Yes, Roger and I are still alive. Life took a busy turn for both of us at once, but I should be back to posting regularly now, so be sure to stick around!
I'm back today because I just read a brilliant observation by Steve Wagner over on the STR Blog, and I want to direct you all to it. He's responding to this section of the statement given by the
We have seen a steady erosion of women's reproductive rights in this country. The Supreme Court's action today, though stunning, in many ways isn't surprising given the current culture in which scientific knowledge frequently takes a back seat to subjective opinion....
My first response to that statement when I read it last week was to object that we'd better have ethics (what they refer to as "subjective opinion") at the center of our decisions rather than "scientific knowledge," or we'll end up with more atrocities like this one. But Steve's deeper observation gets right to the core of the ACOG's hidden assumptions and reveals the hypocrisy inherent in their accusation:
My simple request: be consistent. Either put science first or don't. If you want science to trump subjective opinion…let's let science tell us when the unborn is a human being, okay? Science's answer is uncontroversial: it's a living, whole organism, of the human species. You might question the definitions of these terms, but if we know that you are a biological human being, we know the unborn is one too, from the moment she comes into being.
That's science. The ACOG might respond, as many scientists do, "Sure, the unborn is a biological human being, but it's too dependent and undeveloped to be a real human being." Done with science so soon? How does any scientist know a certain level of development or independence determine our rights and value? Philosophical reflection. They are doing philosophy, which I assume is a synonym in the ACOG lexicon for "subjective opinion."
Read the rest of Steve's post here.
