Always, when discussing Abortion, the question of whether an abortion is murder or not revolves around when life begins; after all, a civilization does not condone murder of the innocent and still remain a civilization in anything but name. So inevitably, the concerned individual asks these questions of himself. Does life begin at conception? (the typical religious answer) When the brain shows activity complex enough to signal consciousness? When the child is born? When the individual develops? (2 or 3 years of age) When does life begin?
How about the missing option? That life has no beginning point. Living tissues from the parents combine to make a living creature that grows in independence until one day it borrows the car keys and crashes the family car, moves out on it’s own and doesn’t call except when it needs something, and eventually confines you in an assisted living facility.C’est la vie.
Well, if life doesn’t have a hard and fast beginning point (as the argument usually evolves) when does interrupting the process of growth constitute muder? That is a tricky question. I think we can afford limited legal protection of the fetus sometime in the third trimester because that is when limited consciousness [might] occur. (Might occur, not does occur. –ed.)
A parent who kills their own child under a certain age (2 or 3) should not be guilty of murder in the normal sense. Psychologically, they are killing a part of themselves, and this changes the crime from the normal homicide to something else. Sterilization of those types of people should be a punishment option. People who kill children should not have more children that they can then also abuse.
A person is entitled to be free from aggression against his or her life.
“Free from aggression” is a dangerous phrase. What about punishment? Time-out? Every method for modifying behavior at a parents disposal can and will be seen as aggression by the child. I know that you mean aggression in a life or death sense, but the best of intentions can be perverted to the worst of uses.
Children remain emotionally and mentally attached to their parents long past the point when they can realistically be called children. (I really hate it when people refer to 16-18 year olds as ‘children’. They aren’t. In the same sense, I know plenty of 20 year olds who don’t deserve the label ‘adult’. Hence the phrase) Young adults should be able to declare themselves emancipated when they deem that the time has arrived. Until that point they remain tied to their parents in some form, and so cannot be “Free from aggression” in the normal child rearing sense.
Although you may argue that the woman has the right to rescind her consent to carry the baby, once the fetus has reached the level of consciousness required to qualify as a person, then the child’s rights must also be considered.
In a theoretical/legal sense, perhaps. Realistically, I have to fall back on the “How do you protect children from their own parents” point that always seems to get overlooked. Unless you are willing to separate parent and child forcefully, you really can’t. Someone else mentioned an outreach program designed to intervene in late term unwanted pregnancy cases. A program designed to reimburse the mother-to-be for agreeing to carry the child to term and then adopt it out.
…That sounds like a good solution on the surface. I would still object to labeling a woman who had a late term abortion (or the doctor who performed it) as a murderer. There are plenty of medically valid reasons why a pregnancy cannot be carried full term; reasons that might not be detectable until late in the pregnancy. If you have to make a choice, better to save one life than loose both. An adult is almost always easier to save than an infant, from a medical standpoint. C’est la guerre.
I’m listening to FreeTalkLive right now. I’m listening to, amongst other subjects, Ian and Mark promote the FTL store at least once an hour, and they mention the ‘beanie‘ in the store at least every other night. I kept hoping they’d figure out what the hat is called on their own, but it’s about to drive me nuts.
I catch myself doing this a lot lately. Listening to the talking heads on the radio and the TV, and correcting their English. Out loud. To myself. I think I’m spending too much time at home alone with the children. It’s either that, or the level of education amongst talking heads has taken a steep drop in the last few years.
The hat in question is called a tuque, or a stocking cap. The difference between a beanie and a stocking cap is the fabric that it is made of (also, a beanie isn’t complete without a propeller on top) and the fact that a tuque is made to keep the head warm.
You live in the Great White North now, guys. (The distance between New Hampshire and Canada is less than the distance between Austin and Dallas. How much closer can you get?) Learn the vernacular, eh?
I’ve been listening to Free Talk Live of late (you might have noticed I’ve blogged on the subject a few times) But I’ve also stumbled across a few other sources that bear mentioning.
I heard about Dan Carlin on Free Talk Live. I’ve enjoyed his rants on occasion; his tendency to deliver his points with emphasis, in a fashion reminiscent of Captain Kirk, can be distracting (or amusing) at times. I recommend his programs anyway. They do get the grey matter flowing.
As far as regular radio format, Jeff Ward in the afternoons on KLBJ-AM is probably the best three hours of local talk to be had on a daily basis. It’s too bad the morning show is so lackluster.
Most people will direct you to iTunes if you are looking for audio content to transfer to a handheld device for playback. I have no use for iTunes, I don’t have an iPod (it’s those pesky DRM issues that go along with iTunes purchases) although the iPod craze is to be thanked for providing a new market for the talk format. However, you don’t need iTunes (or an iPod) to download and listen to Podcasts. If you’re just looking for some new content to listen to, check out Podcast Alley. Get an RSS aggregator for your browser (I use Firefox and Sage myself) and start searching. I was able to find and download podcasts for Penn Jillette and the Mises Institute (recommended by a fellow FTL listener) within minutes using these tools. Loaded up and ready to go on the old Treo 650.
Keeping a constant stream of information going is critical for a news-talk junkie like myself.
Listening to the Halloween edition of Free Talk Live today, while the host trots out some accounts of Ghost Hunters and their exploits in New York and New Jersey to laugh at.
I’d like to say up front that I am not a believer; but having had experiences with what most people refer to as spirits, experiences that I cannot explain, I can’t dismiss the possibility of the paranormal. (More on that in a bit)
Ghost Hunters is a weekly show on the SciFi channel, they are in their third season. The episode with the theater and an orb of light that was discussed and laughed about on air was one where (contrary to the jokes) they debunked any claims to paranormal activity. If I remember correctly, the owners were actually relieved that there wasn’t evidence of anything occurring. It wasn’t something they were comfortable with.
It became painfully clear early in the radio show that the subject of the paranormal did not fall on sympathetic ears, as anyone who called with experiences that they tried to explain, or factual data (in the form of EVP’s) that didn’t make normal sense were immediately attacked with questions like “why aren’t there any real scientists working on it” calling into question anything not done by licensed professionals (a very un-libertarian stance for a libertarian talkshow) as if gov’t approved professionals were the be all and end all on any subject. The scientific method can be followed by anyone, whether they are a scientist or not.
James Randi and his million dollar challenge came up several times. The Amazing Randi isn’t offering a million dollars just for proof of the supernatural, he’s offering a million dollars for reproducible proof. Since the phenomena in question cannot be reproduced at will, there is no way to make a claim for the million. Randi is a debunker, and he’s particularly vicious when he’s debunking. I wouldn’t volunteer to be subject to the type of ridicule that would follow such a claim, not for several million.
The Wife’s father could witch water wells. All the farmers in the area swore by him. When his partner wanted a well dug, he refused to rely on that ‘water witch’ rubbish and hired an engineer to drill his well. Several thousand dollars and several hundred feet later, they hit some rather poor and slow running water that the engineers said was the best they could do. After a few months, he gave up and asked Dad to try a hand at finding better water, which he did. About 15 feet away and 30 feet down. Better water than Dad had on his property. I never saw this occur myself, and Dad has been gone several years now. I would have advised him not to try for the million.
The problem with the supernatural or paranormal is that it doesn’t reproduce itself on demand so that peers can verify the existence of this or that phenomenon. Time and again as I watch Ghost Hunters or some other show dealing with these types of stories, I think to myself “well, that could have been faked” or “this is how that chair could have moved.”
It’s all too easy to be debunked, unless it happens to you.
In my years of service in the architectural field, I have spent innumerable nights in the office, working until late in the morning hours, most times all by myself. While I was generally downtown in some not-so-nice areas late at night, I was never really afraid. I’m not a large man, but I can run fast, and I do know some basic defense tactics.
When I took a job for a firm whose office was in one of the older buildings downtown, I never really thought much about the history of the place, or the particulars of it’s location, or what an impact that might have on my ability to work the late hours that are generally required of architects, but it had an impact none the less.
I was struck, at first, by how quaint the structure was. Nestled against the side of an old quarry, it was backed by an old carriage house that had been renovated into offices as well. After a few weeks of work I settled into my usual routine of staying late and cranking out the work after everyone else left. Gradually I noticed that everyone else tended to leave earlier than usual in the evening; earlier than usual for an architectural office.
After a week or so, I noticed that the place started to feel less quaint, and more threatening, especially at night. I kept hearing people walking, when I knew I was alone in the building. It really started to get weird though, after I traded places with another architect. She wanted to move to the tiny little cramped cubicle that I was in, and was willing to give up a double sized cube space in order to do it. I thought it strange that she would want the cramped space I was in, but jumped at the chance to spread out a bit in a larger space.
Slowly, over the course of the next 12 months, a spiralling series of experiences convinced me that I was either loosing my mind, or that there was something wrong with my environment, something I could not explain.
I began to feel like someone was watching me. It wasn’t all the time, that I could have explained. Weirdly enough it was right about 7:30 pm, pretty much every night. I dismissed it at first as having my back to the floor entrance (a dog-leg stair from the upper floor) but I could not figure out why it didn’t bother me until evening time.
There were windows all around, but it didn’t feel like there was anybody outside. No matter how many times I looked, I never did catch anyone peeping through the windows. Peeping would have been hard anyway. Technically we were on the second floor above the quarry floor, but the front entrance was on the floor above and opened onto the original street that bordered the quarry. The window in my cube tended not to reflect any light off of it, almost like it opened onto nothing (the opposing building wall that was no more than 10 feet away always seemed invisible at night) which was a bit disturbing on its own.
I can’t tell you the number of times I heard footsteps on the upper floor, or walking down the stairs, only to investigate and find no one there. Once, with another architect present, we listened as footsteps appeared to walk the length of the upper floor and go right through a wall on their way out to the street.
Then there was the crowding and the touching. I kept feeling someone leaning over the back of my chair, pushing me into the desk. I kept having to consciously push myself away from the keyboard so that my arms would quit cramping. Something kept touching me on the neck, like fingers brushing across my skin.
It got to the point that I would leave as soon as the eyes started watching at 7:30. If I didn’t leave then, and stayed until the presence was in the cube with me, then when I attempted to leave I would feel as if I was being pursued. All the lights on in a clearly vacant room, and I’m terrified that there is someone who intends me harm, right behind me. Try as I might, I could not shake the feeling.
It was all I could do to make myself walk calmly up the stairs and let myself out. There was frequently an inexplicable cold spot at the top of the stairs, where the warmest air in the building should have been. As soon as I had exited the building, the feeling went away. I’m standing on a dark street, next to a vacant lot that is several feet deep in overgrowth; a place where the homeless were known to congregate, and I feel safer there than in the building.
I began to feel like there were two buildings in the same place at night. One was finished in the clear varnished oak and carpet that I was familiar with; the other was painted dark, cut into small rooms with old fashioned panel doors. Dingy little apartments. I can’t explain why I began to see this juxtaposition in space, I can only say that I did.
Once, when I heard a loud thump on the floor behind me, I spun around to find, just for a second, someone or something standing behind me. There and then gone again. I caught the same figure out of the corner of my eye a few more times after that. Ragged coat. Hat pulled low. Dirty worn out boots. Watching a door in the dark hallway. Waiting for someone. Waiting for someone with violence in his heart.
I wish I could write a fitting climax to the story, but I can’t. I was let go from the firm not too long after that time, and I haven’t had any urge to go back.
I would say that this was “the god’s honest truth”, but I don’t believe in god. It is the truth, exactly as I remember it. I didn’t believe in ghosts. I don’t know what I believe now, but I know that I can’t explain what happened in that building in the evenings. I just know that I wouldn’t stay late at work in that place again, not even if you paid me.
Editor’s note. I rewrote a part of this in a 2014 piece,
Most of my desire to see something proved on the paranormal front has evaporated with time. The most likely explanation is that perceptions in these areas are simply flawed, and we tend to believe what our senses tell us even when they are wrong. The problem remains in trying to distinguish between your perceptual flaws and the real events occurring around you. It is not nearly as easy as debunkers think it is.
For instance. While updating this note for the 2020 move to the new website, it first occurred to me that it is entirely possible that the architect I worked for at the time (Tom Hatch) was trying to scare me out of the office in order to keep me from finishing the work I needed to complete. Work that he would have really rather not had me do since the air-tight documents that I consistently produced for my projects would keep him from altering the design during the construction process.
It never occurred to me that it would be the simplest thing to fuck with me through the windows I couldn’t see out of, or bang on the floor or the ceiling in order to scare me into leaving the office with everyone else. In the end he got what he wanted, both in the documents that I produced for that project, and in the finished project that he made conform to his original designs at a significant savings to the owner. At an equally significant cost to the contractor. I’m sure the contractor still made some money on that project. At least, I hope they did. I know that Hatch did.
I left during the construction process for that project, under direct pressure from him. He wanted me out of his way. I wouldn’t act as his spokesman on the project, but instead insisted on acting as the trustee for the client, trying to make sure that the real estate they would end up owning would be worth the money they spent building it. I don’t know that Tom Hatch ever took that into account. He always seemed to be at war with the contractors and the engineers on the project.
…and I, like the parentified child that I was, stepped in between the factions trying to make some arrangement that would be acceptable to everybody, never understanding that the power was in the hands of the architect, and that the architect was going to get what he wanted one way or the other.
Hatch owned that building. Gaining access to the floors above and below his offices in the building would have been child’s play for him. I wonder if he acted alone, or if some of the others sat around laughing at me behind my back while the pranks were going on without my noticing? Or am I just being paranoid now? Who knows. It is a more likely explanation that ghosts, I’ll tell you that much.
I was listening to the Wednesday edition of Free Talk Live on my Treo 650 today; listening to Ian pound Mark over the head for his support for Intellectual Property rights. (third day in a row, I might add…)
Generally, I agree with Mark on this issue. As an architect, I know that the thought that goes into design is a valuable commodity that needs to be protected. Otherwise the less scrupulous out there will simply wait for someone else to do the hard work of invention so that they can then profit from it at the inventor’s expense. Contrary to Ian’s assertions, I’ve not seen any evidence that people will do the months and years of work required to bring something to market unless they have reasonable confidence that they will make a profit from it. If anybody can copy a design and be free to sell it the day after it hits the market (or as in the case of the Chinese clothing ‘pirates’, even before it hits the market) then the chances for profit are greatly reduced. I don’t know of any business that stays in business without making a profit.
On the other hand, I don’t really believe that corporations (like Disney) should be allowed to hold rights to intellectual property. Those rights should be limited to real people, not legal entities that will continue to expect a profit long past the lifespan of the original author. Disney is a prime example of this, since their lobbying was instrumental in getting the latest extension to copyright terms passed.
There is a phrase that applies to the subject of Disney characters and the school mural that was the subject of rather heated discussion on Wednesday’s show. That phrase is “work of art”. A work of art is generally exempt from claims of copyright infringement. That doesn’t stop the corporations with lawyers and money at their disposal threatening people with legal action if their demands aren’t met. The truth is that the school blinked when Disney decided to play hard ball. If push had come to shove, Disney would probably have dropped the case.
Copyright terms expiring was the real reason for Disney going after public displays of their copyrighted works. Like Coke being synonymous with cola and Kleenex with facial tissue, Disney was fighting the battle of keeping their property from passing into the public domain; and they won that battle by passing new legislation. If corporations were excluded from owning these types of property, the entire battle could have been avoided.
[On the question from a listener concerning the objectivist opinion on the subject; as an objectivist myself, I think I can vouch for the fact that objectivists in general understand the need to protect the mind’s contribution to the creative effort]
Oh, and Ian, your disbelief in intellectual property doesn’t equate to the non-existence of intellectual property. But your willingness to steal other peoples ideas speaks volumes to the subject of why the MPAA and the RIAA are willing to go to such lengths to protect their investments.
For what it’s worth, this is one of those arguments that illustrates the very narrow difference between a communist (in the government-less nature of the word ‘commune’) and the little ‘a’ anarchists of the Libertarian party. They would also tell you that ideas should be free but I’m not willing to live in their version of utopia either.
Postscript
The more things change, the more they stay the same:
The extent that the person believes in communal property as the only property? that is the extent at which the idea of IP goes under the bus. The overlap between anarcho-capitalists like Ian and flat-out Marxists and Maoists on the subject of property really does speak volumes.
