When Does Life Begin? When are you a person?

[___]

I think you're missing my point, it's not about statistical probability. I'm working from the stance that fertilization is the measurable beginning of the process that leads to life - probability that it will develop aside. Before fertilization you have potential in the sense that there is a possibility that any healthy woman who engages in sexual activity will bear a child, but the process of developing a new human being really begins at fertilization.

 

[FlippyD]

I think you're missing my point, it's not about statistical probability. I'm working from the stance that fertilization is the measurable beginning of the process that leads to life - probability that it will develop aside. Before fertilization you have potential in the sense that there is a possibility that any healthy woman who engages in sexual activity will bear a child, but the process of developing a new human being really begins at fertilization.

Who says the process doesn't begin when a couple engages in sexual activity? Without that there's no chance of fertilization.

 

[___]

Yeah, but sexual activity doesn't necessarily fertilize an egg and start a human body growing.

 

[FlippyD]

Well a fertilized egg doesn't necessarily attach to the uterus. In fact, several hormonal contraceptives work that way. That would effectively cause a situation wherein taking certain birth control pills would be considered murder, wouldn't it? That's why I say you need something far more definitive than potentiality. You need something strong that could stand up in a court of law, and that most people could agree with as being what determines if something is human or not, or a high enough life form that it has the right to life.

 

[Calibre]

life begins with a placenta.

 

[CeruSkye]

I think life begins when we die. Enough said.

 

[Calibre]

life beings when the placenta is cut and tied.

 

[CeruSkye]

Ew. That was descriptive. O.O

 

[Calibre]

relatively true though.

 

[___]

Well a fertilized egg doesn't necessarily attach to the uterus. In fact, several hormonal contraceptives work that way. That would effectively cause a situation wherein taking certain birth control pills would be considered murder, wouldn't it? That's why I say you need something far more definitive than potentiality. You need something strong that could stand up in a court of law, and that most people could agree with as being what determines if something is human or not, or a high enough life form that it has the right to life.

That's a fair argument, and that's part of the reason I support pro-choice legislation. You have to remember, and I say it once again, I'm speaking purely from a point of view of philosophy and taste here.

 

[Dissonance]

People should not be considered alive until they've proven they're capable of intelligent thought, rationality, and so on.

Maybe if people were considered wastes of space until proven otherwise they'd shape up and stop being retarded.  :|

 

[FlippyD]

People should not be considered alive until they've proven they're capable of intelligent thought, rationality, and so on.

Maybe if people were considered wastes of space until proven otherwise they'd shape up and stop being retarded.  :|

That's a good thing to tell my two year old child, the lazy little fuck. Bitch hasn't figured out the red circle goes in the circle shaped hole, not the square! If I don't see an improvement in a few weeks it's off to the mother fuckin' glue factory.

 

[___]

People should not be considered alive until they've proven they're capable of intelligent thought, rationality, and so on.

Maybe if people were considered wastes of space until proven otherwise they'd shape up and stop being retarded.  :|

That's a good thing to tell my two year old child, the lazy little fuck. Bitch hasn't figured out the red circle goes in the circle shaped hole, not the square! If I don't see an improvement in a few weeks it's off to the mother fuckin' glue factory.

A supporter of post-natal abortion, eh? Do you use the yearly review model or is it more of an ongoing evaluation process?

 

[FlippyD]

Ongoing evaluation, obviously. That circle-square test is an important scientific standard.

 

[Emtch]

I would say life begins when you get consciousness and some understanding of what happens and start thinking yourself. I don't know when that happens, but I think it's somewhere around the age of 3 years. At least that's when life begins for the person in question, but in general, life begins as soon as the embryo has become a fetus.
That's what I think.

 

[markGRIEVER]

IMO, a person does not become a person until they reach the point in their development where they would be able to function outside the uterus without dying (even if it requires medical machinery for them to do so). Before the point where they are able to do this they aren't really a seperate organism, they're more a part of the mother than anything else.

Still, that's not the same question as "when does life begin". Life "began" millions of years ago and has not stopped since, in one form or another.

 

[FlippyD]

How about we say something becomes a person once you give it a name? Even animals and favored genitalia?

 

[___]

That wouldn't bode well for you carrion eaters

 

[Cirras]

Think about this for a moment. A baby doesn't begin to be a baby when it starts thinking. The second sperm and egg come together, it's a baby. It doesn't make murder less awful because it's inside somebody and only lives because of said person. If I couldn't live without the aid of machinery, then does it mean I am no longer human?

 

[Dissonance]

Think about this for a moment. A baby doesn't begin to be a baby when it starts thinking. The second sperm and egg come together, it's a baby. It doesn't make murder less awful because it's inside somebody and only lives because of said person.

A baby may begin to be a baby upon fertilization, but it is not a HUMAN BEING upon fertilization.  We have people right now who are fully physically developed, walking on the street, holding jobs, and I STILL don't consider them human beings.  Just because a person is able to speak and walk upright does not make them a real human being.

If I couldn't live without the aid of machinery, then does it mean I am no longer human?

Yes.  You're a LEECH on society.  If you're kept alive by machines and yet somehow still produce or contribute in some manner than okay cool.  But if like you're in a coma or something no then get rid of you.