Re: KILL unwanted or disabled babies at birth as they are not a real person'
 

I agree with you on the fact the world has many different opinions. Also while I do believe in religion (Sikhism). I am not a very religious person. I am proud to live in a country like the UK. I also treat all humans and animals as equals

Peace be with you as well

P.S. Would you mind telling me what happened to your kids (you do not have to answer this question)

Re: KILL unwanted or disabled babies at birth as they are not a real person'
 

Re: KILL unwanted or disabled babies at birth as they are not a real person'
 

There is a lesson here, especially for those who respond to media headlines without bothering to check the facts.

Re: KILL unwanted or disabled babies at birth as they are not a real person'
 

Well you could argue the contary too.

Well lets look at it from another perspective policies derived from brainstorming and think tanks. Often a early forms of those policies are dropped in the open to testing the water off the ideoligy of its views. Once idea brought up into the fold its then logical to test the consensus of opinion of experts and public consensus.

Not actually saying this piece will see years down the line such contraversial policy would be law. Now what would happened if this did get in media got support at somepoint rightly or wrongly madcap party down the road would latched onto such thoughts thats why these very dangerous thought provoking views should been kept inhouse.

The notion they shocked it got the media, tv, web to talk about it is stupidly naive. It was bound to happen there paper from the ofset should made it more clear what they saying in this blog. Maybe they wanted the media exposure either way it dont possibly explain away why they did not make the notion clearer in the journal.

Actually after the blog more puzzled why it really need to be in medical journal. To me thats my view rightly/wrongly a reach to find out if it actually a consensus of like minds.

Some very good excellent replys in that blog.

Re: KILL unwanted or disabled babies at birth as they are not a real person'
 

But then you leave no room for pure academic discussion.

Re: KILL unwanted or disabled babies at birth as they are not a real person'
 

Exactly. The article was published in one of the British Medical Journals, which is why the authors said:

Re: KILL unwanted or disabled babies at birth as they are not a real person'
 

There must be room for academic discussion, but in the age of the interwebs those who seek to generate that discussion must be aware that they can no longer assume that the intended audience and the actual audience are the same, or even broadly similar. I agree with Mertle, it was very naive of them to be shocked when their paper achieved such wide coverage.

This is not to say they shouldn't be allowed to write such things, but rather in our information age they should, while writing, have a strategy in mind for answering questions that may then come from outside of their academic ivory tower.

Re: KILL unwanted or disabled babies at birth as they are not a real person'
 

One wonders if any questions were asked of them, or if perhaps some irresponsible hack just ran with the story without asking for clarification. I don't think academic papers should stoop to the lowest common denominator just in case the press picks up on them. They'll become impossible to read for the target audience.

Re: KILL unwanted or disabled babies at birth as they are not a real person'
 

I'm not suggesting the contents of the paper itself should be any less rigorous. Just that the authors may need to become a little more media savvy. At the very least, be aware how what they are saying will sound to an 'uneducated' ear.

Re: KILL unwanted or disabled babies at birth as they are not a real person'
 

I thought they reacted very well with the blog post that Downquark linked to. What more would you expect?

Re: KILL unwanted or disabled babies at birth as they are not a real person'
 

Chris stole me thunder yes internet things like that could be used often seen the medical journal kicking about in NHS, doctors. It will be read by those not in the profesion.

Just think it was naive on there part to not to make it clear what they said in the blog then it certainly would not caused as much storm.

Nobody denying them there thought provoking views just feel they need to do it with more tact.

Certain subjects being disgussed should be away from public ears or clearly made aware its not something profesionals would think to inact. Else we could go into very dangerous ground. Could you imagine what would happen if politician talked about ethnic clensing in political journal not for public eyes it ended in mainstream news. We get backtrack very much as these doctors his political career would be dead.

Its dangerous ground to assume it will be only professionals read the piece.

Re: KILL unwanted or disabled babies at birth as they are not a real person'
 

I think we can all agree that the subject matter in this report will not be up for dicussion for some time