When Does Human Life Begin

Set aside the religious question raised by certain Democrat politicians who claim to be good Catholics (and I do wish that their respective bishops would excommunicate Biden and Pelosi after their recent statements, just to clarify the matter), let's consider it from a strictly scientific perspective.

And fortunately, the scientific evidence is pretty clear on the matter.

In his new book, "Embryo," [Professor Robert] George and co-author Christopher Tollefsen, associate professor of philosophy at the University of South Carolina, left religion behind and set out to establish the embryo's personhood by reviewing all the major scientific works on human embryogenesis and early intrauterine development.

Included was American medicine's most prominent human embryology text, "The Developing Human," whose authors are not imprecise on the matter of life: "Human development begins at fertilization when a male gamete or sperm (spermatozoon) unites with a female gamete or oocyte (ovum) to produce a single cell -- a zygote. This highly specialized, totipotent cell marked the beginning of each of us as a unique individual."

In other words, human life begins at conception. That is not a religious posture, but a scientific fact that the lowest paid laborer on the planet can assert without qualm. What we do with that understanding is another matter, but no one in the 21st century should pretend not to know when human life begins.

Let's take deconstruct that for those at lower pay grades.

1. Sperm meet egg.
   
2. Zygote of species is created.
   
3. Said zygote is alive, and human, ergo constitutes human life.
   
4. There is no stage after that point at which the zygote/embryo/fetus can be legitimately argued to not be human until the cessation of biological functioning.
   

Now, that leaves those who support abortion in an interesting quandary, since they cannot argue that science does not establish the beginning of human life. They must either argue, as do Pelosi and Biden, that theology trumps biology in determining when human life begins (which would constitute a big First Amendment no-no) OR argue that the life question is irrelevant and that certain members of our species are subhuman and therefore merit no protection under law (Paging Adolf Hitler!).

But then again, Barack Obama's actions while in the Illinois Senate demonstrate that he takes the latter view -- and even extends it to include newborn infants who survive an assault in the womb at the hands of the abortionist. Sadly, he lacks the integrity to admit that this is his position, even though the record is unambiguous in that regard.

Posted by: Greg at 10:26 AM | Comments (19) | Add Comment
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