Why All the Arguments?

"there is nothing "above" instincts. Either something is innate inside of you, and thus an intinct, or it is not."

but we do at least agree that the moral law is not an instinct, the moral law can not tell us what instinct to side with while being the instinict itself

however I disagree about the moral law not being something innate inside of us, I am not saying we do not learn the moral law, what I am saying is we know it is true once learned.

For example

you would not punch a man because he sat in the window seat of a airplane when you wanted to sit there... Because you believe that to be wrong..... However if you believe the moral law to be something we learn to be right and do not know it to be truth, you can have no qualms with the man who punches you because you had the window seat.

If the moral law is something we learn to be right and not something we inately know to be right, we can have no qualms with the germans for gassing the jews if they did not know it was wrong, but I believe that 99.9% of human have a universal moral law that once they have learned from their parents etc they inately know it to be true and that intuitive knowledge that the moral law is true is above instinct

the babies in the woods may or may not develop a advanced moral law, but they would have a basic moral law, they may view killing each other as ok but killing the leader as wrong, we are only civilized becaue we have deveolped that moral law to be closer to what we know inately to be true, that no human being is in the right to take another human beings life in other words it is not decent behaviour to kill each other, the babies do not kill the leader and are uncivilized, we have developed what both the babies and we know to be inatley true, that killing human beings is not decent behavior.

Right let us sum up what I have reached thus far.

1. In the case of stones and trees and such things, i.E what we call the laws of nature may not be anything more except a way of speaking, when we say nature is governend by certain laws, we only mean that nature does infact behave in a certain way, the laws may not be anything real, anything above the facts themselves.

2. But in the case of man we see that this will not do. The law of human nature, or of right and wrong must be something above and beyond the natural facts of human behaviour, in the case of human beings beside the actual facts, you have something else – a real law which we did not invent but inatley know to be true and know we ought to obay but often do not.



I want to consider what this tells us about the universe we live in. Ever since men were able to think they have been wondering what this universe really is and how it came to be here. And very roughly, two views have been held throughout human history.

First, there is what is known as the materialist view. People who take this view think that matter and space just happen to exist and always have existed, nobody knows why and that the matter of behaving in certain fixed wayshas just happened by a sort of fluke to produce creatures like ourselves who are able to think. By one chance in a billion billion something hit our sun and made the planets and by another billion billionth chance happened to produce the right chemicals to create and sustain life.

Then by another billion billionth chance this planet became warm enough for life to develop and by another long series of chances creatures like ourselves developed.

The other view is the other view, according to it, what is behind the universe is more like a mind than anything else we know. That is to say it is conscious and has purposes and prefers one thing to another and on this view it made the universe partly for purposes we do not know but partly in order to create creatures like itself. - I mean like itself to the extent of having minds.

Please do not think that one of these views was held long ago and the other has gradually taken its place. Wherever there have been thinking men both views turn up… and this also… we can not find out which view is correct by science in the ordinary sense. Science works by experiments, by observing how things behave. Every scientific statement in the long run however complicated it looks really means something like “i pointed the telescope to such and such part of the sky at “3.20 am on jan 15th and saw so and so” or “ I put so and so in a pot and heated it to such and such a temprature and it did so and so”

do not think I am saying anything against science I am merely saying what its job is. The more scientific a man is there more I believe he would agree with me that this is the job of science and a very useful and neccisary job it is too.

But why anything comes to be there at all, and wether there is anything behind the things science observes – something of a different kind – is not a question science can deal with.

If there is “something behind” it will either have to remain altogether unknown to men or else make itself know in some different way.

The statement that there is no such thing and the statement there is such a thing are neither something science can make. And real scientists usually do not make them. It is usually the journalists and popular novelists who pick up a few odds and ends or half baked science from textbooks who go in for them. It is basic common sense, supposing science became so complete so as to know everything within the entire universe, would not the questions of why the universe was there at all and what the purpose of the universe is still remain?

Now the position would be quite hopeless but for this…

there is one thing and only one thing in the entire universe we know more about then what we could learn from external observation… that one thing is man!

We do not merely observe men, we are me. In this one case we have so to speak “inside information” we are in the know. And because of that we know that men find themselves under a moral law which they did not make but inatley know to be true and can not quite forget it even if they try.A law which they feel they ought to obay and do not.

Notice the following point:

anyone studying man from outside as we study electricity or cabbages, not knowing our language and consequently not able to get any inside knowledge from us, but merely observing what we did would ever get the slightest notion that we had this moral law.

How could he, for his observation would only show what we did, the moral law is about what we ought to do. In the same way if there is anything above and beyond the facts in the case of stones or the weather we by studying them from the outside could never hope to discover it.

The position of the question is like this then…

we want to know whether the universe simply happens to be what it is for no reason or wether there is a power behind it that makes it what it is , since that power if it exists would not be one of the observed facts but a reality that makes them, no mere observation of the facts can find it.

There is only one case in the universe where we can find out if there is anything more than the observed facts. Namely our own case… human beings.

And in that one case we find there is.

Or put it the other way around…

if there was a controlling power outside the universe, it could not show itself to us as one of the facts inside the universe – no more than a arcitect of a house could be a wall or a fireplace in that house. The only way we could expect it to show itself would be inside of ourselves as an influence or a command trying to get us to behave in a certain way….. And that is just what we do find inside ourselves. Surely this must arouse our suspicions?

In the only case where you can expect to get an answer the answer turns out to be yes. And in the other cases where you do not get an answer either way, you see why we do not get an answer.

Suppose someone asked me, when I see a man in a blue uniform going down the street leaving little paper packets at each house, why I suppose that they contain letters? I would reply “because whenever he leaves a similar little packet for me I find it does contain a letter” and then if he objected “but you’ve never seen all these letters which you think other people are getting” I would say “of course not and I shouldn’t expect to, because they are not addressed to me, iam explaining the packets I am not allowed to open by the ones I am allowed to open”

it is the same about this question – the only packet I am allowed to open is man. When I do, especially when I open that particular man called “myself” I find that I do not exist on my own, that indeed I am under a law; that somebody or something wants me to behave in a certain way. I do not of course think that I could get inside a tree or a stone I should find exactly the same thing, just as iu do not believe everyone in the street gets the same letters as I do. I should expect to find that a stone has to obay the law of gravity, where as in my case the sender of the letter merely requests that I obay the law of my human nature. He compels the stone to obay the laws of its stoney nature, but I should expect to find that there was a sender of letters in both cases, a power behind the facts, a director, a guide since that is what I find in my own particular case.

So thus far all I have got to is a “something” which is directing the unviverse and which appears in me as a law urging me onto do right and making me feel responsibe and uncomfortable when I do wrong. I think we have to assume it is more like a mind than it is like anything else we know – because after all the only other thing we know is matter and you can hardly imagine a bit of matter giving instructions… but of course it need not be very much like a mind, still less like a person. I will in my next post see if we can find anything more out about it, but a word of warning…. There has been a great deal of “soft soap” about this perculiar thing we call god in the last 100 years or so. That is not what I am offering, you can cut all that out

note- in order to keep this short enough I mentioned only 2 view, the materialist and the religious view, but to be complete I ought to mention the “in between” view called “life force philosophy” aka “ creative evolution” or “ emergant evolution”

the wittiest expositions of it comes in the works of bernard sshaw but the most profound one in those of bergson. People who hold this view say that the small variations by which life on this planet “evolved” from the lowest forms to man were not due to chance but to the “striving” or “purposivness” of a life force. When people say this we must ask them if when they say “life force” they mean something with a mind or not. If they do then a mind bringing into existence life and guiding it to perfection is really a god and their view is identical to the religious view if not then what is the point in saying something without a mind “strives”or has “purposes” this to me seems fatal to their view.

So you dont think terrorists are bad and wrong, since they grew up in a different culture or at least you cant blame them, right?



But they know just as well as you do that blowing people apart is wrong, the moral law dose not change enough to say it is entirely different, it is only in very small matters where it changes through culture and even then it is usually only very very slightly.


" you instinctively know that it is wrong and gross to eat your fellow humans. "

i dont instinctivly know it is wrong and "gross" as you put it, I instinctivly know I am hungry, starving and if I do not eat I will die, I instictivly have a desire to preserve my own life, if I am in a crash on a mountain top far from civilization and food and I see the pilot of the plane dead,

instinctivly I may want to eat his flesh, I would not instictivly know it to be wrong, infact the moral law probably would tell me it is right to side with my instincts and eat the flesh of the pilot to preserve my life.

However the moral law would not allow me to kill the pilot in order for me to sustain life, but if he was already dead, hey its ok

now say we are in a community of cannables, we do not kill those inside the community to sustain our life, but those outside are fair game. The cannible knows that it is wrong to kill their fellow human beings, they do not view the outsiders as human beings, they differ on a matter of fact not a matter of morality.

Look at it this way.

A starving man in saudi arabia may steal a bowl of rice to feed himself, the saudi culture teaches that all stealing is wrong and the man will probably have his hands cut off. But the people of saudi arabia including the judge who sentanced him to have his hands cut off does not really believe that the man is wrong for doing what he did, infact giving the same situation he would do the same himself.

In our culture a starving man may go into a shop and steal a packet of rice in order to feed his family, he too will probably be prosecuted for shoplifting to the full extent of the law, his penalty is much less harsh, but he is still found guilty because our culture teaches all stealing is wrong too.... However both you and I will agree that, that man was not in the wrong and given the same situation we would do it ourselves.

So people of both cultures are judging what that man has done above what they have been taught by their own culture and both judge the man as innocent, thus both peoples must be judging the men with a. R.E.A.L moral law, a moral law that is above cultural teachings.... Both the people of saudia arabia and our culture would find it equally deplorable if a wealthy man stole a bowl of rice from a poor man even if tax is legal :wink

"cannibals on the other hand have no moral problem at all with consuming human flesh. In every day life, not just survival situations. "

a canmbal may eat human flesh with garlic dip (if he had it) as a treat, he may gorge himself on human flesh, but the instinctive reason he is eating human flesh is to stay alive, he may like the taste in everyday life, but the reason he is eating human flesh is the very reason we are eating pizza or hamburgers... To stay alive.


"we know, but again, survival situation versus everyday life. "

everyday life is a matter of survival

"oh? How do you know that they don't kill those inside of their own community?"

well I dont to be quite honest, I am not much in the know about cannables, it only comes from what I have read, I have never met a cannable and I couldnt rightly say weather they ever existed I only take it on authority of books etc.

"maybe not."

if the cannible does exist and if he dosnt eat those inside his community as these books have told me, then I should say he does.

"outsiders as in other tribes of cannibals or actual foreign explorers?"

lol, both.

I should think that

a tribe would hunt b tribe for supper, and tribe a would not see tribe b as anything more than animals and vice versa especially seeing as actual foreign expolrers would not often be on the menu... Those poor canibles... Bless!

No you see the canibles moral law sides with the herd instinct, he will not kill and eat his own, however he does not view the tribes around him as part of his herd, thus he does not view them as equal to him, he views himself and those in his herd as "human beings" or whatever cultural term a canible has for those in his own herd, however he only sees the people of other tribes.... And forgin explorers as less than those inside his own herd and gives them "animal" status.

Now you and me see all homosapians as "human beings" because we see the human race as one big herd, the canible believes it is wrong to kill and eat human beings - those inside his herd.... Just as much as we see killing and eat human beings as wrong - inside our herd - its just that our herd is the whole human race, his is only his tribe, never the less, his morality is not different to ours. Its just the cannible and us differ on a matter of fact - that of wether our herd is a tribe or hte human race.

In that sense one could say a pro choicer was canabalistic in that he or she does not view the homosapian in the womb as part of the herd, that is to say in our cultural term a "human being" but a pro choice person would not advocte the killing of a born homosapian because they see those as part of the herd "born" or "human beings" thus the moral law of pro choice is the same as pro life, we just differ on the facts.

I'd also like you to answer a question I posed to you ages ago:

who do you think should detrmine personhood, if anyone at all? If no one, then you cannot even declare yourself a person.

What the heck are you talking about "a bad rock and a bad tree" what difference does it make and then we go onto football, you may not like it but I do.
Survival situations are always different!
Terrorist situations are different, it is like wartime situsations, it is survival, it is him or me, we lost a lot of our men in virt nam because their were children, some still in diapers carrying a gun, bigger than they were that were taught not to kill kids so they were killed by these kids, was that right?
Just because I was brought up in a certain way does not mean that I will stay that way after what I have seen and done.
Their are a lot of things that you can eat out ther besides humans.
This has nothing to do with abortion debate!

If a baby is not wanted, if a baby well be brought into hell and cannot stand a chance at a quality of life with or without the mother tobe what good is it? I am a firm believer that it is also dealt with quality not just quantity, especially now-adays, with the drugs, abuse sexually or otherwise, lack of love, ffood and the basics. It is scarry enough just sending them to school, heck, look at .Columbine and others and the way kids dissapeer, just playing at the park or going down the street, you cannot watch them every second, heck, they even have predators on the computers. Yes, it is very scarry, no matter how well you raise them.

"not really. Not for a middle-class american. For a tribe person on the sarengheti? Yes. But for you? No. "

well no, but you see that is why we eat the kfc to stay alive, even if we dont think about it, middle class american has to survive as well, death may not be on the cards if we miss a meal but if we dont eat we will eventually die.... So even if we are "rich" enough to not feel that death is at our door, we still eat to survive.

"we view the fetus as sub-human? Yes, because it factually is. Just look at it"

and looking at the elephant man, was he sub human too...Ok hang on just a second before this goes down a path I dont want it too... Naming and blaming.

Lets look at it this way... If the cannable believes he is eating an animal and not a human we can not lay any blame on him, but if he knows that those people from other tribes were the same as him we would say he was wrong even if he said "ah but they dont have a bone through their nose like I do, they are not "human" so I can eat them" we would say but the bone in your nose does not change the fact they are "human beings" living creatures of the homosapian species.

If the cannable knew this fact that they were infact members of the same species, the same herd we would know that the cannable was only making the exuse that "they dont have a bone through their nose" because he likes to eat human flesh.

The nazis, if they did not know the jews were members of the same species, were human beings we could not blame them we should pity them, but if they were only "dehumanizing" them and making excuses so that it furthered their political or idealistic ends, we would most deffinatly say they were wrong.

Same too, if a person in favor of abortion did not know that the unborn child is infact a living member of the homosapien species, we could not lay blame at their feet for killing fetus' however if they knew that they were living members of the homosapian species we would know that when they say "they dont look the same" "they arnt born" "the law does not recognise them as persons" "they are only a clump of cells" are only exuses to further their own reasons " I want to finish college" "i want to be married before I have children" "i am not ready to be a mother"

now I am not saying you know that unborn fetus to be a living member of the homosapien species, I am not saying any pro choice person on this site knows that to be true, I am not here to lay blame or tell people this or that, it is something that each individual pro life and pro choice person needs to contemplate... Is it a living member of the homosapien species or not and if it is how am I going to respond on the issue of abortion and if it is not how am I going to respond to the issue.

We can make as many exuses, "a child whos family wont love them once they are born should be terminated" "my contraception failed" "it doesnt look the same" "it is not self aware" etc - these are things one should look at once we have determined if that fetus is a living member of the homosapien species or not.

I am not talking about the morality of abortion because morality is not the issue at all since we have at last determined that people have the same morality, but differ on facts.. So the the real issue of abortion is fact, not opinion, not theories... Fact.... Either I am wrong in saying the fetus is a living member of the homosapien species and thus abortion is right, or you are wrong in saying it is not a member of our species and abortion is wrong, you are no more immoral than me, I am no more moral than you, we both have the same moral law within us, we only differ on the facts.

I am not going to spout this or that at you about why I believe the fetus to be a member of the homosapien species, I could talk until I am blue in the face and it wont make any difference... And at the end of the day what have I got to gain even if I could prove you right or wrong????

A big head, a "told you so" - not my style!

No the ball is firmly in your court - are you making excuses or do you really believe the fetus is not a living member of the homosapien species

and if you dont believe it, do you have all the facts?


"what are you basing your morals of considering a fetus part of the "herd"

well since you have asked, here goes.

First off not "morals" but statement "what am I basing my statement" I am making a statement about something I believe to be a fact, I am not saying a fetus is morally part of the human race, I am saying it is factually part of the human race... An animal can not be morally part of the human race, either it is or it is not.

"i base the assesment that the embryo is not part of the "herd" on science. "

well I have to disagree with you there, you see I feel you are basing your assesment (approprate word to use) that the embryo, fetus etc is not a member of the human race on the fact that it doesnt look like a born child or an adult human being, I would hardly call that an assesment based on science.... Look at your statment

"but do we view the fetus as sub-human? Yes, because it factually is. Just look at it; at early enough stages it has gills, webbed feet, and a tail. "

you see you are basing what a human being is off you own ideas (remember its not about ideas but facts) about what humans should look like.

Then follows something that at first glance may seem to support that idea is scientific

"embryos go through mini-evolution, from single-celled organism to fully developed baby by 9 months. "

you use the term "evolution" to support your notion that looks make you human... First off evolution is not a scientific fact, but a scientific theory (remember this is about facts not theories)

2nd that embryo is a human embryo it will not develop into a dog because it is human, therefore the fact that the embryo is still in development does not determine its species or if it is alive, for all it is developing in a "evolution" kind of way, the fact is its species is determined from the very outset and thus a member of the homosapian species...

So to answer your question I base my assesment that the embryo fetus ect is part of the homosapian species, part of our herd... On a particular branch of science that deals with what consitutes one specices against another species...Biology

biologic human life is defined by examining the scientific facts of human development. This is a field where there is no controversy, no disagreement. There is only one set of facts, only one embryology book is studied in medical school.

The more scientific knowledge of fetal development that has been learned, the more science has confirmed that the beginning of any one human individuals life, biologically speaking, begins at the completion of the union of his fathers sperm and his mothers ovum, a process called "conception," "fertilization" or "fecundation." this is so be-cause this being, from fertilization, is alive, human, sexed, complete and growing.

Is this being alive? Yes. He has the characteristics of life. That is, he can reproduce his own cells and develop them into a specific pattern of maturity and function. Or more simply, he is not dead.

Is this being human? Yes. This is a unique being, distinguishable totally from any other living species, completely human in all of his or her characteristics, including the 46 human chromosomes, and can develop only into a fully mature human.

Is this being complete? Yes. Nothing new will be added from the time of union of sperm and egg until the death of the old man or woman except growth and development of what is already there at the beginning. All he needs is time to develop and mature.

Below are testimonies of some of the leading biologists before a senate sub commitie on abortion

i have learned from my earliest medical education that human life begins at the time of conception . . .I submit that human life is present throughout the entire sequence from conception to adulthood and that any interruption at any point throughout this time constitutes a termination of human life . . .

I am no more prepared to say that these early stages [of development in the womb] represent an incomplete human being than I would be to say that the child prior to the dramatic effects of puberty . . . Is not a human being. This is human life at every stage.

Dr. Alfred bongioanni, professor of pediatrics and obstetrics at the university of pa.

It is an accepted fact that the life of any individual organism reproducing by sexual reproduction begins at conception... No experiments have disproved this finding, so it is scientifically correct to say that an individual life begins at conception... And that this developing human always is a member of our species in all stages of its life... Our laws, one function of which is to help preserve the lives of our people, should be based on accurate scientific data.

Micheline mathews-roth, professor at harvard medical school

the beginning of a single human life is from the biological point of view a simple a straightforward matter - the beginning is conception. This straightforward biological fact should not be distorted to serve sociological, political, or economic goals.

Dr. Watson bowes, university of colorado medical school

this is the first time I have found myself having to argue the inarguable. I have never encountered in my reading... Anyone who has argued that life did not begin at the moment of conception... There has been no argument about these matters.
We can say unequivocally that the question of when life begins is no longer a question for theological or philosophical dispute. Theologians and philosophers may go on to debate the meaning of life or the purpose of life, but it is an established fact that all life, including human life, begins at the moment of conception.

Mayo clinic geneticist hymie gordon

“to accept the fact that after fertilization has taken place a new human has come into being is no longer a matter of taste or opinion ... It is plain experimental evidence…there is no new revelation we have done in front of you. We are just telling you what is taught in every genetics course in every country... When people say this has metaphysical connotations they are perfectly correct... But the scientific fact that it is a human being cannot be disputed.”

geneticist jerome lejeune, professor of genetics at university of paris

“the exact moment of the beginning of personhood and of the human body is at the moment of conception.”

dr. Mccarthy de mere, medical doctor and law professor, university of tennessee

“to say that the beginning of human life cannot be determined scientifically is utterly ridiculous.”

dr. Richard v. Jaynes

“conception confers life and makes that life one of a kind…”
“to deny a truth [about when life begins] should not be made a basis for legalizing abortion.”

dr. Landrum shettles, sometimes called the “father of in vitro fertilization”


the subcommities conclusion:

“physicians, biologists, and other scientists agree that conception marks the beginning of the life of a human being - a being that is alive and is a member of the human species. There is overwhelming agreement on this point in countless medical, biological, and scientific writings.”


erie the question is not whether the fetus is a child. This is beyond dispute!

The question is, what value are we going to place on this child?

And what excuses can justify killing the child?


Looks? The fact he is not born? The fact contraception failed?

Some fetus' m/c, it is not our fault. Again, in abortion, you are not killing a child or a baby it is a z/e/f/, you know that it is not a baby until the process of birth, this has been proven tooo many times and I do not care if you believe in nature or not....Survival is a very good excuse and reason for abortion!
You might be eating a dead human being or killing a human being if nothing else is available and eating him or her or an animal, it is survival. You do not have to be a cannible just a someome that is surviving, I do not remember the name of the book or the movie a few years back about an airplane crash and these people were surviving.