alt Hacker NewsExcept it is. In fact, the difference between alive and personhood and the point of transition are, fundamentally, the same issue: if the point of transition is considered the embryo, then the distinction doesn't really exist.
While there's legal consensus based on practicality, that doesn't mean people agree with it. Until a properly formal and objective ethical answer can be found, this disagreement will remain.
I must disagree.
One could argue that a human body with a mostly-functional brain that will never again be conscious is human but not a person. And, simultaneously argue that a few million human stem cells, none of which are neurons yet, is a personified human. But, that would be a clearly inconsistent stance.
And, I’d argue that consensus literally means that a significant population agrees.
Formally and objectively it could be argued that even shortly post-birth, barely-conscious infants lack the required characteristics of an individual person. But, obviously it would require an unacceptable degree of callousness to terminate an infant. Certainly not a practice we agree should be encoded into law in this modern era.
In general, I find the pro-choice consensus to be reasonably conservative regarding the rights of an embryo vs. the rights of a fully-realized mid-life person. Strongly weighted towards the mother before 24 weeks and strongly weighted towards the embryo afterwards. But, if it comes down to the life of the fully-realized person vs. the life of the potential person, the choice goes to the mother. Or, if the potential is clearly a life of suffering and early death, the ethical choice is to reduce suffering via difficult actions.
Generally, I find that the pro-life arguments are largely based on a lack of consideration. I.e. “Life begins at the instant of insemination.” with literally zero further consideration. Or, on knowingly false propaganda: “Evil baby-killers are celebrating killing babies minutes before birth.”
To my knowledge, neither of those stances were in the mainstream before American politicians accepted that the Civil Rights Movement was not going away.
Before that, The Church saw its role in the abortion issue as charitably offering grief counseling to women who had experienced that difficult choice. After the political situation changed, the role of The Church changed to the demonization of unfortunate women for the purpose of manufacturing single-issue voters for the benefit of specific politicians.