What would we use? Existence of brain waves? Existence of neurons? Those both would include most animals.
>like recognition of self, by which you prioritize e.g. a person over a dog
Babies cannot recognize themselves in the mirror until around 1.5 years old. Several types of animals can recognize themselves in the mirror: elephants, dolphins, primates, mice, some birds, some fish.
If we justify the value of babies by saying that they'll have certain abilities in the future, that same thing could be said about a zygote.
>> A sperm isn't a young human; it isn't growing into an adult human. An egg isn't a young human; it isn't growing into an adult human.
>But they are? The only reason they try to fuse together at all is in service of the growth of a human.
Sure the only reason they fuse is in service of the growth of a human. However, before fusing, a sperm only has half the DNA of a human. A sperm's DNA doesn't define a human, and isn't sufficient to grow into a human, and thus cannot be called a young human. Same for an egg. A zygote has the full DNA of a human, which defines a human, and thus the zygote can grow into a human, and thus the zygote can be called a young human.
>>Just because they're nearby each other doesn't make them a human life.
>Right. By the same token, I don’t think a single cell constitutes a “human life”
That's not the same token. I was saying that 2 (or 3) things being nearby each other doesn't make them 1 entity. You're talking about whether a single entity has certain abilities or not. Those are 2 different discussions.
Relating this back to abortion, existence of brain waves is a higher bar than existence of neurons is a higher bar than fertilization. If I could convince you to care about either of those instead, then sure let’s run with that.
The question with abortion is “at what point are we concerned that killing something could be unethical.” For the criteria to include some or even most animals isn’t a terrible thing; we probably shouldn’t kill animals willy nilly.
>>like recognition of self, by which you prioritize e.g. a person over a dog
>Babies cannot recognize themselves in the mirror until around 1.5 years old. Several types of animals can recognize themselves in the mirror: elephants, dolphins, primates, mice, some birds, some fish.
>If we justify the value of babies by saying that they'll have certain abilities in the future, that same thing could be said about a zygote.
If I recall correctly, I was explicitly talking about how we might go about evaluating and comparing ethical worth beyond the developmental scale relevant to abortion, and I said this was just hypothetical. I wasn’t arguing recognition of self is relevant to abortion.
>However, before fusing, a sperm only has half the DNA of a human. A sperm's DNA doesn't define a human, and isn't sufficient to grow into a human, and thus cannot be called a young human.
I don’t consider the “completeness of DNA” philosophically relevant. The sperm-egg system, both considered together, does have a complete set of DNA. Why does the physical separation change the fundamental ethical nature of interfering with the process? If I have a sperm and egg very close to each other, about to merge, and place a barrier between them, why wouldn’t this be as ethically horrifying as immediately destroying the product of their merging?
>I was saying that 2 (or 3) things being nearby each other doesn't make them 1 entity.
Let’s agree my argument and analogy were poor. Why does entity-ness matter to ethics? When you say entity, are you referring to a physical body, or to a unified consciousness? Is a rock an entity? What about an amoeba?
Do you believe that killing a baby is morally worse than killing an innocent dog or elephant? And what is the reasoning for that belief?
Do you believe that killing an innocent adult is morally worse than killing a baby? And what is the reasoning for that belief?
I believe that killing a baby is worse than killing an innocent dog or elephant, because human life has intrinsic value significantly greater than non-human animal life.
I believe that killing an innocent adult and a baby are equally bad, because all people have equal value.
>I don’t consider the “completeness of DNA” philosophically relevant. The sperm-egg system, both considered together, does have a complete set of DNA. Why does the physical separation change the fundamental ethical nature of interfering with the process?
If they're physically separated, we don't have an entity that could be called a young human. We don't have an entity that contains a plan for how to grow into an adult.
After they've joined, we do have an entity that could be called a young human.
>If I have a sperm and egg very close to each other, about to merge, and place a barrier between them, why wouldn’t this be as ethically horrifying as immediately destroying the product of their merging?
No. In the same way that it's not horrifying if some other sperm zoomed in real fast and fertilized the egg and blocks off the first sperm. Before fertilization, there is no entity that could be called a young human.
>Why does entity-ness matter to ethics?
There's no known way a single person can be composed of 2 physical entities. So I say that when there are 2 physical entities, there isn't a single person composed of the 2 of them.
Another line of reasoning is why should there be a moral difference between a sperm and egg very close to each other and a sperm and egg miles apart? I don't see any reason. We would have to consider every possible pair of sperm and egg in the world as a person, which doesn't make sense.
>When you say entity, are you referring to a physical body, or to a unified consciousness?
Physical body. There's no known way a person can be split across 2 bodies. So a sperm and an egg can't be a person.
>Is a rock an entity? What about an amoeba?
Yes and yes.
It has to be. We need some interval of time to experience anything. Continuity also relates a lot to agency. Most people want to keep experiencing over dying.
> Consciousness throughout life takes many forms. A newborn, an adult, someone with dementia, people with various other types of mental illnesses. It makes it hard to define consciousness.
Consciousness is a very low bar honestly. Every one of the people mentioned would possess it in some form or another. You could use a different term if this one is too fuzzy.
> The fact that continuation of consciousness cannot stand by itself, it needs the other factor: humanity.
I think this is more a reflection of our current world than some perfectly ethical one. Since we’re humans, we’re always going to value our own offspring more than a dog. That’s deeply instinctual stuff. That doesn’t mean dogs aren’t richly conscious animals deserving of significant ethical consideration, but we’re not unbiased neutral observers in the matter. I’m just trying to come up with a consistent ethical approach to a narrow issue; for situations where two conscious things are being compared, you might be able to denote specific capacities, like recognition of self, by which you prioritize e.g. a person over a dog, but this is all very hypothetical and I don’t think we need it for the abortion debate.
> A sperm isn't a young human; it isn't growing into an adult human. An egg isn't a young human; it isn't growing into an adult human.
But they are? The only reason they try to fuse together at all is in service of the growth of a human.
> 96% of biologists say human life beings at fertilization. Not when the sperm and egg are nearby each other.
They’re not talking about personhood or something. They’re talking about something fundamentally classificatory, like asking “what makes a species separate from other species.” The usual answer is that they can’t breed with each other, but there are lots of kinda fuzzy exceptions and gray areas with that. To word it better, if I said “Presume the goal is to determine when, in the study of individual organisms, such organisms can be thought to come about. Tell me what stage in the development of a human comes first,” the answer would need to be around the time of fertilization because the question presumes the frame of biological study, the existence of an initial stage, etc.
> If the 3 independent beings were sitting in a room, would we call them 1 merged being? No. They're still 3 independent beings. Same with the sperm and the egg. Just because they're nearby each other doesn't make them a human life.
Right. By the same token, I don’t think a single cell constitutes a “human life”, with all the connotations that phrase carries. If it’s most appropriate to call that single cell a human life, then clearly human life isn’t the thing that determines ethical consideration. My fixation on the sperm + egg -> zygote transformation is a consequence of your belief that the left term isn’t morally significant but the right term is. I think everything that we care about is the same for both terms. Non-conscious, relatively simple mechanically compared to an adult, no nerves or brain, no awareness of the world, no hopes or dreams. The zygote lacks everything essential to personhood at this stage other than its human origin, which it shares with the sperm and egg.