Finally, abortion

[Samuel_Monosov]

Of course it is alive, in the same sense that your skin cell is alive. But you are not alive in the same sense as your skin cell is alive. When an egg is fertilized and becomes a zygote, it no longer part of either the mother nor the father, it is its own separate entity with unique DNA. That is the difference between the sperm and egg and a zygote. That is your logical and biological mistake. You are equating unlike things.

Educate yourself, there are plenty of pregnancy websites you could read with the process completely laid out.

I genuinely do not understand the distinction you are making, but I will try to educate myself on some of the biology, to see if I can come to understand this distinction.

Thanks.

 

[DexUK]

It seems to me that the process of conception is remarkably easy to understand. Why anyone beyond a 5th grade education would try to feign ignorance or confusion about it is beyond me.

Sperm contains father’s unique DNA.

Egg contains mother’s unique DNA

Sperm+Egg = zygote contains an amalgam of both father’s and mother’s DNA and is neither one nor the other. It contains its own unique DNA.

An egg contains enough raw material for the genetically unique single human cell that is created at conception to sustain itself for a short time when using up energy in the cell division process until such time as the cell implants and can extract nutrients from the mother’s body (which is no different in concept than a new born baby extracting nutrients from the mother’s milk - both enable this genetically unique individual to grow and develop).

This is basic stuff. It doesn’t need much knowledge to understand. 10 year olds understand this.

A genetically distinct entity that sustains itself on nutrients while growing is alive. It might belong to one species or another, but it is alive. If its genetics come from a pair of humans, it is a unique human entity. It is therefore an ALIVE human entity. Life therefore begins at conception. There can be no doubt and no argument about this. Anyone who does argue this is being deliberately obtuse.

 

[nickybr38]

It seems to me that the process of conception is remarkably easy to understand. Why anyone beyond a 5th grade education would try to feign ignorance or confusion about it is beyond me.

Sperm contains father’s unique DNA.

Egg contains mother’s unique DNA

Sperm+Egg = zygote contains an amalgam of both father’s and mother’s DNA and is neither one nor the other. It contains its own unique DNA.

An egg contains enough raw material for the genetically unique single human cell that is created at conception to sustain itself for a short time when using up energy in the cell division process until such time as the cell implants and can extract nutrients from the mother’s body (which is no different in concept than a new born baby extracting nutrients from the mother’s milk - both enable this genetically unique individual to grow and develop).

This is basic stuff. It doesn’t need much knowledge to understand. 10 year olds understand this.

A genetically distinct entity that sustains itself on nutrients while growing is alive. It might belong to one species or another, but it is alive. If its genetics come from a pair of humans, it is a unique human entity. It is therefore an ALIVE human entity. Life therefore begins at conception. There can be no doubt and no argument about this. Anyone who does argue this is being deliberately obtuse.

Amen.

 

[SonCatcher]

Thanks. I do repeat myself sometimes.

Rather, you contradicted yourself.

The egg and sperm that became me were at one time separate. Therefore the egg that become me was at one time an unfertilized egg.

However, you asserted that an unfertilized egg could develop into a person even while remaining unfertilized. Now you are contradicting yourself.

Some percentage of a mutated cell’s DNA is separate from the DNA of the surrounding cells.

A very small percentage. Certainly not enough to be “separate.”

I don’t understand the significance of this.

.

 

[JRKH]

Well considering that the only thing a woman has ever given birth to is a human baby, then I think you’d have a hard time saying that a new being formed in a woman’s body is anything else. I tend to be snarky about it though – I usually ask if the woman is pregnant with a dog, a cat or hippopotamus. It’s usually enough to make the point. Or at least make them stop and think for a minute.

 

[NeedImprovement]

I also have been known to repeat myself ,at least partially, particularly when the life of a little one in the womb is at stake.

Almost 15 years ago, Dr. Frederick T. Zugibe, M.S., M.D., Ph.D., FCAP, FACC, FAAFS , explains that through genetics and forensics …

“The question as to when human life and personhood begins has been made a controversial issue because the proponents of abortion do not want it to begin at least before the first 24 weeks of gestation. There, however, should be no controversy because the scientific facts are incontrovertible…”

Imagine the technological advances which are at our disposal today, even within those last 15 years, which support unequivocally the scientific testimony of human personhood in the womb from the moment of conception. Now contrast that against what experts from the scientific community were saying as far back as 1981 (April 23-24) when they appeared before a Senate Judiciary Subcommittee to provide their testimony ,responding to the question : **When does human life begin **?

• Dr. Micheline M. Mathews-Roth, Harvard medical School, gave confirming testimony, supported by references from over 20 embryology and other medical textbooks that human life began at conception.
• “Father of Modern Genetics” Dr. Jerome Lejeune told the lawmakers: “To accept the fact that after fertilization has taken place a new human has come into being is no longer a matter of taste or opinion … it is plain experimental evidence.”
• Dr. Hymie Gordon, Chairman, Department of Genetics at the Mayo Clinic, added: “By all the criteria of modern molecular biology, life is present from the moment of conception.”
• Dr. McCarthy de Mere, medical doctor and law professor, University of Tennessee, testified: “The exact moment of the beginning of personhood and of the human body is at the moment of conception.”
• Dr. Alfred Bongiovanni, University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, concluded, “I am no more prepared to say that these early stages represent an incomplete human being than I would be to say that the child prior to the dramatic effects of puberty … is not a human being.”
• Dr. Richard V. Jaynes: “To say that the beginning of human life cannot be determined scientifically is utterly ridiculous.”
• Dr. Landrum Shettles, sometimes called the “Father of In Vitro Fertilization” notes, “Conception confers life and makes that life one of a kind.” And on the Supreme Court ruling Roe v. Wade, “To deny a truth [about when life begins] should not be made a basis for legalizing abortion.”
• Professor Eugene Diamond: “…either the justices were fed a backwoods biology or they were pretending ignorance about a scientific certainty.”

30 years ago … ! …… with the technology available at that time , medical science stood up to say, “Abortion is a lie.”

…

How fortuitous. It almost appears Professor Eugene Diamond knew what was going to transpire on this thread … He said "backwoods biology" .

Hopefully the OP doesn’t repeat the mistake of the pro-abortionists ; that is, to reject the foremost medical and scientific testimonies on when human life begins … particularly without any sound medical or scientific disputation ( even after perhaps taking a few more biology courses , ) .

……Have I missed something, or would it be accurate to say we still haven’t really delved at all into the psychological damage abortion inflicts on the mother and father ? I have several friends who feel they were practically tricked into going ahead with an abortion by fast-talking abortionists . Consequently, one of them carried a cross for the rest of her shortened life that would’ve surely crushed almost anyone else who attempted to bear it.

 

[Pfaffenhoffen]

My own opinion, though there is much ignorance and uncertainty about the details.

It’s the emerging properties from all of these cells. Empirically? Brian-waves is the big thing. I’ve never met a person without them.

But what is a person and what isn’t connects to metaphysics as well. It’s not very religious for me, since I’m not very religious.

If a single cell has brain-waves, then maybe that cell is a person… but then maybe cells are people without brain-waves, if there are examples of single cells writing music or contemplating metaphysics questions like this one.

When the spermatozoa penetrates the ovule, God creates a person. A person is the Soul, the Spirit, immaterial, eternal, at the image of God.

God creates the Spirit, the Soul, where he wants. That it is a cell it does not matter.

 

[LeafByNiggle]

When the spermatozoa penetrates the ovule, God creates a person. A person is the Soul, the Spirit, immaterial, eternal, at the image of God.

God creates the Spirit, the Soul, where he wants. That it is a cell it does not matter.

Does it bother you that over 4 million of these persons are flushed down the toilet every year in the US due to the natural failure to implant? The best estimates I could find for implantation rates are about 50%. So it there are 4 million live births then there are about 4 million others that didn’t attach.

 

[LilyM]

Does it bother you that over 4 million of these persons are flushed down the toilet every year in the US due to the natural failure to implant? The best estimates I could find for implantation rates are about 50%. So it there are 4 million live births then there are about 4 million others that didn’t attach.

No - for God as creator of human life has every right to take it away when it suits Him. Some He takes at 110 years of age, some at 50, some at 5 and some a mere few hours after conception, before they have even implanted. There may be good reasons - perhaps they would not have survived to be born in any event, due to a flaw in their genetic makeup or some biological problem of the mother or something.

That is the difference between creator and creature - we are restricted as to the circumstances under which we can licitly take life (and indeed, when you think about it, the circumstances in which we can licitly create it, eg by engaging in sexual relations). He is not.

 

[cjmclark]

Does it bother you that over 4 million of these persons are flushed down the toilet every year in the US due to the natural failure to implant? The best estimates I could find for implantation rates are about 50%. So it there are 4 million live births then there are about 4 million others that didn’t attach.

No, what bothers me is that 1.2 million of these persons are willfully terminated every year in the US alone. That’s a 20% termination rate in recent years, which is down from previous years but still pretty horrible when you think about it. Literally 1 in 5 pregnancies across the board ends in abortion.

johnstonsarchive.net/policy/abortion/ab-unitedstates.html

Those numbers, sadly, are a lot higher in cases where prenatal screening has revealed the presence of Down syndrome. In that case, the termination rate is over 90%.

newser.com/story/73121/down-syndrome-on-decline-as-moms-abort.html

 

[LeafByNiggle]

No - for God as creator of human life has every right to take it away when it suits Him. Some He takes at 110 years of age, some at 50, some at 5 and some a mere few hours after conception, before they have even implanted. There may be good reasons - perhaps they would not have survived to be born in any event, due to a flaw in their genetic makeup or some biological problem of the mother or something.

That is the difference between creator and creature - we are restricted as to the circumstances under which we can licitly take life (and indeed, when you think about it, the circumstances in which we can licitly create it, eg by engaging in sexual relations). He is not.

If you saw someone drowning would you say “Ah, must have been God’s will.”? Or would you rather do all you could to rescue them? It is something like that with the embryos that fail to implant. There are things that we might do, or at least try to do, to prevent them from being flushed down the toilet. It is not at all clear that God wanted them to die any more than He wanted someone to drown.

 

[DexUK]

Those numbers, sadly, are a lot higher in cases where prenatal screening has revealed the presence of Down syndrome. In that case, the termination rate is over 90%.

There are cases where ‘tests’ have indicated Downs but the parents have continued the pregnancy and have given birth to a healthy child that does not, after all, have Downs.

Notwithstanding the fact that all abortion is abhorrent, how many perfectly healthy children have been murdered because of these unreliable ‘tests’?

 

[GraceDK]

**

This makes sense. I see how, by this argument, a single cell could be a person.

This also makes sense. But why must this cell be a person? Mutated cells are not people, but they have DNA that is separate and distinct from the person.

Friend, how do you define a human person, and from where do you get your definition?

In my oppinion, and as far as I know science says the same: the human being exists from the moment of conception. All attempts to say that it only becomes a person later on (after 8th week eg) are artificial, illogical, and ideological.

What is a Person? That is the question.
A human being is a person from the beginning, or else its never a person.

A human person has an autonomous dignity and cannot be reduced. Atheism’s many ideologies has tried to reduce the human person according to its worth for society, its weight, its race, its colour, its usefulness, the feeling it elicits in its parents etc… today the human person is reduced to mere biology.

This reminds me of a political prisoner who was beaten up in a Soviet prison during the communism. The tormented cried to his torturer: “Why do you beat me so? Cant you see I am a human being?”
The atheistic torturer answered: “To me you are just a piece of flesh”.

Makes you think, doesn’t it?

 

[ahs]

If you saw someone drowning would you say “Ah, must have been God’s will.”? Or would you rather do all you could to rescue them? It is something like that with the embryos that fail to implant. There are things that we might do, or at least try to do, to prevent them from being flushed down the toilet. It is not at all clear that God wanted them to die any more than He wanted someone to drown.

This is not a good comparison…possibly a “strawman” falacy? If you see someone drowning, you can jump in to attempt to save them. You can’t jump into a woman’s uterus to help an embryo implant properly. A woman can eat right, take vitamins, exercise, and have sex. That’s about all she can do to help implantation. The rest is up to God.

What some humans DO have a tendency to do, however, is enter the uterus (via drugs, IUD’s, or surgery) and make it impossible for implantation…or rip the baby out regardless.

 

[Jeanne_S]

I also have been known to repeat myself ,at least partially, particularly when the life of a little one in the womb is at stake.

How fortuitous. It almost appears Professor Eugene Diamond knew what was going to transpire on this thread … He said "backwoods biology" .

Hopefully the OP doesn’t repeat the mistake of the pro-abortionists ; that is, to reject the foremost medical and scientific testimonies on when human life begins … particularly without any sound medical or scientific disputation ( even after perhaps taking a few more biology courses , ) .

……Have I missed something, or would it be accurate to say we still haven’t really delved at all into the psychological damage abortion inflicts on the mother and father ? I have several friends who feel they were practically tricked into going ahead with an abortion by fast-talking abortionists . Consequently, one of them carried a cross for the rest of her shortened life that would’ve surely crushed almost anyone else who attempted to bear it.

 

[Jeanne_S]

There are cases where ‘tests’ have indicated Downs but the parents have continued the pregnancy and have given birth to a healthy child that does not, after all, have Downs.

Notwithstanding the fact that all abortion is abhorrent, how many perfectly healthy children have been murdered because of these unreliable ‘tests’?

My daughter’s friend had this very experience.She and her husband decided they would be ok.,whatever the out come.Their baby boy was perfectly healthy! This baby could have been part of the ninety percent aborted,because of downs syndrome

 

[LilyM]

If you saw someone drowning would you say “Ah, must have been God’s will.”? Or would you rather do all you could to rescue them? It is something like that with the embryos that fail to implant. There are things that we might do, or at least try to do, to prevent them from being flushed down the toilet. It is not at all clear that God wanted them to die any more than He wanted someone to drown.

Well yes I would try to help a drowning person, because a) God has put me there when the person is drowning and b) I am a reasonably strong swimmer with some training in rescue and so reasonably likely to be successful.

If I were an 89 year old 90-pound granny who had never learned to swim it would be absolutely foolish of me to make any attempt to jump in, as failure (and hence my own drowning as well as that of the other person) would be virtually assured.

By the same token, as strong as I am, if I saw a gaggle of superbly fit and exceedingly well-trained professional lifeguards heading out to the rescue I would sit back and trust that they can do the job much better than I.

These failures you are talking about - 99.9% of the time the woman has no idea that fertilization or failure to implant have even occurred. How do you prevent something when you don’t even know it has happened?

Secondly, I’m not aware of much that can be done pre fertilization or implantation to increase the chances of success, but then heroic and unusual medical treatments are never required. For example there is no requirement to adopt radical treatments to prolong the life of a terminally ill person.

 

[Samuel_Monosov]

This is an excellent answer, and this is my take-away from the thread.

At some point, I might start a thread about how these different beliefs (Catholic and secular, for example) about the single cell being a person should be treated by laws in a secular but religiously pluralistic state that respects the Catholic conscience, but also the autonomy of its non-Catholic citizens.

In any case, thank you for the help in this thread.

When the spermatozoa penetrates the ovule, God creates a person. A person is the Soul, the Spirit, immaterial, eternal, at the image of God.

God creates the Spirit, the Soul, where he wants. That it is a cell it does not matter.

 

[LeafByNiggle]

I’m glad someone got the point of my posting. I was beginning to wonder…

Well yes I would try to help a drowning person, because a) God has put me there when the person is drowning and b) I am a reasonably strong swimmer with some training in rescue and so reasonably likely to be successful.

If I were an 89 year old 90-pound granny who had never learned to swim it would be absolutely foolish of me to make any attempt to jump in, as failure (and hence my own drowning as well as that of the other person) would be virtually assured.

By the same token, as strong as I am, if I saw a gaggle of superbly fit and exceedingly well-trained professional lifeguards heading out to the rescue I would sit back and trust that they can do the job much better than I.

These failures you are talking about - 99.9% of the time the woman has no idea that fertilization or failure to implant have even occurred. How do you prevent something when you don’t even know it has happened?

Secondly, I’m not aware of much that can be done pre fertilization or implantation to increase the chances of success, but then heroic and unusual medical treatments are never required. For example there is no requirement to adopt radical treatments to prolong the life of a terminally ill person.

Good points. My analog of saving a drowning person was not ideal. The situation with regard to abortion is not quite the same. Very few of us have the opportunity to jump in and stop an abortion. But we do have the opportunity to express those concerns by how we promote public policy that is opposed to abortion. Similarly, few of us have the opportunity to see and rescue a drowning person. But we do have the opportunity to express the concerns over children drowning by promoting public policy that requires lifeguards at public pools and taking other reasonable measures to protect people from drowning. And that is in fact done without much fanfare because there is not much controversy over these measures.

But if 4 million kids a year were drowning, even if it was all accidental, you can bet that everyone would be rightly demanding that public policy be changed to prevent these tragedies. That is a better analogy to what is going on with embryos that fail to implant. The fact that we are not aware of exactly when and where these failures take place does not change the analogy. If kids were drowning at unpredictable times and places and out of sight of everyone, the outcry against such a tragedy would be just as loud.

The observation that some of these embryos that fail to implant may have genetic defects is not an excuse either. If one takes this excuse they one would also have to excuse people who want to abort babies that are found to have genetic defects.

The fact that abortion is a willful act while an embryo that fails to implant is an accident has been claimed as a distinction between these two issues. The idea is that accidental failure to implant is God’s will, while abortion is not. First of all, it is not all clear that embryos that fail to implant are failing because it is God’s will that they do so. Saying that would be equivalent to saying that an accidental drowning is also God’s will and therefore we should not interfere because that would be thwarting God’s will, which is obviously nonsense. Of course we should try to save lives, since on such issues we cannot be sure what God’s will is.

Secondly, even if it is God’s will that some die very very young, we cannot use that as excuse for doing wrong by not trying to save them. For this point is may be useful to consider Judas’ betrayal of Jesus. Even though this betrayal was an integral part of bringing about salvation for all, and was in some larger sense part of God’s will as the means to that salvation, it was still wrong for Judas to do what he did. That is the paradox of God bringing about good from out of evil.

Your point about not having to take extraordinary measures to save lives is a valid objection, and I’m not sure how to respond. If it could be proven that it is medically impossible to rescue failed implants and “put them back in”, then I suppose that would settle it. But there are other things that might be done to reduce the number of failed implants. One study I came across showed that dioxins in the environment can have a big effect on the implantation rate. With so many lives at stake you would think there would be more of a push to explore this issue, but this is not on the pro-life radar.

Finally, let me propose that with 4 million failed implants being discarded naturally every year, suppose it was decided that it was appropriate to allow these embryos to continue to die as they always have been. Then suppose someone invents a “smart tampon” that is able to detect and capture naturally expelled embryos. Could such a device morally be used as a source of stem cells for embryonic stem cell research?

 

[Pfaffenhoffen]

Does it bother you that over 4 million of these persons are flushed down the toilet every year in the US due to the natural failure to implant? The best estimates I could find for implantation rates are about 50%. So it there are 4 million live births then there are about 4 million others that didn’t attach.

No, it does not bother to me at all.
Sorry, I am not God. It is not me who created man, who created the Universe.
Your image is brutal and I prefer not to deal with it.
I know that when a kid dies, He is in God’s Hand, so He is not being flushed through the toilet.
So, what does statistics mean?
If you study animal reproduction carefully, you see that mammals have the best rate of implantation. Fishes, should be 1/1000, maybe.
It is not me who created the Universe, Life, and Men.
Should I ask Him why did He do things this way? Why is there suffering and death?Why is there evil? I have asked enough…

I think your arguments does not prove that Soul is created on fertilization… You know, each day 40 thousand children die of hunger in the world…