THBT: On balance, the US ought to make abortion illegal.

Personhood is believed to be the ground of the special moral status that human beings enjoy. ‘Persons’ have the capacity for acquiring a sense of self and engaging intelligently with the external world. Beings capable of these operations are worthy of special respect (or so the argument goes). If personhood is the ground of moral status, it is, therefore, of crucial importance to determine whether the fetus is a human ‘person’. If the fetus is a ‘person’, then it should be accorded the same rights and privileges as are enjoyed by adult human beings. If it is not a ‘person’, it need not be. The most reasonable view of personhood is called the ‘Lockean view’, named after the 17th century philosopher John Locke, who inspired much of the literature on this kind of personhood. In the Lockean view, a fetus is not a person and, while it may have some sort of moral status, does not have the same rights and privileges as a fully developed human being.

I already covered that. The fact that abortion ban is separable from imprisoning women for miscarriages solves that problem. Also, it falls under reasonable exceptions. Pro said that. Also, it falls under 1%. To translate: Pros conditions of making abortion illegal dont allow the punishment for miscarriages.

Just read your vote, and am curious what evidence did pro use to show that abortion bans result in women no longer being imprisoned for miscarriages?

Yeah, I'm still in shock over that issue happening in the USA.

I will finish my vote between today and tomorrow.

I wish I could honestly say that that’s all you did here, but I won’t argue it with you in the comments. If you want to discuss your vote by PM, I’d be happy to do so after the voting period ends.

I will avenge you one day whiteflame.

I just weighted the arguments. Everything I used was mentioned in the debate by Pro or by Con. For example, the uncertainty argument was compared to consistency argument. Pro did say that what applies to unborn ones has to apply to born ones too. Uncertainty argument doesnt negate that in any way. In fact, the consistency argument remained unchallenged through round 1, 2 and 3. Well, to be more precise, it was ignored by Con through the entire debate.

I appreciate the time and effort you put into this RFD, though I take issue with much of your characterization of my points.

Conclusion on debate
Con rested his entire case on structural violence, providing a definition that cant be worked with. His entire case rests on personhood, but he does not explain why people should be granted personhoods. He doesnt give us any standard other than "we cant know". He held a position of uncertainty, which made his entire case inconsistent. Con didnt explain what logic he uses to grant personhood to some, and deny it to others. The fact that he didnt use reasons there drops his entire case as flawed.

Pro recognized the need for consistency in determining personhood, and used that consistency to support his case. Hence, with such consistency he proved the personhood of a fetus. With that, the need for uphelding the rights of a fetus. With that, Pros position was upheld.

To deny Pros position, Con needed to prove that abortion ban increases number of abortions. But he admitted that its impossible to have correct number of abortions during an abortion ban. He also posted sources with contradicting informations.

Pro wins because he upheld his position and because Con didnt upheld his.

Pro wins on sources too, as Cons sources contradicted to each other and to Cons position.

Grammar and spelling were fine on both sides without any significant difference.

Conduct was good overall as there were no insults used.

Round 3 Pro:
1) Pro further explained the double standards in society
2) Explained slavery argument with refuting structural violence argument
3) Established again that there are exceptions possible, explained theft analogy as proof for the existence of exceptions in the law
4) Explained the need for criteria in determining personhood
5) Explained the need for determining whether someone has rights or not, as a condition for proper judgment
6) Repeated the point that the reason sufficient to kill an unborn child is also sufficient to kill a born child. Con never refuted this argument.
7) Pro established the difference in types of utilitarianism, hence negating the contradiction from round 2.
8)Argument of unborn children being the ones that are invisible seems to expose inconsistency in Cons case
9) Explained the need for abortion ban so that abortion cases can be dealt with properly by the law enforcement.
10) Explained that 21% increase in mortality rates means 49 deaths
11) Exposed flaw in Cons critique of laws based on technical difficulties
12) Explained that the most objective position is the one that life begins at fertilization. To contend that position would mean to cause unsolvable problems in consistency
13) Pro explains that Con has not presented any criteria for determining personhood.
14) Pro explains that Cons position is essentially that of legalizing a roulette, due to Cons uncertainty.
15) Explains that Cons scenario is 1%.

Round 3: Con
1) Con wants for us to reject Pros exceptions because Pro didnt mention them in round 1. This seems like a very unreasonable request, considering that Con had a chance to respond in round 2 and 3 when the exceptions were presented. Con didnt respond, so there is no way he wins that argument.
2) Con says that Pros use of utilitarianism means neglecting to protect individual human rights. Cons entire case, as Pro said, is based upon uncertainty of personhood that neglects rights of unborn and human rights in general.
3) Con seems to present an out of this world argument that structural violence only happens to someone if that someone is not discussed about at all. This seems like an impossible to work with definition.
4) Con attempts to attack the personhood argument as uncertain, but ignores the argument that only by giving personhood to a fetus only then we can give personhood to all humans.
5) Con claims that he uses an existing legal standard for granting rights. He doesnt explain why such standard is any good. He doesnt explain the justification for why such standard doesnt give rights to unborn children.
Pro already made an argument that denying rights to unborn denies rights to everyone.
Con never refuted this argument. Con took position of uncertainty on personhood. However, there doesnt seem to be an explanation by Con as to why giving rights to born ones and denying rights to unborn ones is justified if personhood is uncertain in both cases.
6) Con again claims that his sources show that abortions will not decrease after abortion ban. However, some of his own sources in round 1 and 2 negated this.
7) Con seems to imply that Pro has reduced the list of unjustified reasons for abortion to only two. However, it is clear that Pro stated in round 1 that almost all are unjustified. Pro has even explained why they are unjustified. They wouldnt apply to born children. Con never refuted this.
8) Con again admits the effects abortion ban will have on mothers who kill their unborn children.
9) Con repeats again the argument of reproductive coercion. It was already taken into account. See comment about round 1 and 2.

I believe pro's talk of anomalies was in regards to medical exceptions, as opposed to the problem miscarriages existing and women already being thrown in prison for them; whereas his defense of miscarriages was something about planned parenthood brainwashing people thereby making those people not at fault for actively having abortions (as opposed to accidently having miscarriages).

"Discard it as an anomaly" that's not a robust philosophical position, nor a metaethical position if it has clear holes in it and we just say "whooptydoo" How can you be content with such a moral philosophy?

It amazes me the red herrings people use to justify murder.

God allowed you to get raped, so we should murder babies.

Can you PLEASE explain to me how that is, in any way, shape, or form, a dynamic equivalency?

That is like saying we should allow guns because Russia has a military. One does not depend on the other. It is a completely incoherent line of thinking and ignores almost all of the particulars in the situation.

"right to privacy" what about the unborns right to life????

"What is your opinion of the miscarriage contentions raised in this debate?"

bones showed that it was an anomaly so it doesn't fairly represent the other 99 percent of abortions, and also that even if we concede that it is an issue, we can discard it as an anomaly.

"Also what is your opinion of the conflicting sourcing for the effectiveness of abortion bans on affecting the rate of abortions?"

1. Bones contested with the sources (abortions were through the roof for many years after they legalised it
2. Even if it is not effective (which is weird because whiteflames spent the entire time listing off all these bad attachments with abortion, so if they are really as bad as whiteflames says, wouldn't they deter??), there is still the fundamental principle which needs to be refuted (if slavery bans resulted in more slaves, which in and of itself is illogical, you wouldn't then legally say let's all get slaves, because that would be an active promotion of something immoral".

Alright, though that decision was recently overturned, at least in large part. That aside, I think this debate explores other facets of the issue. Would appreciate your voting on it if you're interested.

Should we really be telling kids that God loves you and because of that he allowed your mother to be raped so that you would be here to love God?
Or because you have no skull you are still an alive human inside your mother and therefore you must be born so you can die within a few days?

What is your opinion of the miscarriage contentions raised in this debate? Also what is your opinion of the conflicting sourcing for the effectiveness of abortion bans on affecting the rate of abortions?

Round 2 Pro
1) Pro provided working link about the beginning of life
2) Establised the definition of balance
3) Established the difference between banning abortion and banning medical services, established that one does not have to include the other, established reasonable exceptions
4) Re-stated the need for criteria
5) Found contradiction in Cons case: Con claimed that the beginning of personhood is unknown. However, Cons case depends entirely on personhood.
6) Established when human beings come into existence
7) Established the harms of abortion
8) Established that women are in most cases responsible for getting pregnant, hence at fault for their condition
9) Repeated that the immorality of killing an unborn child is the sufficient reason to make it illegal
10) Provided sources which seem to indicate a decrease in reported cases of abortions during abortion ban
11) Established the connection between rights of born and unborn child
12) Refutes Cons structural violence argument by its applicability to killing of born children
13) Slavery comparison argument shows that argument of reducing harm can be used to justify slavery.
14) Argued that reproductive coercion is separable from abortion ban, hence is not caused by it
15) Proves inconsistencies in self managed abortion argument
16) Proves inconsistencies in argument of overburdening the medical system
17) Argues that abortion ban is separable from the punishment of miscarriages, hence latter not caused by the former.

Round 2 Con:
1) Con negates their need to disprove the personhood of a fetus
2)Claims that Pros case is utilitarian,
3) Makes argument that structural violence holds higher weight than anything else
4) Makes the argument that abortion ban harms the needs of the many
5) Repeats the causation of structural violence by abortion ban
6) Con finds contradiction in one of Pros arguments: reliance on utilitarianism while rejecting utilitarianism
7) Con seems to imply that legalizing abortions decreases number of abortions. For this he provides a source. However, his source says how abortions decreased in only half of countries, 10 out of 20 countries. This places doubt on proposed causation.
8) Cons source in round 2 about women still looking for abortion after abortion ban seems to contradict to his sources in round 1. See round 1: Con.
9) Con uses utilitarian argument combined with structural violence argument to deny theft analogy and make difference between theft banning and abortion banning. However, in his argument of structural violence Con doesnt seem to include violence done to unborn children.
10) If personhood of a fetus is proven: Cons entire position depends on proving that abortion ban will not decrease the number of abortions but increase them. See 7). However, Con marked the beginning of personhood as uncertain. This makes the personhood of every human uncertain, making Cons position depend upon assumptions.
11) Con claims that Pro never explained why reasons for abortions are unjustified. But Pro did mention consistency, applicability to born children.
12) Con claims lack of funds created by abortions will strip reproductive care in general. However, there doesnt seem to be an explanation by Con as to why abortions are the only way to fund reproductive care.
13) There doesnt seem to be an explanation by Con as to why abortion is the only way to solve structural violence
14) Con made a confusing claim: "Pro is granting new legal protections to a large set of humans who currently dont have them, and, in many cases, might not be born into this world alive.".
"Might not be born alive" doesnt mean "will not be born alive". It is very unclear what is Cons argument here.

In round 1 and 2, Con admitted that due to abortion ban, abortions will be more expensive, more difficult to get and more risky.
In round 2, Cons position became much more uncertain as he extended a position of uncertainty on personhood to round 2. This places Cons entire moral system used in this debate under serious inconsistency.
Notice that Pros position does not depend on abortion ban reducing the number of abortions. Uphelding the rights of unborn children and uphelding consistency is also Pros position. To disprove Pros position, Con would need to prove that abortion ban increases number of abortions, which Con didnt yet prove through round 1 and 2.

I thought your vote was good, although I thought most of them were actually. I probably disagree with Novice in that respect. If you consider the debate a draw, I think it's unlikely you had a significant bias.

Meant to respond to you earlier. I get it, only a week and a half left so probably not enough time to get those things. In any case, appreciate the interest and any feedback on the debate, whether it's in vote form or otherwise.

I've come to learn, I may be the only person on the planet who frequently changes their mind from debates. I've come to know it as a superpower, really.

Understood.

Just saying, I wasn’t directing the comment to you (more so towards some less charitable opponents who have objected to votes with the dozens of 200 word objections) - I was ovserving that people always seem never to change their minds (me included). Obviously, expressing frustration is fine - I was speaking more on contenders continually complaining over a period of days.

Round one: Con
1) Cons first argument is structural violence, where as part of the explanation he lists unequal life chances and reproductive coercion.
This is already negated by the Pro: "4) Consistency, 5) human rights of an unborn child, 6) Unjustified killing"
There doesnt seem to be a way for Con to explain how the presence of violence justifies the killing of an unborn child who bears no guilt for that violence. See "Source 3 legal certainty"
2) Cons argument about miscarriages sounds valid. Will be analyzed with round 2.
3) Patient provider relationships argument at the end seems to claim that abortion ban will harm the aborted fetus.
Cons sources seem to imply that because of abortion ban, some women will be forced to give birth. This translates to that thanks to abortion ban, there will be less abortions.
Same is implied in his argument about coerced reproduction.
4) Self managed abortions argument is where Con starts to argue in favor of Pro.
Con admits that abortion ban will achieve the effect of punishment for women who kill their unborn children. Abortion ban will not only make it more difficult and more expensive for women to kill their unborn children, it will also punish them for killing their unborn children.
5) Base risk argument is refuted by Pro:" 4) Consistency, 5) Human rights of a fetus, 6) Unjustified killing"
From Cons point of view, making abortions unsafe is an unjustified punishment for mothers who kill their own unborn children. The Cons arguments seem to refute themselves there.
6) No exceptions argument is where Con assumed that Pro makes no exceptions to any case of abortion because Pro didnt mention exceptions in round 1.
7) Overburdening the medical system is where Con gives one source.
However, Con draws a conclusion:
"Many of the children carried to term will be born with..."
But his source says it differently:
"...will see more babies, including some with substantial medical needs..."
Con turned the word "some" into "many". Seems like a claim with no actual numbers behind it. How much is "some"?
Also, Cons source argues against some of Cons later points:
"People who cant travel for care or manage their own abortions, will give birth. Recent unpublished updates to older estimates - from economist Caitlin Myers and other researchers - are that 18 to 57% of women deciding to end a pregnancy in counties where travel distance for abortion care increase will give birth. This estimate translates to a 5 - 17% increase in births in Michigan."
So by Cons own source, there will be less abortions if abortion ban takes place.
Finally, Cons argument seems to be that mothers killing their unborn children is good because it prevents overcrowded hospitals.
Such argument is already refuted by Pro: "4) Consistency, 5) human rights of a fetus, 6) Unjustified killing"
8) Punishing miscarriages argument seems to be solid. I will get back to it with round 2.
9) Case conclusions by Con
Con doesnt make a reasonable difference between justified and unjustified harm. For example, he insists that it is unjustified to punish mothers who kill their unborn children.
10) Cons rebuttals where Con says "...is only meaningful if said policy is effective"
Here, I need to remind everyone that Cons own sources claimed abortion ban will increase birth rates, decrease abortions and punish women who kill their unborn children.
See 4), 7).
11) Con further claims "The beginnings of personhood do not influence my case"
Further:
"Any stage of development...is only distinguished by the "inconsequential differences"."
This is already resolved by Pro: "4) Consistency (consistency, inconsistency, application to born humans)"
12) Con claims that harms from allowing abortions are "uncertain".
Cons sources have given some data on this "uncertainty":
A) Banning abortion increases birth rates and the number of abortions. See 7). From this, it goes to say allowing abortion decreases birth rates and increases the number of abortions.
B) Banning abortions punishes mothers who kill their unborn children. See 4). From this, it goes that allowing abortions means mothers will be unpunished for killing their unborn children.
C) Banning abortion will make it more expensive and risky to kill an unborn child. See 7). From this, it goes to say that allowing abortion will make it less expensive and less risky to kill an unborn child.
These are Cons sources arguing against Con. All arguments in 12) are Cons own arguments posted by him in round 1.
13) Unjustified killing rebuttal from Con. See Pro: "4) Consistency"

This is just round 1. I have to say, more work than I expected. Characters limit doesnt help either.

Burden of proof is shared

Round one: Pro
1) Personhood defined
2) Con needs to argue that fetus is not a person in order to prove that abortion is not killing of a person
3) Pro defends the personhood of a fetus claiming its not affected by its location, dependency or development.
Pro points out the flaw of standards.
4) The important next line is about consistency. The criteria for determining moral value has to be consistent. Inconsistency is the manifestation of unfairness. This is basically argument which Pro uses to say that inconsistency exists, and that argument which negates the rights of unborn children also negates the rights of born children and humans.
5) Pro claims that all human beings who have been concepted should have human rights, otherwise a contradiction will follow.
6) Unjustified killing argument seems to be the core of Pros argument. Person needs a very strong reason that justifies the killing of an unborn child. Such reason should never be applicable to born humans.
7) Pro points out inconsistencies in standards
Sources:
Source 1 saying that anything connected to the rights and justice has a positive substantive values.
Source 2 about consistency being vital in making fairness of the law.
Source 3 about legal certainty confirms the lack of guilt of an unborn child.
Source 4 about biologists - doesnt work
Source 5 about reasons for abortion seem to be providing us with a list of reasons why mothers kill their unborn children. Con would have to prove why any of those reasons is sufficient to kill a child. Hard task indeed.

Was my vote dogshit Novice? be honest. Looking for constructive feedback.

Would if I could. I haven't hit the 100 forum posts or 2 completed rated debates threshold yet.

Brought up in previous comments, I think we can all agree on that Barney's vote is ridiculous as an unfortunate representation of the moderation of this platform, as well as our voting standards. There are a number of reasons this is the case. Foremostly, Bones may as well be arguing with concepts Barney does not know well, or understand. There also is the obvious position of bias to a certain side, and perhaps an interest in helping a certain person to win etc. On the former, many people find it difficult to separate these feelings, or even remove them form the consideration of a vote (particularly people with low control over their emotions). My only empathetic apology would be to Bones who was most affected by this. The lack of distinct counter expression is perhaps the best choice. It only encourages this behavior as I have found.

Yeah, I always end up feeling strange writing that at the end of a debate for that very reason.

Would appreciate your voting on the debate of course.

CON's last two words made me laugh because of the irony of the statement if taken humorously and out of context.

Very thorough debate.

I often have a good deal of respect for votes that go against me, and you can feel free to look back at my previous debates - I have no interest in starting or continuing a set of comments about a vote, whether I like or dislike it. That being said, expressing some degree of frustration with a vote is sometimes warranted. You don’t have to agree that that’s the case here, though I’d be willing to discuss it via PM if you want.

I imagine this happens because we can only see through own own eyes. If we could all see each others thoughts and experiences problems like this wouldn't happen, who won the debate would be far easier to tell without bias being involved.

I find it interesting that people always disagree with votes that are casted against them. This seems to be a trend prevalent particularly on this site. I also contribute to this - I quite strongly disagree with Bareny's vote on pretty much every analysis he provides, despite him being a prestigious and respected voter. On the flip side, I particularly dislike when voters arduously complain about votes in the comment sections and spark "comment wars", hence me not expressing any comment on Barney's vote.

Well, I appreciate your taking the time to vote, though I have several problems with it. I won’t discuss those here as I don’t wish to influence other voters.

Great stuff!

Well, it seems to me that Con is just terribly inconsistent.
He claims:
1) number of abortions will not decrease
2) due to ban, some women will be unable to abort and will be forced to give birth.
These two already contradict each other.

Con spent a lot of the debate making claims of coerced reproduction, claiming that some women will be denied abortion and be forced to give birth in case of abortion ban. If some women will be unable to abort because of abortion ban, that means abortion ban saved their children from being killed and allowed them to live. In other words: decreased the number of abortions.

Con also claims that a woman has a right to kill her child to escape the abuse she experiences. I cant see any logic there.

Pro argues that banning abortions will decrease the number of abortions.
Con argues that banning abortions will punish the mothers who kill their own children.

Cons arguments seem to be self defeating.

I will read the debate again later to see if I can make a better conclusion with more detailed explanation, and then maybe vote on it.

Thanks for your observation. As this debate is pretty short on votes, would you be interested in voting?

Actually, con himself admitted the effects of banning abortion:

"Medication is the safest means by which to manage an abortion. Other interventions come with additional risks, which get a lot worse in self-managed cases. An abortion ban necessarily reduces or removes access to these medications, leading “[p]atients [to] use unsafe methods… [that] may require lifesaving critical care for sepsis..."

Here, he admits that abortion ban will have the desired effect of punishing women who kill their children.

I think you made a really good analysis. I also found it odd that whiteflame avoided any personhood argument. I would also agree that Bones' biggest flaw is simply the vagueness of when abortion is acceptable and when it is not. Not knowing the effects of his abortion ban, Which is essential if it ought to be banned. We should know if it actually works at doing just that, Stopping abortion. Based on that i don't believe Bones fulfilled his "ought" criteria. In retrospect whiteflames position was also riddled with assumptions and (likely) impractical contradictory implementation.

I.B Flaws
There are many issues with both cases. I will give these sections for each round tentatively as they are the main factor by which I may evaluate this debate.

I. Despite being convincing, pro's argument comes with limitations.
a. Pro does not define what abortion is, and he does not distinguish it, or its implications from events like a miscarriage. Unsurprisingly, this creates problems subsequently.
b. Neither does pro establish that abortion bans will reduce the number of abortions that take place. If his policy does not even reduce the amount of abortions that happen, it seems suspect.
c. Pro also does not lay a specific criterion in which abortion is permissible and abortion is not permissible. His final syllogism only leaves me with the implication that if there is a justified reason for abortion it could be allowed, yet pro does not inform me of what these just reasons could be.

II. Con's case made use of many convincing statistics and arguments, however, his case contains many pivotal issues like pro's, perhaps even more so.
a. Con's definition of structural violence was short and vague. Frankly, con does not outright express how this precludes any policy that exists. This places con's syllogism to suspect. It causes one to question makes premise one true. If a policy implements a lesser degree of structural violence than an issue it amends to solve, should this policy be enacted? His argument suggests no. Con's case is consequentialist, yet he does not cover the implications of his own argument which suggests to me that society ought not to be improved in the case where it could be morally, nor does he account for the social issues that said policies resolve to address.
b. Con's sources seem credible, but the contention of elimination of care does not show the scale of which these actions are prevalent. He cites figures from survivors of domestic abuse, however, he does not indicate the degree to which these people compose the paradigm of people.
c. His contention from self-managed abortions seemingly assumes that abortion is permissible in the first place and thus, it is hard to see how this would fall under his category of structural violence any more than people stealing when stealing is by the statuette, illegal.
d. His contention about "overburdening the medical system," does not support the argument suggested by the heading. There is no indication of figures that would suggest hospitals are in clear capacity jeopardy, and this just amounts to an argument that more children would be born, which is not presented as an intrinsically bad or good phenomenon, or as a form of structural violence.
e. His cut-off mark for abortion is 15 weeks, if this is the case why would this restriction not create or ential structural violence as previously cited? Would not all of his contentions apply to abortions at 16 weeks? If it is the case that it does would it not be a policy that "ought not be implemented." This to me, is unclear.
f. Con says that the beginning of personhood does not influence his case. This is peculiar. If it is true that killing an unborn child is morally the same as killing a born one, then why would the implication of adverse conditions impact this, especially when contending a threshold deontological position? The appeal to pro's case of uncertainty seems flawed. Pro argued that inconsequential differences ential the predicate of his framework. If pro is arguing from moral equalization (https://headbirths.wordpress.com/2014/08/16/moral-equalization/) and con does not attempt to reject this, pro's argument expresses that personhood as an ontology must necessarily apply to all humans, and the uncertainty of personhood in respect to pro is inconsequential.

I.
The burden of proof is effectively shared. Pro's argument is straightforward, he makes a case of inconsequential differences using 3/4 of Scott Klusendorf's four contentions (no one intelligent would argue that size confers personhood). He does well in analyzing the failure of arbitrary and poorly analyzed concepts of personhood. The principle of uncertainty did its job. 75% of the outcomes appear to be societally unacceptable, and if pro's previous conditions hold true, we know that there is no morally relevant difference between the unborn and the born. The case allows contention 3's syllogism to be both valid and sound and round one is compelling. Pro arguing that con has additional burdens does not fundamentally alter the provisions within the description. It could be the case that each debater must justify their respective side of the policy, however, con needs to provide the argument for personhood in order to refute pro's side.

Con's syllogism is not complex, and there is no need to restate it. First, the classification of structural violence is clear. Con establishes harm that comes from the elimination of care, and consequences of hesitation to proceed with certain procedures. Domestic abuse from reproductive-related periods as well as patient-provider relationships is somewhat evident, and the measures people will pursue to get abortions are also commonplace in this debate. Subsequent for con is the risk of mortality as well as the overburdening of the medical system. He also properly exploits Bone's lack of distinctly cited exceptions, while going on to cit his own limit at 15 weeks. Con's rebuttals are concise and very well written. He argues that pro coverts a moral case into a policy one, which he asserts is erroneous. He argues that personhood does not impact his case based on structural violence. He argues that pro's standard for personhood claims certainty, while he affirms uncertainty for it as an ontological category. Lastly, he shows that pro has not distinguished between justified and unjustified killing and re-notes his lack of exceptions.

That was the beginning of my vote, I will be continuing in the comments.

Threshold deontology could literally be argued to be utilitarianism, except something has to be "serious enough" to violate deontology for utilitarianism, while utilitarianism runs on the principle of the many no matter what. There is a lot of misinformation about deontology. Philosophically, it is far more robust and superior to utilitarianism. People just strawman it by saying you can't kill evil people no matter what. Kant never said this, that would not be a viable metaethics philosophy. Kant wasn't an idiot with a philosophy a 10 year old could come up with.
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It is also incorrect that deontologists "violate" their laws in threshold deontology. Kant would just tell you to make a new maxim if it exists in a spot where you can't kill the joker. We can make a deontological maxim such as: killing is bad. But then you may be in a spot where you have to kill someone for your own life. Kant would just tell you to make a new deontological argument where killing these people is ok.

I agree that I probably didn't need to concede soft utilitarians, but I think that, as a whole, society adopts soft utilitarianism so it can be held as largely axiomatic.

As you've clearly read this debate, would you be interested in voting?

let's start here then. For one, the previous votes as typical provide me with no particular disposition. The unfortunate case presents itself that there is bias present in aspects of them, something that detracts from what I see as the imperative fairness of this debate. It is unfortunate.

A) Utilitarianism
In ethical philosophy, utilitarianism is a family of normative ethical theories that prescribe actions that maximize happiness and well-being for all affected individuals (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Utilitarianism). This becomes a mildly contested point in deliberation. Con's framework that predicated upon the notion of structural violence is more obviously utilitarian to this me, Bones's primary line of argumentation in countenance to such is that the existence of structural violence consequently is not sufficient to make the killing of entity's who hold the same degree of moral value as well as the same rights to life. For one, the unborn do not experience happiness in the womb, and Bone's argument is not contingent on well being or human pleasure related senses.

Bone's case is one of threshold deontology in my interpretation (https://tinyurl.com/thresholddeontology). He posits that the consequences introduced by the contender are no sufficient to entertain the permissibility of systemically violating an intrinsically immoral principle. Utilitarianism in not intrinsically wrong and my tabula rasa inclinations would not allow me to theorize this. However, Pro does well in arguing for Utilitarianisms violation of human rights. Regardless, one framework is utilitarian above another. I doubt pro needed to concede soft utilitarianism, his argument does not even seem to entail this as it is concerned with rights violations rather than utility.

Some more votes would be appreciated. Pinging you too as you have explicitly expressed interest in the comments.

All I’ll say here while voting is ongoing (because we could get into territory of what was actually said and why) is that I had anticipated that kind of response and that he does at least allude to that point in R3. We can discuss it via PM if you’re interested since you already have a vote posted.

I was thinking before, about how Bones could have beat you. How would you respond to the argument that, although anti-abortion laws create structural violence against women, pro-abortion laws also create structural violence against unborn babies?
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I feel like this spins your own argument against you. He could of argued that if the murder of a fetus is legally permissible if they create structural violence. Would you then also concede that it should be legally permissible to murder criminals and politicians who create structural violence?
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It seems that this is the argument that bones needed to force you to argue on bone's terms, to argue the morality before the policy is in question. Unless you think my analysis is incorrect?