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From: bird@gcc-bill.ARPA (Brian Wells)
Newsgroups: net.abortion
Subject: Re: The Status of the Fetus and Its Rights
Message-ID: <343@gcc-bill.ARPA>
Date: Fri, 4-Oct-85 13:31:02 EDT
Article-I.D.: gcc-bill.343
Posted: Fri Oct  4 13:31:02 1985
Date-Received: Mon, 7-Oct-85 05:01:12 EDT
References: <429@cmu-cs-spice.ARPA> <1546@pyuxd.UUCP> <322@gcc-bill.ARPA> <1765@pyuxd.UUCP>
Reply-To: bird@gcc-bill.UUCP (Brian Wells)
Organization: General Computer Company, Cambridge Ma (Home of the HyperDrive)
Lines: 55

In article <1765@pyuxd.UUCP> rlr@pyuxd.UUCP (Rich Rosen) writes:
>>>First, there's a big difference between being tied to a machine for
>>>a small subset of life functions and being tied to A HUMAN BEING for
>>>all life support.  Are the machine's rights in violation because the
>>>person is "using" it?  Of course not.  Are the woman's rights in violation
>>>if an entity is "using" her without her consent?
>
>> 	Her rights are not in violation if she put the entity there.
>
>She "put"?  How quaint.  Do you anti-choicers ever tire of the "you fucked
>around, so suffer" argument?  I have.  It's irrelevant to the issue (you
>don't like what she [and apparently someone else?] did, so you feel
>that "consequences" should be "suffered") and pointless.  If I write a
>program and it has a bug in it and it ravages through everyone's files
>and starts destroying them all, am I (and is my installation) obliged to
>let it run because "I submitted the job"?  Or can we take steps to stop
>the program from completing?  The ball is in your court to show why the
>woman doesn't have that same option, and you have continuously (as a group)
>failed to do so.

	No, Rich, I don't tire of the argument.  And I am not as unsympathetic
and insensitive as you imply.  I believe in preventing unwanted pregnancies
not aborting them.  I also believe in helping people with the alternatives
to abortion, because I believe the fetus is alive and I value that human
life.  
	To answer your questions, you are not obliged to let that program
run, you may take steps to stop the program from completing.  A woman is
not a computer, a baby is not a program, a developing fetus does not go
through a woman's body destroying her parts.  Furthermore, the computer
is not alive, and by means of backup media, the system can be restored to
the state prior to when your program went around doing the destruction.
I contend that the program/computer-baby/woman analogy does not fit for
the above reasons.

>> 	Why is autonomy so important in determining if it is alive?  I have
>> never heard this before reading your postings.  And when I use scientific 
>> reasoning I come to the conclusion that the fetus is alive.  I would like
>> to see some source references to back you up because I have only seen you
>> make these claims.
>
>Why is metabolism important in determining whether something is alive?
>Or respiration?  Or reproductive capability?  Is this the Brave New World
>in which if you don't like the definition of something you just change
>it around?  Read up on viruses, my friend, and find out how they are
>distinguished from living things.
>-- 

	All I asked was a simple question.  I am still waiting for an
answer.  I did not change any definitions.  In fact I didn't even give
a definition.  I will read up on viruses if you read up on fetuses and
see how they are distinguished from viruses.

						Brian Wells
____________________________________________________________________________
James 1:5