What is a Human Being (what does it really mean)

A short riff about “human being”.

This is also about abortion.  The other day, I heard respected conservative lawyer, David French explain why he opposes the right to abortion and his basis is more or less that from conception (or soon after) the clump of cells are a human being (or person - the difference is meaningless here) and we can’t kill a human (without a good reason?).  

But if so, the concept of human being is so broad as to be useless here. Of course David is a lawyer and lawyers use debaters word games all the time.  They use a word, get agreement concerning something, then they take a different instance of that word - pretend it is the same and play a game of gotcha.   They never go back and ask if they should revise either their definitions or their premises.  

Here is what happens with abortion.   The anti abortion advocate gets us to agree that we should not kill a human being.  That to kill a human being is murder.  Of course we all agree (we will leave out a discussion of when it is ok to kill).  Then they say that the unborn child is a human being.   We still agree to a point.   Then they say something like there is a heartbeat at… so many weeks.  That too is a human.  We are soon agreeing that abortion is wrong for the entire course of pregnancy.   

But if  “human being” has any meaning here, we surely can agree that there is a large difference between an adult (so a father and mother raising a family) and the unborn child.   There are even differences between the fetus, the baby, the child and the adult. 

So when does the fetus incur the rights of a person?   And why do we believe they have rights at all?   

Resorting to the magic of the moment life begins, I suggest that the baby at birth does have the rights of a person - at least of a child.  They don’t have the rights to make their own decisions for themselves - in fact they can’t.  And since lines are hard to draw, we might as well concede that they have similar rights even before birth, at least as soon as they can survive outside the womb.   

The Supreme Court in Roe v Wade put forth the notion of viability.  This fairly reasonable idea has been attacked by debaters who note that medicine now has the capacity to treat very premature babies such that the point of viability is not meaningful, that with better medical technology, it continues to move earlier and earlier.  But even 50 years after Roe - the point of viability may have moved from 24 weeks to 23.  Fetuses at 22 weeks may be viable with luck and phenomenal care, but no one in medicine who studies the issue thinks it will move further.  The sort of care premies require at 24, 23 or 22 weeks is of a sort that is virtually unimaginable for any other medical condition.  By the way, at 28 weeks the premie has much better chances.  

And what about the soul?   

If a newborn has a soul….  what meaning does that have.  In Christianity there is the notion of the soul bearing the stain of sin.  But sin, except for original sin, is believed not to be possible until the child has the ability to form an intention to sin.  And please don’t bring up the absurd concept of original sin.   

So whatever soul a fetus may have is what?  Nothing really.  

A different way to look at abortion would be to dismiss any notion of a sky wizard (god) and to look instead at the different attitudes toward killing human beings and how we react to the act of killing.  Most societies recognize killing a human after birth as wrong except in war, self defense or as punishment for a crime.  Those who murder are ostracized and even executed.   but abortion is different.  Women have always sought abortions, seeking herbs and such to end their pregnancies.  Midwives helped with pregnancies and provided herbs to abort in the era before medical doctors took over.  Even Ben Franklin included a recipe for early abortion in one of the books he published.  

My conclusion:  the viability limit seems fair as a time before which a woman can end her pregnancy at will.  But even after that - if there is a condition that is a danger to the woman, we should allow doctors to treat as they and the woman choose.  Some may defer care till they give birth.  Others may not take want to risk their life.  

I have known only a few women who told me that they had an abortion.  It was never an easy decision (per their account).  A few eventually had a successful pregnancy resulting in a child.