Do Souls Exist? Science Says No.

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soul physicsThis photo is of Phineas Gage, a railroad worker who, in 1848, was tamping down black powder with an iron rod when the powder exploded and shot the rod through his head, coming in under his left cheekbone and out the top. This picture shows him with the rod, his “constant companion.” (To see his skull and a recreation of where the rod went, go here.)
Mind/brain connection
What happens when much of the left frontal lobe of a person’s brain is destroyed? Gage was one of the first examples by which modern medicine saw how cognition and personality—what we think of as the mind—are connected to the physical brain.
Modern science has continued to find connections between various parts of the brain and different functions, and the mind is often defined as simply what the brain does. For example, Henry Molaison had part of his brain surgically removed in 1953 to treat epilepsy. An unintended consequence of the surgery was a type of amnesia in which he could remember events before the operation, but he couldn’t form new memories.
Another example is Clive Wearing, a British musicologist who got amnesia from encephalitis in 1985. His long term memory is poor, and he can’t remember new events for more than half a minute. He feels like he is continually waking up. He can still play the piano, though he has no recollection of ever being taught.
Then there’s Klüver-Bucy Syndrome, the rare result of some kinds of brain damage from surgery or disease. Or aphasia, the loss of the ability to speak, which usually comes from strokes. Or the kinds of personality and memory loss caused by Alzheimer’s and other kinds of dementia. Or even prions, the misshapen proteins that cause BSE (“mad cow disease”) in cattle and similar degenerative brain diseases in humans. These are all examples of the “mind” being changed due to physical damage to the brain.
The “mind” is a useful idea, but this close connection between the brain and mental function leaves no room for a physical mind—something separate from the brain—to hide. The same is true for the soul. It’s a useful word to refer to someone’s essence or moral character, but there is no evidence that the soul exists as anything more than an abstract concept.
The brain behaves exactly as if it’s all that there is, not that it is simply the shoebox in which the soul is stored. How could an injury to the shoebox affect its contents, when the soul is immutable and will be good as new in heaven?
When you change your mind, the old opinion doesn’t go anywhere, it just stops existing in your mind. Why should the soul be any different?
What does physics say?
Physics isn’t a field that usually has much to say about the soul, but a video by physicist Sean M. Carroll of CalTech makes the intriguing argument that physics shows that souls don’t exist.
There’s plenty of physics that we don’t yet understand, he says, but the physics of our Newtonian world is all understood. For example, you don’t need to understand string theory to work in chemistry. Any physics that operates in our world would be known to us by now, which leaves no room for the supernatural.

Could new particles hide from our view? Sure, but only if they were (1) very weakly interacting or (2) too heavy to create or (3) too short-lived to detect. In any of those cases, the new particle would be irrelevant to our everyday lives. (Source)

Everyday physics is understood. We’re done. It’s nothing more than quarks, mass, and the fundamental forces.
The physics that remains are non-everyday physics (dark matter, dark energy, quantum gravity, origin of the universe, etc.) and complicated systems that are the result of the understood physics (superconductivity, turbulence, cancer, consciousness, etc.).
Compare physics with chess. Knowing the rules of chess doesn’t make you a grandmaster, but it does constrain the kinds of games you can play. Any games in which the pawn moves like a queen, for example, can be simply ruled out.
In physics, we know the rules of the everyday world, and this constrains the kinds of things that make sense. We know enough to simply rule out astrology, claims of clairvoyance, ESP, life after death, homeopathy, and other supernatural claims. If these claims were true, we would know that already. If you claim that a soul exists and lives on in the afterlife, tell us the physics by which the soul moves to the afterlife.
The ideas that the soul actually exists and that the mind is separate from the brain belong back to the time when demons were said to cause mental illness.

What is freedom of expression?
Without the freedom to offend,
it ceases to exist.
— Salman Rushdie

(This is an update of a post that originally appeared 5/4/13.)
Photo credit: Wikipedia
 

Can a Moral Person Be a Carnivore?

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synthetic cultured meatMorality changes, and we shake our heads in disbelief at the conditions that Western society tolerated just a century or two ago—slavery, child labor, mental hospitals as warehouses, voting for white men only, and so on. But let’s not pretend that we’ve now got it all figured out. A century in our future, society might look back on our world in disbelief at the moral errors (from their standpoint) that we found acceptable. Raising animals and then killing and eating them may be one of these moral errors.
There is a solution: synthetic meat.
The moral issue
How many of us have heard someone say that they took a tour of a slaughterhouse and became a vegetarian on the spot? Some cows, chickens, or pigs live fairly natural lives before they are killed for meat, but there are millions that won’t.
I eat meat. What’s my moral excuse? If pressed, I’d argue with a combination of “I like to eat meat” and “Yeah, but everyone else is doing it.” There is a small health issue—getting the right amino acid mix is easy from meat, but from plants it requires some thought—but that is easily resolved. By eating meat, I’m taking the easy route, but I don’t have much of a moral defense.
What got me thinking about this was a recent Sam Harris interview with Uma Valeti of Memphis Meats, a new company working on synthetic meat (Valeti prefers the term cultured meat).
The environmental issue
The magnitude of the environmental problem is as shocking as the moral one.

  • Land use. Pastureland (land used for open grazing as well as that used to raise crops for livestock) is one quarter of the earth’s land area (Annenberg). “Only about 20 percent of the planet’s agricultural land is used to produce food that is eaten directly by people, while about four times as much is used to feed livestock.” (Union of Concerned Scientists)
  • Greenhouse gases. Cows produce a lot of methane. The agriculture contribution to worldwide greenhouse gases is 15% (UN FAO).
  • Deforestation. The need for pastureland is a major driver of deforestation (Union of Concerned Scientists).
  • Water use. “The consumption of animal products contributes to more than one-quarter of the water footprint of humanity.” Source
  • The environmental impact of beef is especially large: “Nearly 60% of the world’s agricultural land is used for beef production, yet beef accounts for less than 2% of the calories that are consumed throughout the world. Beef makes up 24% of the world’s meat consumption, yet requires 30 million square kilometres of land to produce. In contrast, poultry accounts for 34% of global meat consumption and pork accounts for 40%. Poultry and pork production each use less than two million square kilometres of land.” Source

These problems also touch on political tensions caused by scarce fresh water and climate change. There’s also the energy used and the pollution caused by raising livestock.
Can cultured meat be the answer?
A 2013 article titled, “A quarter-million pounder and fries” documented the taste test of a €250,000 hamburger, the first made from synthetic beef. We have a long way to go, but, as Sam Harris noted, the cost to sequence a human genome is now around $1000, while the first one, sequenced in 2003, cost $3 billion. Technology predictions often disappoint, but there is room for optimism.
Valeti of Memphis Meats cites the problems with the status quo, both moral and environmental, as the motivation for cultured meat. There are other benefits.

  • No antibiotics would be needed (70% of antibiotics used in the U.S. are for livestock).
  • The amount and kind of fat in the meat can be tuned.
  • There are 4 million illnesses every year from eating meat in the U.S., and most of these are due to unsterile meat from the store.
  • Eliminating animal breeders might also eliminate influenza pandemics.
  • There would be no risk of prion disease such as BSE.
  • The cultured process is more efficient. It now takes 23 calories to make 1 calorie of beef, while Valeti’s process should require just 3 calories.

The public responds
Harris said that his own informal Twitter poll reported that, while most people would switch if the cost and taste were identical to conventional meat, the creepiness factor was a problem to some. I suppose they imagine peaceful grazing cows monitored by hay-chewing cowboys replaced by bubbling vats of chemicals monitored by white-coated technicians. So they’re grossed out by vats but okay with a slaughterhouse?
“Natural” as a trait of food is in vogue today, and there will be pushback against cultured meat. But how natural are the animals we’re growing for meat? Valeti said, “The chickens that we eat now grow 6 to 7 times faster than they would in the natural environment. The cows give about 10 times more milk than what they would naturally give. Turkeys are so top-heavy that they can’t even stand up to breed.”
We’re not there yet
We should hold off celebrations. Hamburgers and sausage may happen quickly (Memphis Meats hopes to release their first product in five years), but complex structures like steak will take longer. A technology maxim that we often forget is that you can’t schedule a breakthrough. The politically powerful ranching industry will fight for the status quo.
Nevertheless, I find it encouraging that a startup like Memphis Meats quickly found funding.
The switch to a diet with meat has been credited with changing our genus and permitting our large human brain. Maybe we’ll soon be able to eat that diet with a clear conscience.

In 50 years, I personally believe that
the thought of slaughtering animals for meat
will be laughable.
— Uma Valeti of Memphis Meats

Image credit: IQRemix, flickr, CC

Alister McGrath’s Journey from Atheism to Christianity: a Critique

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Anglican priest and professor of theology Alister McGrath recently contrasted atheism and Christianity in an interview, “An Atheist’s Reasonable Journey to Faith: An Interview With Alister McGrath.” You may know him from his The Dawkins Delusion, which I read shortly after it came out in 2007.
Let’s see how reasonable the journey was and how well supported the adopted Christian position is.
1. Science has limitations, and other avenues may be more attractive. McGrath says that “science did not demand atheism” and that the other options “seemed to be more interesting.” Another limitation of science was that it didn’t answer life’s big questions such as the meaning of life. “I began to realize that human beings need existential answers about meaning, purpose and value, not just an understanding about how the universe works.”
Yes, science is limited. Scientists themselves are quick to make these limitations clear. It’s too bad we don’t see the same thing within Christianity. I wish Christianity was also self-critical and both admitted and made clear its limitations. As an example of Christianity’s hydra-headed blundering in many directions at once, consider John Hagee’s “four blood moons” humiliation. It’s been six months, and (while your mileage may vary) the feeling of schadenfreude is still strong for me.
McGrath next wonders about other options that are more interesting than science while doing nothing to convince us that they’re correct. Without this fundamental first step, who really cares whether they’re interesting?
I’ll grant that Christianity can tell you what the meaning of life is. So can Islam, Hinduism, or Buddhism. So can David Koresh, Jim Jones, or Sathya Sai Baba. So can Pastafarianism, Jediism, or Zuism. So can the drunk stranger at a party. But are any of these sources worth listening to?
2. We have Christianity to thank for nurturing science. “There has always been a strong religious motivation for the scientific study of nature. Religious writers like Thomas Aquinas have always insisted that the regularity and beauty of nature point to the wisdom and beauty of God.”
There have been Christian scientists for centuries, though that’s not saying much since pretty much everyone in Europe was Christian until recently. To give Christianity credit for the last 500 years of European science is to call attention to how little Europe progressed while Christianity was in charge (see also here).
McGrath admits that Christianity hasn’t always been science-positive: “Of course, there have been episodes when religious ideas or politics have got in the way of scientific advance.” To add to that, I’ve written about how apologists falsely claim the Bible anticipated modern science and how the Bible got science wrong. Also, about how apologists’ claims about Christianity building universities and hospitals are overblown.
3. Christianity makes sense of the world. Many think that religion is irrational, but don’t let that stop you. Consider how seemingly irrational are areas of science such as quantum physics.
C. S. Lewis said, “I believe in Christianity as I believe that the sun has risen, not only because I see it, but because by it I see everything else.” McGrath added, “A theory is judged by how much sense it makes of our world.”
If Christianity untangles reality where no other worldview does, McGrath does nothing to argue for this claim. The most charitable interpretation of this is that McGrath has support for these claims but the interview simply didn’t allow him to express them. A less-charitable interpretation is that McGrath’s arguments are aimed only at his own community, and he doesn’t have much that would convince an atheist, despite his frequent contrasting of the two worldviews.
4. Science is “provisional and limited.” Science is provisional because it changes its mind. It’s limited because it can’t address the important areas of meaning, value, and beauty.
Yes, science is limited. Do you have an alternative? Surely you’re not thinking of Christianity. With 45,000 denominations and counting, it can’t even sort out its own beliefs.
Every year there is a “Top 10” list of scientific discoveries. Show me a similar list of things Christianity has given the world. If Christianity doesn’t dirty its hands with evidence and doesn’t care to make such advancements, then what good is it? If instead Christianity’s contributions to the world are in the past, then I wonder what he has in mind.
McGrath has good things to say about science and points out limitations that anyone would grant. But his vague praise about the Christian worldview make me want to set some ground rules. Can we at least agree that groundless certainty is bad? And that evidence is mandatory to support a belief? And that faith (that is, belief despite insufficient evidence) has no place in this conversation? If so, I wonder where Christianity is in all of this.
5. Science can’t prove whether God exists or not. “Science has been hijacked by ideological atheists, who have weaponized science in their battle against religion…. The epistemic dilemma of humanity is that we cannot prove the things that matter most to us. We can only prove shallow truths. It’s not a comfortable situation, but we have to get used to it, and not seek refuge in the illusory utopian world of the New Atheism, which holds that we can prove all our valid core beliefs.”
(I’ll remember Weaponized Science if I need a name for another blog. Or a band.)
McGrath frets about science’s “shallow truths,” but I wonder what truths these are. Perhaps truths like, “The earth orbits an ordinary star in an unimportant corner of a vast galaxy, just one of 200 billion”? Or, “This technique will increase crop yields so that billions can be fed”? Or, “This vaccine will immunize your child against smallpox”? Those sound like pretty important truths to me. Here’s another one: you don’t need to have someone give you the answers to life’s Big Questions®. You decide what the purpose of your life is. I appreciate that this is can be an intimidating challenge, but it’s also a thrilling opportunity.
As for science being unable to prove or disprove God, that’s true. All we can do is follow the evidence (and it’s not looking good for Christianity). I have no idea what he means by an “illusory utopian world of the New Atheism” in which we can prove all core beliefs. That certainly doesn’t describe my views.
6. Christianity helps science in two ways. First, it provides “a reassurance of the coherence of reality.” Our view of the world is imperfect, but we see a bigger picture that gives meaning to a world that would otherwise be “incoherent and pointless.”
Second, Christianity provides answers where science can’t to the big questions such as “the meaning of life, and our place in a greater scheme of things.” Science alone can’t be “the foundation of meaning and value.”
These are interesting claims, but I need evidence to back them up. Show me where Christianity has helped science. Yes, all the clues from science tell us that the universe is ultimately pointless, but that doesn’t mean that you can’t find meaning in life and provide a purpose for your existence. It doesn’t bother me that the universe has no ultimate purpose, but if it troubles you, remember that your wishing reality were different counts for nothing.
McGrath says that there is more to a full life than science. If he’s thinking of enjoying family and friends, finding satisfaction in a job well done, or helping the less fortunate, that falls outside of both science and Christianity.
McGrath’s approach can be adapted to justify lots of worldviews, but many of these are incompatible with Christianity. He has done nothing to make clear why Christianity is the only correct worldview or even why we should believe the supernatural of any sort exists.

Mystical explanations are considered deep.
The truth is that they are not even superficial.
— Friedrich Nietzsche

Image credit: Bureau of Land Management Oregon and Washington, flickr, CC

National Day of Actually DOING Something

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national day of prayerToday is the National Day of Prayer. How about a National Day of Actually Doing Something instead?
The president issues the obligatory proclamation every year. In 2013, he said, “Prayer brings communities together and can be a wellspring of strength and support,” and so on. In 2015, “Prayer is a powerful force for peace, justice, and a brighter, more hopeful tomorrow,” and blah, blah, blah.
We’ve had a National Day of Prayer since 1952. What good has it done? In 1952, the world had 50 million cases of smallpox each year. Today, zero. Guinea worm and polio should soon follow. Computers? Cell phones? GPS? The internet? Science delivers, not God.
I can appreciate that praying to Jesus can help someone feel better, but so can praying to Shiva or Quetzalcoatl or whatever god you’ve been raised with. In terms of actual results, praying to Jesus is as effective as praying to a jug of milk.
I understand how the National Day of Prayer helps politicians suck up to Christians, but how it coexists with the First Amendment (“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion”), I can’t imagine. Last year’s proclamation ended with “I join all people of faith in asking for God’s continued guidance, mercy, and protection as we seek a more just world.” I’m not sure why all people of faith would want to appeal to an obviously Christian god.
Julia Sweeney’s departure from Christianity
My own departure from Christianity was pretty gentle, and I learned a lot from the painful road taken by Julia Sweeney (creator of “Letting Go of God”). As she gradually fell away from first Catholicism, then Christianity, and finally religion, she realized with a shock how ineffective prayer had been. Prayer lets you imagine that you’re doing something when you’re actually doing absolutely nothing. Her prayers had helped her feel like she was helping people—whether the person on hard times down the street or the city devastated by natural disaster around the world—but in fact those prayers had been worthless.
Not only does prayer do nothing in cases like this, but it is actually harmful. The pain that people naturally feel when they hear of disaster—that emotion that could be the motivator for action—is drained away by prayer. Why bother doing something yourself when God is so much more capable? When you “let go and let God,” you’ve washed your hands of the issue and can go back to watching television, confident that the problem is now in more capable hands.
Prayer becomes an abdication of responsibility, while atheism can open the doors to action.
Where help actually comes from
Sweeney’s conclusion: if you want to help the victims of the tsunami in Haiti or the earthquake in Ecuador (or whatever the latest disaster is), you need to do something since God clearly isn’t doing anything. Contribute to a charity that will help, or demand that the federal government spend more to help and demand the tax increase to pay for it. If it’s a sick friend, Jesus isn’t going to take them soup and cheer them up … but you can.
Prayer doesn’t “work” like other things do. Electricity works. Your phone works. An antibiotic works. But prayer doesn’t. As the bumper sticker says, Nothing Fails Like Prayer.
Even televangelists make clear that prayer is useless. Their shows are just long infomercials that end with a direct appeal in two parts: please pray for us, and send lots and lots of cash. But what possible value could my $20 provide compared to what the almighty Creator of the universe could do?
Televangelists’ appeals for money make clear that they know what I know: that praying is like waiting for the Great Pumpkin. People can reliably deliver money, but prayer doesn’t deliver anything.
Instead of a National Day of Prayer, how about a National Day of Actually Doing Something? Many local United Way offices organize a Day of Action—what about something like that on a national level?
Doing something makes you feel good, just like prayer, but it actually delivers the results.

Prayer is like masturbation.
It makes you feel good but it doesn’t change the world.
— Don Baker

(This is a modified version of an article originally posted 5/3/12.)
Photo credit: Wikimedia

When Abortion is Illegal in America

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Illegal abortion pro-life pro-choiceThis is a continuation of our analysis of the question, “Does Pro-life Logic Mean Women Who Get Abortions Should Be Punished?” addressed by Greg Koukl of the Stand to Reason podcast. (Start with part 1 here.)
A future America with abortion illegal
Koukl has a simple—some might say childish—attitude toward abortion.

Pro-lifers would like to see abortion abolished, but the only way to really abolish abortion ultimately is to make it illegal, and then the incidence of abortion would shrink to virtually nothing. (@4:05)

With abortion being such an important topic to Koukl’s ministry, you’d think that he would be more educated about it. He’s completely wrong. Making abortions illegal simply means that abortions will be done, just illegally.
We know because America has already tried the experiment. From the Guttmacher Institute:

Before the Roe v. Wade decision in 1973, data on abortion in the United States were scarce. In 1955, experts had estimated, on the basis of qualitative assumptions, that 200,000–1,200,000 illegal abortions were performed each year. Despite its wide range, this estimate remained the most reliable indicator of the magnitude of induced abortion for many years. In 1967, researchers confirmed this estimate by extrapolating data from a randomized-response survey conducted in North Carolina: They concluded that a total of 800,000 induced (mostly illegal) abortions were performed nationally each year.

Compare this with the abortion rate of 700,000 per year in the U.S. today, with twice the population of 1955.
A future America where abortion was illegal could simply switch to the simple medical (drug-induced) abortion in many cases. This is already the predominant procedure in many European countries.
We also have examples worldwide showing that making abortion illegal does little to reduce the rate. From CBS News:

Abortion rates are highest where the procedure is illegal, according to a new study. The study also found nearly half of all abortions worldwide are unsafe, with the vast majority of unsafe abortions occurring in developing countries.

The Guttmacher Institute says, “Highly restrictive abortion laws are not associated with lower abortion rates” and notes that in Africa and Latin America, where “abortion is illegal under most circumstances in the majority of countries,” the rate per capita is more than twice that in the U.S. and Western Europe.
Unsurprisingly, poorer safety correlates with abortion being illegal. The New York Times reported on a World Health Organization study: “About 20 million abortions that would be considered unsafe are performed each year [and] 67,000 women die as a result of complications from those abortions, most in countries where abortion is illegal.” That’s a mortality rate of 1 for every 300. By comparison, the mortality rate in the U.S., with legal abortion, is 1 for every 170,000 (the mortality rate for women giving birth is 15 times worse).
Abortion providers are basically vultures, right?
Koukl next attacks the ethics of the abortion providers.

Without the [abortion] doctors, who are exploiting people’s difficult circumstances for money, you probably aren’t going to have the abortions. (@19:16)

I didn’t realize that abortion providers exploit people’s hardships. Is that true for other specialties? I suppose the greedy oncologist rubs his hands and smiles when he sees new names in his appointment calendar. The predatory geriatrician twists his mustache and cackles when another old man hobbles in. The rapacious pediatrician sees a crying kid with a broken arm and thinks, “There’s a month’s payment on Daddy’s Bentley!”
Apparently, I have my ignorance to thank for being able to look at doctors and see hard-working professionals who view their patients as more than piles of cash.
In contrast to Koukl’s contempt for abortion providers and his lack of concern for women with unwanted pregnancies, consider Dr. Willie Parker, who travels from his home in Chicago to Mississippi twice a month to be one of only two doctors providing abortions at Mississippi’s last abortion clinic. Women desperately need a medical procedure, and Dr. Parker provides it. He said, “I do abortions because I am a Christian.”
Remember Kermit Gosnell’s filthy abortion clinic? Pro-lifers were horrified, and yet those conditions are what they’re pushing for. Making abortion illegal doesn’t eliminate abortion, it just drives it underground to clinics that aren’t inspected. When organizations like Planned Parenthood that provide safe abortions are squeezed out by nuisance regulations or other regulatory hurdles, illegal operations will fill the vacuum. Similarly, when noisy abortion protesters create a gauntlet at safe clinics, women will be driven to ones that cut corners. One of Gosnell’s patients said about the closest Planned Parenthood clinic, “The picketers out there, they just scared me half to death.”
Coat hangers
Three years ago, I attended a celebration of the forty-year anniversary of the Supreme Court case Roe v. Wade that made abortion legal in the United States. Sarah Weddington was the lawyer on the winning side, and she spoke of her experience on a plane trip. She was wearing a button showing a coat hanger with a red “not” line through it (like this) as a symbol of the pre-Roe days that she was determined America would not revisit.
A female flight attendant walked past her several times until she finally said, “I’ve just got to ask you: what have you got against coat hangers?”
Weddington’s point was that this young woman had lived her entire life with abortion as a right. She didn’t know of a time before that right when coat hangers were the abortion method of last resort. More importantly, she didn’t realize how tenuous that right is. Millions of conservatives would make abortion illegal in an instant if they could. Complacency is not an option.
Continue to part 4: “Arguing the Pro-Life Case (Such as It Is)“

“Explain to me how making abortion illegal
wouldn’t lower abortion rates.”
Explain to me how making drugs illegal
didn’t lower drug use rates.
— commenter adam

Image credit: Pēteris, flickr, CC

Unraveling Bad Pro-Life Thinking

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Illegal abortion pro-life pro-choiceGreg Koukl and Alan Shlemon of the Stand to Reason podcast recently responded to an issue raised in the U.S. Republican campaign, “Does Pro-life Logic Mean Women Who Get Abortions Should Be Punished?”
Here’s how they outline the dilemma for pro-life Christians. Christians declare that abortion is murder, but you can’t have a crime without the appropriate punishment. Both the abortion provider and the woman herself should be severely punished—this is murder, after all.
On the other hand, that paints Christians as callous and unfeeling, so maybe we shouldn’t impose a harsh penalty on the woman. Or maybe any penalty at all. But in that case, what happened to the “abortion = murder” claim? Was that just hyperbole? Does the Christian carrying the sign know that abortion isn’t really murder? If it’s just a little harmless exaggeration to make a point, how compelling is the pro-life case?
Though the boys tried mightily to extricate the average Christian from the punish-her-or-not dilemma, none of their attempts eliminated the problem.
Attempt 1: suicide analogy
If only the labeling of the crime (which the pro-lifers want) could be detached from the associated punishment (which they don’t want). They point to a recent article that gives an analogy they’d like to follow. From that article:

Until the late 1960s, suicide was illegal in the United States. Of course the successful suicide cannot be prosecuted. Still, given that the great majority of suicide attempts are unsuccessful, we could in principle prosecute large numbers of people for unjustified attempts on their own innocent lives. Why don’t we do this?

We don’t now because attempted suicide has been decriminalized. But in the 1960s, in some states it was a misdemeanor or even a felony. That is, it was a crime with a punishment. (Is there any other kind?)
Public opinion has since softened. The article continues:

In general, it doesn’t seem either prudent or constructive [to punish suicide attempts]. Suicidal people typically aren’t a public safety risk. Anyone who wants to end his own life probably needs support and care.

The parallel is that women who have abortions are also not public safety risks, which allows Christians to sidestep punishing those women.
What actually happened was that the hypocrisy of toothless laws against suicide led to it being decriminalized. Does the pro-life movement want to simply repeat that blunder and criminalize abortion with no threat of punishment? Is this just hyperbole, or is abortion actually murder? If so, demand the appropriate punishment.
This parallels the problem with many Christian anti-gay arguments. They point to the Bible to argue that homosexuality is wrong (it doesn’t say that—see here and here), but then they refuse to bring along the Old Testament’s punishment. With both abortion and homosexuality, there can be no crime without a punishment.
Attempt 2: drug use analogy
Drug use is another parallel. The drug user is the pregnant woman, and the drug dealer is the abortion provider. Punish only the latter, Koukl says.
The analogy argues that drug users only hurt themselves, like the person attempting suicide. Drug users do hurt society if their habit drives them to crime—robbery or burglary, for example—but of course when they commit those crimes, they get the regular punishment. When a woman asks for and then consumes a chemical abortifacient (the preferred approach up to about two months of gestation), she should logically receive the punishment due any crime she committed.
As with suicide, the trends aren’t going where Koukl wants them to. Attempted suicide was criminalized; now it’s not. Drug use was criminalized, but that’s being reduced. Crimes are punished consistently; it’s just that some things are no longer crimes. Koukl wants the unbalanced situation where abortion is a crime … without punishment for the central participant.
Attempt 3: fetal homicide laws
Koukl notes that 38 U.S. states have fetal homicide laws in place. These laws apply to “fetuses killed by violent acts against pregnant women.” There you go—killing a fetus is homicide.
There’s just one point that must be emphasized. It’s a small point. Indeed, it’s so trivial that I hesitate to muddy the water by mentioning it, but it must be made clear: sometimes the pregnant woman very much wants to keep the pregnancy and sometimes she very much doesn’t! These are two completely different situations, and fetal homicide laws are meant to protect the woman and fetus in the first situation only. For our discussion, this is a red herring.
Read the other posts in this series:

If men struggle and strike a woman with child
so that she has a miscarriage,
yet there is no further injury,
he shall be fined as the woman’s husband may demand of him,
and he shall pay as the judges decide.
— Exodus 21:22–3

Image credit: Anna Levinzon, flickr, CC