Personhood

[Rahul]

And? Here's where the logic ends. You have to show that a person has to experience those things in order for it to be "logical" to keep it alive. This is a purely emotional argument. It's one I agree with, but only on an emotional level. Where I draw the line is calling it logical as if there is some logical formula for determining whether a person should live. Hint: There isn't.

You are making a fundamental error. It isn't a "person". It's a brainless, breathing human body. If I cut off your arm and you see it laying on the ground is that arm you? No, it was a part of your body.

Even the molecules that comprise that arm weren't there a couple years ago. Our bodies are constantly rebuilding and purging out old molecules. Divorced from the part of your body that contains your awareness it isn't a person. It's a thing. A thing that used to belong to the body of a person.

If I remove your brain from your skull and toss it in the proverbial brain vat, is your old body you? No. It contains no awareness. It was simply the housing of a person. Separated from that it becomes a non-person. A biological object.

Yes, that is what I meant. You cannot determine what is psychologically healthy for another individual in every case.

I'm not trying to determine what is psychologically health in every case. But living with a breathing corpse instead of accepting reality is not healthy for a person who is mentally healthy. If someone finds joy in such a thing they need help to become psychologically healthy.

What we should not do is to encourage unhealthy behavior.

Firstly, armchair psychology is stupid.

But we're both doing it.

Secondly, your emotions are completely subjective. She could be happier than a pig in shit and you would assume she wasn't because you aren't.

Not if she was mentally healthy. No parent would be happy as a pig in shit that the child they had hoped for was replaced with a brainless corpse.

People with religious standing on certain issues can be pretty witless. Therefore, we cannot say for certain that she is unhappy. She could think the kid was the next Messiah or something and be overcome with joy.

Many serial killers were overcome with joy by killing people. Because they were mentally disturbed. An unhealthy mind frequently encourages itself to engage in unhealthy pursuits.

Well, someone with Munchausen by proxy would shit themselves with joy over it, but I digress.

Correct. A mentally unhealthy person who needed help.

Of course people don't hope for that, but we rarely get exactly what we hope for and people deal with it.

Agreed. She should deal with it. She should go through the grieving process and move on with her life. Not stay in limbo caring for a brainless piece of meat and clinging to illusions that she has a baby to take care of.

You are again applying your own emotional responses to someone else. That is fine and I agree, but why call it "logical?" It's not a logic problem.

No. As a dispassionate observer who does not know this woman or have any emotions invested in her plight I am stating what healthy behavior would be to any mentally healthy person.