Comment

Friday Afternoon Open

114
kirkspencer3/16/2012 6:03:44 pm PDT

re: #105 Tourquoise Supremacist

re: #103 kirkspencer

Where does one draw the line on principle though? “At birth” is very arbitrary. There’s no difference between a -5 min / +5 min baby.

Actually there is to me.

a -5 minute baby has not yet been born. A +5 minute baby has been born. To say “birth” is arbitrary is ignoring a rather practical measure.

Oh, I get your point. In measure of the baby itself there’s no difference. And yet it is this same arbitrariness which has allowed the gradual whittling of what was and was not permitted, because once a line is drawn those who wish it further restricted make this same argument: there is no difference between this side and that side of the line.

But birth, whether by vaginal or cesarean, is a bright line test.