From: no_offline_contact@example.com
On 2026-02-15 2:53 a.m., Adam H. Kerman wrote:
> Rhino wrote:
>> On 2026-02-14 9:01 p.m., Adam H. Kerman wrote:
>>> Rhino wrote:
>>>> On 2026-02-14 4:30 p.m., Adam H. Kerman wrote:
>>>
>>>>> A lawyer commenting repeated my line that a woman who spontaneously
>>>>> aborts in the first month or two of pregnancy can be charged with
>>>>> murder. This has massive implications for the clinical treatment of
>>>>> women in ordinary and extraordinary circumstances.
>>>
>>>>> The wall of separation between church and state has been breached.
>>>
>>>>>
>> https://apnews.com/article/puerto-rico-923-governor-signed-la
-pregnancies-9d2f1fb895a17511a920cc42d480668e
>>>
>>>> I think you could make a case for that breach to have happened in Roe v.
>>>> Wade. The Supremes essentially drew a dividing line saying abortion was
>>>> fine at such-and-such a point in the gestation cycle; the Puerto Rico
>>>> decision just moved the line.
>>>
>>> I'm not seeing your point. Blackman was criticized at the time for both
>>> the arbitrary time ranges, which were not based on landmarks in
>>> gestation, and his notion of when viability might occur, which he just
>>> made up. Viability was a moving target anyway, given advances in
>>> technology.
>>>
>>> Where's the religion?
>>>
>> It seems to me that the Supreme Court justices ruled as they did at
>> least partially out of their own beliefs about when life began, which
>> would surely be informed by whatever religious beliefs they had.
>
> Everybody agrees that the embryonic being is alive. Please distinguish
> between life and human life.
>
If a fetus in the womb is not human life, what is it then? A dog? A
chicken?
>> You
>> don't really believe that their decision was entirely on the basis of
>> statute law do you? Aren't we all informed at least in part by whatever
>> we were told when we were young by clergy, schools, and parents?
>
> Well, if you want judicial activism, that's one way to get it by
> ignoring the Constitution, statutes, common law, and precedent.
>
> Big chunks of the decision was judicial activism, but human life
> beginning with live birth was from common law.
>
I think that's because until very recently - within my lifetime - it was
almost unheard of for a premature infant to survive. It probably made
sense to set the beginning of life as the point at which the baby
emerged from the womb since that was the practical and readily
measurable point at which life was visible.
New medical technologies and techniques have made it possible for
significantly premature babies to survive now so the question of where
life begins is not so clear cut any more.
We've had a comparable situation with death. Again with my lifetime,
we've changed the definition of death from when the heart stopped to the
point where brain activity ceases because a heart stopping is not
necessarily the end of life any more.
>>> The arguments didn't change the centuries-old legal concept that human
>>> life begins with a live birth. In probate law, a yet to be born child
>>> does not inherit from the father if the father died between conception
>>> and birth.
>>>
>>> That human life begins at conception is a religious concept. Do you care
>>> to comment about how women's health care could be affected generally?
>>
>> I have trouble with the idea that life begins at a live birth. I think
>> life begins at conception. I don't say that from the point of view of
>> religion - I'm not religious - it just seems obvious from the point of
>> view of biology. That thing that comes out of a mother's womb alive at
>> 36 weeks was not dead the day before it came out. It wasn't a tumour
>> either; tumours don't have lives of their own.
>>
>> There's obviously no guarantee that a baby will be born since babies can
>> die in the womb of natural (or unnatural) causes or that it will have a
>> good life but there is a more than reasonable chance that a conception
>> will lead to a live birth if uninterrupted by disease or human
>> intervention. Whether a baby was wanted is a different matter of course;
>> people ignorant about birth control or too lazy to use it can bring
>> unwanted children into the world. I have no problem with such children
>> being put up for adoption. I'm not as sanguine about killing them.
>
> Morning after pills, which prevent implantation, have been falsely
> redefined as abortificants in order to try to make them illegal. They
> absolutely are not.
Really? They appear to have the exact same goal - ending a pregnancy -
but simply have a different technique for accomplishing that end.
> Not all safe forms of birth control are readily available.
>
Agreed. Some may not even be legal in some jurisdictions. I remember
talking to a work colleague who'd grown up in the former Yugoslavia and
she went back to visit friends and family there. She went out with some
of her female friends and was astonished to find that she was the only
one in the group who'd never had an abortion. Tito's Yugoslavia
apparently outlawed contraceptives but freely allowed abortion.
But the difficulty of obtaining contraceptives seems a rather weak
argument to me. There remains a reliable way to prevent conception:
abstinence. I know there is a strong whiff of Christian fundamentalism
associated with that word but religious beliefs are not needed to
realize that an unwanted pregnancy is not a good idea for a given woman.
She may practice abstinence simply because she is too young or
financially insecure or too busy with work or other obligations; those
are all perfectly rational reasons even for a rabidly atheistic woman.
>> I think the consequences for women's health are very well understood at
>> this point. It would be pointless for me to regurgitate them here.
>
> They absolutely are not. Sometimes health care will result in the loss
> of the foetus even though that is not the primary intent. That's now
> been criminalized. An ectopic pregnancy is now human life, but there's
> nothing to do with the embryo as it cannot become a human being. It's
> been starved despite some cell division taking place outside the womb.
> This is life ending for the woman but now she cannot be saved.
>
Yes, I know about ectopic pregnancies and agree that letting a woman die
because of one is horrible. I would certainly exempt any doctor from
criminal charges for helping end an ectopic pregnancy.
>> I really don't care where the law traditionally says life begins; I
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