The nazis performed abortions blah blah blah (just anticipating the next diatribe)

That you asserted it earlier doesn't make it more supported, James. I also can't find any support for your 12-week claim, only references that cite 12 weeks as a point where connections begin being made, in a way that leads to something resembling consciousness somewhere in the 23-30 wk range. Another cite:

http://www.nature.com/pr/journal/v65/n3/full/pr200950a.html

So I don't buy your certainty that consciousness begins "much earlier than 24 weeks" at all.

A few points. Roe v wade doesn't provide a right to abortions post viability, which is definitely NOT 20 weeks. A fetus has like a 5% chance of survival at that point.

Also, late term abortions are basically invariably for medical reasons, so basically people who oppose them are just into torturing parents who have just lost a child and might lose the mother. Nice.

Finally, we are talking about whether the state has a right to commandeer your body and compell you into servitude. As you know, slavery was banned and constitutionally doing that would require compensation from the state. So, add "most support tax increases to pay for it" to the list of things anti-choice people has to believe to not be a hypocrite.

Frankly, I don't like the idea that the state gets control of my body just to satisfy the whackadoodle notions of religious people.

"Thalamic afferents to the cortex develop from approximately 12-16 wk of gestation, reach the cortical subplate, but “wait” until they grow into the cortical plate (16). At this stage, only long depolarization of the deep layers may reach the cortex (17) (Fig. 2)."

this is what you're quoting i'm assuming with nerve connections. the idea of processed consciousness is generally given at 28 weeks, though i don't think complex intelligence is a requirement to be called life. There are many animals with brave wave functions sub-Delta, which our still scientifically classified as life

reflexes kick in at around week 12. This si when nerve endings are attaching, and consciousness is arising. not complex, and intelligent, but simple, basic electricity throughout the nertgrtbvbb

http://www.babycenter.com/fetal-development-week-by-week

@Ogion

did you unmute me? can you hear me? because i'm not religious, and i'm not against late term abortions. christ this one is thick

secondly, if it IS a human life, and there is a legal acceptance of that life: then the matter is not "imposing will upon children" rather it's "making sure you don't kill a child"

right now it's not that way legally, but it's up to the states in many matters. I'm more arguing "ought" than "is"

No I don't think he unmuted you yet.

gud

sleepsinallday, stop with your condescending bullshit.

"why the fuck do you think it's acceptable to call out Democrats for 'indoctrination,' whilst citing a breitbart article"

Liberals cite Huffington Post all the time; the difference is that universities are expected to be impartial purveyors of information and are key to shaping the minds of new generations.

"I think you are fundamentally misunderstanding what that quote is stating"

I am not. The Vice Chancellor is saying that it is politically neutral but will create a "counternarrative" (tearing apart posters) against certain ideologies that he deems offensive.

"ignoring the fact that education system is but one of millions of influences on the decisions that people make."

Yeah, I'm sure the Soviet indoctrination system was also just one among millions of influences. Though your statement is objectively true, education is one of the strongest influences on ideological formation.

"Perhaps if you had went to university"

There you go stereotyping me to be an uneducated (white) middle-aged person. While it is true that I haven't yet attended college, though I'm applying this year, your assertion that only college-graduates can have legitimate opinions is incredibly elitist.

"the value in our first amendment freedoms comes not from our ability to utilize them, but of our respect for the individuals who hold those rights"

That's nonsense jargon you're spouting to sound educated when you probably have no idea what it means yourself. If individuals aren't able to utilize their freedom of speech, then it does not exist.

" you would have encountered individuals whose lives have been negatively impacted by "free speech.""

That, there, is authoritarian as fuck. You have a right to be offended, but you don't have the right to curb others' freedom of speech because you're offended.

"Perhaps, if instead of rejecting new sources of information on the principle of bias, you would be capable of hearing other perspectives and logically evaluating their argumentative merit. "

Right back at you.

"Nowadays, we have social media and near-everyone has the opportunity to propagandize an issue."

Social media is incomparable to the hallowed halls of academia.

"That is why it is doubly important that we teach people to have respect for their freedoms."

Completely agree, though your words appear empty and ring hollow.

"When we compromise the integrity of national coherence for the advancement of individuals' political agendas, we put ourselves at risk for things that the Nazis actually did..."

National coherence? You sound like a South American strongman. The American republic was founded upon division, and the founding father relied on this division to maintain a balance of power. Without division, democracy is meaningless. As for Nazis, they absolutely have freedom of speech as well, no matter how much you or I disagree with them.

https://www.oyez.org/cases/1976/76-1786

I feel like not enough credence is given to the notion that some of the far-left things passed in SGA's stems from bored students shitposting because they don't have much better to do in SGA's.

@krellin

hey! we were talking about neuroscience!

and @lethologica

it's a stiff debate right now, but i'm not saying you're wrong, i only believe you are. you could be right, but there is so much more research on the brain that needs to be done. I'm in college right now and all my studies on brain chemistry have come from an anthropological basis, and outside readings.

There's supposed to be some French guy who made a breakthrough recently, but i can't find a translation of his paper. if you find anything PM it to me, I think it's a Parisian journal, but i haven't had any luck. all i can find are separate breakthroughs on autism

@James:
-Consciousness was the bar that was being discussed. If you wish merely to talk about life, a zygote is life, but it's substantially different from what we're trying to protect with all this talk about abortion being murder.
-Reflexes are not consciousness. If you want to make an argument based on reflexes, feel free to do so, but just because you feel like "consciousness is arising" doesn't mean it is.
-The argument from ignorance doesn't support your belief that I'm wrong in any substantial way.

Men debating abortions is like women debating sports ..We know a bit about it but not really enough to have a solid ground for getting involved. Yes im expecting the backlash re both...

Aboriginal culture states that the " baby soul" enters the body at about 12-14 weeks which is weird timing considering this deduction was done with their stone age tec .

Sports is not something intrinsic only to men... Try erectile dysfunction.

Smokey, women's opinion on abortion used to largely mirror that of men from 2001-2008 before the left's divide and conquer strategy.

"Men debating abortions is like women debating sports ..We know a bit about it but not really enough to have a solid ground for getting involved. "

what an utterly fucking stupid thing to say

Actually, since there are a lot of women who are better at sports and more knowledgeable than most men, it isn't at all like that. More like that's a bunch of sexist bullshit. I bet Hope Solo would love to have a word with you on that score. lol.

It is more like a bunch of white slaveowners discussing the pluses and minuses of being a slave. Actually, it isn't that far off, since we're discussing commandeering people's bodies to provide a service other people want to take by force.

And if you want to talk about a zygote being "life" a cancer cell is "life" too. Are we now opposed to chemotherapy? Perhaps we should deny cancer treatment to Christians.

And this notion that abortion is murder is bullshit, unless we're going to make the death penalty murder, wars murder, make every shooting into murder, and make a failure to render first aid murder, failure to donate kidneys into murder, and so forth. even if we are talking about a killing (which is a dubious proposition) there are all kinds of circumstances where such things are sanctioned and are not murder. Here, we are talking about someone declining to render major support at significant personal risk and detriment and that is all. And we're not even necessarily talking about failing to render aid to an actual person, but rather to something that might become a person. The whole argument is entirely bogus.

@leon: thanks for your comments, my intention was really not to stereotype or discredit you. Rather, I wanted to point to the cognitive dissonance present (and still present) in your argument. Now that you've opened the discussion, I'd like to address each of your points with regards to Sandel's theories and my defense of censorship, but I have a lot on my plate this morning. My goal is to educate, not to chastise. (good luck on your college applications!)

The real implication of this fucking retarded suggestion -- which is simply man-hating "feminists" bullshit -- is that the OVERWHELMONG MAJORITY of women therefore are not allowed to discuss abortion either, since most women have never had an abortion or even considered an abortion, and a fair number of women have never even been pregnant.

But more to the fucking point, since abortion is the taking of a pre-birth life --- let's call it murder just to make the discussion easier --- and since all men able to converse are therefore presumably alive (just like a baby in the womb) then I would say ALL HUMANITY, regardless of gender, has a right to have a say in the discussion of the acceptability of murdering a pre-birth human.

As for ogions childish liberal argument that "death penalty = murder", I suppose this jackass all thinks that incarcerating someone for a crime is kidnapping, huh? That's the same childish fucking logic.

Useless idiocy has no place in this discussion....but I'm sure he's just mindlessly parroting his liberal mentors

Latest Polling data today is all over the place.

Colorado showing Hillary at a +3 (Emerson)
Arizona showing Trump pulling away at +5 (CNN) +4 (Emerson)
Pennsylvania Clinton still holding on in +4 (CNN) +4 (Monmouth)
Virginia shows Clinton tending back up to +5 (Winthrop)
Nevada surging for Trump at +6 (CNN)

Interesting indeed. Will be the test of time to see if those numbers hold through the end of the week like Trump will really need them too. If these numbers change, some polls showing Hillary now only at +2 Pennsylvania, ND could actually be right.

Taking that data and plugging into an electoral map gives you the following:
http://www.270towin.com/maps/AWwR2

Trump can win if these numbers hold, and just 1 more state turns his way, maybe Virginia, though it seems unlikely, maybe Colorado but that isnt a state where he was invested much. So it looks like everything comes down to these new numbers in Pennsylvania and if he can appeal to the voters there.

Keep in mind this all relies on him Holding Florida, and holding these numbers in Nevada

It really tightened up fast. Clinton is slipping, and Trump isn't talking much. which is good for him.

You might owe ND a pizza after all

@Lethologica

"Electric signals by themselves are worth shit. Reflexes are worth shit."

you said reflexe--- whatever. this debate moved into Krellin/Ogion territory so it's out of my grasp

and it wasn't an appeal to ignorance, as much as i was saying- don't pretend you know 100%, the top neuroscientists in the world disagree with how living conciousness develops into external conciousness, I.E. reaction to stimuli

but if you have a better answer than them, fine. you might be right.

Florida 45.1 46.1 Trump +1.0
Ohio 44.3 46.8 Trump +2.5
Pennsylvania 47.3 42.4 Clinton +4.9Trending Down
Colorado 43.7 41.3 Clinton +2.4Trending Down
North Carolina 46.3 47.0 Trump +0.7Trending Up
Virginia 47.0 42.3 Clinton +4.7Trending Down
Nevada 44.0 45.6 Trump +1.6Trending Up
Wisconsin 46.8 41.0 Clinton +5.8Trending Up
Michigan 47.0 40.0 Clinton +7.0
New Hampshire 46.0 41.3 Clinton +4.7
Maine 45.3 38.7 Clinton +6.6Trending Down
Georgia 42.3 48.0 Trump +5.7Trending Up
Iowa 40.3 41.7 Trump +1.4
Arizona 43.5 46.5 Trump +3.0Trending Up

RCP Poll Average 47.0 45.3 Clinton +1.7Trending Down
4-Way RCP Average 45.3 43.4 Clinton +1.9Trending Down

Clinton is down to only one state trending up. Nonetheless, her lead is still there... under a week to go!!!

@Lethologica, Krellin, Ogion (you need to unmute me you silly fruitcake)

should we start a new thread on the abortion stuff? I don't want to crowd up this thread, unless this is coming to an end

http://www.aljazeera.com/blogs/americas/2016/10/voter-turnout-161029212538884.html

No but yanik, honestly, this is NOWHERE near as frightening as it could be. It signals what we all kinda expected, two candidates that are not really that liked. Hillary will win probably by a state or two, virginia, colorado and pennsyvlania will likely go her way even if these others dont. I havent heard a single Republican strategist ever suggest Trump was gonna do well in virginia or colorado.

Kelly ann Conway his campaign manager would have you beleive that Michigan and Wisconsin are a toss up but thatd be a cold day in hell before the whole Rust belt reagan democrats go Trump crazy.

@bo, whats funny is, a huge swath of Hillary voters already voted. of the 23 million early votes the majority are democrats. Were looking at some states like Nevada where the early voting has actually changed the race entirely. Not sure how Trump surged to a +6 today. But thats CNN reporting, try figuring that out.

What +6 in Nevada would equal too, would literally cancel any gains at all she got from early voting. question is not whether Hillary Voters stay home, its whether disaffected moderate republicans will still home at this point.

@brainbomb

31% chance to Trump right now from 538. I would not take those betting odds when it comes to Pizza

I'm Italian. I BUY a pizza and GIVE it away?

I'm Calabrian. We don't play that way