No morality in opposing abortion

[samseva]

How about this. The buddha teaches that birth is dukkha. For birth to be dukkha there must be an ability to sense something. The foetus then is not born until it is capable of senseing something. Then by this line of reasoning if an embryo or foetus does not have an adequately developed nervous system it can not sense anything and so has not yet been born.

Plants are able to sense things, but they don't have consciousness.

[Mr Man]

Bhikkhu Pesala / Samseva
The question is not about the actual act of abortion and our views on that but imposing our views on others.

Yes, but imposing our views on others, regarding abortion. We need to know what kind of abortion we are talking about.

The article relates to Thailand where abortion is illegal (except in exceptional circumstances) but also fairly common. I think generally speaking those who oppose abortion due to a moral conviction oppose it outright.

[Bhikkhu Pesala]

The article relates to Thailand where abortion is illegal (except in exceptional circumstances) but also fairly common. I think generally speaking those who oppose abortion due to a moral conviction oppose it outright.

The Buddhist view on abortion is based on the Canon. The preciousness of human life as described in The Simile of the Blind Turtle makes killing of human beings especially blameworthy.

It is not the duty of the monks to impose their views on others, though that may happen due to fear and ignorance. What the monks must do is explain what the Buddha taught, and leave it to others to decide what to do.

The observance of the five precepts is a voluntary undertaking, and the precepts are only administered to lay devotees at their request. The law of the land is not made by monks, but inevitably it will be strongly influenced by Buddhist teachings in a country like Thailand.

[samseva]

It is not the duty of the monks to impose their views on others, though that may happen due to fear and ignorance. What the monks must do is explain what the Buddha taught, and leave it to others to decide what to do.

The observance of the five precepts is a voluntary undertaking, and the precepts are only administered to lay devotees at their request. The law of the land is not made by monks, but inevitably it will be strongly influenced by Buddhist teachings in a country like Thailand.

Well said.

[retrofuturist]

Greetings Mr.Man,

The question is not about the actual act of abortion and our views on that but imposing our views on others.

Well then, no, I don't believe we should.

A moral order of free persons rejects appeal to the natural authority of some people’s private judgments over those of others. A social morality that allows the (self-appointed?) “enlightened” to make moral demands on others that as free and equal moral persons those others cannot see reason to acknowledge is authoritarian. Just as authoritarians in politics hold that they should rule over others who are too unenlightened or corrupt to see the wisdom of their laws, so too do these “enlightened” moralists hold up their “right reasoning” about morality as the standard that warrants their demands about how others should live, even when those others, exercising their rational moral autonomy, cannot endorse the imperatives to which they are subject.

I believe in moral autonomy, not authoritarianism.

Metta,
Paul.

[Nicholas Weeks]

Imposition is not needed or suggested, but explaining or sharing the Dhamma is fine, whether by lay or monastic.

Nowadays 'imposition' is popularly thought of as having to read or listen to anything one does not like. That is not what the word means though.

Peter Harvey has a chapter on Abortion in his Introduction to Buddhist Ethics:

A key reason why Buddhist principles treat abortion as such a serious
matter is that human life, with all its potential for moral and spiritual
development, is seen as a rare and precious opportunity in a being’s wandering
in the round of rebirths. For a being to gain a foothold
in a human womb and then be killed is to have this rare opportunity
destroyed.
Now it might be said: as all rebirth is due to past karma (see,
for example, Miln. ), might not a being with the karma for a human
rebirth simply find another human womb if aborted from another? This
is possible, but should no more ‘excuse’ abortion than the killing of an
adult who might then be reborn as a human. In any case, the state of
mind in which a being dies can affect its next rebirth and the
trauma of being aborted might lead to anger and fear in the foetus,
meaning that it would have a less good rebirth than it was previously
heading for, thus losing the opportunity for a human rebirth for some
time.
Now, being aborted might well be itself due to a foetus’s past
karma, but again, this should no more excuse abortion than saying that
if a person murders an adult, this is acceptable as the death is due to the
adult’s past karma.

[robertk]

I have found a passage of the Pāḷi names for some of the stages of pregnancy, but nothing describing which stage the embryo/fetus is considered alive. Would you know where I can find this passage?

http://www.dhammawheel.com/viewtopic.ph ... on+robertk" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;
Postby robertk » Mon Aug 31, 2015 4:33 pm

visuddhimgga VIII
30. Herein, firstly the span has no sign because there is no definition such as:
Just so much must be lived, no more than that. For beings [die in the various
stages of the embryo, namely], at the time of the kalala, of the abbuda, of the pesi, of
the ghana, at one month gone, two months gone, three months gone, four months
gone, five months gone … ten months gone, and on the occasion of coming out
of the womb. And after that they die this side or the other of the century.


The kalala is that time shortly after the meeting of the male seed with the female egg when the fetus is just beginning to develop. Once this occurs the matter is ripe for the arising of a new consciousness.

XVII
1
52. But when that minimal amount arises in the two kinds of generation
termed egg-born and womb-born, it amounts to no more than a drop of cream of
ghee on a single fibre of new-born [kid’s] wool, and it is known as the “embryo
in the first stage” (S I 206).

[robertk]

how long is the being in the womb?

vis. XVI
37.When this being is born in the mother’s womb, he is not born inside a blue or
red or white lotus, etc., but on the contrary, like a worm in rotting fish, rotting dough,
cesspools, etc., he is born in the belly in a position that is below the receptacle for
undigested food (stomach), above the receptacle for digested food (rectum), between
the belly-lining and the backbone, which is very cramped, quite dark, pervaded by
very fetid draughts redolent of various smells of ordure, and exception-ally
loathsome.11 And on being reborn there, for ten months he undergoes excessive
suffering, being cooked like a pudding in a bag by the heat produced in the mother’s
womb, and steamed like a dumpling of dough, with no bending, stretching, and so
on. So this, firstly, is the suffering rooted in the descent into the womb.


The pain of abortion

XVI
39. When the mother has an abortion, the pain that arises in him through the
cutting and rending in the place where the pain arises that is not fit to be seen
even by friends and intimates and companions—this is the suffering rooted in
abortion.

[SarathW]

[quote] with no bending, stretching, and so
on.[quote]

I remember this when I was in my mother's womb.
I couldn't wait to get out.
Perhaps I was day dreaming after my birth.

[Modus.Ponens]

I think many of us are talking pass each other. The question at hand is not whether individualy we would consider abortion imoral. As buddhists we strive not to kill even ants and mosquitos. An abortion, especialy 2nd or 3rd trimester, would be even worse than that.

The question is what the societal morality should be regarding abortion. Many times there is a tension between individual morality and societal morality. And the reason is that women who are determined, or forced, to abort are going to do it anyway. I agree that we should do everything possible in terms of sex ed, contraception, explaining the emotional scars of abortion before we get to the point of unwanted pregnancy. But once there is one, those who need to abort will do it even if it's ilegal. Not everyone has the same moral code so it leads to this.

Once a problem is inevitable, and it is, the function of government is to minimise it. If the government is successful in minimising the problem, by legalising abortion, but also by beting strong on realistic prevention, then pro choice is the lesser of two evils.

I doubt there are many theravadins who consider abortion to be a moral act. That's not the point. The point is how those we ellected are going to minimise the problem.

And finaly, the reasons against abortion, as we are seeing right here in this topic, revolve around some form of sanctity of the human life. This is a religious/spiritual objection, not a misogynistic one. We've already started seeing in this topic the potentialy endless sutta quoting and respective hermeneutics, proving my exact point about the nature of the objections. And the worst part is that we would continue to talk pass each other.

Anjali

[robertk]

An abortion, especialy 2nd or 3rd trimester, would be even worse than that.

T those who need to abort will do it even if it's ilegal. Not everyone has the same moral code so it leads to this.

Once a problem is inevitable, and it is, the function of government is to minimise it. If the government is successful in minimising the problem, by legalising abortion, but also by beting strong on realistic prevention, then pro choice is the lesser of two evils.

I
Anjali

where is the evidence that 2nd or 3rd trimester abortion is worse than first semester?


If your argument about those wanting to abort will do it anyway, hence the government should then minimise the problem (hassle) (by giving easy access to qualified abortionists?) holds, then why not extend it to those who want to murder. No government has eliminated murder to date and yet most give funds to police forces to try to hinder and jail killers.

Abortion kills far more people than murder or war. There are at least 40 million legal abortions annually- and in many countries these are done in public hospitals and even funded by the government.

[chownah]

How about this. The buddha teaches that birth is dukkha. For birth to be dukkha there must be an ability to sense something. The foetus then is not born until it is capable of senseing something. Then by this line of reasoning if an embryo or foetus does not have an adequately developed nervous system it can not sense anything and so has not yet been born.

Plants are able to sense things, but they don't have consciousness.

I'm not sure how this is commenting on what I posted. I am talking about if a foetus CAN NOT sense anything then it is not yet born because if there is no ability to sense things then dukkha can not arise. This has to do with the condition of the lack of the ability to sense....it doesn't say anything about things that DO HAVE the ability to sense things.

You might consider whether plants actually do sense things. It is clear that for instance sunlight striking a sunflower will effect biochemical changes in the plants stem which result in the face of the flower orienting towards the sun. You can say that the sunflower senses the sunlight and adjusts its posture but an engineer can design and build a fairly simple devise which will do the same thing to enable a solar panel to move and track the sun. Would you say that the mechanical devise senses the sunlight?...one might say this but then this reduces "sensing" to being possible from simply mechanical devices and I think that most will agree that mechanical devices are not sentient. So....my view is that saying that plants can "sense" things could mean just that there is a biochemical feedback mechanism which is acting and that questions of sentience or conscioiusness or life are not warranted from just the ability to for instance track the sun........but this is off topic.
chownah
P.S. Perhaps more on topic (perhaps not) is the idea that:
1. things which are born are subject to death.
2. if a foetus does not have the biological apparatus to feel (e.g. a functioning nervous system) then it can not sense dukkha and hence is not yet born.
3. if a foetus is not yet born then it can not be subject to death and thus can not be killed.

I hope that people will comment on this but probably they won't because it is too clear and concise and for many will put an end to the otherwise endless discussion which we are all so addicted to. In effect this idea has the potential to take away one of our favorite addictive drugs.....better to ignore it.

chownah

[Modus.Ponens]

where is the evidence that 2nd or 3rd trimester abortion is worse than first semester?


If your argument about those wanting to abort will do it anyway, hence the government should then minimise the problem (hassle) (by giving easy access to qualified abortionists?) holds, then why not extend it to those who wanut to murder. No government has eliminated murder to date and yet most give funds to police forces to try to hinder and jail killers.

Abortion kills far more people than murder or war. There are at least 40 million legal abortions annually- and in many countries these are done in public hospitals and even funded by the government.

Because there is an aspect of self preservation in abortion. A woman with a high risk pregnancy might die. A woman who was raped has legitimate disgust of birthing the child of her rapist. A woman who has a fetus with severe a disability has legitimate concerns about giving birth. In my personal view these legitimate concerns do not necessarily make abortion legitimate. But since I can't impose my spiritual values on a secular society, these women have the right to do what they feel legitimate to do.

But this aspect of self preservation would only have an analog with killing in self defense. Since killing in self defense is not usually possible to postpone to be done under government regulation, it's not legal to give attackers a more humane death in self defense.

I hope it's clear that killing a fetus with 8.5 months and killing a 2 cells organism is different. By the same reasoning, I believe that 1st trimester is less serious than 2nd or 3rd.

But I do see the point of objecting to government giving access to abortion. I think a lot should be invested on prevention. The nutjobs in the US saying that contraception is wrong and abstinence is the only 100% effective way of preventing pregnancy are not helping. At all. It would help to make clear that abortion will leave mental and emotional scars for life. It would help to show what the horrible process is and instilling in kids the value of personal responsability to prevent that from happeninng. It would help to make clear that the baby you abort may be your last chance of being a mother. It would help to make very clear that being a mother is a good thing that women should be proud of, not an impediment to happiness. And so on. Any realistic and effective prevention strategy should be adopted.

[Mr Man]

The law of the land is not made by monks, but inevitably it will be strongly influenced by Buddhist teachings in a country like Thailand.

According to this article https://www.womenonwaves.org/en/page/51 ... rtion-laws" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; "The abortion law was based on European model (19th century) introduced by European advisor to the King Rama V. Prior to this introduction there was no abortion law."

Although this article confirms that "Thai Buddhism has also had a key political role in maintaining current abortion laws"

Abortion reform is up against Buddhism in Thailand http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfre ... m-thailand" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

Thailand does have capital punishment though so any influence of Buddhist teachings only goes so far

[samseva]

I'm not sure how this is commenting on what I posted. I am talking about if a foetus CAN NOT sense anything then it is not yet born because if there is no ability to sense things then dukkha can not arise. This has to do with the condition of the lack of the ability to sense....it doesn't say anything about things that DO HAVE the ability to sense things.

So a fetus cannot sense anything? Even 10-5 weeks before birth?

You might consider whether plants actually do sense things. It is clear that for instance sunlight striking a sunflower will effect biochemical changes in the plants stem which result in the face of the flower orienting towards the sun. You can say that the sunflower senses the sunlight and adjusts its posture

Plants can sense, they are one-facultied (ekindriya), but they are not sentient—which are two different things.

3. if a foetus is not yet born then it can not be subject to death and thus can not be killed.

See conclusive sentence below.

chownah, it isn't the passing through the opening of a woman's genitals that is the determining factor of whether or not a baby is alive/sentient or just a piece of flesh devoid of life. The baby is alive way before the actual act of birth.