Life begins at conception - when does personhood?

[Knee]

I'm solidly pro-choice too, but the idea that an undeveloped baby should be considered on the same level as a tumor, to paraphrase, doesn't seem right to me, as the tumor has no chance to develop "personhood" later on, and an undeveloped baby does.

Per personal experience I'm going to have to argue with your 'babies born with severe problems' assertions. My brother was born at 7 months and weighed around 14 ounces (if I recall correctly.) He had to be in an incubator and have all kinds of stuff done to help him survive, but he is now a healthy (although very small for his age,) happy Star Wars fanatic of seven years.

[mswas]

Originally Posted by Knee

I'm solidly pro-choice too, but the idea that an undeveloped baby should be considered on the same level as a tumor, to paraphrase, doesn't seem right to me, as the tumor has no chance to develop "personhood" later on, and an undeveloped baby does.

Per personal experience I'm going to have to argue with your 'babies born with severe problems' assertions. My brother was born at 7 months and weighed around 14 ounces (if I recall correctly.) He had to be in an incubator and have all kinds of stuff done to help him survive, but he is now a healthy (although very small for his age,) happy Star Wars fanatic of seven years.

Yeah, my sister was born about the same time and weighed 21 oz.

[Illuminati Primus]

Originally Posted by Knee

Per personal experience I'm going to have to argue with your 'babies born with severe problems' assertions. My brother was born at 7 months and weighed around 14 ounces (if I recall correctly.) He had to be in an incubator and have all kinds of stuff done to help him survive, but he is now a healthy (although very small for his age,) happy Star Wars fanatic of seven years.

To be clear you're misunderstanding my point - I'm not saying that any level of medical need upon birth renders someone an untermensch, I'm questioning whether a child born so early that even with the best medical care there is little certainty whether it'll live (five or six months) has successfully crossed the threshold into personhood. Fine, it's now outside the mother's body, but it's ability to survive without massive help is effectively zero.

A child born early who needs assistance? Well that's what medical science is for, but at the same time a child born at 7 months can potentially survive without help, it's just far less likely. I'm also speaking as a child born breach via caesarean section due to wearing my umbilical cord around my neck like a fashion accessory. If it weren't for good obstetrics I wouldn't be here to ask any of this.

squarepeg - I think you've voiced the social darwinist questions that I didn't want to explicitly state, but which I guess come logically with my OP. A member of my family was born severely mentally handicapped and had to be in care for the whole of his life before dying quite early in his 40s. My grandmother looked after him until she was too old and infirm to do so, then he had to go into state care as the rest of the family wasn't equipped to be able to do so (and, really, didn't want the responsibility). Sure, it's callous to disregard someone like this for reasons beyond their control, but I definitely find myself asking the question of whether such people should be born in the first place. Of course the next question is what should be on that list of mandatory abortionable disorders? I'm not sure I want to have to decide that.