re: #53 freetoken

As I’ve mentioned here before, I am in principle against late-term abortions, but that is the current law anyway so there’s no real space between my own position and the law.

Against the creationists’ magickal idea of “person”, I suggest that a much better definition has to do with brain function - which is why “brain death” is one criteria for unplugging someone totally dependent upon life support.

Without a functioning neocortex/cerebral cortex there can be no conscious thought, no collection of memories interacting with sensory input can exist.

I agree with the bolded position with a couple of caveats:

1) Lethal teratogenic malformations, which many women, especially the poor who do not enjoy sufficient prenatal care, do not discover until after 25 weeks gestation. Why continue to carry an anencaphalic corpse to term?

2) Lethal genetics that will surely kill a child young and will require intense pain, suffering, and crippling costs for all concerned. (NB: Families should have the *choice* of termination in this instance.)

I am in total agreement with the rest of the post. The question becomes when that occurs. Twenty weeks? Twenty one? Is it a moving target based on the youngest preemie of record to survive? It’s a puzzlement.