When does life begin?

[Zorro]

The question at the heart of America’s abortion debate is the most elemental — and the most complicated.

It was the perfect ornament for Christmas, she thought — the photograph from the doctor of those little circles, those early cells dividing.

Tina Mody followed every moment when she became pregnant two years ago. The I.V.F. process meant she knew exactly when the egg met the sperm, and when the cells implanted in her uterus. She tracked the morphology of the embryo, its size and shape, thrilled when all looked perfect. She started a nursery, and listened for when she would hear the first sound of a heartbeat.

This is my daughter, she thought. She named her Maya.

On her way to her 16-week pregnancy appointment, she started bleeding. She lost her beloved Maya in the emergency room. Then she had to have a surgical evacuation procedure to remove the placenta before she bled out.

“I can’t tell you exactly when I pinpoint the moment that I think Maya is a person,” said Dr. Mody, a pharmacist. “Because to me and my wife, we think so much of her as the hopes and the dreams that we want in this child.”

https://tinyurl.com/3vretw65

[Meadowoak]

1. According to the bible, when a baby takes it's first breath.

[Harker]

2. About 5:30. n/t

[intrepidity]

3. I mean, they also believe in everlasting life

so it's no wonder they're confused on the whole topic.

[masmdu]

4. When the kids move out and the dog dies!

Thanks! I'll be here all week. Try the veal and please tip your waitress....

[AZ8theist]

10. You got THAT RIGHT!!!!

[erronis]

5. Depends on definition of "life". On planet Earth only when all known life-forms cease to exist.

I know that's self-referential, but we're dealing with a very indeterminate subject and language that doesn't hold the myriad of meanings.

So, for example, my life never ends. Even when I've breathed my last, my proteins/etc. will give rise to new life. My father's sperm reached the end of its "life" when it combined with my mother's egg. Was the egg "living"? Or the sperm? They can be frozen - is that a form of life?

The religious/philosophical types just like having these types of discussions since they don't want to get into the hard science.

[RainCaster]

6. When does it end? It's not the heartbeat

What do the courts say about end of life?

When the heart stops beating?

When sentience ends?

Your voting rights start 18 years after you are born, so is it when you are born that your life starts?

[PoindexterOglethorpe]

7. When does it end is even murkier than when it begins.

I recently read The Undead by Dick Teresi. It's about organ harvesting, how it's decided that a person is dead enough to start taking the organs. The standards and definitions are somewhat loose, and I am no longer willing to be an organ donor.

[SWBTATTReg]

8. I read a recent article on viruses and they still can't decide if they are alive or not. Amazing w/

all of the tech we have today, that they're (in the medical field) can't decide whether a virus is alive or not. At least w/ most things, alive is pretty easy to determine.

[Igel]

12. Because no universal single criterion.

You picks your definition, you gets your answer.

Used to collect Echinofossulocactus (aka Stenocactus) species. It was a pain. The species are variable and form a continuum in the Sonoran desert. I finally sorted out that there were two different sets of species names going on. You name the southernmost species and start looking for enough differences to say as you go northward, "Ah, this is sufficiently distinct to be a different speices," and you get one set of divisions. Start from the north and you get a different set of divisions. There were at least 3 species, possibly more (because botanists, like linguists, can be splitters and try to have a big a number of named things or lumpers, minimizing the number of named things).

Same for life. At some point a system is complex and self-sustaining and definitely life. But there's the temptation to say, "I have a definition; it states an eternal and universal truth." No, it's a definition and definitions should be useful and determined by a consensus of speakers.

[niyad]

9. When the last kid leaves for college. According to Erma Bombeck, I believe.

[republianmushroom]

11. at birth or when hatched.