Life, conception, and embryos discussion... a little help?

[The_Angelus]

Someone else and I have been getting into verbal wars over contraception. He and his wife have a frozen embryo they are “trying to decide what to do with,” and I have been landing strongly on the side of “Have the baby, folks!” This has led to some interesting discussions. Among these was the usual pro-life argument.

So he ended it with this question. “If an embryo has the right to life and shouldn’t be eliminated, then what about a sperm and egg? Since an embryo has potential life, then so do sperm and eggs, right?” Note: this guy is a scientist. It’s going to take a lot of hard scientific evidence, not emotional appeal.

The only answer I could come up with was that neither sperm nor egg could survive on its own, while an embryo could. No components are missing from the embryo, while the sperm and egg need each other. It’s not a very good argument so I’m looking for others.

I know I really stink at apologetics, but I really don’t think this couple should donate their embryo to stem cell research (which is what will happen to it if they don’t have the baby). I’ve been trying to tell the scientist that. But his colleagues are almost exclusively pro-abortion liberals and keep telling him it’s just a clump of cells with no actual life. It’s pretty hard to counteract all that weight and I always get accused of religious zealotry.

A little help please? Pretty please? :bounce:

 

[1ke]

The_Angelus:

Someone else and I have been getting into verbal wars over contraception. He and his wife have a frozen embryo they are “trying to decide what to do with,” and I have been landing strongly on the side of “Have the baby, folks!” This has led to some interesting discussions. Among these was the usual pro-life argument.

So he ended it with this question. “If an embryo has the right to life and shouldn’t be eliminated, then what about a sperm and egg? Since an embryo has potential life, then so do sperm and eggs, right?” Note: this guy is a scientist. It’s going to take a lot of hard scientific evidence, not emotional appeal.

The only answer I could come up with was that neither sperm nor egg could survive on its own, while an embryo could. No components are missing from the embryo, while the sperm and egg need each other. It’s not a very good argument so I’m looking for others.

I know I really stink at apologetics, but I really don’t think this couple should donate their embryo to stem cell research (which is what will happen to it if they don’t have the baby). I’ve been trying to tell the scientist that. But his colleagues are almost exclusively pro-abortion liberals and keep telling him it’s just a clump of cells with no actual life. It’s pretty hard to counteract all that weight and I always get accused of religious zealotry.

A little help please? Pretty please? :bounce:

Sperm and egg each have 32 chromosomes, they are not a complete organism of any species, they are not alive. An embryo has 64 and at the point of fertilization becomes a unique and never to be repeated member of the species homo sapiens. As a scientist, he should understand this. It is alive, it is self directed in its cell division, and it is neither the mother nor the father, it is uniquely its own person.

If the embryo that was you was snuffed at 5 days old, you would not be here. An embryo is not a potential you it is you. It is you at 5 days old.

 

[1ke]

YOu can also visit www.omsoul.com and www.all.org for info.

 

[Mom_of_one]

1ke:

Sperm and egg each have 32 chromosomes, they are not a complete organism of any species, they are not alive. An embryo has 64 and at the point of fertilization becomes a unique and never to be repeated member of the species homo sapiens. As a scientist, he should understand this. It is alive, it is self directed in its cell division, and it is neither the mother nor the father, it is uniquely its own person.

If the embryo that was you was snuffed at 5 days old, you would not be here. An embryo is not a potential you it is you. It is you at 5 days old.

Oops, you got the numbers backwards. Sperm and egg have 23 chromosomes each and the embryo has 46.

When else could life begin? Only at conception does a new individual, with its own DNA, begin. Everything that makes up that person is there- the sex , the blood type, the hair and eye color, and so much more- are determined at conception. All he or she needs is time.

 

[1ke]

Momofone:

Oops, you got the numbers backwards. Sperm and egg have 23 chromosomes each and the embryo has 46.

When else could life begin? Only at conception does a new individual, with its own DNA, begin. Everything that makes up that person is there- the sex , the blood type, the hair and eye color, and so much more- are determined at conception. All he or she needs is time.

Thank you-- can I not type late at night???

 

[felra]

Momofone:

Oops, you got the numbers backwards. Sperm and egg have 23 chromosomes each and the embryo has 46.

When else could life begin? Only at conception does a new individual, with its own DNA, begin. Everything that makes up that person is there- the sex , the blood type, the hair and eye color, and so much more- are determined at conception. All he or she needs is time.

I would also add under the bio-ethics consideration: besides being a viable life beginning at conception, the embryo has at conception personhood with an eternal life (soul), despite what senator Kerry and other likeminded politicians arbitrarily claim otherwise.

 

[mlchance]

The_Angelus:

So he ended it with this question. “If an embryo has the right to life and shouldn’t be eliminated, then what about a sperm and egg? Since an embryo has potential life, then so do sperm and eggs, right?”

First suggestion: Advise him to stop turning to Monty Python for information about human biology. Contrary to the catchy tune, every sperm is not sacred.

Now look at the errors: “[A]n embyro has potential life…” What does this mean? Potential life? Either the embyro is alive, or it isn’t. Embryology plainly informs us that an embyro is alive, that it is a distinct human organism, and that (barring forces to the contrary) will develop and be born as a human infant.

Sperm and eggs, however, aren’t really alive in this sense. They are living cells, but they are not distinct human organisms. They, in and of themselves, will never develop into anything. In fact, by the very nature of the human reproductive system, almost all sperm and eggs never do anything but get produced and then die.

– Mark L. Chance.

 

[Daniel_Kane]

Tell him that at the moment of conception; a single celled human being exists that is biologically unique and self determined. This individual normally exists for a time, in a state of intimate dependency within the body of another human and for a longer time in a state of dependency within the home of humans.

Should one provide this individual time, nutrition and an environment that is compatible with life, this individual will become more and more independent but its humanity (and its status as being alive) will be unchanged (and is unchangeable) from the beginning. We do not become more human or more alive we simply become, bigger more independent humans. The potential at hand is for independent maturity, not life. The argument itself suggests that the embryo is alive and human (since the concept of implanting dead cells or non-human embryos is not under consideration).

The molecular and microbiologic organization of the embryo is distinctly that of a living human embryo and nothing else. It’s internal organization, development and nature is molecularly independent and unique from the parents. “Embryo” is just an adjective for the current state of life it is in, (just as infant, child and teen are adjectives of more mature states of life). All adults and teens reading this were once embryos, fetuses and infants.

As previous posters have stated, sperm and ova are not human life, they are normally essential materials of future humans. They themselves are not human or life. They are unique human materials given by the individuals selected by God to join Him in the creation of human life. Janet Smith says that parents are co-creators with God as it is his design humans to join with Him in His creative act. In a certain oversimplified sense, Mom provides 23 chromosomes, Dad provides 23 chromosomes and God provides the soul. The deliberate frustration of the gift of your “materials” within the act that was designed by God to effect the procreation of humans is an offense by the co-creator against God the Creator. This in part is part of the sin of contraception.

 

[manualman]

This should be an easy one for a real scientist.

A sperm or egg is simply a specialized part of the father or mother respectively. A FERTILIZED egg has its own UNIQUE DNA, totally separate from father or mother.

From that stage on, the new life simply develops. No fundamental change in essence occurs. If he rejects the idea that life begins at conception, when DOES it begin? Ask him, as a scientist, to demonstrate a stage in development he can point to at which life clearly begins. There isn’t any.

The only point at which things fundamentally change in essence is conception. (Nothing radically changes with a baby’s first breath of air, etc.)

Surely he does not find a 6 year old to be a more valuable human being than a 6 month old? 6 day old? Why not, if a baby 6 days BEFORE birth is less valuable. Why the inconsistancy?

 

[The_Angelus]

Thanks for all the suggestions - they’ve been really helpful.

Unfortunately, as soon as the scientist in question started to see what I meant, his colleagues weighed in again. The argument has turned to “How the **** does the Church know what has a soul and what doesn’t?” I answered with doctrine, which doesn’t cut ice with those who are agnostic or atheistic (the majority of them, unfortunately). So we are once again stuck at an impasse. Is there any answer to this?

:whacky: