The idea of life at conception
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I’m not Stu
ERM64man
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« on: December 01, 2016, 10:40:25 PM »

The Vatican's position is that life begins at conception. Where does this come from? The Bible seems to indicate life begins sometime later. Does anyone know the history of this?
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Nathan
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« Reply #1 on: December 01, 2016, 10:43:03 PM »

The super-short version is that the doctrine developed in the modern period based on developments in embryology that showed the Aristotelian distinction between formed and unformed flesh to be untenable. Mainstream Catholicism has been consistently anti-abortion but it wasn't always seen as homicidal.
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DC Al Fine
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« Reply #2 on: December 02, 2016, 06:42:33 PM »

To elaborate on what Nathan said, the early church was against abortion. The Didache is one of the oldest, if not the oldest non-Bible Christian document out there. Among other things it says:

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The question then, was when does life begin? This developed as our knowledge of conception and pregnancy grew. St. Augustine I believe speculated that the soul entered the body at quickening. This should not be taken as endorsement of first trimester abortion, but rather a question of the science at the time.
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Young Conservative
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« Reply #3 on: December 10, 2016, 09:02:56 AM »

The idea? Scientifically it is a fact. The question isn't life but when sentience begins.
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Blue3
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« Reply #4 on: December 10, 2016, 03:58:10 PM »

The real question is personhood (for law), and presumably for religion it would mean have a soul breathed into it by God in the image of God?
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Mike67
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« Reply #5 on: December 10, 2016, 06:05:09 PM »

Life begins at conception
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RI
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« Reply #6 on: December 10, 2016, 08:30:22 PM »

Essentially every other possible answer to the question of "when does life begin?" is in some way intellectually inconsistent with how we regard life post-birth (or takes an abhorrent angle which disregards some aspect of post-birth life).
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Small L
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« Reply #7 on: December 10, 2016, 08:31:30 PM »

The real question is personhood (for law), and presumably for religion it would mean have a soul breathed into it by God in the image of God?
Personhood is the real question. The pro-life/pro-choice debate (mostly) comes down to the philosophical/religious question of what a person is.
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True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)
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« Reply #8 on: December 10, 2016, 11:24:23 PM »

The real question is personhood (for law), and presumably for religion it would mean have a soul breathed into it by God in the image of God?
Personhood is the real question. The pro-life/pro-choice debate (mostly) comes down to the philosophical/religious question of what a person is.

And it's one that can't be answered objectively, which is why altho I favor legal first-trimester abortions, I think Roe was a bad decision. The subjective question of personhood needs to be left to the legislative branch, not the judicial branch to decide because under our system of separation of powers, the job of deciding what is the answer to subjective questions belongs to the legislative branch(es).
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Just Passion Through
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« Reply #9 on: December 10, 2016, 11:34:25 PM »

Life as we know it has already began.

Human life begins at conception.

Personhood happens at or shortly prior to birth.

Life-life begins at forty.
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TJ in Oregon
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« Reply #10 on: December 11, 2016, 04:02:37 PM »

The real question is personhood (for law), and presumably for religion it would mean have a soul breathed into it by God in the image of God?
Personhood is the real question. The pro-life/pro-choice debate (mostly) comes down to the philosophical/religious question of what a person is.

And it's one that can't be answered objectively, which is why altho I favor legal first-trimester abortions, I think Roe was a bad decision. The subjective question of personhood needs to be left to the legislative branch, not the judicial branch to decide because under our system of separation of powers, the job of deciding what is the answer to subjective questions belongs to the legislative branch(es).

The question, whether answerable or not, if personhood exists as an entity at all, cannot be subjective. That's sort of the point. If a person has a certain objective value to it, then regardless of whether we call it a person or not, if it has that objective value (substantial form) then it is a person and if not, then it isn't.

The US system isn't really setup to deal with such questions at all but rather is based on consensus, but I do agree the legislature is better suited to answering it than a Court, especially given the Court has no specific authority to address the question given to it by the Constitution and will thus simply rig the arguments to come up with the conclusion it would like.
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True Federalist (진정한 연방 주의자)
Ernest
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« Reply #11 on: December 11, 2016, 09:43:49 PM »

The real question is personhood (for law), and presumably for religion it would mean have a soul breathed into it by God in the image of God?
Personhood is the real question. The pro-life/pro-choice debate (mostly) comes down to the philosophical/religious question of what a person is.

And it's one that can't be answered objectively, which is why altho I favor legal first-trimester abortions, I think Roe was a bad decision. The subjective question of personhood needs to be left to the legislative branch, not the judicial branch to decide because under our system of separation of powers, the job of deciding what is the answer to subjective questions belongs to the legislative branch(es).

The question, whether answerable or not, if personhood exists as an entity at all, cannot be subjective. That's sort of the point. If a person has a certain objective value to it, then regardless of whether we call it a person or not, if it has that objective value (substantial form) then it is a person and if not, then it isn't.

The US system isn't really setup to deal with such questions at all but rather is based on consensus, but I do agree the legislature is better suited to answering it than a Court, especially given the Court has no specific authority to address the question given to it by the Constitution and will thus simply rig the arguments to come up with the conclusion it would like.

The question of what constitutes a person is subjective. Once that subjective question is answered then whether something meets that answer is for the most part objective.  Even once we had a subjective answer, there's still the question of whether the grant of personhood only extends to those that definitely meet the criteria chosen, or to all who it cannot be shown do not. (The latter is tricky as it could end up granting personhood to some non-human species such as cetaceans, octopi, and the great apes if the definition does not include a requirement to be of the genus Homo.
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Greatest I am
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« Reply #12 on: December 12, 2016, 03:47:23 PM »

The Vatican's position is that life begins at conception. Where does this come from? The Bible seems to indicate life begins sometime later. Does anyone know the history of this?

I hate to agree with the pope on anything but I think he is correct in this.

Think in terms of a potential human.

When does a sperm and egg become a potential human?

They become that at the instant of conception or when the first cell splits into two and begins to grow just after conception.

Regards
DL

 
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muon2
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« Reply #13 on: December 18, 2016, 07:37:13 PM »

I'm not sure I agree with the statement that what constitutes a legal person is necessarily subjective. In particular the law of estates is very much concerned with when a legal person ceases to be. Here is the definition of death in statute from IL, and I suspect many states have similar language:

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In the dictionary death is defined as the end of life, so life must be present for there to be death. If the above is the legal definition of the end of life, then logically the existence of the two conditions in the statute above are the necessary conditions for a person to have life. Thus it follows that a human organism that exhibits both blood flow (circulation) with the exchange of gases in the blood (respiration) and brain functions at the most basic level is legally alive.
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Young Conservative
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« Reply #14 on: December 21, 2016, 08:25:28 PM »

Life as we know it has already began.

Human life begins at conception.

Personhood happens at or shortly prior to birth.

Life-life begins at forty.
It shouldn't work like that...
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Potus
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« Reply #15 on: December 22, 2016, 07:04:56 AM »

That verse in Jeremiah. Before I made you in the womb, I knew.
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« Reply #16 on: December 24, 2016, 04:31:53 AM »

That verse in Jeremiah. Before I made you in the womb, I knew.

Foreknowledge does not imply personhood.
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Greatest I am
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« Reply #17 on: December 28, 2016, 05:48:47 PM »

I'm not sure I agree with the statement that what constitutes a legal person is necessarily subjective. In particular the law of estates is very much concerned with when a legal person ceases to be. Here is the definition of death in statute from IL, and I suspect many states have similar language:

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In the dictionary death is defined as the end of life, so life must be present for there to be death. If the above is the legal definition of the end of life, then logically the existence of the two conditions in the statute above are the necessary conditions for a person to have life. Thus it follows that a human organism that exhibits both blood flow (circulation) with the exchange of gases in the blood (respiration) and brain functions at the most basic level is legally alive.

Engineers use extremes to prove their concepts and I do the same with mine.

You have given the potential human quite a ways to grow before calling it life.

Let's play with a scenario.

Let' say you and I are from an advanced civilization and come to earth to save the people from a plague that has infected all that have been born.

We have the technology to maintain life from conception on or from what I say begins live. When sperm and egg fertilize and begin to split. What I call a potential human.

Let's also say that we will be well paid for every human we can extract from people and grow to term.

I cannot see us only harvesting only those who "exhibits both blood flow (circulation) with the exchange of gases in the blood (respiration) and brain functions at the most basic level is legally alive" as legality does not apply to our harvest.

Would you say goodbye to all that cash you can get if you bring the less developed zygotes and fertilized  and growing eggs. I would not.

Regards
DL
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Greatest I am
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« Reply #18 on: December 28, 2016, 05:50:11 PM »

Life as we know it has already began.

Human life begins at conception.

Personhood happens at or shortly prior to birth.

Life-life begins at forty.
It shouldn't work like that...

How do you think it should work?

Regards
DL
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Greatest I am
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« Reply #19 on: December 28, 2016, 05:51:17 PM »

That verse in Jeremiah. Before I made you in the womb, I knew.

Supernatural drivel.

Regards
DL
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Nathan
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« Reply #20 on: December 28, 2016, 08:31:19 PM »

I'm trying to think of things I care less about than "Greatest I am"'s thoughts on abortion, and I'm coming up blank.
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muon2
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« Reply #21 on: December 28, 2016, 10:42:12 PM »

I'm not sure I agree with the statement that what constitutes a legal person is necessarily subjective. In particular the law of estates is very much concerned with when a legal person ceases to be. Here is the definition of death in statute from IL, and I suspect many states have similar language:

Quote
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In the dictionary death is defined as the end of life, so life must be present for there to be death. If the above is the legal definition of the end of life, then logically the existence of the two conditions in the statute above are the necessary conditions for a person to have life. Thus it follows that a human organism that exhibits both blood flow (circulation) with the exchange of gases in the blood (respiration) and brain functions at the most basic level is legally alive.

Engineers use extremes to prove their concepts and I do the same with mine.

You have given the potential human quite a ways to grow before calling it life.

Let's play with a scenario.

Let' say you and I are from an advanced civilization and come to earth to save the people from a plague that has infected all that have been born.

We have the technology to maintain life from conception on or from what I say begins live. When sperm and egg fertilize and begin to split. What I call a potential human.

Let's also say that we will be well paid for every human we can extract from people and grow to term.

I cannot see us only harvesting only those who "exhibits both blood flow (circulation) with the exchange of gases in the blood (respiration) and brain functions at the most basic level is legally alive" as legality does not apply to our harvest.

Would you say goodbye to all that cash you can get if you bring the less developed zygotes and fertilized  and growing eggs. I would not.

Regards
DL

My example was in response to the statement that a legal person is subjective. I was not saying when there was biological life, but rather how one might define a legal person entitled to legal rights. The difference can be important, so let me provide you with an additional scenario.

An egg is fertilized and forms a zygote of undifferentiated cells. Suppose one were to call this a legal person as defined by the act of fertilization. It is not uncommon for live cells to flake off the zygote, just as they do from our own bodies. Sometimes those flaked-off cells spontaneously begin to form a new zygote, and thus an identical twin. In this case there was no fertilization to mark the beginning of the twin. So if fertilization defines the person, then the identical twin is not a person and has no legal rights, though I certainly think the identical twin should have rights.

Since that's not a satisfying conclusion, let's travel an alternate path. Suppose that the twin is a person at the point the cell is shed from the zygote. We don't know a priori which shed cells will develop into new zygotes, but it is presumably rare based on the number of identical twins. Therefore to protect the identical twin as a legal person at the moment the cell is shed from the original zygote, we would have to ascribe personhood to all shed cells from zygotes, most of which never develop. That creates the prospect of not one or two but many persons in the form of separate zygotic cells in the womb at the same time. As they die off, which most will, they now potentially have legal issues that must be resolved as would any person who dies. This also seems an entirely unworkable definition to me.

One path of definition fails to recognize humans that should have rights, and the other path recognizes cells that would never reach a point that should have rights.  Instead I offered one possible consistent test that can be applied to determine when a legal person exists.
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Greatest I am
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« Reply #22 on: December 29, 2016, 05:22:25 PM »

I'm not sure I agree with the statement that what constitutes a legal person is necessarily subjective. In particular the law of estates is very much concerned with when a legal person ceases to be. Here is the definition of death in statute from IL, and I suspect many states have similar language:

Quote
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In the dictionary death is defined as the end of life, so life must be present for there to be death. If the above is the legal definition of the end of life, then logically the existence of the two conditions in the statute above are the necessary conditions for a person to have life. Thus it follows that a human organism that exhibits both blood flow (circulation) with the exchange of gases in the blood (respiration) and brain functions at the most basic level is legally alive.

Engineers use extremes to prove their concepts and I do the same with mine.

You have given the potential human quite a ways to grow before calling it life.

Let's play with a scenario.

Let' say you and I are from an advanced civilization and come to earth to save the people from a plague that has infected all that have been born.

We have the technology to maintain life from conception on or from what I say begins live. When sperm and egg fertilize and begin to split. What I call a potential human.

Let's also say that we will be well paid for every human we can extract from people and grow to term.

I cannot see us only harvesting only those who "exhibits both blood flow (circulation) with the exchange of gases in the blood (respiration) and brain functions at the most basic level is legally alive" as legality does not apply to our harvest.

Would you say goodbye to all that cash you can get if you bring the less developed zygotes and fertilized  and growing eggs. I would not.

Regards
DL

My example was in response to the statement that a legal person is subjective. I was not saying when there was biological life, but rather how one might define a legal person entitled to legal rights. The difference can be important, so let me provide you with an additional scenario.

An egg is fertilized and forms a zygote of undifferentiated cells. Suppose one were to call this a legal person as defined by the act of fertilization. It is not uncommon for live cells to flake off the zygote, just as they do from our own bodies. Sometimes those flaked-off cells spontaneously begin to form a new zygote, and thus an identical twin. In this case there was no fertilization to mark the beginning of the twin. So if fertilization defines the person, then the identical twin is not a person and has no legal rights, though I certainly think the identical twin should have rights.

Since that's not a satisfying conclusion, let's travel an alternate path. Suppose that the twin is a person at the point the cell is shed from the zygote. We don't know a priori which shed cells will develop into new zygotes, but it is presumably rare based on the number of identical twins. Therefore to protect the identical twin as a legal person at the moment the cell is shed from the original zygote, we would have to ascribe personhood to all shed cells from zygotes, most of which never develop. That creates the prospect of not one or two but many persons in the form of separate zygotic cells in the womb at the same time. As they die off, which most will, they now potentially have legal issues that must be resolved as would any person who dies. This also seems an entirely unworkable definition to me.

One path of definition fails to recognize humans that should have rights, and the other path recognizes cells that would never reach a point that should have rights.  Instead I offered one possible consistent test that can be applied to determine when a legal person exists.

Most cells that are shed are dead but that aside, in my description of a potential human, I included dividing and joining cells so I covered my rump on that.

You introduce the issue of rights which is a completely different issue.

Rights are subjective and not objective so that is a whole new ball game.

The rights a zygote might be given depends entirely on what the community says they are as it is to the community to enforce or grant those rights.

In the days of city states and finite resources, babies were often sacrificed because to let them live would have brought hardship to the workers needed to bring in those finite resources.

If too many babies lived, adults would die. Their morality, I guess, said that the good of the whole tribe was more important than a new baby.

To give the ancients points for trying to reduce the numbers of those sacrificed babies, let us not forget the Temple Prostitutes and the elaborate mating rituals of husband and wives that some tribes resorted to to keep those sacrifices at a minimum.

Regards
DL
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muon2
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« Reply #23 on: December 29, 2016, 06:51:28 PM »

Most cells that are shed are dead but that aside, in my description of a potential human, I included dividing and joining cells so I covered my rump on that.

You introduce the issue of rights which is a completely different issue.

I agree that the issue of rights is a completely different issue than the issue of life, and I said as much. However, it is the issue of rights in our society that makes this question so open to debate, especially when the rights of individuals come into conflict. To recognize the root of the debate before us today one needs to say when a human deserves their most basic of rights, and what those rights are. The rights granted by some ancient society doesn't bring much light to the question before us now.

But I'm trying to focus on the first part, the part the defines the beginning of rights in our society today. If you did make a specific definition of the onset of life that includes the twin, I apologize that I missed it. I would appreciate it if you stated it again.
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Greatest I am
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« Reply #24 on: December 30, 2016, 11:53:36 AM »

Most cells that are shed are dead but that aside, in my description of a potential human, I included dividing and joining cells so I covered my rump on that.

You introduce the issue of rights which is a completely different issue.

I agree that the issue of rights is a completely different issue than the issue of life, and I said as much. However, it is the issue of rights in our society that makes this question so open to debate, especially when the rights of individuals come into conflict. To recognize the root of the debate before us today one needs to say when a human deserves their most basic of rights, and what those rights are. The rights granted by some ancient society doesn't bring much light to the question before us now.

But I'm trying to focus on the first part, the part the defines the beginning of rights in our society today. If you did make a specific definition of the onset of life that includes the twin, I apologize that I missed it. I would appreciate it if you stated it again.

Simply stated, if cells can divide and grow, regardless of how many potential humans are being produced, then when they begin to divide and grow is when another potential human begins. Conception, which begins that process soon after fertilization, is what most people call that.

As an aside on rights, if we are to force women to have children, then it is our duty to insure the best possible end to those children and society is not interested in insuring that best end with cold hard cash. Pro-lifers do not recognize their duty when putting on their jack boots.

We already have half the household with single females manning the parenting while men run and hide from their duty to their offspring. Pro-life would exacerbate that situation but you do nto see them go after the deadbeat dads much.

Regards
DL
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