[anasawad]

The elderly are workers. What do you think they did before they were old? :?:

Depends, there are tons of options to go with on what did they do before.

Sick people are workers, if I get the flu and have a couple of days of work do I magically cease to be a builder? :?:

There lots of types of sickness other than flu. Many can incapacitate people for prolong periods of time.

I am not sure what you mean by unable to work, do you mean soft rich people who have never tried it before, because a few years in the gulag cures a lot of things.

Same as said aboe, with a few more options.

Non working mothers? What an odd idea. Is bringing a child up not work? :?: They are workers. If a childminder is a worker and teacher is a worker why would a parent not be a worker?

Sure it is, just not in an economic sense.

Children and teenagers are workers in training (well apart from rich ones who are blood sucking parasites in training). When I was being taught how to set up a plumb profile on the side of some brickwork for the first time I was not actually producing anything but I was still working. Training is part of working.

Also depends.


You have ignored the entire first half of my previous post. hmmmm, interesting.

[Stormsmith]

Although I'm not a big fan of abortion, I have concluded: Abortion should be legal.

After reviewing stats on the incidents of abortion, vs incidents of teen parenting, i have also concluded most cases of abortion and for sex diseases could be radically reduced if birth control was behind the counter and free. This means both the pill and condoms. The cost of the programme would easily be covered by a reduction of medical expenses and through the cost of education etc.

Excellent post, Dr Lee

[Decky]

I am not sure if it is a language barrier issue, if you cannot see the economic value in children being bought up instead of living like animals then I don't know what else to say Anasawad. It is clearly work in the economic sense. As for the Balbeck thing part of the post. It isn't something that interests me.

[anasawad]

@Decky
Sure children has to be brought up well, but when in practice, mothers or fathers who stay at home to raise them are not the same as those who work on records.
Anyways, this is just a technicality. Never mind it.


And its not Baalbak thing. Its the fact that landlords who own vast patches of lands exist mostly in Europe, North America and some parts of Africa now.
These things no longer exists in most places around the world, and specially in Asia where most people of the world live.
As these vast lands were broken off to much smaller pieces over the centuries and the class of landlords is pretty much gone these days.
So simply, generalising about anyone to own a land is as that is simply wrong, because you're talking about killing off workers then. and that as you can see is contradictory.
And since in any communist revolution it would probably be in Asia to succeed since as said before thats where majority of the world population lives and thus cant succeed and spread if started else where.
This principle simply cant be applied. Maybe when it reaches Britain sure, but in Asia, a revolution wont go off the ground if it was based on such principles since that pretty much says to large portions of the regular everyday people that they'll lose everything they have and starve. Not gonna get much support there.

[Decky]

@Decky
Sure children has to be brought up well, but when in practice, mothers or fathers who stay at home to raise them are not the same as those who work on records.
Anyways, this is just a technicality. Never mind it.

It is not technicality at all. They do socially useful labour and thus they are workers.

And its not Baalbak thing. Its the fact that landlords who own vast patches of lands exist mostly in Europe, North America and some parts of Africa now.
These things no longer exists in most places around the world, and specially in Asia where most people of the world live.
As these vast lands were broken off to much smaller pieces over the centuries and the class of landlords is pretty much gone these days.
So simply, generalising about anyone to own a land is as that is simply wrong, because you're talking about killing off workers then. and that as you can see is contradictory.
And since in any communist revolution it would probably be in Asia to succeed since as said before thats where majority of the world population lives and thus cant succeed and spread if started else where.

The idea of non rich people owning land is bizarre. Do you know who owns the land here? The decedents of the Norman aristocracy who stole it from us in 1066. Maybe you don't think socialism will be attractive to Asians, go tell it to China or Vietnam, I will live in the real world instead.

[anasawad]

@Decky

It is not technicality at all. They do socially useful labour and thus they are workers.

In a state you look at records.

The idea of non rich people owning land is bizarre. Do you know who owns the land here? The decedents of the Norman aristocracy who stole it from us in 1066. Maybe you don't think socialism will be attractive to Asians, go tell it to China or Vietnam, I will live in the real world instead.

No, socialism is attractive to Asians, thats why its everywhere there.
However communism is more extreme, and the type of communism you invoke specifically is not attractive to most people. Thats why China moved away from it because its days were counted for the people so they had to turn to a better system, and thats why people in Vietnam are begining to hate
communism.
Because extremes harm the regular people.


non rich people owning land is i would say the only way to describe reality in large parts of Asia specifically central Asia.
Britain is different because Britain was annexed and practically is still annexed from its people by royalties with their armies. Thats the results of feudalism .
Central Asia and large parts of southern Asia are different. The people have been owning the land since millenias and formed many empires to maintain it, and even with colonialism, they still owned it and kicked off those who tried to steel it from them.
So Britain=/= Asia in this matter. Because if it does, you'd probably see famine again in many parts of Asia, with this time getting out of control.

[Patrickov]

Still murder and not justified.

This is too extreme. I myself is also strongly pro-life but at least I wouldn't immediately declare that "illegal".

For rape, the case depends. The victim is still a parent of the child no matter what, but she has a greater say on whether this child should be kept. If the child is born, she (or anyone else) might have to do the hard job of telling the truth and let the child learn that not all unions are voluntary, as well as one must deal with it. Bearing the child may also be seen as a victory of the rapist, so we must be careful.

Incest is only detrimental to the society by the genetic deficiency and the social cost it brings. I agree that no abortion is really necessary, but such parents may need to take up greater responsibility themselves, and there should be tighter restriction on their welfare application.

If the fetus poses a danger to the mother and you don't perform the abortion to save her, then you are murdering the mother. Period.

[Blondie]

Should abortion be protected as a reproductive right? or illegal as a right to life for the fetus?
Pro-choice: Right to choice. Supports it being up to the person.
Pro-life: Right to life for unborn. Supports the protection of the unborn.

I am strongly pro-choice. A fetus is not a baby until it can survive on its own outside the womb. So, until it's 24 weeks old, it is a part of the woman's body. Thus, it's her right to decide to have it snipped or not. Just like you would have every right to cut off your own pinkie finger, if you so desired.

[Stormsmith]

Perhaps you are guided by your passions. We should strive to be guided by the divine law.

1. We don't live in a theocracy, nor should we

2. 8 to 34 % of all pregnancies spontaniously abort. Going to hang God?

3. Appeals to God beg the question

[Donna]

1. We don't live in a theocracy, nor should we

2. 8 to 34 % of all pregnancies spontaniously abort. Going to hang God?

3. Appeals to God beg the question

1. Banning abortion does not mean that the political system has become theocratic.

2. Those are called miscarriages.

3. No, they do not.

[Stormsmith]

1. Banning abortion based on the divine law is

2. Either one. Gonna to hang God.

3. It is the very definition of "begging the question".

[Donna]

1. Banning abortion based on the divine law is

No. Plenty of countries do this and they don't have theocratic political systems. Using your logic the United States was a theocracy before 1973. This is absurd.

2. Either one. Gonna to hang God.

This is a very 'pantheistic' argument that displays a great deal of theological ignorance on your part. According to St. Augustine and St. Anselm, evil (including natural evil, i.e. sickness and death) is not decreed by God, but is given permission to exist in order to sustain free moral agency. With this in mind, we cannot hold God criminally responsible for miscarriages anymore than death itself, which is caused by Man's own corruption of what is known as original justice. The Angelic Doctor, St. Thomas Aquinas writes:

Nevertheless, if we look at the matter rightly, it will appear sufficiently probable that, divine providence having fitted each perfection to that which is to be perfected, God has united a higher to a lower nature in order that the former might dominate the latter, and, should any obstacle to this dominion arise through a defect of nature, God by a special and supernatural act of kindness would remove it. Wherefore, since the rational soul is of a higher nature than the body, we believe that it was united to the body under such conditions, that there can be nothing in the body to oppose the soul whereby the body lives.... Hence, according to the teaching of faith, we affirm that man was, from the beginning, so fashioned that as long as his reason was subject to God, not only would his lower powers serve him without hindrance; but there would be nothing in his body to lessen its subjection; since whatever was lacking in nature to bring this about God by His grace would supply. (Summa Contra Gentiles, Book IV, ch. 52)

3. It is the very definition of "begging the question".

It isn't. Theological claims use inductive reasoning to arrive at their conclusions. They aren't arbitrary.

[Drlee]

Perhaps you are guided by your passions. We should strive to be guided by the divine law.”

Speaking of individuals I completely agree. No persons should be compelled to violate their religious beliefs by being forced to abort their child.

But it is not that of which you speak. You are speaking of imposing your religious beliefs (that one ought not abort one's child) on another person. At that point your free will argument fails. Being prevented from sin is not the same as not sinning as a choice.

A person who is prevented from the occasion of sin can make no claim of righteousness because he/she did not perform the sin from which he/she was prevented in the first place.

Your Aquinas quote affirms this idea perfectly. He did not speak of society at all but rather of one man and his relationship with God.

Can the argument be made that God extends these individual, 'may I use the term commandments' to society in general? Not really. The words of Christ...if we are to be bound by them, never command behavior of nations or governments. Indeed, we are admonished:

Every person is to be in subjection to the governing authorities For there is no authority except from God, and those which exist are established by God

So is this wrong? Of course not. God used the governments of Rome and the Hebrew nation to bring about the death of His Son which we believe is necessary for the salvation of all people. So Paul is telling us that God established Rome and commanded it even at a time when Rome rejected His very existence. And, not to put to fine a point on it, to obey this government even when we know it is NOT behaving righteously.

Could I ensure that my child gets into heaven by locking it up, away from the occasion of sin? No. Does my banning abortion save a woman from the "sin" of abortion. Obviously. But can she, before the throne of God, claim any "merit" for not having an abortion? No. Of course not.

Is it possible that an abortion might be an act of love? I could make a very good case for it. I could make a case which maintains that a pregnant woman loves her "child" too much to allow it to be born without arms or legs. Or addicted to crack, infected by AIDS, and such.

I can understand and even agree that God does not like abortion. I can even more certainly understand that my God could easily forgive a woman for having one. Very easily.

[Stormsmith]

No. Plenty of countries do this and they don't have theocratic political systems. Using your logic the United States was a theocracy before 1973. This is absurd.

Although murder is listed as one of the ten commandments and is defined as illegal, we regard it as secular because we understand murder is wrong a priori.

This is a very 'pantheistic' argument that displays a great deal of theological ignorance on your part. According to St. Augustine and St. Anselm, evil (including natural evil, i.e. sickness and death) is not decreed by God, but is given permission to exist in order to sustain free moral agency. With this in mind, we cannot hold God criminally responsible for miscarriages anymore than death itself, which is caused by Man's own corruption of what is known as original justice. The Angelic Doctor, St. Thomas Aquinas writes:

Nevertheless, if we look at the matter rightly, it will appear sufficiently probable that, divine providence having fitted each perfection to that which is to be perfected, God has united a higher to a lower nature in order that the former might dominate the latter, and, should any obstacle to this dominion arise through a defect of nature, God by a special and supernatural act of kindness would remove it. Wherefore, since the rational soul is of a higher nature than the body, we believe that it was united to the body under such conditions, that there can be nothing in the body to oppose the soul whereby the body lives.... Hence, according to the teaching of faith, we affirm that man was, from the beginning, so fashioned that as long as his reason was subject to God, not only would his lower powers serve him without hindrance; but there would be nothing in his body to lessen its subjection; since whatever was lacking in nature to bring this about God by His grace would supply. (Summa Contra Gentiles, Book IV, ch. 52)

Shouldn't have picked two philosophers who are Aristotelian.

Augustine (354-430 CE) reversed centuries of Christian teaching in Western Europe, by returning to the Aristotelian Pagan concept of "delayed ensoulment." He wrote 7 that a human soul cannot live in an unformed body. Thus, early in pregnancy, an abortion is not murder because no soul is destroyed (or, more accurately, only a vegetable or animal soul is terminated). He wrote extensively on sexual matters, teaching that the original sin of Adam and Eve are passed to each successive generation through the pleasure generated during sexual intercourse. This passed into the church's canon law. Only abortion of a more fully developed "fetus animatus" (animated fetus) was punished as murder.

Anselm and, to a lesser extent, Aquinas agreed

It isn't. Theological claims use inductive reasoning to arrive at their conclusions. They aren't arbitrary.

Begging the question, presupposes the conclusion of an argumentry is assumed in the premise.

[Stormsmith]

Although murder is listed as one of the ten commandments and is defined as illegal, we regard it as secular because we understand murder is wrong a priori.





Shouldn't have picked two philosophers who are Aristotelian.

Augustine (354-430 CE) reversed centuries of Christian teaching in Western Europe, by returning to the Aristotelian Pagan concept of "delayed ensoulment." He wrote that a human soul cannot live in an unformed body. Thus, early in pregnancy, an abortion is not murder because no soul is destroyed (or, more accurately, only a vegetable or animal soul is terminated). He wrote extensively on sexual matters, teaching that the original sin of Adam and Eve are passed to each successive generation through the pleasure generated during sexual intercourse. This passed into the church's canon law. Only abortion of a more fully developed "fetus animatus" (animated fetus) was punished as murder.

Anselm and, to a lesser extent, Aquinas agreed





Begging the question, presupposes the conclusion of an argumentry is assumed in the premise.

[Donna]

But it is not that of which you speak. You are speaking of imposing your religious beliefs (that one ought not abort one's child) on another person. At that point you free will argument fails. Being prevented from sin is not the same as not sinning as a choice.

The state's prohibition of unlawful killing does not impinge on the free moral agency of Man.

A person who is prevented from the occasion of sin can make no claim of righteousness because they did not perform the sin from which they were prevented in the first place.

At no point have I claimed that such an individual is "righteous". Obviously they still have a sinful heart if the only thing preventing them from sinning is the physical enforcement of the law.

He did not speak of society at all but rather of one man and his relationship with God.

This is false.

The words of Christ...if we are to be bound by them, never command behavior of nations or governments.

The infallible teachings of Jesus Christ's Church do in fact demand that states, governments, polities, etc. obey God's law and uphold the dignity of life.

So is this wrong? Of course not. God used the governments of Rome and the Hebrew nation to bring about the death of His Son we are told necessary for the salvation of all people. So Paul is telling us that God established Rome even at a time when Rome rejected His very existence. And, not to put to fine a point on it, to obey this government even when we know it is NOT behaving righteously.

What this means is that the Christian does not engage in violent or otherwise revolutionary behaviour against governments on the premise that they are unjust. The context here is the historical conflict between Israel and Rome at the time.

This does not mean that the Christian suspends his efforts to influence unjust situations.

Could I ensure that my child gets into heaven by locking it up, away from the occasion of sin? No.

It isn't your prerogative in the first place. Read Augustine's De Civitate Dei contra Paganos for a better understanding of the role of state authorities in the history of salvation.

Does my banning abortion save a woman from the "sin" of abortion. Obviously. But can she, before the throne of God, claim any "merit" for not having an abortion? No. Of course not.

Abortion is prohibited in order to protect the life of the child, not to protect sinners from themselves.

Is it possible that an abortion might be an act of love? I could make a very good case for it. I could make a case that maintains that a pregnant woman loves her "child" too much to allow it to be born without arms or legs. Or addicted to crack, infected by AIDS, and such.

'Love' as it is understood here is irrational and emotionally subjective and thus it has potential for distortion or evil. In our fidelity to reason we love our children as they are (i.e. as God created them), we do not destroy them because they have inherited maladies from the creation.

I can understand and even agree that God does not like abortion. I can even more certainly understand that my God could easily forgive a woman for having one. Very easily.

Sure. The Church teaches that if one's contrition is sincere, then there is no sin that is not pardonable by God other than to despair in God's capacity for mercy. But this does not mean that the Christian is permitted to ignore the unjustness of abortion, let alone actively condone it.

[Donna]

Stormsmith, you are relying on the same distortion of Augustine as Nancy Pelosi did a few years ago, namely his commentary on Exodus 21:22. The teaching faculty of the Church takes into account that this verse clearly calls for the protection of the unborn and that Augustine did not intend to abrogate it: "If men fight, and hurt a woman with child, so that she gives birth prematurely (a live birth, yatza in Hebrew, thus not a miscarriage which would require the verb to be accompanied by some form of muth, meaning to die), yet no harm follows, he shall surely be punished accordingly as the woman's husband imposes on him; and he shall pay as the judges determine." Because we can say with certainty that Augustine was not abrogating the Mosaic teaching on the matter (or the teachings of the ancient church derived from the Didache, which explicitly prohibit abortion and infanticide), we must conclude that the attempt to use Augustine's writing in such a manner to justify abortion is clearly erroneous.

[Godstud]

Pro-Choice.

I am also pro-life(to a degree). Adoption should be encouraged, but in the end it's up to the woman, since she's the one in charge of her own body.

[Albert]

No, women in traditional society are a possession of men, thus the fruits' of her production are also a property of men. Therefore logically we decide if a woman is to carry a child or not.

A woman's body belongs to her husband.

[Donna]

No, women in traditional society are a possession of men, thus the fruits' of her production are also a property of men. Therefore logically we decide if a woman is to carry a child or not.

A woman's body belongs to her husband.

This is a very Mohammedan view. Our bodies belong to God.