Announcement

Collapse

Civics 101 Guidelines

Want to argue about politics? Healthcare reform? Taxes? Governments? You've come to the right place!

Try to keep it civil though. The rules still apply here.
See more
See less

Why I Voted For Trump...

Collapse
X
 
  • Filter
  • Time
  • Show
Clear All
new posts

  • Originally posted by Starlight View Post
    As far as scientific sources go, that ones pretty dodgy, cos you're linking to an unreviewed draft paper, so the author could have written literally anything and posted it on the internet and in that sense its no better than a post in this forum.
    And yet you offered a "the biologists that I know"

    I'm always still in trouble again

    "You're by far the worst poster on TWeb" and "TWeb's biggest liar" --starlight (the guy who says Stalin was a right-winger)
    "Overall I would rate the withdrawal from Afghanistan as by far the best thing Biden's done" --Starlight
    "Of course, human life begins at fertilization that’s not the argument." --Tassman

    Comment


    • Originally posted by rogue06 View Post
      And yet you offered a "the biologists that I know"
      Indeed, I was clear and upfront about what my source was and its quality.

      Looking at a survey of scientists by Pew Research, my anecdotes were on the money. The vast majority of US scientists lean liberal rather than conservative:

      Most [US] scientists identify as Democrats (55%), while 32% identify as independents and just 6% say they are Republicans. When the leanings of independents are considered, fully 81% [of US scientists] identify as Democrats or lean to the Democratic Party, compared with 12% [of US scientists] who either identify as Republicans or lean toward the GOP.


      When they broke this down by scientific field, the "Biological and Medical" category was pretty close to identical to scientists as a whole:


      So approximately, 8 in 10 scientists / biological & medical scientists are liberal, 1 in 10 are conservative, and 1 in 10 are neither.

      Pew found the majority of scientists are aware of the strong liberal leanings of scientists as a whole:

      most [US] scientists (56%) perceive the scientific community as politically liberal; just 2% think scientists are politically conservative. About four-in-ten scientists (42%)... [think] that scientists, as a group, are neither in particular.

      So given, that finding, it is unsurprising that as a scientist I was able to accurately tell you that my scientific colleagues lean liberal. My anecdotes about NZ scientists were indeed generally representative of US scientists.

      Amusingly, Pew found that almost two thirds of non-scientist Americans wrongly thought scientists were neither liberal nor conservative on the whole.

      Pew notes that in various survey questions they asked, US scientists were much more pro-government, pro-equal-rights, anti-business, and anti-militaristic than the average US citizen. e.g.
      [Only] 14% of scientists agree [vs 83% who disagreed] that “we have gone too far in pushing equal rights in this country.”

      Also only 33% of US scientists reported belief in God compared to 83% of the US public.

      Pew does not appear to have specifically asked the scientists about their view as to whether abortion should be legal. But I think it's reasonable to infer their position on abortion policy given US biological and medical scientists leaned Democratic over Republican at an 8 to 1 ratio.
      Last edited by Starlight; 10-29-2019, 03:52 AM.
      "I hate him passionately", he's "a demonic force" - Tucker Carlson, in private, on Donald Trump
      "Every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly or indirectly, against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism" - George Orwell
      "[Capitalism] as it exists today is, in my opinion, the real source of evils. I am convinced there is only one way to eliminate these grave evils, namely through the establishment of a socialist economy" - Albert Einstein

      Comment


      • I looked further into the guy's survey that CP linked, and as he reports elsewhere he did ask the biologists he surveyed whether they supported abortion and what their political leanings were. He found that the biologists he surveyed were 85% pro-choice, and of those who had political leanings, 92% of them were Democrat. So that's actually pretty close to the 8 to 1 ratio Pew found US biologists/scientists to have. It's also pretty much what I was describing I see in my own workplace among the biologists I work with.

        So I guess an accurate summary of the findings of the guy CP linked to would be: The vast majority of biologists are pro-choice. The vast majority of biologists when asked when human life begins, say it begins at conception. This suggests that the vast majority of biologists don't think the question of when human life begins determines whether abortion should be legal.
        ...Which is what I have been telling you guys in this thread.
        "I hate him passionately", he's "a demonic force" - Tucker Carlson, in private, on Donald Trump
        "Every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly or indirectly, against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism" - George Orwell
        "[Capitalism] as it exists today is, in my opinion, the real source of evils. I am convinced there is only one way to eliminate these grave evils, namely through the establishment of a socialist economy" - Albert Einstein

        Comment


        • Originally posted by Starlight View Post
          Indeed, I was clear and upfront about what my source was and its quality.

          Looking at a survey of scientists by Pew Research, my anecdotes were on the money. The vast majority of US scientists lean liberal rather than conservative:

          Most [US] scientists identify as Democrats (55%), while 32% identify as independents and just 6% say they are Republicans. When the leanings of independents are considered, fully 81% [of US scientists] identify as Democrats or lean to the Democratic Party, compared with 12% [of US scientists] who either identify as Republicans or lean toward the GOP.


          When they broke this down by scientific field, the "Biological and Medical" category was pretty close to identical to scientists as a whole:


          So approximately, 8 in 10 scientists / biological & medical scientists are liberal, 1 in 10 are conservative, and 1 in 10 are neither.

          Pew found the majority of scientists are aware of the strong liberal leanings of scientists as a whole:

          most [US] scientists (56%) perceive the scientific community as politically liberal; just 2% think scientists are politically conservative. About four-in-ten scientists (42%)... [think] that scientists, as a group, are neither in particular.

          So given, that finding, it is unsurprising that as a scientist I was able to accurately tell you that my scientific colleagues lean liberal. My anecdotes about NZ scientists were indeed generally representative of US scientists.

          Amusingly, Pew found that almost two thirds of non-scientist Americans wrongly thought scientists were neither liberal nor conservative on the whole.

          Pew notes that in various survey questions they asked, US scientists were much more pro-government, pro-equal-rights, anti-business, and anti-militaristic than the average US citizen. e.g.
          [Only] 14% of scientists agree [vs 83% who disagreed] that “we have gone too far in pushing equal rights in this country.”

          Also only 33% of US scientists reported belief in God compared to 83% of the US public.

          Pew does not appear to have specifically asked the scientists about their view as to whether abortion should be legal. But I think it's reasonable to infer their position on abortion policy given US biological and medical scientists leaned Democratic over Republican at an 8 to 1 ratio.
          Proving that they are majority liberal, proving they agree with you on the issue of abortion, that those that work in fields dealing with fetal development agree with you on abortion, and they are pro abortion based on science and not politics, are different claims. It’s not hard to see your sad attempts to pull the wool over our eyes. Try harder.
          "The man from the yacht thought he was the first to find England; I thought I was the first to find Europe. I did try to found a heresy of my own; and when I had put the last touches to it, I discovered that it was orthodoxy."
          GK Chesterton; Orthodoxy

          Comment


          • Originally posted by Starlight View Post
            I looked further into the guy's survey that CP linked, and as he reports elsewhere he did ask the biologists he surveyed whether they supported abortion and what their political leanings were. He found that the biologists he surveyed were 85% pro-choice, and of those who had political leanings, 92% of them were Democrat. So that's actually pretty close to the 8 to 1 ratio Pew found US biologists/scientists to have. It's also pretty much what I was describing I see in my own workplace among the biologists I work with.

            So I guess an accurate summary of the findings of the guy CP linked to would be: The vast majority of biologists are pro-choice. The vast majority of biologists when asked when human life begins, say it begins at conception. This suggests that the vast majority of biologists don't think the question of when human life begins determines whether abortion should be legal.
            ...Which is what I have been telling you guys in this thread.
            And that still doesn’t answer what was first asked:

            Are they scientist in fields that have anything to do with fetal development?
            Do they base their position on the science or politics?

            Your dodging of my points is noted. Biology is a pretty wide field of study many of which has nothing to do with fetal development. Try harder to pull the wool over our eyes Starlight.
            "The man from the yacht thought he was the first to find England; I thought I was the first to find Europe. I did try to found a heresy of my own; and when I had put the last touches to it, I discovered that it was orthodoxy."
            GK Chesterton; Orthodoxy

            Comment


            • Originally posted by seer View Post
              Don't they all eat grits and marry their sisters?
              No, don't be silly, not all of them eat grits, seer.

              Comment


              • Originally posted by Tassman View Post
                Criswell was a senior pastor in the Southern Baptist Convention
                As were many other men. He was NOT, however, President of the Southern Baptist Convention at the time of the ruling as you falsely stated.

                and his views on abortion vis-a-vis Roe v Wade were representative of the general view at the time among Evangelicals.
                That has already been addressed numerous times.

                “A 1968 a symposium sponsored by the Christian Medical Society and Christianity Today, the flagship magazine of evangelicalism, refused to characterize abortion as sinful, citing 'individual health, family welfare, and social responsibility' as justifications for ending a pregnancy”.

                http://www.thechristianleftblog.org/blog-home/abortion

                In this they were following the traditional Judeo/Christian belief that in Jewish law and belief an unborn fetus is not considered a person (Heb. nefesh, lit. “soul”) until it has been born.
                It was RvW that caused a deeper look at the issue, and the tide has changed. Stop living in the past, Tassy.
                The first to state his case seems right until another comes and cross-examines him.

                Comment


                • Originally posted by rogue06 View Post
                  And yet you offered a "the biologists that I know"
                  Star only associates with the 'right kind' of biologists.
                  The first to state his case seems right until another comes and cross-examines him.

                  Comment


                  • Originally posted by Starlight View Post
                    I looked further into the guy's survey that CP linked, and as he reports elsewhere he did ask the biologists he surveyed whether they supported abortion and what their political leanings were. He found that the biologists he surveyed were 85% pro-choice, and of those who had political leanings, 92% of them were Democrat. So that's actually pretty close to the 8 to 1 ratio Pew found US biologists/scientists to have. It's also pretty much what I was describing I see in my own workplace among the biologists I work with.

                    So I guess an accurate summary of the findings of the guy CP linked to would be: The vast majority of biologists are pro-choice. The vast majority of biologists when asked when human life begins, say it begins at conception. This suggests that the vast majority of biologists don't think the question of when human life begins determines whether abortion should be legal.
                    ...Which is what I have been telling you guys in this thread.
                    That was the original point, Star -- that even PRO-CHOICE biologists overwhelmingly agree that life begins at conception -- THEREFORE -- the narrative has to change to "personhood" or "viability" or some other metric.
                    The first to state his case seems right until another comes and cross-examines him.

                    Comment


                    • Originally posted by Cow Poke View Post
                      Star only associates with the 'right kind' of biologists.
                      I associate with the biologists that happen to have been employed for their biological expertise by the same private company as I work for. I didn't choose those employees nor have a say in their employment nor met them until after I chose to work for the company, nor does the company ask about political issues in the hiring process nor is it interested in them. I have every reason to think the biologists I work with are a perfectly random sample of biologists with regard to their political opinions, and indeed, as the research you cited demonstrates, their opinions are in fact representative of US biologists in general.

                      Originally posted by Cow Poke View Post
                      even PRO-CHOICE biologists overwhelmingly agree that life begins at conception -- THEREFORE -- the narrative has to change
                      What needs to change is your false narrative that "when life begins" is relevant to the issue. You are deceiving yourself and others. And it is disingenuous of you to keep pushing that false narrative.

                      The biologists overwhelmingly agree that when life begins isn't relevant to the question of abortion: Those who know the SCIENCE are overwhelming are PRO-CHOICE. They also can factually answer the question that life begins at conception, the one having no bearing on the other.

                      Back in the day when the Romans were exposing unwanted infants, they weren't doing it because their lack of scientific knowledge made them not realize that the babies they were killing were alive. They perfectly well knew and could obviously see with their own eyes that the babies they were leaving out to die were alive, and did it anyway. Human cultures throughout history have typically been fine with the killing of fetuses or babies they believed/knew were a new human life. The question of whether the baby/fetus was 'alive' or a 'new human life' has never been the issue. And modern scientists agree it is not relevant to the political issue of abortion legality.

                      As the survey you cited demonstrates, in today's world the more a person knows about the science of biology the more likely they are to be pro-choice. The biological expertise are much, much, much more likely than the average person to be pro-choice.

                      However the delusional modern anti-abortion crowd has invented the moronic idea that the cut-off for legal abortions should be 'when human life begins'. That's simply an idiotic criteria invented by ignorant idiots who were anti-abortion already, in an attempt to justify their own position with pretend arguments. There's no reason to take it seriously as a criteria - neither the ancient Romans nor modern biologists think it has any relevance at all.
                      Last edited by Starlight; 10-29-2019, 04:35 PM.
                      "I hate him passionately", he's "a demonic force" - Tucker Carlson, in private, on Donald Trump
                      "Every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly or indirectly, against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism" - George Orwell
                      "[Capitalism] as it exists today is, in my opinion, the real source of evils. I am convinced there is only one way to eliminate these grave evils, namely through the establishment of a socialist economy" - Albert Einstein

                      Comment


                      • Originally posted by Cow Poke View Post
                        That was the original point, Star -- that even PRO-CHOICE biologists overwhelmingly agree that life begins at conception -- THEREFORE -- the narrative has to change to "personhood" or "viability" or some other metric.
                        The beginning of a biological life is NOT the issue. The issue is when such a life becomes subject to the rights and protections of law. According to Roe v Wade this is when the fetus has developed to the stage of viability. This has also long been the tradition throughout most of Judeo/Christian history.

                        Originally posted by Cow Poke View Post



                        It was R v W that caused a deeper look at the issue, and the tide has changed. Stop living in the past, Tassy.
                        No. Roe v Wade did NOT cause a deeper look at the issue until six years after the decision and for motives other than ‘pro-life’ doctrine.

                        https://www.politico.com/magazine/st...origins-107133

                        Initially the Religious Right favored the decision.
                        “He felt that his whole life was a kind of dream and he sometimes wondered whose it was and whether they were enjoying it.” - Douglas Adams.

                        Comment


                        • Originally posted by Tassman View Post
                          The issue is when such a life becomes subject to the rights and protections of law.
                          Indeed.

                          "Infanticide has been practiced on every continent and by people on every level of cultural complexity, from hunter gatherers to high civilizations, including our own ancestors. Rather than being an exception, then, it has been the rule." - Anthropologist Laila Williamson in Infanticide and the Value of Life.

                          So the vast majority of human cultures have thought the rights and protections of law didn't extend to newborns.

                          According to Roe v Wade this is when the fetus has developed to the stage of viability. This has also long been the tradition throughout most of Judeo/Christian history.
                          Not really - it was much more lax than that.

                          In the Middle Ages, infanticide "was practiced on gigantic scale with absolute impunity, noticed by writers with most frigid indifference" - William L. Langer in Infanticide: a historical survey.

                          It wasn't really until the 19th century that infanticide was being seriously monitored in Europe and laws were put on the books against it and were being consistently enforced. So it's not true to say 'viability' has been the standard for most of Judeo/Christian history. For most of that history infanticide was tolerated.

                          Initially the Religious Right favored the [Roe v Wade] decision.
                          Hardly surprising since the bible never once condemns abortion or infanticide. Despite them being common practices in the cultures of the time.


                          For the sarcastically impaired the following is said in jest

                          But now that modern biologists have discovered that babies are alive, we can realize what those unscientific ancient peoples never did: That babies are human beings. So we can now know that infanticide is wrong. Also abortion. Cos SCIENCE.

                          Last edited by Starlight; 10-30-2019, 04:30 AM.
                          "I hate him passionately", he's "a demonic force" - Tucker Carlson, in private, on Donald Trump
                          "Every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly or indirectly, against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism" - George Orwell
                          "[Capitalism] as it exists today is, in my opinion, the real source of evils. I am convinced there is only one way to eliminate these grave evils, namely through the establishment of a socialist economy" - Albert Einstein

                          Comment


                          • Originally posted by Starlight View Post
                            Indeed.

                            "Infanticide has been practiced on every continent and by people on every level of cultural complexity, from hunter gatherers to high civilizations, including our own ancestors. Rather than being an exception, then, it has been the rule." - Anthropologist Laila Williamson in Infanticide and the Value of Life.

                            So the vast majority of human cultures have thought the rights and protections of law didn't extend to newborns.
                            But the rights and protections of law DID extend to newborns in the Judeo/Christian tradition even though, as you rightly say, infanticide was widely practiced despite this tradition.

                            The time, according to traditional Jewish Law that a fetus legally acquires the status equal to an adult human being is at birth. The Talmud states in part that if the “greater part was already born, one may not touch it, for one may not set aside one person’s life for that of another.” Thus, the act of birth changes the status of the fetus from a nonperson to a person (nefesh). Killing the newborn after this point is infanticide.

                            https://www.myjewishlearning.com/art...fe-in-judaism/

                            But it didn’t extend to the newly conceived zygote or embryo until relatively recently.
                            “He felt that his whole life was a kind of dream and he sometimes wondered whose it was and whether they were enjoying it.” - Douglas Adams.

                            Comment


                            • SCOTUS denies First Amendment challenge to Kentucky ultrasound abortion law

                              https://www.theblaze.com/news/scotus...d-abortion-law
                              Atheism is the cult of death, the death of hope. The universe is doomed, you are doomed, the only thing that remains is to await your execution...

                              https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jbnueb2OI4o&t=3s

                              Comment


                              • I didn't vote for Trump. I voted for Rand Paul in the primary and Gary Johnson in the general election. I thought Trump was too inexperienced and too uncertain to have his fingers anywhere near the nuclear hot buttons.

                                But now, with the advantage of hindsight, I will have no problem voting for him in 2020. He has proven himself to be anti-globalist (win) and anti-militarist (another win). I don't like what's happening with the imbalanced budgets and the national debt (which is a looming disaster) but no other candidates have offered any solutions yet. Rand Paul came closest.

                                Comment

                                Related Threads

                                Collapse

                                Topics Statistics Last Post
                                Started by CivilDiscourse, Today, 09:58 AM
                                5 responses
                                20 views
                                0 likes
                                Last Post rogue06
                                by rogue06
                                 
                                Started by little_monkey, 03-27-2024, 04:19 PM
                                16 responses
                                197 views
                                0 likes
                                Last Post One Bad Pig  
                                Started by whag, 03-26-2024, 04:38 PM
                                53 responses
                                422 views
                                0 likes
                                Last Post Mountain Man  
                                Started by rogue06, 03-26-2024, 11:45 AM
                                25 responses
                                114 views
                                0 likes
                                Last Post rogue06
                                by rogue06
                                 
                                Started by Hypatia_Alexandria, 03-26-2024, 09:21 AM
                                33 responses
                                198 views
                                0 likes
                                Last Post Roy
                                by Roy
                                 
                                Working...
                                X