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Amendment 48's simplicity is its weakness

This letter has not been edited

Dan Kushmaul, Longmont

Published October 11, 2008 at 6 p.m.

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I just saw Kristi Burton defending Amendment 48 on TV and I feel I must respond. She cited un-named medical discoveries when she declared that a fertilized egg is a unique individual. She must have read different textbooks than I did when I studied Developmental Biology at CU in Boulder.

A fertilized egg is not an individual. It has the potential to be a person, or two people, or many. If we declare a fertilized egg a person, does that mean identical twins are legally one individual? If a fertilized egg is a person or persons, then any contraception or procedure that prevents implantation, or perhaps even fertilization, will constitute depriving a person of life - murder. Do we really want to criminalize IUDs, condoms, and the pill, and force in vitro fertilization clinics to implant every egg they fertilize?

The simplicity of Amendment 48 is its weakness, attempting to force simple minded, purely emotional rules upon a complex cultural and scientific issue with no regard to its far-reaching legal ramifications.

Amendment 48 is bad science, bad law, and bad for society.

Comments

  • October 11, 2008

    8:41 p.m.

    Suggest removal

    LetsThink writes:

    Dan (and other Abortionists).

    Can you tell us with absolutely no question, when Life begins???

    And don't say when the baby is breathing. That's totally arbitrary, and gives you the opportunity to kill the baby, hopefully without going to prison.

    Do you also agree that killing an unborn baby is wrong? It is evil, and a sin.

    And don't try to deceive us by saying the baby is part of the mother. We're too smart for that lie.

    And don't try to tell us that you want to have abortion in case of rape, incest, and danger to mother's health. They all can be fabricated, if the mother can find a 'doctor' with no morals.

    Who will stand up for the unborn, who are defenseless against the knife that is plunged into them.

    Shall we go on with this discussion?

    It's time for Abortionists to stop lying. We're too smart to be deluded by these empty justifications (I heard the debate also, and the abortionist made a fool of herself).

  • October 11, 2008

    8:56 p.m.

    Suggest removal

    leftside writes:

    Don't you like the way LetsThink tells you how to answer his questions?

    "Shall we go on with this discussion?"

    You've already had a nice discussion with yourself. Did you win?

    "Beware of false prophets", folks.

  • October 12, 2008

    8:50 a.m.

    Suggest removal

    Ari writes:

    "LetsThink" asks, "Can you tell us with absolutely no question, when Life begins???"

    That question is irrelevant. Amendment 48 does not define when "life" begins; it (arbitrarily) defines when personhood begins. Life does not begin at conception; life precedes conception. Both the sperm cell and pre-fertilized egg are alive. Life is a never-ending chain that goes back to the first living things. So the only sensible answer to the question is "around four billion years ago."

    "LetsThink" denies that "the baby is part of the mother." But that statement is ambiguous. The fertilized egg is not an element of the woman's own bodily functions, as a kidney is. The fertilized egg contains a unique set of human DNA. So, no, a fertilized egg is not like a kidney in that way. But a fertilized egg (through the fetal stage) is entirely contained within and completely dependent upon the woman's body, and that fact is central to the issue of personhoon. Biological distinction, in the sense of existing independently, physically apart from another person, is a necessary condition for personhood.

    "LetsThink" declares, without offering a single example and with loaded language, "It's time for Abortionists to stop lying." No, it's time for "LetsThink" to start telling the truth.

    For a complete discussion of the horrific consequences of Amendment 48, and a more detailed explanation of why a fertilized egg is not a person, please see the paper by Diana Hsieh and me titled, "Amendment 48 Is Anti-Life:"
    http://www.seculargovernment.us/docs/...

    Thanks,
    Ari Armstrong

  • October 12, 2008

    10:04 a.m.

    Suggest removal

    IronmanCarmichael writes:

    Ah, good old reliable LetsThink. Nice house, nobody home.

    Now can the rest of you please stop getting all riled up by what he writes, or dignifying them with response? You risk lowering yourself to his level. Just let the poor man alone with his fantasies and his childish moralizing and his paranoia (soon he'll be writing his usual "Our liberal friends are attacking me and dodging the issue instead of answering my question" post). I admit I'm as guilty as the rest of you--although I've manfully resisted the urge to call him LetsStink--but I've come to realize that trying to reason with the man is like trying to sort confetti in a wind tunnel. (Frankly, Wechasa, I doubt he has a wife, let alone children.) So just ignore him; better yet, don't even do that.

  • October 12, 2008

    10:27 a.m.

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    AngelontheSidelines writes:

    Potential just means you haven't done anything yet.

  • October 12, 2008

    5:14 p.m.

    Suggest removal

    dianahsieh writes:

    The advocates of Amendment 48 claim that a newly-created embryo -- a single cell without any human attributes except DNA -- is a human person with a right to life. They wish to force that view on everyone, whatever the costs. Consider:

    * Amendment 48 would make abortion first-degree murder, except perhaps to save the woman's life. First-degree murder is defined in Colorado law as deliberately causing the death of a "person," a crime punished by life in prison or the death penalty. So women and their doctors would be punished with the severest possible penalty under law for terminating a pregnancy -- even in cases of rape, incest, and fetal deformity.

    * Amendment 48 would ban any form of birth control that might sometimes prevent the implantation of a fertilized egg in the uterus -- including the birth control pill, morning-after pill, and IUD. The result would be many more unintended pregnancies and unwanted children in Colorado.

    * Amendment 48 would ban in vitro fertilization because the process usually creates more fertilized eggs than can be safely implanted in the womb. So every year, hundreds of Colorado couples would be denied the joy of a child of their own.

    Amendment 48 has very sharp teeth. Yet such consequences seem to be of little concern to the advocates of Amendment 48. They think that the men and women of Colorado should be forced to sacrifice for the sake these new "persons" in the womb.

    So we must ask: Is a fertilized egg a human person with a right to life? The only rational answer is "NO."

    An embryo or fetus is wholly dependent on the woman for its basic life-functions. It goes where she goes, eats what she eats, and breathes what she breathes. It lives as an extension of her body, contained within and dependent on her for its survival. It is only a potential person, not an actual person.

    That situation changes radically at birth. The newborn baby exists as a distinct organism, separate from his mother. Although still very needy, he lives his own life. He is a person, and his life must be protected as a matter of right.

    So when a woman chooses to terminate a pregnancy she does not violate the rights of any person. Instead, she is properly exercising her own rights over her own body in pursuit of her own happiness.

    For a detailed analysis, see the issue paper "Amendment 48 Is Anti-Life: Why It Matters That a Fertilized Egg Is Not a Person" by Ari Armstrong and myself. It's available at:

    http://www.seculargovernment.us/docs/...

    The sad fact is that Amendment 48 is based on sectarian religious dogma, not objective science or philosophy. It is a blatant attempt to impose theocracy in America.

    Please vote NO on 48!

    Diana Hsieh
    Founder, Coalition for Secular Government
    http://www.seculargovernment.us

  • October 13, 2008

    10:03 a.m.

    Suggest removal

    Danchan writes:

    Isn't it weird that anytime Letsthink decides to comment on a letter at least half of all the following comments will be about the crazy guy and the actual letter writers idea gets lost.

    It's like he's kryptonite for honest debate.

  • October 13, 2008

    11:27 a.m.

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    walong writes:

    > A fertilized egg is not an individual. It has the potential to be a person, or two people, or many.

    This "potential person" assertion is deliberately misleading. Scientific fact establishes that a new human being comes into existence at conception. The development of a human being is a continuum that begins as a single-celled zygote and continues into adulthood. Science does not allow for arbitrary moments in the development process where "potential" becomes "actualized". Under the "potential" assertion, newborns, infants, and toddlers are not "complete" persons either.

    If CU is teaching that a fertilized egg is not a human being, then they are in contradiction with scientific facts as established by world-renown embryologists.

  • October 13, 2008

    11:59 a.m.

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    walong writes:

    dianahsieh writes:

    > So we must ask: Is a fertilized egg a human person with a right to
    > life? The only rational answer is "NO."

    > The sad fact is that Amendment 48 is based on sectarian religious
    > dogma, not objective science or philosophy. It is a blatant attempt
    > to impose theocracy in America.

    dianahseih: You are asserting misinformation as fact, and misrepresenting fact as opinion or dogma. Clinical embryology openly refutes your attempts to dehumanize human life at its earliest stages of existence:

    KEITH MOORE AND T.V.N. PERSAUD, The Developing Human: Clinically
    Oriented Embryology (6th ed. only) (Philadelphia: W.B. Saunders Company,
    1998): "Human development is a continuous process that begins when an
    oocyte (ovum) from a female is fertilized by a sperm (or spermatozoon)
    from a male. ... the embryo begins to develop as soon as the oocyte is
    fertilized. ... Zygote: this cell results from the union of an oocyte
    and a sperm. A zygote is the beginning of a new human being (i.e., an
    embryo). ... Human development begins at fertilization, the process
    during which a male gamete or sperm ... unites with a female gamete or
    oocyte ... to form a single cell called a zygote. This highly
    specialized, totipotent cell marks the beginning of each of us as a
    unique individual."

    WILLIAM J. LARSEN, Human Embryology (New York: Churchill Livingstone,
    1997): "In this text, we begin our description of the developing human
    with the formation and differentiation of the male and female sex cells
    or gametes, which will unite at fertilization to initiate the embryonic
    development of a new individual. ... Fertilization takes place in the
    oviduct ... resulting in the formation of a zygote containing a single
    diploid nucleus. Embryonic development is considered to begin at this
    point. .... This moment of zygote formation may be taken as
    the beginning or zero time point of embryonic development."

    RONAN O'RAHILLY AND FABIOLA MULLER, Human Embryology & Teratology (New
    York: Wiley-Liss, 1994): "Fertilization is an important landmark
    because, under ordinary circumstances, a new, genetically distinct human
    organism is thereby formed."

  • October 15, 2008

    8:48 a.m.

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    walong writes:

    > And, when "extraordinary circumstances" happen to occur, what then?

    I think the key thing to remember is that there are no "circumstances" that change that fact that this is about the life of a human being.