We need not resolve the difficult question of when life begins. When those trained in the respective disciplines of medicine, philosophy, and theology are unable to arrive at any consensus, the judiciary, at this point in the development of man's knowledge, is not in a position to speculate as to the answer.
Interpretation
The quote suggests that the question of when life begins is complex and unresolved, and thus the judiciary should not attempt to provide an answer.
Harry A. Blackmun emphasizes the complexity surrounding the question of when life begins, pointing out that experts from various fields—medicine, philosophy, and theology—have not reached a consensus on this matter. As such, he suggests that the judiciary should refrain from speculating on this issue given the current state of knowledge. This reflects the broader philosophical debate on the nature of life and the implications of defining it.
In practice
This quote could be used in a debate about bioethics or abortion rights.
I cannot see any of these death penalty cases where there hasn't been a violation on the ground of either poverty or race. If we can ever get that straightened out, it will help. But, of course, the real answer to it is to do away with the death penalty.
From this day forward, I no longer shall tinker with the machinery of death. ... I fell morally and intellectually obligated simply to concede that the death penalty experiment has failed.
Of one thing, however, I am certain. Just as an execution without adequate safeguards is unacceptable, so too is an execution when the condemned prisoner can prove that he is innocent. The execution of a person who can show that he is innocent comes perilously close to simple murder.
The right of an individual to conduct intimate relationships in the intimacy of his or her own home seems to me to be the heart of the Constitutions protection of privacy.
From this day forward, I no longer shall tinker with the machinery of death.
In order to get beyond racism, we must first take account of race. There is no other way. And in order to treat some persons equally, we must treat them differently.
I do not speak as I think, I do not think as I should, and so it all goes on in helpless darkness.
Sometimes human places, create inhuman monsters.
We have no evidence whatsoever that the soul perishes with the body.
If it’s going to be a world with no time for sentiment, it’s not a world that I want to live in.
It seems that American patriotism measures itself against an outcast group. The right Americans are the right Americans because they're not like the wrong Americans, who are not really Americans.
Economic and military power can be developed under the spur of laws and appropriations. But moral power does not derive from any act of Congress. It depends on the relations of a people to their God. It is the churches to which we must look to develop the resources for the great moral offensive that is required to make human rights secure, and to win a just and lasting peace.
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.