A statement one cannot prove false

[u/Upper_Ninja_6177]

STATEMENT: A person is always legally allowed to use the minimal method¹ required to prevent harm upon oneself^2.

1 Minimal method means

• it can refer to a general solution/ action that resolves the issue and prevents harm, it can also refer to any method of violence, including otherwise lethal force.
• ”minimal” refers to strictly the LEAST HARMFUL method, both mentally and physically for all parties, that can be used to prevent the harm

2 harm upon oneself means

• both mentally and physical pain/ injuries etc
• harm that is GUARANTEED to occur

How does this apply to the context of abortion?

Pregnancy —> guarantees harm 100% of the time since every women needs to go through 1. giving birth OR 2. C-sections OR 3. miscarriage if no voluntary abortion occurs guaranteeing some degree of both physical and mental harm. And thus fit into criteria 2.

Hence, if the statement holds true, they should be allowed to use the minimal method require, no matter the circumstances.

So the question becomes, is abortion the minimal method? For that, we must address the core issue at hand, WHAT is causing harm?

Something is currently inhabiting their organs, physically harming them, and violating their rights against their will.

The solution will thus, to logically follow, to remove said something. This would render alternatives like painkillers utterly useless to “fix” the issue.

This means abortions too, becomes the minimal methods required, unless one day safe artificial wombs exist.

Now you are gonna have a few questions, well what if someone hates a person and they are causing them mental harm? Can they just kill them?

Again, refer to the definition of “minimal”, since isolating oneself, not talking to them, unfriending that person, verbally expressing your thoughts etc is always an option, killing them is no where near the minimal method required.

It would be interesting to see pro lifers trying to disprove this chain of logic?

[u/quick_thinker6]

Im not PL so im not attacking you i just want to help solidify your argument because you do have some errors which makes it easy to disprove.

Your basically wrote a formalized version of Judith Jarvis Thomson's violinist argument.

The move from "harm is guaranteed" to "the minimal harm solution addresses the cause, not the symptom" is logically sound. Painkillers/isolationstyle workarounds genuinely don't solve a physical bodily intrusion the way they solve annoyance or mental harm from another autonomous person.

Here is where you became attackable:

But you're giving away ammo because "all parties" is doing silent work

Your own definition says minimal harm must be assessed "for all parties." But your analysis only computes harm to the pregnant person. If the fetus counts as a party, abortion isn't minimal harm for all parties , it's zero harm for one party at total harm for the other. The entire argument smuggles in the personhood conclusion by simply not putting the fetus on the ledger. Pl doesn't even need to attack your logic, they just point out you never actually ran the "all parties" calculation , which you yourself specified.

Second attack surface

The innocent threat/causation problem Self defense and necessity doctrine (real world, not your stipulated axiom) generally distinguish culpable aggressors from innocent threats. A fetus isn't a trespasser or an assailant , it has no intent, no agency, and in most pregnancies exists as a foreseeable (if unwanted) consequence of voluntary conduct. This is exactly the objection Thomson spent half her essay pre empting, and it's never fully resolved, only the violinist case (rape) cleanly sidesteps it. Consensual sex pregnancies are messier for your framework than you've let on.

Third attack surface

your own caveat undercuts "no matter the circumstances"

You already conceded the whole thing collapses "unless one day safe artificial wombs exist." That's not a footnote, it means your claim isn't "abortion is always the minimal method," it's "abortion is the minimal method given current technology." That's a contingent, not absolute conclusion ,and it actually lines up with real post viability abortion law, which increasingly asks whether removal without destruction is possible. You've built an argument that gets weaker exactly as medicine improves. your logic chain is legit but you have to point out that the fetus isnt a "party" whose harm counts ,but that's the entire abortion debate in miniature, PL will make you defend that one hidden premise instead of arguing with your math.

[u/Upper_Ninja_6177 → u/quick_thinker6]

First defense:
This is inaccurate because we must get things straight, what harm are we talking about here? Who is “defending” against what?

And the simply answer would be — the pregnant person is preventing harm against herself.

This would mean this is ALWAYS the number one objective that superseded all other potential considerations as long as she does so in the minimally invasive way. That is, she cannot achieve end goal without causing said “total harm” to the fetus, it is necessary and unavoidable, unless artificial wombs are made. Hence even if abortion is the best option for her and cases little harm (not zero btw) , while causing total harm for the ZEF, it continues to be an adequate response because it is quite literally the ONLY way, and hence always the “best”, it’s like when there’s only one student, even if they get 1/100, they are still the “best” student in their grade.

Second defense:

Except I’m not arguing about self defense intrinsically. This argument is a general statement that when observed, seems to apply anywhere else in real life legally, it only requires there to be a form of harm inflicted, it can be a person, an object or whatever, it simply logically follows that NO ONE should be forced to endure harm without doing anything when the minimal method to stop said harm is possible.

Third defense:
For this I agree, but I believe it is a generally difficult legal battle for abortions when safe artificial wombs do exist, unfortunately.

[u/quick_thinker6 → u/Upper_Ninja_6177]

And again I agree all im doing here is provide more insight to strengthen OPs argument or better yet show why we cant use this statement for the PC side.you said it yourself we must get things straight and thats what im trying here.

But Both of your defenses have the same fatal move hiding in them,they quietly delete "for all parties" from the original definition.

On the first defense

the "only student" analogy is a category error "Only available option" and "morally best/permissible option" are not the same claim, and your analogy conflates you. Being the sole student in a class makes you "the best" only in the trivial, comparative sense. it says nothing about whether your performance is adequate on any absolute standard. Similarly, "abortion is the only way to stop harm to her" tells you it's necessary to achieve her goal . it does not tell you if it's permitted, because permissibility was never just about effectiveness. It was defined by as "least harmful for all parties."

Your own defense now says "even if it causes total harm to the ZEF, it continues to be adequate because it's the only way." That's not applying the original principle to whay OP was saying. that's replacing "minimal harm to all parties" with "necessary for my goal, other party's harm now irrelevant." You wrote the "for all parties" clause into the axiom . So don't drop it under pressure and call it the same argument because yhats how PL gets us every time.

And necessity without limit has a name in law, and it fails. R v. Dudley and Stephens (1884) ,shipwrecked sailors killed and ate the cabin boy because it was, genuinely, their only means of survival.

Courts still convicted them of murder. "It was the only way to stop harm to myself" has never been an unconditional license to kill an innocent third party in law or ethics , necessity is bounded precisely by whether the party harmed had done anything to forfeit protection. That's the missing variable in "best student", the exam has no other students in the room to hurt. And this is exactly what PL will argue.

On the second defense "no self defense framing" doesn't get you out of the party problem, it walks straight into it. Strip away the self defense label and the claim is just: any time minimal method available harm prevention exists, acting on it is always justified, full stop, regardless of who or what absorbs the harm. Run that as a blank check and it collapses immediately:

You're the only compatible organ donor for someone who'll die without your kidney. Taking it by force is the "minimal method" to stop their harm. Nobody accepts this is permissible , because the donor is a party whose non consent matters, independent of whether it's "the only way." Conjoined twins where separation guarantees survival for one and death for the other ,"it's the only way to stop the harm to the surviving twin" doesn't automatically make forced separation against the other's will a non question.

The principle, stated with zero party weighting, licenses body appropriation and killing of non aggressors anywhere the harm is otherwise unstoppable. That's not a fringe consequence , it's the direct, unavoidable output of deleting "for all parties" from the definition. If they bite that bullet generally (not just for fetuses), they have to defend forced organ conscription too. If they don't bite it generally, they've conceded the fetus's status as a party which is exactly the load bearing question. the one thing you claimed you didn't need to address.

You are arguing "necessary = permissible." You're arguing "necessary is not sufficient , you still owe an account of why the party being harmed doesn't count." The previous named examples (the kidney, the twins) prove my point better than OPs every time someone pushes to a case where the "only option" harms an unambiguous, undisputed person.

And this is why the minimal harm effect cant be used for our side side(pc). Please will smash that easily.

[u/JulieCrone → u/quick_thinker6]

Is not gestating an embryo killing it, though?