Foetuses [Fetuses] 'may be conscious long before abortion limit'

The Daily Telegraph ^ | March 10, 2003 | David Derbyshire

[MadIvan]

Foetuses may develop consciousness long before the legal age limit for abortions, one of Britain's leading brain scientists has said.

Baroness Greenfield, a professor of neurology at Oxford University and the director of the Royal Institution, said there was evidence to suggest the conscious mind could develop before 24 weeks, the upper age where terminations are permitted.

Although she fell short of calling for changes in the abortion laws, she urged doctors and society to be cautious when assuming unborn babies lacked consciousness. "Is the foetus conscious? The answer is yes, but up to a point," she said.

"Given that we can't prove consciousness or not, we should be very cautious about being too gung ho and assuming something is not conscious. We should err on the side of caution."

Last year, a Daily Telegraph straw poll found many neurologists were concerned that foetuses could feel pain in the womb before 24 weeks after conception.

Many believed foetuses should be given anaesthetics during a late abortion, after 20 weeks. Some also believe pain relief should be given for keyhole surgery in the womb.

Abortions are allowed up to 24 weeks in Britain, but are rarely given so late. Around 90 per cent of the 175,000 planned terminations that take place each year in England and Wales are in the first 12 weeks of pregnancy. Around 1.5 per cent - or 2,600 - take place after the 20th week.

Terminations after 24 weeks are only allowed in exceptional circumstances if, for instance, the mother's life is threatened.

Lady Greenfield is sceptical of philosophers and doctors who argue that consciousness is "switched on" at some point during the brain's development.

She believes instead that there is a sliding scale of consciousness and that it develops gradually as neurons, or brain cells, make more and more connections with each other.

She told the British Fertility Society in London last week that she had serious concerns about foetal consciousness.

"The Home Office has legislation that applies to a mammal and they have now extended it to the octopus, a mollusc, because it can learn," she said. "If a mollusc can be attributed with being sentient, and now has Home Office protection, then my own view is that we should be very cautious after making assumptions."

In 2001 a Medical Research Council expert group said unborn babies might feel pain as early as 20 weeks and almost certainly by 24. They called for more sensitive treatment of very premature babies, who often had to undergo painful procedures like heel pricks and injections.

[Gophack]

I agree with you, I only call them pro-abortion, but I was being sarcastic. Should have made it more obvious!

[muawiyah]

Regarding your "breath-takingly ignorant" comment, it is up to you to prove your contention.

[Aquinasfan]

Also, at the other end of the spectrum, are the pro-lifers that actually argue that life begins before conception.

You may be misunderstanding the argument against artificial birth control. The argument against birth control is different than the argument against abortion, but is equally straight forward.

Health consists in the proper operation of the body. It is unhealthy, unnatural and in most cases immoral to diminish the health of one's body. Only an evil or insane person would purposely diminish the operation of his bodily organs and systems.

The argument seems trivial. No one would argue for the right to blind oneself or for the right to amputate one's limbs. Yet many people find it morally acceptable to completely prevent the proper operation of their reproductive system.

(Preventing the proper operation of a bodily system is morally permissible when it occurs indirectly as when, for example, medicine with harmful side-effects is used to fight a disease. This is a case of the principle of double-effect. The primary effect of the medicine is prevention of disease. The secondary effect is harm to another bodily system.)

On the other hand, there are times within the woman's monthly cycle where she is infertile. It is morally permissible to engage in intercourse during these periods to avoid the possibility of pregnancy. (The same God created both fertile and infertile periods in a woman's monthly cycle.)

Nevertheless, the most basic purpose of the human reproductive system is reproduction. And reproduction is one of the two most basic purposes of marriage. So couples should only employ "natural" birth control for grave reasons, i.e. when effects resulting from a pregnancy would present grave dangers to the family and marriage itself.

[mcrommert]

wow!!! They finally figured out the obvious. Too them long enough!

[Search4Truth]

"Find out who your enemies are. Often it is those who claim to be your friends."

That statement certainly reveals something about you. Is that what you really think about people? Do you really think of your friends as enemies?

Reminds me of the saying, "A man sees in the world, that which is already in his heart".

You sir, obviously have a serious character flaw.

[jwalsh07]

The development of the brain has nothing to do with concsciousness

This necessarily implies that consciousness is independent of the brain. Do you believe that?

Thought is a function of the brain and the neurons, ganglia and dendrons that reside there.

If there are no neurons, thought is not possible.

This says nothing about the right to life or when life begins, which is undeniably at conception.

As an addendum, in order to use thoguth, consciousness, as a criteria for whether or not you can kill babies, you would have to have a device capable of measuring same to even begin the discussion.

As an asdie an unborn baby has more neurons than you, I or Hank so if that is the criteria, the three of us have no bag limit and the unborn should be protected.

[CavScoutNC]

Let me ease your mind. The development of the brain has nothing to do with concsciousness.

Do you really thing our minds could ever be at ease with murder? Abortion is murder, plain and simple. Life begins at conception and should be treated as a human being just like you or me. Abortion is a barbaric practice that is used to make up for the immaturity of those who practiced unprotected sex and want the easy way out.

I posed a question to a pro-choice person and never got a response, just a dead stare. It was a question that provoked a lot of thought into this person and caused them to change their viewpoint. All I asked was, "Would you support your Mother to have an abortion if she was carrying you at the time?"

[Maeve]

Talked to her this morning. She's doing well. Her observance of Lent is off to a good start.

[muawiyah]

So far we really don't know where the seat of consciousness might be. All we know is that the brain seems to be in contact with it.

[Question_Assumptions]

It was clear you were being sarcastic. I was simply clarifying why I agree with you and my take on matters.

[Gophack]

Sorry ... and I re-read your comments. You are correct.

I am amazed that so many seemingly intelligent people can sit around and pontificate on why abortion is necessary for this or that reason, without seeing what the outcome of abortion-on-demand is.

Forced abortions and sterilizations in China aside, looking at America, most women who seek an abortion feel that they actually have NO OTHER CHOICE. They are pressured by friends, family and boyfriends; they've young, have little support structure, probably concerned about money, and think that abortion IS the ONLY choice.

These women are abused and tossed aside by a system that CLAIMS to be "pro-woman", and in fact has complete disdain for women. After all, it's the WOMAN'S "problem" that SHE needs to take care of.

We need to do more as pro-lifers to 1) save unborn babies and 2) help the women who feel abortion IS their only choice.

God bless!!!!

[goldilucky]

bump here

[Tribune7]

bump

[Question_Assumptions]

The consciousness argument is not an exclusive or choice.

Again, I know that. But real people are not logic machines. They have limited attention spans and tend to latch on to criteria that they think feel right. Have you ever had to argue about why mylenation of neurons has no impact on personhood? I have. Why? Because a person heard that criteria, liked where it placed the line, and stuck with it. A lot of people want to set a line somewhere between the first and second trimester or somewhere in the second trimester (this is, in part, why "viability" is so popular). The pain criteria gives them such a criteria. While you and I both know that it isn't an exclusive choice, there are people who will latch onto it an use it as their only criteria.

If you think you can prevent abortions by using this argument with individual women, by all means do so. My wariness has to do primarily with the bigger debate.

[Question_Assumptions]

The entire leadership of my college's pro-life group was women -- pro-life feminists.

[Gophack]

I think men are far more likely to be pro-abortion or neutral than women. And, I think that women who are pro-abortion fall in one of the following two categories (for the most part):

1) They have had an abortion or knew someone close to them who had an abortion, and supporting "abortion rights" justifies to them the decision they made or helped to make to abort; or

2) They are, basically, clueless; never had an abortion but bought into the propaganda of the pro-abortion movement who talk about "choice" "freedom" "women's rights" without talking about what abortion REALLY is.

[Question_Assumptions]

Those who try to assign humanness to a life at some point post-fertilization are commonly mired in sea of arbitrary thresholds.

That's why I'm not sure why people are even debating the consciousness issue. For the record, I've seen myelination arguments used to defend first trimester abortions. For that reason, I'd avoid even handing that factoid to the other side to play with.

[Question_Assumptions]

Establishing that the unborn are both human and alive is trivially easy (for all but the most dense Kool Aid drinking pro-aborts). Proving that those criteria, alone, make one a "person" is less trivial. To complicate the issue even further, one must also prove that even if the unborn are persons, that they also have the right to use a woman's body against her will to stay alive. I believe that all of these issues can be answered but they are not as easy or trivial as proving one criteria or another exists in the unborn. You need to prove it matters and, even then, that the life of the unborn warrants forcing women to remain pregnant who don't want to be. Not as easy as it sound.

[Question_Assumptions]

Polls generally do show women to be slightly more pro-life than men. Detailed abortion polls show all sorts of other nuances that I'm sure the pro-abortion side doesn't want to advertise.

[Red6]

You’re not a freak for posting this! I think it's good since most people who talk about woman’s rights and partial birth abortion have NO CLUE what it is. In fact, as so many times in our society, people supporting this do NOT want to know or be confronted with the consequences of their actions. The partial birth abortion is an abhorrent practice, which I can't believe is legal.