Actually, I've heard plenty of pro-lifers speak out against the destruction of "potential life". Sometimes it's hard to explain to them why that doesn't make a lick of sense.
Well I haven't met any (again besides the aforementioned anti-birth control people), but I can't say I'd be very surprised that such people exist. If they're fine with birth control but anti-abortion of potential people there's definitely a non-sequitur in there somewhere. I won't even really go into the logical conclusion of protecting potential people (IE boning as much as possible for maximum baby potential, like some sort of twisted dwarf fortress player).
Any value in my own position is because I find other positions to be untenable. This includes the non-committal stance you believe you are taking, without realizing that it is in itself a stance on the issue of personhood. Being a person or non-person extends beyond the single issue of abortion. Whenever you eat another non-human animal, or allow another non-human animal to be killed, you're making that decision with a particular understanding of what is a person. Even the usage of plants or non-living objects include an assumption of personhood that most people gloss over entirely because intelligent rocks are something that on its face seems absurd, yet we're still applying an unconscious understanding of person vs. nonperson in our interactions.
I'm non-committal specifically on abortion. I'm committal on animals and plants (I'm a vegetarian for moral reasons).
It's true I have several opinions on what does and does not define personhood, but I've got far from a complete set. So if you don't want me to use "non-committal" to describe it, how about just plain "uncertain"?
If you don't like making guesses when it comes to peoples' lives, then how do you justify or ignore so much else that happens in human society?
Two things.
1) Do PETA's methods work? Sometimes you gotta realize shouting as loud as possible and claiming other people are horrible and repugnant doesn't work to further your goal. There's one justification for "ignoring" things.
2) I perhaps do less than I can to fight against nasty stuff in human society, but it's not nothing. Besides, how much is enough? If I want to stop or mitigate homelessness, that doesn't mean I have to volunteer at a shelter for hours every day to satisfy a moral obligation.
Also, my "not liking making guesses" is again, specifically for abortion. It's hard to think up an analogy... so I won't. To me it's shades of uncertainty; I'm pretty sure the child is human prior to the umbilical cord being cut. I'm pretty sure it's not human at the point of the sperm hits the egg. Where in-between it becomes human, I dunno, and am unwilling to make a commitment. Risking the wrong choice is not blood I want on my hands. That's the basis of my neutrality, pretty much.
I cannot speak with certainty here, it is true, but given that observed hints of emerging social capacity start to appear only after the infancy period, I'm very confident that if they do appear during the pre-birthing period it is only at the very end. The blurred line is well outside of the region where most of the abortion dispute takes place, opening only a sliver for partial birth abortion discussion. When considering where that line is exactly we must honestly reflect on why we exclude other animals who might possess similar intellectual ability from personhood while accepting even less capable human fetuses. Certainly many feel that speciesism is acceptable, looking at the issue as a simplified in-group vs. out-group distinction, but I prefer an answer which cuts to the heart of what society and its people are. Much better to have a more encompassing answer if spacefaring extraterrestrials, new terrestrial intelligence, or true AI, arrive some day and then if needed refine the idea from a somewhat workable platform. That way we can avoid another debacle involving "races without souls."
Without evidence to back the intelligence of a fetus and given a considerably low probability when it comes to meeting the requirements we use to exclude non-humans from person status, I give full support behind the right for a woman to abort said fetus, especially when its existence is harmful to her own personal or financial well-being.
Righto. I don't necessarily agree but I'll admit you've got solid logic from the stated premises.
To me, intelligence doesn't quite suit my view of "personhood." More (or maybe less?) to it than that. Life, to me, is all about experiencing the world around you, and as such it extends (far) beyond social things. Perhaps simple consciousness satisfies my view, perhaps not. Not decided yet.