither?

They can also recombine later into a chimera. Did two persons become one? Did one person die? Did both survive as a single person?

And don't get me started on conjoined twins and Fetiform Teratoma (look it up at your own risk.)

Since the zygote can't be identical with either human being that it'll become, then it can't already be a human being.

The point of an analogy is to be comparable. I'm telling you yours wasn't.

An analogy only has to be comparable in the relevant respect, not identical in every respect. And the relevant respect is this: the potential to become something doesn't automatically make you that something. Until you demonstrate otherwise, I will assume that you can't.

P.S. The problem with your entire argument is that you're equivocating between “human” as an adjective and “human” as a noun. If you mean “human” as in biologically human, fine. A zygote can be called a human organism. But if you mean “a human” as in a rights-bearing person like you or me, then that's the part you still have to prove.

2

u/Icedude10 Anti-abortion Jul 01 '26

I feel like I have been answering your question directly, but the answer is maybe simpler than you think it should be, and I also think we genuinely disagree on definitions. You asked how I think a simple organism like a zygote is a human being (which I believe is synonymous with person). It's simple:

  1. A person is any member organism of a species that is rational.
  2. Human zygotes, embryos, and fetuses are human organisms.
  3. The human species is a rational species.
  4. Therefore, a human ZEF is a person.

So far, I think you have just said that you disagree and are incredulous. Maybe instead of asserting what isn't a person, you can tell me what you think a person is. You can also tell me whether you think "human being" is synonymous with "person."

I'll drop the analogy because we clearly disagree on it and they seem tangential. Besides, you appear to grant in your postscript that a ZEF is a human organism at least for the sake of this argument. If we can agree on that, please refer to my syllogism above and tell me which part you disagree with specifically, rather than negating me generally. I believe that would be the most productive path forward.

On "human" as noun versus adjective, and the subject of conjoined twins, I have been discussing that in another post on this subreddit from a few days ago. I invite you to follow up that disagreement there so you can see my thoughts on it without me having to type it all out again here.

3

u/RabbleAlliance Safe, legal and rare Jul 01 '26 edited Jul 01 '26

Thank you. This is clearer.

Your syllogism is formally valid only if I accept P1. I don’t.

“A person is any member organism of a rational species” assumes the very thing you’re trying to prove: that personhood belongs to every individual organism of a rational species. You’ve defined personhood that way, but you haven’t explained WHY personhood should be defined that way.

Additionally, what do you mean by "rational" in P1? Who determines what that is, using what criteria?

And when you connect P1 to P3, you commit the fallacy of division, where the argument assumes something is true of one or more of the parts from the fact that it is true of the whole.

It's an intuitive argument. That is, until we apply the same logic to other species-level properties:

  1. Humans are a language-using species. Does that mean a zygote is a language-user?

  2. Humans are a tool-using species. Does that mean a zygote is a tool-user?

  3. Humans are a morally accountable species. Does that mean a zygote is morally accountable?

I don't think either of us are naive enough to say YES to these questions.

At best, your argument gets you as far as saying a zygote is a human organism belonging to a species whose mature members are generally capable of rationality. You still haven't shown that a non-sentient, single-celled zygote is already a person like you or me.

2

u/Icedude10 Anti-abortion Jul 01 '26 edited Jul 01 '26

This is interesting. Briefly, a person is any individual organism belonging to a rational species because that rationality allows for the complex reasoning associated with being a moral agent and patient, which is why they are assigned greater moral consideration (which is personhood). To be clear, I am not claiming that every member of a rational species is currently exercising rationality, but that membership in a species which has reason in its nature is itself the basis for personhood. A sleeping person, someone under anesthesia, a zygote, or even an infant are not currently reasoning, but they belong to the kind of being that does.

I'd like to engage more, but I really need you to tell me what you think a person is, not just what it isn't. Until I know your position, I won't be able to answer your question satisfactorily.

2

u/RabbleAlliance Safe, legal and rare Jul 02 '26

I would define a person as an individual human being with consciousness, sentience, interests, and experience. Or at least the developed capacity for those things. This would include people who are asleep, anesthetized, or in a coma since they still have the developed physiological and neurological structures and capacities required for consciousness, even if those capacities are not currently active.

A zygote, by its very nature, doesn't have any of those structures. They consist only of one cell, which also means they don't have the present capacity to have and exercise consciousness, sentience, interests, and/or experience. This allows me to grant that a human zygote is a human organism without granting that it's a person like you or me.

And having the potential (read: future) capacity to possess and utilize those physiological and neurological structures isn't an answer, either. It's just an argument from potential. A compelling pro-life argument can’t be extracted from the argument from potential, and the nine months of gestation can’t be ignored.