One-Issue Voters Make Me Sick

[Drachasor]

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi
So why would the happiness of someone who rates a 2, be the same as someone else who rates a 10? This is not an empirical measure, as it is reliant upon individual opinion.

Overall it is a decent scale to go by. 10s equal 10, and so forth. The people that give 2's aren't as happy as the 10s, that's the point.

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi
Okay. Given these conditions, what evidence do you have that believers disproportionately suffer from these blights of unhappiness?

That wasn't my point and I never said that. I said that a theocratic society (one ruled by one religious view and that enforced that view) is less happy than a freer one that allows people to believe what they want and practice what they want so long as it doesn't harm others.

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi
Why does happiness have anything to do with the brain?

-Drachasor

[Ben Kenobi]

Overall it is a decent scale to go by. 10s equal 10, and so forth. The people that give 2's aren't as happy as the 10s, that's the point.

Does everyone have the same level of pleasure?

I said that a theocratic society (one ruled by one religious view and that enforced that view) is less happy than a freer one that allows people to believe what they want and practice what they want so long as it doesn't harm others.

How do you know this? Perhaps people would be more happy in such a society that supported rather than challenged their beliefs.

Why does happiness have anything to do with the brain?

It is a valid question, regardless of what you think. I'm curious. Why do you believe better understanding of the brain will lead to insights of happiness?

[Ben Kenobi]

Life obviously begins at conception - or actually, the cell is alive even before fertilization. Whether being "alive" in such a manner has any meaning morally is the question. The cell is really not all that different from a bacterium.

Yet she is not a bacterium. She is human in the sense that she is of the same species as you or I, from the moment of conception onwards.

Now, DF challenged me for proof, that this is what medicine teaches.

http://embryology.med.unsw.edu.au/Notes/week1.htm

Note, on the pictures:

Fertilized Human Zygote

And then later,

4 Cell Human Embryo

[Q Classic]

Am I allowed to beat up my infant child, in the privacy of my own home because I believe her to be my property?

am i allowed to force someone else to give up their flesh and blood, because i believe that somebody else should be given a chance to raise this couple's combined DNA?

These children are not the property of their parents before their birth, any more so than they are after birth.

these children are not the government's property and outside of its jurisdiction, and thus the government cannot force them to give up what is theirs.

So, why don't unloved children be given up to science so that we can one day cure cancer?

why not? especially if they're gay children, since they're not going to be breeding in the forseeable future anyway.

[Q Classic]

Frozen embryos can survive without the consent of their mother.

ben, if you think being frozen is "survival", you've got a twisted view on what life is.

[GePap]

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi


True. However, Removal of all religious influence upon government = oppression of believers.

Ah, No, it does not.

Wow, that was a simple one to win

[Kontiki]

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi

http://embryology.med.unsw.edu.au/Notes/week1.htm

Note, on the pictures:

Fertilized Human Zygote

And then later,

4 Cell Human Embryo

Also note from the pictures:

Mature Human Egg

Menstration is murder!

Please, Ben. That was just the most pathetic attempt at proving a point ever.

[Drachasor]

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi
Does everyone have the same level of pleasure?

An admitted innaccuracy, and the best one can do is work on other questions and so forth that can help address this. In the end there will be error, but it is much better than having *nothing* to go on.

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi
How do you know this? Perhaps people would be more happy in such a society that supported rather than challenged their beliefs.

You are ignoring all the people that wouldn't agree with the accepted belief system. A pluralistic society allows everyone to practice their own beliefs, hence there is no belief oppression.

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi
It is a valid question, regardless of what you think. I'm curious. Why do you believe better understanding of the brain will lead to insights of happiness?

It is, quite frankly, a rather ignorant question (and I suspect you are fully aware of this). Studies of the brain have clearly shown emotion centers and given other insights into how the brain works. Further research will yeild more and more results letting us understand the brain and how it can very from person to person very, very well. So to suggest that the brain might have nothing to do with happiness, or even any other emotion, is quite ridiculous.

-Drachasor

[Ben Kenobi]

Yes, the point was that the unborn child is of the human species.

[Whaleboy]

So what?

[GePap]

Originally posted by Ben Kenobi
Yes, the point was that the unborn child is of the human species.

An egg is in no way an "unborn child".

[Whaleboy]

...and what GePap said

[Ben Kenobi]

am i allowed to force someone else to give up their flesh and blood, because i believe that somebody else should be given a chance to raise this couple's combined DNA?

That's what we do for parents who don't want to take care of their child.

You are not forcing them to give up their child, they have already decided that they do not want this child.

these children are not the government's property and outside of its jurisdiction, and thus the government cannot force them to give up what is theirs.

Right. So if these children are not their parent's property, and not the property of the state, than who do they belong to?

The state has an obligation to protect people. If these children are people, then they cannot be treated as property. If the biological parents refuse to take care of a child, then an adoptive parent, ought to be allowed to do so.

why not? especially if they're gay children, since they're not going to be breeding in the forseeable future anyway.

They are people, Q^3, and as such, should not be experimented upon without their prior consent.

ben, if you think being frozen is "survival", you've got a twisted view on what life is

Suspended animation is still living, just slower than normal. The real problem is the tissue death over time.

[Ben Kenobi]

An egg is in no way an "unborn child".

It isn't?

I thought you believed them to be precisely the same!

True, there are differences, but species classification is not one of them.

[Whaleboy]

So you consider the differences between an egg (and presumably an embryo) to be one of species too?