Q&A: Abortions – an article you wrote
Abortions – an article you wrote
Question
In an article the Rabbi wrote, you said that the discussion should not be about a woman’s right over her own body, but rather about the single question of “what counts as life.” I agree with that claim, but I’m trying to understand what you would propose as “life.” I think the question “what counts as life” is a philosophical question, since it’s impossible to propose an experiment that would refute or confirm your thesis regarding what life is. This is a discussion about a socially loaded concept, but one that needs to be conducted on the philosophical plane. I’m also trying to understand why it wouldn’t be considered life from the moment the sperm meets the egg. Why does it matter if at the moment the fetus is not developed enough, but in another month it will be? Is that month enough to determine that it can be killed? After all, how does time function as a factor at all, when the only difference between a one-week-old fetus and a nine-month-old fetus is that the latter was formed nine months earlier, and nothing more than that?
Thank you 🙂
Answer
This is the sorites paradox. Indeed, there are those who for that reason also see wasting seed as a kind of murder. But common sense says that you cannot view a drop of semen as a living person, whereas a newborn baby certainly is. Exactly where the line is crossed? I don’t know how to give criteria, but others don’t know either. Therefore, out of doubt, it seems to me that one should prohibit it at any stage where there is doubt.
The difference between a one-week-old fetus and a nine-month-old fetus is not only time. There is a very significant developmental difference. In any case, between the black and white poles there is a large gray area, but that doesn’t mean there is no black and no white at the sides. It seems to me that from the moment the egg is fertilized in the womb, I would be concerned that we are dealing with life (this is a person lacking only time).
*that the fetus is fertilized in the womb, I would be concerned about life.
What fun it is to correct you 🙂