Err. Some words about abortion. I can’t think of a proper title, though.

September 25th, 2012 § 2 comments

What do Ludwig von Beethoven, Justin Bieber and Tim Tebow have in common?

A professor in a college ethics class presented his students with a problem. He said, ‘A man has syphilis and his wife has tuberculosis.

They have had four children: one has died, the other three have what is considered to be a terminal illness.

The mother is pregnant. What do you recommend?’

After a spirited discussion, the majority of the class voted that she should abort the child.

‘Fine,’ said the professor. ‘You’ve just killed Beethoven.’

and then Peter Saunders describes how Justin Bieber came into the world, and “a future star football player”, Tim Tebow (whoever he is).

Decisions to keep babies in circumstances in which many might opt for an abortion resulted in Beethoven, Justin Bieber and Tim Tebow.

Well, at least one of those is a reason for abortion.

Seriously, though, you can’t not have an abortion just because that baby might turn out to have some great skill or talent. The decision has to be for what is best at the time.

I’m not a doctor, otherwise I wouldn’t be writing this, I’d be milking the ill, frail and infirm for every penny I could get and sod off to a desert island as soon as I could, but I’m guessing the the students in the Beethoven case came to their conclusion because on the balance of probabilities either Beethoven should’ve been born completely fucked up, his mother dead or both.

The same for Beiber and that footballing chap. Neither parent knew what their offspring would grow up to be. It just happens that they both grew up to be famous to some degree or other and at the same time be completely replaceable in their chosen field of err, expertise. Beethoven might have been a fellow with an unparalleled talent for music but would the world really have been much different without him?

You could turn things around and look at all the normal, healthy babies that are born to normal, healthy, loving parents, then turn out to be serial killers or war criminals. There’s probably a more of a reason for aborting babies using that logic.

Just because someone has studied medicine for a few years and knows what should happen to a body in certain circumstance doesn’t mean they know what will happen. They look at what has happened previously and state the odds, in one way or another, of particular outcomes. There will always be anomalies. That’s the nature of statistics.

Abortion shouldn’t be taken lightly. The people involved need to be given proper information about what could happen, what is likely to happen and then left to clear it with their own conscience about what they feel is right.

You can’t have or not have an abortion because that child might be the one to find the cure for cancer. One person, believe it or not, is not that special in the big scheme of things.

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§ 2 Responses to Err. Some words about abortion. I can’t think of a proper title, though."

  • Robert says:

    Good point. I might also add that Beethoven wasn’t Beethoven as a baby. Same goes for Bieber. It is te environment and parenting that makes them so.

    I often wonder how many other Beethovens and Hendrixes (Hendri?) there are in Africa right now, dying of TB, malaria and AIDS. A lot, probably. Human beings are a bit like the stems cells from which they grow: in the very early stages tey can grow up to be anything, depending on what environment you place them in.

    Tim Tebow, by the way, is an American footballer who is also an ostentatious Christian.

    • Sim-O says:

      It’s a pretty poor choice of examples Saunders chooses. Someone with a talent that millions of other people have and a someone that has shown he *may* have considerable talent, along with millions of others that *may* have the same talent.

      It’s not the talent they have that has marked them out in our society, it’s being in the right place at the right time.

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