mmmcannibalism

woot were still alive, thats good I guess :P still have to wait till they do the actual testing to see if we will all go boom or woosh

tactically he was not a bad choice, its just that a lot of voters dont care about issues and palin has been able to energize the right to vote and the media to talk about her which has eliminated biden from the equation for now. The vice president matters issue wise less then the presidential candidate another brilliant thing as that even though palin is very flawed politically it is harder to attack a woman without sounding sexist or cruel; therefore, people are falling in behind mccain because they think obama is attacking a woman. Im not saying that's right, and it isnt its just the truth

encourage philosophy and science, if they had half of my craziness theyd end up either curing cancer or becoming dictators of an empire, and really isnt that what we all want :lol:

1st off my bad if this has ever been made before this thought just came to me semi randomly and I thought Id put it up for discussion we all talk about the ideals of a government, and what would make the best system. however just theoretically Is there anything wrong with a monarchy or even a dictatorship if it allows freedom, gives the people a forum for discussion, and has a good balanced leader? edit--just because 2nd reply mentioned the idea is there anything wrong with anarchy if everyone is peaceful and gets along?

thats fine, personally im more concerned with what they are doing to the body inside them in this discussion. So with that we are back to a when is it a seperate body and not just a group of cells debate which is a definition of life debate. As ive stated Id love an ideal world where conception could be the start of life but i would count life as the time clearly before neural and brain development. If a woman wants to take an icepick and ram herself in the arm repeadetly I see no reason to stop her presuming shes sane. If a woman wants to smoke in an area where it wont effect anyone else all the power to them if we arent going to give them state money to treat it. The reason for being pro choice is to protect unborn lives not control adult ones.

do any of the people trying to set the beginning of life at conception actually think they will accomplish anything? The definition of life should be set at a reasonable level before any nerve or brain functions could have developed. I hate the fact that we will never be able to eliminate abortions completely but driving them under ground does nothing. if we want to fix the problem we need to put the money into sex ed programs and encouraging adoption.

while this is soo unlikely, it is an awesome idea lol. Id really prefer to not die to this but at least its a cool death

yeah by state abortion bans would not be worthwhile, especially because they would probably say crossing lines to get an abortion is illegal. Thats just asking for illegal abortions which are in no way good. I dont see the logic of saying that if they were going by winning votes Hillary would be a better option then Obama. The primaries are votes too, and members of the party vote among the people in their own party running. Its not like a commitee chooses the candidate. The democratic party in america has something around 90% of african american voters being a part of it. That would make being black an advantage in the primary I would say, just like Hillary being a woman helped her in some places. It just so happens that Obama won with nothing but being strongly liberal and giving good speeches. I am getting sick of finding out how right wing sarah palin is. Could mccain not find a more moderate woman to run with?

There is no article by that name. You are referring to Levonorgestel, which only works in the first 72 hours after intercourse. This leads to one problem, and one fallacy in the pro-life argument. The problem is that not all rape cases are reported within 72 hours, and some even go unreported altogether. It becomes impossible for a woman in such a situation to get the medication - unless that is, you honestly suggest we should punish rape victims for not coming forward within the first 72 hours by not offering them an abortion. Nor is it 100% efficient either - anything less than 100% would still leave a possible need for an abortion open. The fallacy is that pro-life demonstrators argue life begins at conception. 72 hours after fertilisation is still a life to them nonetheless, thus logically they cannot argue this would be a suitable alternative to an abortion. A child which may or may not philosophically exist depending on when you deem life to have started. Giving blanket rights to a life whose existence remains such a controversial argument with strong points on both sides is ludicrous. Hence why it should be left for the woman to decide what she deems as the start of life; and if a woman does believe life starts at conception, not to opt for an abortion and have the child. Diplomatic experience with Canada hardly equips a person for diplomacy with Iran. It would be like saying, "That nurse has worked in a care home - let her do brain surgery". Not the point he made. Nice strawman though. Obama can't help the fact he's black (not unless he had plastic surgery anyway - and why should he?). McCain has a choice over his VP nomination, and there were many people better qualified for VP than Palin in the Republican Party. McCain saw he was suffering in the polls and wouldn't stand a chance unless he had some major fightback come November. He went for shock to try and appeal to Obama's weakest group of support - Hillary's women supporters. For this he chose Palin. It's really as simple to interpret as political moves come. to the first point Im pretty sure you dont have to report being raped to get the pills, I believe they are over the counter. Also, most teenagers if they were ashamed to admit it could probably call a friend to drive them to a pharmacy and not ask questions. Also, I have said that I would accept abortions being legal for something like the first trimester which would still allow time if they found out the pills failed. My main concern is stopping late term abortions and encouraging people to not have early term abortions. As to the statement of a pro life argument saying conception is life, just because most pro life people will say that doesnt mean its universal. I prefer immensely the plan b pills to later term abortions, and if most abortions were prevented by the taking of those pills it would be a near perfect outcome to the definition of life, I agree the choice to abort is the womans in that case, what we need to do legally is make sure the definition of life is not pushing on infantacide. I agree she doesnt have major foreign policy experience but vice president does lend itself to training yes mccain did pick her partially for being female, just like how obama was promoted by the party because he was black it is a fair comparison.

first off if you want to attack her character im just going to point out that I dont believe anyone she has worked with in alaska has said a single bad thing about her. on abortion--before you go all crazy about not allowing abortions for rape go to wikipedia and type in plan b pills. That should explain a very good way to prevent pregnancy from rape. If that doesnt just do some google searching. Definition of life is something that is really hard to get a concrete definition of, because few people can agree what designates life in this case. You realize that saying giving the woman the right to do whatever she wants to her body has a nice way of ignoring the unborn child. creationism in schools--I already said earlier this isnt a good idea at all. I know somewhere she said she meant that if a debate about evolution vs creationism starts it shouldnt stop, but this was probably covering herself and it is a bad idea to teach it in schools. experience--lets see obama worked as a community organizer for 4 years then moved onto the senate for about 2 before campaigning. She served as mayor for approximately 6 years governor for 1 and 3 years in various positions usually ethic based. Even if it was a small town id say 6 years as mayor is at least as good as 4 being a community organizer. Also, since she is running for vice president if elected she actually will have on the job time to learn what it takes to be president if that becomes necessary, Obama would have to jump right in international experience--she worked with Canada on pipelines that run from alaska to the United states, im not going to say she is an expert but she has done more then be near Canada and Russia. iraq--yeah your right, I mean freeing people from a ruthless dictator is a terrible thing to do. Not like he was commiting mass murder or anything like that. Sure, there is still violence there but you cant argue that combat deaths are worse then mass murder. her children--let me take this moment to point out that she does have a husband. Believe it or not, her husband could actually do some of the child care :shock: isnt that a radical thought! In addition, her 18 year old son is about to be deployed to Iraq and is an adult so that brings the number of children she would be taking care of to 4. Her pregnant daughter is 17 so im sure she can handle herself fairly effectively. Her other 3 children are 13, 7, and about 1 respectively. I think her husband can handle a 13, 7, and 1 year old, not to mention that if they came to washington with her she would still be there a good amount of time. edit--to the comment about her getting votes for mccain by being a woman. Its not like Obama is getting votes for being black or anything, clearly only republicans have people vote for them based on appearances.

actually the babies chance of survival is a very relevant factor. If the baby could live outside the woom what makes it not a human being and therefore protected by laws banning murder? debating whether something that cannot survive on its own can be eliminated is different then debating whether something that can survive can be legally eliminated. A baby that can survive on its own is the same as a newborn except that the fetus isnt as well developed and may need aid of a respirator and/or other life support temporarily.

evolution only goes into our hands if we start controlling the entire genome that is passed on. Lets assume im talking about the near future when we start to custom inherit. Maybe parents in general prefer green eyes to blue and lets assume both blue and green eyes are just caused by a single gene and blue is dominant for the sake of example, and blue and green are the only two possible eye colors. If 1/4 people is green eyed and 3/4 is blue(made up numbers), yet all couples want green eyes if either of them has a gene where noone with blue eyes bothers to choose eye color. if 1/4 of people are green eyed then 7/16 of couples will have at least one green eyed partner. Out of those 7/16 1/16 are both green eyed and therefore would have a green eyed child anyway. out of the other 6/16 there would be varying degrees of likelyhood for them to have a green eyed child normally. If they all choose green eyes then the percent of green eyed children goes up along with the presence of the green eyed gene. If the next generation went through the same process eventually blue eyes wouldnt exist except for natural births. this would be evolution by some for of selection

there is a difference between the teapot and god with a good enough instrument you could detect the gravity from the teapot, sure it may take thousands of years for that type of instrument and who knows how long to find it but we could. the best bet for scientific proof of god is the uncertainty principle. As long as noone can know everything the knowledge of everything itself is god.

reasonable thought the problem even I have understanding my cycle thing is that it is really hard to imagine time as having gone back forever, if it were possible for the universe to spread out to nothing it would have already happened an infinite amount of time ago, thus making it impossible for us to be here if that were true

I dont believe gravity has a finite sphere, im sure after a certain distance it becomes nearly nothing but you have to consider that any fraction of the entire universe's gravity is going to be strong. I guess the only proof for the fact the universe isnt constantly expanding is that it is still around. My whole thought we have cycles meaning that if it could expand forever one of the other cycles in the past infinite amount of time would have spread out to the point of nothingness

OK, so the mother has to go through the pain (and I mean intense physical pain; men seem to think giving birth is a walk in the park - my mother almost died having me) so that you can have 'your' child. I wasn't aware the child's life was possessed by anyone except the child. Since the child does not biologically have a life of its own in the first five months of pregnancy, surely the only person who can actually take responsibility over its life is the person that 'life' is dependent upon - namely, the mother through its umbilical cord. Throughout the whole of the pregnancy, you will do nothing to aid the foetus' development except make her pregnant in the first place. Therefore, it is the mother's right to decide. The dangerous nature of childbirth only strengthens that argument. Why must you be so logical and make it hard for me to argue back? :lol: on topic I am strongly pro life, but realize that a full out abortion ban isnt going to do much except make some uncertified doctors in alleys a little richer. I think the end to abortions being legal for reason of low income or not desiring the baby should be earlier then the 5 month standard. Im not an expert on fetal development so not sure where to place it, but it should be something reasonable like two months after detection is possible. That should leave plenty of time to make a thought out choice, its not like someone would need 4-5 months to decide that, especially since most people have a strong opinion on whether they would have an abortion or not. Now, there are some important exceptions to me thinking the limit should be at about 3 months. If the mother's life is in severe danger its their choice what to do, obviously Im not going to say that we should control whether people want to risk themself or not. If the fetus has a severe mental or physicalhandicap that would never allow for a respectable quality of life it is the mothers choice. By severe handicap I dont mean something like the child will suffer from add or will have asthma, I mean something that would be a terrible strain for the mother to live with, and would make the child not have a productive life. Obviously any disease that can be reasonably maintained or cured with a good quality of life would not be included in this. Just dealing with people that say in case of incest or rape or maybe ripped condoms you do know about plan b pills right? Day after birth control but stuff only to take in emergency, that right there should get rid of a lot of those pregancies. What we do need to do that I think almost everyone will agree on is prevent the amount of times someone will have to choose between an abortion or having the child, preventing more unplanned pregnancies. We need to have better sex ed programs in school and not the abstinance only stuff that does nothing. The plan b pills really need to be mentioned because they could eliminate alot of abortions.

just a thought on this assuming that to be true, that would strongly support the rubber band theory along with the thought that the universe has/will undergo an infinite series of big bangs forming expanding universes that eventually slow down retract into a single point which causes the next big bang and so on? Would it? How so? I'm not so hot on the cyclic big bang model ever since I heard that the the Universe is expanding at an accelerating rate, i.e. it doesn't look like it's going to retract into any kind of crunch. I need to read more about it though. well the basis for my thought on that is that if the universe didnt cycle it would have disappeared an infinite amount of time ago. Also since there has always been the matter there is now it has to have been doing something pre big bang as to the spreading of the universe accelerating Id say that either everything is still riding the big bang shockwave which will run out of energy eventually or its dark energy as some theorize causing this which will also eventually run out. Then gravity will very slowly bring the expansion to a halt and begin to pull everything together

He's right. The government will need that money to pay welfare to people born into poor families, who could not afford abortions. wow good job of taking a tiny part of my beliefs and trying to twist it. My belief stands that federal money shouldnt go to abortions. Actually, if you stopped putting money into abortions and instead poured that money into better sex ed programs we would be trading abortions for babies not being conceived. That is a much better turnout as we have less debate as to if infantacide is occuring, with the birthrate not going up. That welfare comment is also irrelavant as I have said that if the woman cannot take care of the baby they should put it up for adoption, putting them in a family that can afford to take care of the child.

just a thought on this assuming that to be true, that would strongly support the rubber band theory along with the thought that the universe has/will undergo an infinite series of big bangs forming expanding universes that eventually slow down retract into a single point which causes the next big bang and so on? edit--the escape velocity can exceed the speed of light because it just means that you would have to exceed the speed of light to escape, thus rendering it impossible without opening a wormhole or using a warp drive type device

um I would have to check but do you know off hand when pregnancy tests register pregnancy, and when most women would notice said pregnancy without a test? Would provide a better frame of where we are going from abortion because contraception failed to deciding they dont want the baby and killing. It is really hard to say much about times when contraceptive fails and people that tried to avoid becoming pregnant do. I guess the most realistic frame for what abortions should be based both on the time a pregnancy can be detected and the time of fetal nerve development. The main problem I think we have in 1st world countries is that we have way too many conveinance abortions when they baby could be born perfectly well and sent to a family with fertility issues that wanted to adopt. It isnt right to draw a line on what is acceptable and what is not here. also id rather see state funds go into adoption clinics then abortion clinics. We need to work on a way to encourage carrying babies to term, while accepting that abstinance only and demonizing anyone that gets an abortion will never work. edit--actually adoption is desirable, Im adopted and not bothered by the fact my 16 year old mother couldnt take care of me. I dont know what to call my definition of life, your is certainly very reasonable and actually I would call that a great basis for legal definition. I personally lean towards the time when it goes from a cluster of cells to human formed but thats an individual thing.

gravity is I believe one of the things that really lacks a good practical explanation though it is in full three dimensions the one example I have heard of gravity that worked well was hold a piece of paper up in the air, this is space. any matter you put on it will push the paper down there and anything that can slide on the slope will approach it and make the dent in paper bigger the heavier the object the more the paper pushes down, a black hole is like putting a thing on the paper so heavy it breaks through. edit--the problem with gravity as an energy source is that you have to elevate something to get gravity to pull it down and the process of taking it up cancels the energy gain

First off plan b pills ftw(prevent fetus from developing past small cluster of cells) just saying. If you are holding to only allowing abortions before fetus develops ability to feel pain how about we just agree to disagree, your clearly being reasonable in your opinion so I have no problem there. as to the babies not wanted, what we need to do is start promoting adoption over in vitro in such, but yes I do realize there is a tricky issue with lower income people getting pregnant. if she thinks global warming is not at all man made she is being stubborn, so is saying that it is not at all natural, though if her opinion is the first I agree she is at least partly wrong edit--whether the baby has life or not is a valid issue in a debate on womens choice to an abortion, because even you have to agree that one life doesnt have the right to end another. The abortion debate should focus on what we want to define as life agreed? I agree we should have thoughrough(spelling) sex ed in schools, you arent going to stop teens from having sex so we need to really explain that they need to use birth control and if they have unprotected sex need to go get plan b pills. That would cut a whole lot of abortions right there something that im sure you agree is a good thing edit again--abortion shouldnt get federal funding, if an organization wants to work privately to fund abortions then thats their matter but tax dollars shouldnt go to it.

first off to clarify I do think palin is too far right wing. She does put too many religious arguments into politics (main one I know off hand is opposing civil unions for gays. I think gay marriage should be legal but think there are people that legitimately believe in civil unions but maintaining special status for marriage.) just to say again I do think she is too right wing, I think part of choosing her was that she can energize people and she seems human which is something we do need more of in politicians. okay now to actually get onto defending some points made there 1. dont all politicians force their views on others to an extent, any law is doing that to some extent 2. before i note ginger if you want an abortion debate lets go to pm to keep this on topic. Saying women have a right to choose an abortion really understates the babies right to live. Like I said lets not turn this into an abortion debate. 3. ill give you this one because as i said she is too hard right wing 4. it is man made to a certain extent and really its a debate for scientists 5. true but obama has very little, and she has more then 2 years just 2 years as governor 6. its not the fact that she has a baby with down syndrome the point is she is against abortion and stuck to it 7. id have to do some research on that speech(cant watch video dial up) but id keep it open that she meant god given to spread liberty, yes that is pretty cheesy sounding. Will need to research but would still connect to me agreeing she is too religion run 8. are we really going to judge her by the fact that her daughter is pregnant? I mean I even say her abstinance only plan is terrible but no matter how good parents are there would still be kids that "rebelled". She does have 5 kids also so if she wasnt uber shielding her 17 year old can you blame her?

on the whole justification of laws based on culture, there is a difference between practices being archaic and just being wrong any example is going to be a little iffy here but when europeans discovered the americas we slaughtered a ton of indians because of our culture. Do you want to argue that was justified just because it was considered okay back then? an example of something cultural that is reasonable though we find it odd is the ritual suicide of japanese warriors in ww2. General western philosophy says that suicide is/was bad but it has to be respected that they were doing something considered honorable, and if you are tolerant perfectly reasonable edit--as to nature being opposed to actions, the only way i can see that is either someone acting good in a long scheme to gain political power or a vigilante that is truly good but is doing something that is considered bad edit again--light yagami in the beginning of death note may be a decent example, killing hundreds with the goal of peace could be considered being a good person doing bad acts with good intent. Granted he does become ego centered and therefore not good at all later.

there is a major difference though, the split of woman by party is something like 60 40 as opposed to a very large majority of black voters being democratic. And honestly Obama did get a lot of votes because he was black just like hillary got a lot for being a woman. also Obama is getting a lot of votes just because he is a very good orator, it doesnt matter to a lot of people what his policies are they just think hes cool because of his speeches. on topic now my thoughts on palin is that she is too hard core right wing on a few things for me to truly like her on policy. I do thought think she is more legitimate then most politicians and I prefer someone that is hard core honestly right wing to someone that claims to be centrist and is just lying. I may be back later to debate policy specifically but I do agree she is a bit too far right except on abortion where I agree with her(I go on the thought that as long as the baby is feasible and isnt going to kill or severly injure the mother it deserves to live, I say it should remain legal in cases of severe mental/physical handicap where I just feel its not the governments right to put that burden on someone. As to anyone that is going to say rape babies should be allowed to be aborted, you do realize they have the plan b pills now? also creationism in schools is a bad idea, assuming it is her true belief I do agree on allowing it to be debated if it is brought up. It shouldnt be part of the curriculum though as there is very little if any proof of it(big bang and what happened before it being only shot of proof I know of)