aspeeder

That's the point. They're selling it at a bargain price. Yes I'll admit, for those using it at a professional career it is affordable. But if teenagers (The age group we're talking about) want to become acquainted with an industry-standard software they have a huuuuge cost barrier which is not easy to overcome with the employment options they usually have. Their high schools might have it for them to practice, and they'll probably go to an art school with copies for them, but it's possible they don't. I'll admit that's a pretty niche audience I'm talking about, but those are also the most likely candidates for pirates of photoshop.

yea, wheres the mention of all those billions going to the military industrial complex or of the patriot act? I was thinking more of afghan democracy, greatly improved infrastructure and quality of life, but okay. I was mostly posting the hard and known facts of the war, I'd never say there weren't any gains but they are much more subjective.

People survive fine without having sex. And the act of sex has a purpose: to make a child. There is no primary 'need' to have sex. It's a desire, most likely inherent in us so that we don't fall off the face of this planet. People use birth control to separate the responsibilities and consequences that come from sex (it's whole purpose being the creation of a child) from the pleasure one gets from it. And that, I find, is selfish when coupled with the fact that you will not die solely because you don't have sex. Maslow's hierarchy of needs Also, see that food and shelter is at the bottom with sex. You can also enjoy those without needing to fulfill them to keep living. I can eat something right now, and enjoy it just for the taste rather than to fill my stomach, and it would still be a primary need. Sexual desire is not a part of our nature as animals that we need to suppress, and now we can minimize the risks of sexual contact.

Looks like the animation has changed for catching monkfish, that or it's just a glitch.

1801 US Casualties 2753 Total Coalition Casualties 50,000+ Afghan Civilian Casualties $461 Billion http://www.cnn.com/2011/10/07/world/asia/afghanistan-war-anniversary/?hpt=wo_c1 Just figured this'd be a good retrospective, along with 10 years after 9/11. Thoughts?

How about you write your own software and use that instead? Things cost money for a reason. Because one teenager can write all the code for a professional-grade software that's taken almost 30 years to develop into its current state. GIMP is a pretty good open-source equivalent and can help get the basic techniques down, so if you want to try out photoshopping without hundreds of dollars give that a shot first.

"Suggesting that women have abortions for 'convenience' diminishes the hard work of women and is beyond insulting." Are you arguing that being pregnant isn't inconvenient? Are you arguing that being pregnant is easy? Are you arguing that women that terminate their pregnancies are doing it because it's more difficult than being pregnant, or having a child? Woman have abortions because it is decidedly more convenient than birthing a child. If carrying a child to term for 9 months was a cake walk, there would be no need for abortion. You, and whoever you're quoting have completely missed the point. What the author and I are suggesting is that the term "convenient" to describe women following their dreams and goals is a demeaning and insulting term to use. It's convenient to drive to a store rather than to walk to it, carrying around a fetus for 9 months is life-changing and in some cases dream-shattering; for an example of that actually look at the page I linked to. Yes, because having a proactive dream is incredibly selfish of someone. Life fulfillment is so much less important than a 2 month old embryo. It's pretty easy to say that giving up your existence against your will is selfish when there's no chance of it happening to you. Also, sex is a primary need, that's the reason people use birth control: to fulfill a primary need without the complications of pregnancy.

They're making it easier to sue internationally for breaking those kind of laws :P

The DMCA already does most of this for us in the USA, it looks like this is just an international framework so that companies in America can apply their copyright to those living in the states that agreed and pursue legal action more easily.

Certainly, but one justifies a pro-abortion stance by placing a higher value on present human life the convenience of a woman over the life of her child. "But I do not believe that reaching my 16 year dream is a mere “convenience.” It’s my dream and I have worked exceedingly hard for it. I am entitled to enjoy the rewards of my hard work. Suggesting that women have abortions for “convenience” diminishes the hard work of women and is beyond insulting. Living my dream is my right. Not having my body hijacked, especially when I am doing everything possible to prevent pregnancy, is my right. I refuse to be told that my dreams are inconvenient and should be sacrificed. To all the women out there with inconvenient dreams, never stop dreaming and never stop fighting. It is just as much a tragedy when a woman is forbidden from reaching her dream as it is when a man is forbidden. You are entitled to every dream you can dream — dreams are never inconvenient." http://abortiongang.org/2011/03/inconvenient-dreams/ How. Dare. You. EDIT: @Nomrombom, it was directed at sees_all1, he was the one who edited in the bit about abortions being for the convenience of the female.

[spoiler=Might be too soon] My condolences and all that, I've never been a Mac fan but bringing the computer to the masses and driving the digital music players back in the day are huge accoplishments.

I was posting my own arguments using evidence to back it up, but since you ignored the link beforehand I figured I should post the whole thing anyway. It's also the way you debate on the debate team, and lack of credible evidence is seen as a poor argument, but that could just be my style. Idk, I guess since it's so easy to reference things on the internet I'd rather show my sources of info rather than paraphrase them. He wasn't using consciousness in the "passing out or going to sleep and then waking back up" sense. He was using it in the sense of being aware of yourself as an individual separate from your environment, which zygotes, fetuses, and even babies lack. http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/consciousness?show=0&t=1317870820 1a : the quality or state of being aware especially of something within oneself b : the state or fact of being conscious of an external object, state, or fact c : awareness; especially : concern for some social or political cause 2: the state of being characterized by sensation, emotion, volition, and thought : mind 3: the totality of conscious states of an individual 4: the normal state of conscious life <regained consciousness> 5: the upper level of mental life of which the person is aware as contrasted with unconscious processes Yes, we view them as individuals for 2 reasons: 1. They are self aware persons with distinct and differing personalities. 2. Their relationship is (Generally) symbiotic in nature, they have both help each other to live or else they'd die. A fetus on the other hand is a parasitic organism. The article never made the argument that it wasn't alive or seperate genetically from the mother, it was just making the point that it is, in fact, within the body of another person and two entities existing within the same body cannot both retain full rights (And that doesn't apply to the conjoined twins argument, the bodies are shared but I believe each individual twin controls certain parts of the whole, rather than 2 entities existing fully within the same body); the article we posted addressed this. A potential person must always be given full human rights unless its existence interferes with the rights of Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness of an already existing conscious human being. Thus, a gestating fetus has no rights before birth and full rights after birth. If a fetus comes to term and is born, it is because the mother chooses to forgo her own rights and her own bodily security in order to allow that future person to gestate inside her body. If the mother chooses to exercise control over her own body and to protect herself from the potential dangers of childbearing, then she has the full right to terminate the pregnancy. Anti-abortion activists are fond of saying "The only difference between a fetus and a baby is a trip down the birth canal." This flippant phrase may make for catchy rhetoric, but it doesn't belie the fact that indeed "location" makes all the difference in the world. It's actually quite simple. You cannot have two entities with equal rights occupying one body. One will automatically have veto power over the other - and thus they don't have equal rights. In the case of a pregnant woman, giving a "right to life" to the potential person in the womb automatically cancels out the mother's right to Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness. After birth, on the other hand, the potential person no longer occupies the same body as the mother, and thus, giving it full human rights causes no interference with another's right to control her body. Therefore, even though a full-term human baby may still not be a person, after birth it enjoys the full support of the law in protecting its rights. After birth its independence begs that it be protected as if it were equal to a fully-conscience human being. But before birth its lack of personhood and its threat to the women in which it resides makes abortion a completely logical and moral choice.

My hair follicle won't grow into another of me if left alone... [spoiler=The rest of that article, fully articulates all these arguments.]3. Is it a person? No. It's merely a potential person. Webster's Dictionary lists a person as "being an individual or existing as an indivisible whole; existing as a distinct entity." Anti-abortionists claim that each new fertilized zygote is already a new person because its DNA is uniquely different than anyone else's. In other words, if you're human, you must be a person. Of course we've already seen that a simple hair follicle is just as human as a single-cell zygote, and, that unique DNA doesn't make the difference since two twins are not one person. It's quite obvious, then, that something else must occur to make one human being different from another. There must be something else that happens to change a DNA-patterned body into a distinct person. (Or in the case of twins, two identically DNA-patterned bodies into two distinct persons.) There is, and most people inherently know it, but they have trouble verbalizing it for one very specific reason. The defining mark between something that is human and someone who is a person is 'consciousness.' It is the self-aware quality of consciousness that makes us uniquely different from others. This self-awareness, this sentient consciousness is also what separates us from every other animal life form on the planet. We think about ourselves. We use language to describe ourselves. We are aware of ourselves as a part of the greater whole. The problem is that consciousness normally doesn't occur until months, even years, after a baby is born. This creates a moral dilemma for the defender of abortion rights. Indeed, they inherently know what makes a human into a person, but they are also aware such individual personhood doesn't occur until well after birth. To use personhood as an argument for abortion rights, therefore, also leads to the argument that it should be okay to kill a 3-month-old baby since it hasn't obtained consciousness either. Anti-abortionists use this perceived problem in an attempt to prove their point. In a debate, a Pro Choice defender will rightly state that the difference between a fetus and a full-term human being is that the fetus isn't a person. The anti-abortion activist, being quite sly, will reply by asking his opponent to define what makes someone into a person. Suddenly the Pro Choice defender is at a loss for words to describe what he or she knows innately. We know it because we lived it. We know we have no memory of self-awareness before our first birthday, or even before our second. But we also quickly become aware of the "problem" we create if we say a human doesn't become a person until well after its birth. And we end up saying nothing. The anti-abortionist then takes this inability to verbalize the nature of personhood as proof of their claim that a human is a person at conception. But they are wrong. Their "logic" is greatly flawed. Just because someone is afraid to speak the truth doesn't make it any less true. And in reality, the Pro Choice defender's fear is unfounded. They are right, and they can state it without hesitation. A human indeed does not become a full person until consciousness. And consciousness doesn't occur until well after the birth of the child. But that does not automatically lend credence to the anti-abortionist's argument that it should, therefore, be acceptable to kill a three-month-old baby because it is not yet a person. It is still a potential person. And after birth it is an independent potential person whose existence no longer poses a threat to the physical wellbeing of another. To understand this better, we need to look at the next question. 4. Is it physically independent? No. It is absolutely dependent on another human being for its continued existence. Without the mother's life-giving nutrients and oxygen it would die. Throughout gestation the zygote-embryo-fetus and the mother's body are symbiotically linked, existing in the same physical space and sharing the same risks. What the mother does affects the fetus. And when things go wrong with the fetus, it affects the mother. Anti-abortionists claim fetal dependence cannot be used as an issue in the abortion debate. They make the point that even after birth, and for years to come, a child is still dependent on its mother, its father, and those around it. And since no one would claim its okay to kill a child because of its dependency on others, we can't, if we follow their logic, claim it's okay to abort a fetus because of its dependence. What the anti-abortionist fails to do, however, is differentiate between physical dependence and social dependence. Physical dependence does not refer to meeting the physical needs of the child - such as in the anti-abortionist's argument above. That's social dependence; that's where the child depends on society - on other people - to feed it, clothe it, and love it. Physical dependence occurs when one life form depends solely on the physical body of another life form for its existence. Physical dependence was cleverly illustrated back in 1971 by philosopher Judith Jarvis Thompson. She created a scenario in which a woman is kidnapped and wakes up to find she's been surgically attached to a world-famous violinist who, for nine months, needs her body to survive. After those nine months, the violinist can survive just fine on his own, but he must have this particular woman in order to survive until then. Thompson then asks if the woman is morally obliged to stay connected to the violinist who is living off her body. It might be a very good thing if she did - the world could have the beauty that would come from such a violinist - but is she morally obliged to let another being use her body to survive? This very situation is already conceded by anti-abortionists. They claim RU-486 should be illegal for a mother to take because it causes her uterus to flush its nutrient-rich lining, thus removing a zygote from its necessary support system and, therefore, ending its short existence as a life form. Thus the anti-abortionist's own rhetoric only proves the point of absolute physical dependence. This question becomes even more profound when we consider a scenario where it's not an existing person who is living off the woman's body, but simply a potential person, or better yet, a single-cell zygote with human DNA that is no different than the DNA in a simple hair follicle. To complicate it even further, we need to realize that physical dependence also means a physical threat to the life of the mother. The World Health Organization reports that nearly 670,000 women die from pregnancy-related complications each year (this number does not include abortions). That's 1,800 women per day. We also read that in developed countries, such as the United States and Canada, a woman is 13 times more likely to die bringing a pregnancy to term than by having an abortion. Therefore, not only is pregnancy the prospect of having a potential person physically dependent on the body of one particular women, it also includes the women putting herself into a life-threatening situation for that potential person. Unlike social dependence, where the mother can choose to put her child up for adoption or make it a ward of the state or hire someone else to take care of it, during pregnancy the fetus is absolutely physically dependent on the body of one woman. Unlike social dependence, where a woman's physical life is not threatened by the existence of another person, during pregnancy, a woman places herself in the path of bodily harm for the benefit of a DNA life form that is only a potential person - even exposing herself to the threat of death. This brings us to the next question: do the rights of a potential person supercede the rights of the mother to control her body and protect herself from potential life-threatening danger? 5. Does it have human rights? Yes and No. A potential person must always be given full human rights unless its existence interferes with the rights of Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness of an already existing conscious human being. Thus, a gestating fetus has no rights before birth and full rights after birth. If a fetus comes to term and is born, it is because the mother chooses to forgo her own rights and her own bodily security in order to allow that future person to gestate inside her body. If the mother chooses to exercise control over her own body and to protect herself from the potential dangers of childbearing, then she has the full right to terminate the pregnancy. Anti-abortion activists are fond of saying "The only difference between a fetus and a baby is a trip down the birth canal." This flippant phrase may make for catchy rhetoric, but it doesn't belie the fact that indeed "location" makes all the difference in the world. It's actually quite simple. You cannot have two entities with equal rights occupying one body. One will automatically have veto power over the other - and thus they don't have equal rights. In the case of a pregnant woman, giving a "right to life" to the potential person in the womb automatically cancels out the mother's right to Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness. After birth, on the other hand, the potential person no longer occupies the same body as the mother, and thus, giving it full human rights causes no interference with another's right to control her body. Therefore, even though a full-term human baby may still not be a person, after birth it enjoys the full support of the law in protecting its rights. After birth its independence begs that it be protected as if it were equal to a fully-conscience human being. But before birth its lack of personhood and its threat to the women in which it resides makes abortion a completely logical and moral choice. Which brings us to our last question, which is the real crux of the issue.... 6. Is abortion murder? No. Absolutely not. It's not murder if it's not an independent person. One might argue, then, that it's not murder to end the life of any child before she reaches consciousness, but we don't know how long after birth personhood arrives for each new child, so it's completely logical to use their independence as the dividing line for when full rights are given to a new human being. Using independence also solves the problem of dealing with premature babies. Although a preemie is obviously still only a potential person, by virtue of its independence from the mother, we give it the full rights of a conscious person. This saves us from setting some other arbitrary date of when we consider a new human being a full person. Older cultures used to set it at two years of age, or even older. Modern religious cultures want to set it at conception, which is simply wishful thinking on their part. As we've clearly demonstrated, a single-cell zygote is no more a person that a human hair follicle. But that doesn't stop religious fanatics from dumping their judgements and their anger on top of women who choose to exercise the right to control their bodies. It's the ultimate irony that people who claim to represent a loving God resort to scare tactics and fear to support their mistaken beliefs. It's even worse when you consider that most women who have an abortion have just made the most difficult decision of their life. No one thinks abortion is a wonderful thing. No one tries to get pregnant just so they can terminate it. Even though it's not murder, it still eliminates a potential person, a potential daughter, a potential son. It's hard enough as it is. Women certainly don't need others telling them it's a murder. It's not. On the contrary, abortion is an absolutely moral choice for any woman wishing to control her body.

Huh? Not that I think having a unique DNA sequence is a good argument for what it takes to be considered a 'person'. I just have an uncontrollable desire to clear any discrepancies amongst debates. "Not known, however, is whether these changes in identical twins occur at the embryonic level, as the twins age or both." I must admit I didn't know about that study, doesn't surprise me though that it could change as time goes on. I appreciate the fact-checking, I was just anticipating other pro-life arguments.

I think that means an automatic forfeit. Unless you've won the tour de france 7 consecutive times... How many tour de france titles does conquering the country give you?

Just from a quick glance at google images Mussolini looks like he'd beat the crap out of Hitler.

This. The worst that'd happen with Manipulators is that they'd decide to merch something I need (Ppots or something like that) and it'd inconvenience me for a few days-weeks. That, and messing with new items for as long as they're hyped were basically the only things that affected me, with bots and RWT I'm having a lot more trouble making money than I ever had before.

:lol: Think I'm the only guy here who really can't stand the CMC. Their anthem is probably the only song I can't bear. I can't stand them either. Alone, they are fine, but together... God save us all. Honestly I don't mind them together that much, but yeah the first time I watched the first season and their theme came up I muted it until it was finished; I knew it was going to be terrible and awkward and I hate watching stuff like that for too long. EDIT: Important read for fans and people wondering wtf we're thinking: Why grown-ass men love My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic

If you force a woman to give birth against her will, that is by definition taking away her rights. That is sexism. And even if you don't want to cede that, there's no question that the leaders of the pro-life movement are sexist. They don't like it that women control their own sexual reproduction, and want to control it themselves (it's why the leaders are also opposed to contraception). Plus, overwhelming evidence shows that poverty is correlated (and yes, causative) with women controlling their reproduction. You're stating something that is inherently a matter of opinion and not a "fact by definition". The label of "sexist" is something applied by the pro-abortion movement to anyone pro-life in order to discredit them. It seems unfathomable to basically every pro-choice person I've ever met that pro-life people actually mean what they say - and oppose abortion simply because they believe it to be murder. I could go one step further, for instance, and say that abortion supporters are sexist because they're taking away the right of a man to decide what happens to his child. But I won't go there, because that would be a cheap attempt to discredit someone based on a parody of their actual argument. I doubt you'll show me the same courtesy. No, forcing someone to give up their bodily freedom for another parasitic (And yes, a fetus is biologically parasitic as it is completely physically dependent on the mother, rather than just socially dependent after birth) lifeform is, by definition, taking away her rights. According to Article 3 from the Universal Declaration of Human Rights: Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person. And before you use that to try and extend those rights to a fetus: everyone is defined as every person, person being defined as a human being regarded as an individual. That's what I've been trying to argue for a page here, that a fetus/fertilized egg isn't an individual because it lacks characteristics of personhood. One more thing, if you're going to argue that the fetus's unique DNA makes it an individual, consider that identical twins have the exact same DNA yet are separate individuals. That security of person extends to bodily security, which if not given willingly by the female is a violation of her Human Rights. That's why I'm arguing that a fetus is not a person, because it doesn't have the same rights. Furthermore, if you're arguing that it's murder from a biblical standpoint you might want to read through your bible again. [spoiler=Long Quote]Clearly there is a quality of life issue being put forth in the Scriptures. And in this case, Solomon makes the point that it is sometimes better to end a pregnancy prematurely than to allow it to continue into a miserable life. This is made even more clear in these following verses: "Then I looked again at all the acts of oppression which were being done under the sun. And behold I saw the tears of the oppressed and that they had no one to comfort them; and on the side of their oppressors was power, but they had no one to comfort them. So I congratulated the dead who are already dead more than the living who are still living. But better off than both of them is the one who has never existed, who has never seen the evil activity that is done under the sun." Ecclesiastes 4:1-3 Here we have an argument for both euthanasia and abortion. When quality of life is at stake, Solomon seems to make the argument that ending a painful life or ending what will be a painful existence is preferable. Now remember, we're not talking about David's songs here. We're reading the words of the man to whom God gave the world's greatest wisdom. And Solomon was not alone in this argument. Consider the words of Job, a man of great faith and wealth, when his life fell upon the hardest of times: "And Job said, 'Let the day perish on which I was to be born, and the night which said, "a boy is conceived." May that day be darkness; let not God above care for it, nor light shine on it.'" "Why did I not die at birth, come forth from my womb and expire? Why did the knees receive me, and why the breasts, that I should suck? For now I would have lain down and been quiet; I would have slept then, I would have been at rest, with kings and with counselors of the earth, who rebuilt ruins for themselves; or with princes who had gold, who were filling their houses with silver,. Or like the miscarriage which is discarded, I would not be, as infants that never saw light. There the wicked cease from raging, and there the weary are at rest. The prisoners are at ease together; they do not hear the voice of the taskmaster. The small and the great are there, and the slave is free from his master." Job 3:2-4,11-19 And again a few chapters later Job reiterates the greater grace he would have known if his life had been terminated as a fetus: "Why then hast Thou brought me out of the womb? Would that I had died and no eye had seen me! I should have been as though I had not been, carried from womb to tomb." Job 10:18-19 Clearly there is a strong argument here that the quality of a life is as important if not more important than the act of being born. Indeed, we could claim that the Bible supports ending a pregnancy in the face of a life without quality. And, if I wanted to be bold, I could claim that this interpretation is in fact a biblical mandate to support the use of abortion as a way to improve our quality of life. And taking these verses to their extreme, I could claim that abortion is not just a good idea, it is a sacrament. Actually, I will stop short of making that claim. In fact, I will stop short of making the claim that the Bible condemns or supports abortion at all. It does neither. The condemning and supporting comes not from the words of the Bible but from leaders within our Culture of Christianity who use verses out of context -- the same way I just did to support abortion -- to support their views against abortion. The condemning and the supporting comes not from the Scriptures but from average Christians who take the easy way out, accepting one or two verses of the Bible as proof that their leaders are speaking the gospel truth. The condemning and supporting comes not from God but from those who do not take the time to read the Bible, in its own context, and decide for themselves the meanings therein. For indeed, there is one passage in the Bible that deals specifically with the act of causing a woman to abort a pregnancy. And the penalty for causing the abortion is not what many would lead us to believe: "And if men struggle and strike a woman with child so that she has a miscarriage, yet there is no further injury, he shall be fined as the woman's husband may demand of him, and he shall pay as the judges decide. But if there is any further injury, then you shall appoint as a penalty life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burn for burn, wound for wound, bruise for bruise." Exodus 21:22-25 This is a very illuminating passage. In it we find a woman losing her child by being stuck by men who are fighting. Rather than it being a capital offense, however, it is relegated to a civil matter, with the father-to-be taking the participants to court for a settlement. But, as we read on, if the woman is killed, a "life for a life," then the men who killed her shall be killed. Some have claimed that the life for a life part is talking about the baby. But from reading the context we can see this is not true. It also states a tooth for a tooth and a burn for a burn. Babies don't have teeth when they are born, and it is highly unlikely a baby will be burned during birth. It is pretty clear that this part refers to the mother. Thus we can see that if the baby is lost, it does not require a death sentence -- it is not considered murder. But if the woman is lost, it is considered murder and is punished by death. It's important to note that some anti-abortion lobbyists want to convince us the baby in this passage survived the miscarriage. They point to the more "politically-correct" translation they find in the New International Version of the Bible. There it translates the term "miscarriage" into "gives birth prematurely" (the actual words in Hebrew translate "she lose her offspring"). While this may give them the warm and fuzzy notion that this verse might actually support their cause if maybe the child survived, it is wishful thinking at best. In our modern era of miracle medicine only 60% of all premature births survive. Three thousand years ago, when this passage was written, they did not have modern technology to keep a preemie alive. In fact, at that time, more than half of all live births died before their first birthday. In a world like that, a premature birth was a death sentence. Others have looked to the actual Hebrew words, themselves, to try and refute these verses. They note that the word "yalad" is used in verse 22 to describe the untimely birth, and that yalad is also used in other places to describe a live birth. They then go on to say other places in the Bible use the words "nefel" and "shakol" to describe a miscarriage. Therefore, the argument goes, the baby in Exodus 21:22 must have been born alive. It's easy to see how a novice might make this mistake, but a closer look at the words in question reveal the flaw in this argument. The word yalad is a verb that describes the process of something coming out - the departing of the fetus. Since it is describing the process, and not the result, it could be used to describe either a live birth or a miscarriage. Shakol which shows up in Hosea 9:14, is also a verb, but its meaning is to make a woman barren. Now a barren woman certainly might miscarry, but with this understanding of the word, it's clear why the writer of Exodus would not have used it since this miscarriage was caused by an accident, not by barrenness. And the word nefel is not even a verb. It's a noun. True, as a noun it is the term for a miscarried fetus, but the writer wasn't using a noun. He was using a verb to describe the coming out of the fetus. Thus, if I were describing a man falling to his death, I would use the verb "to fall" which can be used for both those who die and those who survive a fall, but to describe the man himself I would use the word the "fatality." So we can see that while a novice might mistake a verb for a noun and come to the wrong conclusions about the original Hebrew words used in the Exodus passage, a more careful look proves that the words only describe the action of losing the fetus, not the fetus itself. And that being the case, we can't use the Hebrew translations to determine if the fetus was alive or not when it came out - so we are forced to accept that in all certainly, considering the medical knowledge at the time, the preemie died. This makes it even more clear that the "tooth for a tooth" passage refers only to the mother, not to the miscarried fetus. What has been so clearly demonstrated by the passage in Exodus - the fact that God does not consider a fetus a human person - can also be seen in a variety of other Bible verses. In Leviticus 27:6 a monetary value was placed on children, but not until they reached one month old (any younger had no value). Likewise, in Numbers 3:15 a census was commanded, but the Jews were told only to count those one month old and above - anything less, particularly a fetus, was not counted as a human person. In Ezekiel 37:8-10 we watch as God re-animates dead bones into living soldiers, but the passage makes the interesting note that they were not alive as persons until their first breath. Likewise, in Genesis 2:7, Adam had a human form and a vibrant new body but he only becomes a fully-alive human person after God makes him breathe. And in the same book, in Genesis 38:24, we read about a pregnant woman condemned to death by burning. Though the leaders of Israel knew the woman was carrying a fetus, this was not taken into consideration. If indeed the Jews, and the God who instructed them, believed the fetus to be an equal human person to the mother, then why would they let the fetus die for the mother's crimes? The truth is simple. A fetus is not a human person, and its destruction is not a murder. Period. I'm not debating in a "philosophical" sense because the characteristics that make something human are very real. Furthermore, seeing as in the philosophical sense there hasn't been a universal definition established there's no point trying to argue anything else, but in a scientific sense there is a very real definition that's perfectly reasonable. What you're trying to do is change common language to divorce two words that have the same inherent meaning and connotation so you can legally create a subclass of human beings that aren't quite "persons," and therefore marginalize their rights while telling half truths to others to convince them that what they're doing isn't wrong. A clear example of this happened in the 1960's... The definition of pregnancy was changed. In common terms, pregnancy meant (and still means) being "with child." The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists changed the definition of the start of pregnancy from the moment of conception (when truly a unique individual is formed inside the woman), to implantation. This allowed them to avoid having to label the pill as an abortifacient, because technically it didn't terminate a pregnancy (they changed the very definition), it only just prevented implantation. We are debating this in a philosophical sense, or at least I am, because we're debating what characteristics are needed to give a human full rights. Anyway I've stated what I said is needed to make something a full person, what's your scientific definition? I'm trying to make the language more clear and accurate, common understandings aren't always correct. And yes I am creating another class of humans, because I think many of us can agree that this shouldn't be given priority over this. And as to your example, I applaud what the scientists did. Watch that Carlin video and he addresses that point about implantation vs. conception. And I think in the common sense most people wouldn't say someone's pregnant a day after having sex that resulted in a later pregnancy, people usually only say a woman's pregnant if she identifies herself as such or if there is clear evidence (I.e. a swollen belly).

That's an inaccurate reading if you're basing it on the fact that there's an or. The list needs a conjunction to be grammatically correct and the or fulfills that requirement, it serves no further meaning in the sentence. In this sense something doesn't have to fulfill all 7 definitions to be a person, rather just 1. Wikipedia has something similar to this, it's disambiguation page: Person or Persons may refer to: Person, any of various established definitions of personhood; people is often used in English as the suppletive plural of person Grammatical person, concerning the ways in which languages address people and describe their relationships to the speaker Legal person (or juristic person), an entity that the law treats as a natural person for some purposes, such as an incorporated organization Natural person, a legal term to differentiate human beings from juristic persons An individual human, a member of the species Homo sapiens The living body (see Human body) of a human being; either (a) the actual body as distinct from clothing, etc., or from the mind or soul, or (b) the body with its clothing and adornment as presented to the sight of others; bodily frame or figure. Usually with of or possessive But since we're discussing what does make something/one a person in a philosophical and moral sense personhood is the more appropriate term to be debating (The wikipedia entry I referenced initially is basically defining this term). I get what you're saying, but you're using common vernacular and I'm afraid at this level of discussion it can often times be inaccurate or inappropriate. per·son·hood noun /ˈpərsənˌod/  The quality or condition of being an individual person

OR means fulfilling any one condition satisfies the definition. AND means fulfilling all conditions satisfies the definition. The conjunction linking the parts of the definition is "or" not "and", so both conditions don't have to be satisfied for the definition to be fulfilled. The conjunction is only referring to the list in the first phrase of the sentance; the "or" has no bearing on the dependent clause in the second half of the sentence. The way you're looking at it, with the "or" separating two independent clauses it would read like this: A person is a human being. An entity that has certain capacities or attributes associated with personhood, for example in a particular moral or legal context. The way I'm reading it is: A person is a human being/an entity that has certain capacities or attributes associated with personhood, for example in a particular moral or legal context.

Right from square one the definition says "A person is a human being". An unborn child is human, and is alive (a being). The second part "or an entity" doesn't exclude human beings (unborn children) from being persons, it just includes other things. Even if you were to completely ignore the first statement defining a person, the second part isn't an exhaustive list of capacities or attributes. The key words that you missed were "can include" and "among others". Also calling something "debatable" is a far cry from calling it "proven," as you did in an earlier post. You misinterpreted the definition, it didn't say a person is a human (In any state), or an entity that fulfills x capacities. It states that both the human and entity must fulfill the requirements which can include agency, self-awareness, a notion of the past and future, and the possession of rights and duties; a fetus cannot fulfill the vast majority of these qualities. And the reasons they wrote "can include" and "among others" was to point to the amount of diversity on the topic, but from a western point of view the attributes listed were what we generally associate with personhood. I showed that it was debatable using a standard definition from a fairly unbiased source, in my earlier post (And the one you quoted and edited) I had other evidence showing I was right/that supported my argument (I.e. proven).

This is false, or at the very least debatable. For a standard wikipedia definition: A person is a human being, or an entity (In other words, it doesn't have to be a human and thus the two words aren't totally synonymous) that has certain capacities or attributes associated with personhood, for example in a particular moral or legal context. Such capacities or attributes can include agency, self-awareness, a notion of the past and future, and the possession of rights and duties (And a fetus possesses none, or at the very least less, of these than a fully self-aware and sexually developed female), among others. However, the concept of a person is difficult to define in a way that is universally accepted, due to its historical and cultural variability and the controversies surrounding its use in some contexts (Like I said, debatable). I also linked to this earlier in the thread, but it's a (Granted, biased) piece on the differences between a human, and a person, and thus shows why abortion is a moral choice for the carrier to make: http://www.elroy.net/ehr/abortionanswers.html Well yes in plain speech now it would be since there aren't any other entities that we know of that possesses the qualities of personhood. If alien life is discovered, or AI increases to the point of self-awareness then "human person" may become a necessary distinction from "robotic person" or "extraterrestrial person."

Speaking of the msuic, At the Gala has really grown on me recently. I haven't got it down as well as Winter Wrap Up or Art of the Dress but I'm getting there.

Two quests I really remember enjoying for the humor were My Arm's Big Adventure and Rocking Out, and for story/atmosphere I have to go with Darkness of Hallowvale.