You've said this twice now and I'm afraid you've lost me.
To which bodily system are you referring?
toldailytopic: Should the government force companies to offer the Morning After Pill
- Thread starter Nathon Detroit
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You've said this twice now and I'm afraid you've lost me.
To which bodily system are you referring?
It's very simple. We don't have to talk about what body parts are "for" in the abstract. It's not like we're having a moral discussion about sexuality and I'm trying to bring in teleology.
No. We're talking about medicine and health. Medicine, insofar as it is a practical art, necessarily involves teleology. The doctor has a goal in mind whenever he performs his craft. He's trying to bring a state of affairs into being. Necessarily, this involves teleology: "there is some end which I am trying to attain."
Thus, whenever a doctor reasons medically, he has to conceive of body parts and systems of the body as functioning properly and improperly. Otherwise, he wouldn't bother.
So we start asking the question:
What is the heart for?
What is the liver for?
What are the kidneys for?
It's by asking these questions that the doctor figures out how what constitutes a state of well-being for these organs, what constitutes a sickness and how to treat them.
:doh: I get it. You're talking about the reproductive sytem.
I missed the forest for the trees. Right now I'm studying lower level sytems.
I missed the forest for the trees. Right now I'm studying lower level sytems.
PureX
Well-known member
Well, there ya go ... choices. It's all part of maintaining "good health".
Yeah. The point of medicine is making sure that everything works properly. That's what health is: we can only conceive of health teleologically.
In what sense of the term can contraceptives possibly constitute medicine, at least, qua contraceptive? How can contraceptives, which prevent the proper functioning of the reproductive system, possibly be considered as contributing to the right functioning of the reproductive system?
It's not medicine. It's anti-medicine.
And the choice of whether or not to have a pregnancy is best made when?
When one is already pregnant?
PureX
Well-known member
Not in an ideal world, maybe, but we don't live in an ideal world. We live in this one. Making choices about a potential pregnancy is definitely a health related choice. And it's a choice that people should make for themselves, don't you think? I certainly can't think of any good reason why our employers should be making those choices for us.
A potential pregnancy? Sure.
ddevonb
New member
PureX
Well-known member
The morning after pill is not taken to eliminate a pregnancy. It's taken to eliminate a potential pregnancy. It's difficult to understand this if you assume that every fertilized cell is already a "baby". But lots of cells get fertilized that never become implanted, or stay implanted long enough that the woman actually becomes "pregnant".
I stand by my previous comment.