I hate groupthink, it's always A vs B polarized stupidity. I've seen the pictures of babies in utero. I've bothered to notice all the people born in the second trimester living full lives. I've watched my own daughter on an ultrasound at 8 weeks old, with arms and legs wiggling and heart beating.

You're being stupid if you don't think those are human lives. Sorry, might be rude to say it, but that's how i see it. Close-minded, unthinking, willfully ignorant, etc. Believing life starts at birth might have been arguable 30 years ago when most people had never seen an ultrasound and we didn't have the medicine to support preemies that we do now. But that's just ignorant, unscientific and, frankly, heartless to still claim that.

So drop the stupid lines about women's rights and devaluing women. I've never met a pro-lifer who was pro-life for that reason. If you honestly think that's the motive, then again, you are being willfully ignorant and close-minded.

And those on the pro-life side, it'd be nice if you'd drop the "all or nothing" arrogance. Not everyone shares your theology. So legislating based on that isn't very reasonable. Wouldn't it be wiser to find an argument that should carry weight with the vast majority? How's this: allow abortions up to the point when brain waves can be detected. Fund some studies on that, get some science behind it. Allow people the choice for 2-3 months. That's plenty of time for women to become aware and do something about it.

And pro-choicers, get a clue and stop denying the humanity of the unborn. It's a losing battle. The pro-life viewpoint has been gaining in popularity for decades not because of religious ideology (which has been declining afaict), but because you're wrong. Consciousness, humanity, whatever you want to call it that makes us us doesn't start at birth. And more people get the chance to see that all the time. You can't hide that information from them forever.

Drop the all or nothing, folks.

Late term abortions are not doe frivolously, only if there are big health risks involved to the mother. And the argument from "being able to live" is not a strong one - we can keep brain dead people alive indefinitely, but they still have to be kept alive - same thing with babies, they cannot in any shape or form take care of themselves. I would rather a baby/fetus was aborted at 3 months, than dumped in an alley to freeze to death, for instance. If people has made the choice, they should be able to exercise that choice easily, quickly and safely.

There's not a choice to get an abortion in the last period - if a mother says "i want an abortion" in the eigth month, she won't get it. In those cases there has to be serious reasons.

>> ^nadabu:
I'm with Xax. Pro-life personally and politically, and quite consistent about it. If we outlaw one murder, we should outlaw them all: abortion, the regular kind, the death penalty, suicide and absolute lunacies like pre-emptive war. Violence against humans (and imho, the higher animals) is only permissible in sports with safety measures taken and in reactive, clear and restrained self-defense, both personally and militarily.
That's only the general rule, of course. There MUST be room for exceptions, which either void conviction or provide ample latitude for judges when deciding punishments. The typical "mother at risk of dying" example is the clearest exception. Likewise, i currently think it unwise to outlaw abortions performed prior to 8 weeks, as the studies showing brain functions prior to that are not thorough. Similar exceptions should be made for withholding care to persons already born, but lacking brain function. And so on...
But the general rule of "thou shalt not kill" seems like damn good public policy to me. It's hard to see how abortion is justifiable, especially after 5 mos, when many babies can live outside the mother with the amazing preemie care possible these days. How long do you need to make your choice? Even in rape, where there was no choice about birth control, you still have around 2 mos before brain function is detectable (thus far). I'm ok with choice. But i think it is totally irrational and willfully ignorant to advocate giving 9 months for that decision. Maybe that made some sort of sense in the 60s or 70s, when most people had never seen an ultrasound or heard of things EEG, but that's just stupid nowadays. Get out of the dark ages. Don't kill people.

I'm with Xax. Pro-life personally and politically, and quite consistent about it. If we outlaw one murder, we should outlaw them all: abortion, the regular kind, the death penalty, suicide and absolute lunacies like pre-emptive war. Violence against humans (and imho, the higher animals) is only permissible in sports with safety measures taken and in reactive, clear and restrained self-defense, both personally and militarily.

That's only the general rule, of course. There MUST be room for exceptions, which either void conviction or provide ample latitude for judges when deciding punishments. The typical "mother at risk of dying" example is the clearest exception. Likewise, i currently think it unwise to outlaw abortions performed prior to 8 weeks, as the studies showing brain functions prior to that are not thorough. Similar exceptions should be made for withholding care to persons already born, but lacking brain function. And so on...

But the general rule of "thou shalt not kill" seems like damn good public policy to me. It's hard to see how abortion is justifiable, especially after 5 mos, when many babies can live outside the mother with the amazing preemie care possible these days. How long do you need to make your choice? Even in rape, where there was no choice about birth control, you still have around 2 mos before brain function is detectable (thus far). I'm ok with choice. But i think it is totally irrational and willfully ignorant to advocate giving 9 months for that decision. Maybe that made some sort of sense in the 60s or 70s, when most people had never seen an ultrasound or heard of things EEG, but that's just stupid nowadays. Get out of the dark ages. Don't kill people.

Fetuses before 20weeks have no brain function, that is the science, they are not people by any reasonable definition.

"No brain function?" My goodness, that's a grossly inaccurate claim. First, my understanding is that 20 weeks is the earliest detected (thus far) activity in the cerebral cortex. That is not the earliest brain "function" detected. Far as i know, the brain stem cells are connecting and responding to stimuli by 8 weeks according to some studies. So, to me, 20 weeks is the very *latest* time frame i would consider reasonable to still permit "choice" as a rule. However, since there has been limited study in this area, especially of late, i believe it would be wiser to move the legislative controls to the 8 or 12 week time frame. Certainly your life prior to the pregnancy plus 2+ months of awareness of the pregnancy is enough time for most people to make such a decision. Obviously, there should be a variety of exceptions for rare, extreme cases, but my beef is that the general rule permits abortion later than it ought.

And please drop the nonsense about miscarriages (which usually happen by 12 weeks anyway) being "manslaughter". That is first class idiocy. Natural processes kill people every second and no one calls it "manslaughter". The very idea is both a laughable straw man and terribly insensitive.

Anyway, despite the limited recent study in the specific area of fetal brain activity, you are grossly exaggerating our ignorance by labeling birth the "least absurd of the arbitrary criteria" available to us. Birth was an absurd criteria even before we had ultrasounds, EEGs and the medical ability to keep a kid born months premature alive and healthy. Societies for *millenia* have called it murder when an unborn child is killed by an act of violence against a pregnant woman, because it is very obvious that the unborn baby is a person well before they are born. I'm guessing that you've never closely walked through a pregnancy with a woman before if you can say something ignorant like that. Go have a kid, watch them on an ultrasound at 8 and 20 weeks, feel them kick and respond to sounds (even recognize mom's voice) in the last trimester. Then come back and tell me again how you think "birth is the least absurd" choice for recognizing a baby's humanity.

>> ^nadabu: oh, and the whole abortion debate is handled on preposterously unscientific grounds most of the time. it's plain as day that unborn "fetuses" are very much human children long before they are born. my son was born at 24 weeks. would he really have been "just a fetus" that my wife had some "right to kill" for the next 16 weeks were he not premature? Heck, i saw my daughter on ultrasound at 8.5 weeks. She already looked very human (just with an oversized head) and was moving around. Where on earth do we get the idea that human rights should only start at birth?

Roe V. Wade, which is the current state of the law in the US, allows limits on 3rd trimester abortion, for the reason you mentioned. But saying conception, or 1/2/3 months = human would mean that most miscarriages are manslaughter, or that the mothers body is, at the very least, a crime scene, this would be more absurd than the status quo.

Fetuses before 20weeks have no brain function, that is the science, they are not people by any reasonable definition. We, at present, have a continuum of "value" which the law places on a fetus as it becomes more likely to be conscious. As it stands birth is the least absurd of the arbitrary criteria we could use for discrete personhood.

Our moral sense did not evolve to deal with the fluidity of personhood, but that is what we see when we look at the science. No solution is morally satisfying, because the universe is not structured to appease our moral sense.

Enoch is right. The health insurance industry/lobby is failing and abusing us dramatically. In large part, this is because they fail to acknowledge what "insurance" is. Insurance is supposed to be for when something goes badly wrong. Car insurance companies do not pay for maintenance tune-ups, new wipers, signal lights and brake pads, even though those can all prevent accidents. Why then does health insurance cover those? Answer: it makes them more money. The more they get their dirty fingers into our health care, the more money they make. But that's more money that goes to a middle man and is spent on bureaucracy instead of into doctors' pockets. This is causing rising prices and decreasing numbers of doctors due to higher workload for less pay.

Let's be clear. Insurance is for alleviating the cost of *problems* by spreading risk across a population. Insurance is NOT for checkups, vaccinations and allergy meds. You can try to rationalize that those reduce later costs, but the evidence i'm seeing out there is rising costs and reduced physician availability. The proof is in the pudding.

So, what to do? I'm fine with the government financing health insurance and even regular health care. No issues. I'm not fine with the government running both of those through greedy insurance companies and complicated bureuacracies. I like their compassion for the poor and sick. I despise their need for control. I do believe the free market can do it better. But for that to happen, we have to do a few things:

1) finance it via tax credits (deductions for the rich, rebates for the poor) so that individuals maintain control of spending, but have at least a portion of it ultimately paid by the government. thus we have both freedom AND compassion. oh, and this must include Medicare/Medicaid.

2) ending the employer tax breaks for providing health care. this is sand in the free market gears, as it reduces the number of choices happening.

3) educate people that the "we pay for every little thing" plans are not financially sound. because, they're not, especially if #1 is put in place.

oh, and the whole abortion debate is handled on preposterously unscientific grounds most of the time. it's plain as day that unborn "fetuses" are very much human children long before they are born. my son was born at 24 weeks. would he really have been "just a fetus" that my wife had some "right to kill" for the next 16 weeks were he not premature? Heck, i saw my daughter on ultrasound at 8.5 weeks. She already looked very human (just with an oversized head) and was moving around. Where on earth do we get the idea that human rights should only start at birth? Maybe that seemed sensible 30 years ago, but it's seems scientifically ignorant given all we've learned about life in utero since. I would much rather see the "right to abortion" at least end at a more sensible stage of development, like 8 or maybe 12 weeks. That's plenty of time to make a choice.

It has to be stressed that Nick is an incredible guy... I admire him. I think this and his other videos are great. But his father's a pastor, and his parents were surprised by his condition when he was born. Do fundamentalists not use ultrasounds?

Most people are reasonable, but the gap in innate diseases & deformities between supernaturalists and mainstream society is going to continue to increase as technology advances over the next 100 years.

Here's my ultrasound.

the reason for the sound is that the snes's soundchip was based on yamaha if memory serves me correctly and it was insanely powerful for it's day even to the point of allowing some small surround sounds if you had a hifi system with rear speakers plus the music format is still unsurpassed with it's compression tech.


That Yamaha FM sound was shit even for it's time. GF1 wavetable was where it was at. You need to hear Doom on the Gravis Ultrasound to appreciate the difference.

#36 A duck's quack doesn't echo

#37 A snail breathes through its foot

#38 Fish cough.

#39 An ant's smell is stronger then a dog's

#40 It is possible to lead a cow up stairs but not down

#41 Shrimp can only swim backward

#42 Frogs cannot swallow with their eyes open

#43 A cat's lower jaw cannot move sideways

#44 The bullfrog is the only animal that never sleeps

#45 Elephants are capable of swimming 20 miles per day

#46 Elephants are the only mammal that cannot jump

#47 Giraffes have no vocal chords

#48 Cats can hear ultrasound

#49 Despite its hump...camels has a straight spine

#50 Mosquitoes have 47 teeth

#51 There is 63,360 inches in a mile

#52 11% of people in the world are left-handed

#53 The average women consumes 6lbs of lipstick in her lifetime

#54 The average smell weighs 760 nanograms *

#55 A human brain weighs about 3lbs

#56 1/4 of the bones in your body are in your feet

#57 You blink over 10,000,000 times a year

#58 A sneeze travels out of your nose at 100mph

#59 Brain waves can be used to power an electric train

#60 The tongue is the fastest healing part of the body

#61 Pigs get sunburn

#62 The lifespan of a taste bud is 10 days

#63 The average human produces 10,000 gallons of saliva in a lifetime

#64 Strawberries contain more Vitamin C then oranges

#65 A one-day weather forecast requires about 10 billion math calculations

#66 Americans on average eat 18 acres of pizza a day

#67 There are 18 different animal shapes in the Animal cracker zoo

#68 The longest one syllable word is "screeched"

#69 No word in the English language rhymes with month

#70 A "jiffy" is actually 1/100 of a second

#71 There is a town called "Big Ugly" in West Virginia

#72 The average person uses 150 gallons of water per day for personal use

#73 The average person spends 2 weeks of its life waiting for a traffic light to change

#74 You share your birthday with 9 million others in the world

#75 The average person makes 1,140 phone calls per year

#76 The average person spends 2 years on the phone in his/her lifetime

#77 No piece of paper can be folded more then 7 times

#78 Alaska is the most eastern and western state in the US

#79 There are 119 grooves on the edge of a quarter

#80 About 18% of Animal owners share their bed with their pet

#81 Alaska has more caribou then people

#82 August has the highest percent of births

#83 Googol is a number (1 followed by 100 zeros)

#84 Oysters can change genders back and forth

#85 The Mona Lisa has no eyebrows

#86 Until the 19th century solid blocks of tea were used as money in Siberia

#87 A mile on the ocean and a mile on land are not the same distance

#88 A ten gallon hat holds less then one gallon of liquid

#89 The average American walks 18,000 steps a day

#90 The average raindrop falls at 7mph

#91 There are more telephones than people in Washington D.C.

#92 Fish can drown

#93 A Kangaroo can jump 30 feet

#94 Lizards communicate by doing push-ups

#95 Squids can have eyeballs the size of volleyballs

#96 The average American will eat 35,000 cookies in his/her lifetime

#97 A turkey can run at 20mph

#98 When the moon is directly over you, you weigh less

#99 You burn 20 calories an hour chewing gum

#100 In a year, the average person walks 4 miles making their bed

#101 About half of all Americans are on a diet at any given time

#102 A one-minute kiss burns 26 calories

#103 Frowning burns more calories then smiling

#104 There are more then 30,000 diets on public record

#105 You will burn 7% more calories walking on hard dirt then pavement

#106 You way less at the top of a mountain then sea level

#107 You burn more calories sleeping then watching TV

#108 Licking a stamp burns 10 calories

#109 Smelling apples and/or bananas can help you lose weight

#110 Frogs never drink

#111 Only male turkeys gobble

#112 At birth, a Dalmation is always pure white

#113 The fastest recorded speed of a racehorse was over 43 mph

#114 The oldest known animal was a tortoise, which lived to be 152 years old

#115 Bamboo makes up 99% of a panda's diet

#116 The largest fish is the whale shark - It can be over 50 feet long and weigh 2 tons

#117 The starfish is the only animal that can turn its stomach inside out

#118 Honeybees are the only insects that create a form of food for humans

#119 The hummingbird is the only bird that can fly backwards

#120 The only continent without native reptiles or snakes is Antarctica

#121 The only bird that can swim and not fly is a penguin

#122 A duck can't walk without bobbing its head

#123 Beavers were once the size of bears

#124 Seals sleep only one and a half minutes at a time

I really don't get how pro-choice people can talk like it's all about the woman and her choice, casual or not. I don't care how seriously you thought about killing that person, murder is murder.

I saw my daughter on the ultrasound just 6 weeks after she was conceived. She had arms, legs, hands, heartbeat, brainwaves, and we could see her moving around. Small, but very obviously a human being just halfway through the first trimester. I have seen babies who were born just 5 months after conception and survived, not even through the second trimester yet.

How can people be ok with killing these innocent little kids? I am passionate believer in limited government, but forgive me if i think that it is very much the government's duty to try and prevent murder, especially those innocents who cannot defend themselves. It is especially unconscionable that the federal government actively prevents state governments from stopping these murders and even goes so far as to fund them with taxpayer dollars. Makes me sick.

I want Obama as president because i do not trust McCain and i'm sick of Bush's policies. But i will not vote for him. I'll be voting for Bob Barr, thank you very much.

no brainer, really. i was hoping for a twist at the end, though. compressed ultrasound barrage that'd fry the spider from inside out or some shit like that... well, maybe next time

This has also been tried in an MRI scanner. Because of the nature of MRI machines, though, I don't think they were able to acquire time-series data like the ultrasound did.

I replied to this on the video post itself... but I kinda wanted to make sure you heard my side:

>> ^asynchronice:
My wife works at a hospital, and can tell stories of 'natural births' that have gone horribly wrong. While that can also happen at a hospital, at least at a hospital you have the the very best people available to step in ASAP. I can't fathom why an 'empowering experience' would be more important than the physical well-being of your child.
And I get weary of the 'business=bad' line of thinking; if you don't like capitalism, try the other games in town and see what you think. These montages of 'people in suits SIGNING things' are so cliche.


*sigh* You and your wife are so very much part of the problem:

* The use of quotations around natural births suggests that you don't think giving birth the way your body was built to give birth is natural... which, is... you know, weird and all.

* You have many, MANY misconceptions here:

1. You assume a natural birth means to give birth at home... hmmm... how about a big fat WRONG on that. While yes, many people would like to give birth at home, and many do, especially in countries which actually support it, it's in no way a necessity. Allow me to state the case for a natural birth IN HOSPITAL... Our first child was diagnosed with a collection (yep, a good 4 or so) of serious heart defects at the 20 week ultrasound (yeah, see, wanting a natural birth doesn't mean eschewing all forms of science you know). Even with this knowledge we (and especially my wife) still wanted a natural birth, and after consultation it was decided it could indeed go ahead that way... and you know what? She had a completely natural birth, and as soon as he was born he was taken care of by an enormous team of doctors, specialists and god knows who else... and now, after open heart surgery and care he's a very happy 4 year old with a funky chest scar.

2. You suggest that the doctors/nurses etc. at the hospital are the 'very best people'... not really true in many cases when it comes to child birth. What is happening SO, SO more now is doctors wanting to get births done and out of the way as quickly as possible. Close friends of ours had their birth booked in so as to fall before the DOCTOR'S HOLIDAY... heaven forbid it be let happen naturally, no, it was induced and pushed out early with many drugs, just so the doctor could go and have his hugely expensive holiday. The doctors and nurses at hospitals are so VERY MUCH NOT natural birth friendly or aware most of the time. We've had hospital midwives throw their hands up and leave the room because my wife refused to be strapped to a bed in a very uncomfortable position during childbirth because that was 'procedure'... (We've always had an independent midwife, and let me tell you they're worth their weight in gold, as they can step in when the nurses/doctors are saying 'look, the baby is distressed etc. I think we need to speed this up'... etc. etc. They can step in and say 'Um, actually, no, the baby is fine... their heart rate does that you know... they are being squished a fair bit down there...
Doctors LOVE to use the term 'baby in distress' to force people into have a caesar or force things along with drugs, or using suction or forceps or the like... because they know that without any other knowledge, if you suggest to parent's to be that their unborn baby might be in danger, you'll leap. With an knowledgeable independent midwife you can cut through the bullshit and know when it's ok to continue going naturally... that sometimes births do actually, you know, take a while... and sometimes they do hurt a lot (man they love offering you drugs), and sometimes the mother makes a lot of noise (we have friends who were told they were being too noisy), and all of this is OK. But if you're thinking they're rogue operators who love to put mothers and babies in risk, you're wrong. They also know when to say "Actually, they're right, it's best to intervene here"

3. "I can't fathom why an 'empowering experience' would be more important than the physical well-being of your child." Because it's not about putting one above the other, it's about what's best for BOTH mother AND baby. What's better for the baby do you think? A natural birth the way things nature intended, with all the GOOD body chemicals etc. being brought into play, and the baby being pushed out AS DESIGNED. OR... a birth where both mother and baby are drug addled with un-natural drugs and possibly removed from the mother either by being yanked out by metal clasps on the skull, or pulled out via the mother being cut open?

YES, sometimes things go wrong that require intervention, but MOST, by FAR most times it is NOT required. Check out the world facts, check out the stats on countries that encourage midwives and natural births, and you'll find FAR fewer interventions with NO increase in complications. This leaping to intervene crap is PURELY the doctors et al not liking being out of control, preferring (for THEIR sakes, not the mother/baby) to be able to control things with a scalpel.

4. "And I get weary of the 'business=bad' line of thinking; if you don't like capitalism, try the other games in town and see what you think." You think that's the way to run HEALTH CARE? You do know that in the VAST majority of countries this sort of thing is free? Provided by the government, as it should be? Not for profit? No, you think that giving birth should be for profit do you? I'm sorry, but that's pretty twisted.

>> ^asynchronice:
My wife works at a hospital, and can tell stories of 'natural births' that have gone horribly wrong. While that can also happen at a hospital, at least at a hospital you have the the very best people available to step in ASAP. I can't fathom why an 'empowering experience' would be more important than the physical well-being of your child.
And I get weary of the 'business=bad' line of thinking; if you don't like capitalism, try the other games in town and see what you think. These montages of 'people in suits SIGNING things' are so cliche.


*sigh* You and your wife are so very much part of the problem:

* The use of quotations around natural births suggests that you don't think giving birth the way your body was built to give birth is natural... which, is... you know, weird and all.

* You have many, MANY misconceptions here:

1. You assume a natural birth means to give birth at home... hmmm... how about a big fat WRONG on that. While yes, many people would like to give birth at home, and many do, especially in countries which actually support it, it's in no way a necessity. Allow me to state the case for a natural birth IN HOSPITAL... Our first child was diagnosed with a collection (yep, a good 4 or so) of serious heart defects at the 20 week ultrasound (yeah, see, wanting a natural birth doesn't mean eschewing all forms of science you know). Even with this knowledge we (and especially my wife) still wanted a natural birth, and after consultation it was decided it could indeed go ahead that way... and you know what? She had a completely natural birth, and as soon as he was born he was taken care of by an enormous team of doctors, specialists and god knows who else... and now, after open heart surgery and care he's a very happy 4 year old with a funky chest scar.

2. You suggest that the doctors/nurses etc. at the hospital are the 'very best people'... not really true in many cases when it comes to child birth. What is happening SO, SO more now is doctors wanting to get births done and out of the way as quickly as possible. Close friends of ours had their birth booked in so as to fall before the DOCTOR'S HOLIDAY... heaven forbid it be let happen naturally, no, it was induced and pushed out early with many drugs, just so the doctor could go and have his hugely expensive holiday. The doctors and nurses at hospitals are so VERY MUCH NOT natural birth friendly or aware most of the time. We've had hospital midwives throw their hands up and leave the room because my wife refused to be strapped to a bed in a very uncomfortable position during childbirth because that was 'procedure'... (We've always had an independent midwife, and let me tell you they're worth their weight in gold, as they can step in when the nurses/doctors are saying 'look, the baby is distressed etc. I think we need to speed this up'... etc. etc. They can step in and say 'Um, actually, no, the baby is fine... their heart rate does that you know... they are being squished a fair bit down there...
Doctors LOVE to use the term 'baby in distress' to force people into have a caesar or force things along with drugs, or using suction or forceps or the like... because they know that without any other knowledge, if you suggest to parent's to be that their unborn baby might be in danger, you'll leap. With an knowledgeable independent midwife you can cut through the bullshit and know when it's ok to continue going naturally... that sometimes births do actually, you know, take a while... and sometimes they do hurt a lot (man they love offering you drugs), and sometimes the mother makes a lot of noise (we have friends who were told they were being too noisy), and all of this is OK. But if you're thinking they're rogue operators who love to put mothers and babies in risk, you're wrong. They also know when to say "Actually, they're right, it's best to intervene here"

3. "I can't fathom why an 'empowering experience' would be more important than the physical well-being of your child." Because it's not about putting one above the other, it's about what's best for BOTH mother AND baby. What's better for the baby do you think? A natural birth the way things nature intended, with all the GOOD body chemicals etc. being brought into play, and the baby being pushed out AS DESIGNED. OR... a birth where both mother and baby are drug addled with un-natural drugs and possibly removed from the mother either by being yanked out by metal clasps on the skull, or pulled out via the mother being cut open?

YES, sometimes things go wrong that require intervention, but MOST, by FAR most times it is NOT required. Check out the world facts, check out the stats on countries that encourage midwives and natural births, and you'll find FAR fewer interventions with NO increase in complications. This leaping to intervene crap is PURELY the doctors et al not liking being out of control, preferring (for THEIR sakes, not the mother/baby) to be able to control things with a scalpel.

4. "And I get weary of the 'business=bad' line of thinking; if you don't like capitalism, try the other games in town and see what you think." You think that's the way to run HEALTH CARE? You do know that in the VAST majority of countries this sort of thing is free? Provided by the government, as it should be? Not for profit? No, you think that giving birth should be for profit do you? I'm sorry, but that's pretty twisted.