Perhaps it would be better to be more precise. When you say life, do you mean a distinct separate person, or just any living cells? A fertilized egg is certainly alive, but is more accurately considered just another part of an existing person. Do you consider an appendectomy to be murder? That kills living cells too.
That is exactly not the case. Life began billions of years ago and has never stopped. If you mean a single cell with a unique combination of DNA, then yes, that began at conception.
If you mean a unique human being, that is something very different, IMHO. What makes us human is not our DNA but our minds so once we have a functioning brain, we deserve the title of human.
A new, genetically distinct, living, human being. One that has never existed before and will never exist again. Conception is the beginning of the human life cycle which ends at death. Every step along that continuum is fully human and possesses the appropriate attributes for that stage in its life cycle. That's what the science shows.
I meant exactly what I wrote. Life beginning at conception is literally what embryology textbooks teach. Or do you believe embryology textbooks are teaching how life began on earth instead of how and when human life begins?
I'm pretty sure those textbooks say the egg and sperm are both alive, even before fertilization.
When do you think sentience is present
Challenging God is all throughout the Bible, such as Moses challenging God to spare the Hebrew people from their actions and Jacob literally wrestling with God in hand to hand combat. In fact, the term "Israel" means to wrestle with God.
Maybe look at the characteristics of living things. Because they aren't living beings. Your grasping at straws only further proves that if you believed they were human beings then you wouldn't support ending their life. You have literally constructed a straw man argument for the express purposes of rationalizing your position. Which is totally unnecessary as all you have to do is to take the position that you support ending their lives despite the inherent unfairness. But you can't because that's how strong the concept of fairness is hardwired into you. So you construct ridiculous arguments to avoid having to deal with your guilt.
You are proving my point. The concept of fairness is so hardwired into you that you can't take unfair positions. Every position you take you have rationalized as being fair.
It doesn't enter into the equation. That's just a convenient excuse for you to avoid the reality that abortion ends a human life. Just admit that abortion literally ends a human life and you are OK with that. Stop trying to morally justify your position.
How is removal of a zygote different than countless spontaneous abortions. 20% of all clinically recognized pregnancies end in spontaneous abortion. That doesn't include the countless unrecognized pregnancies that suddenly end.
Without sentience, it's not a human life any more than what is expelled each month.
You may see a fundamental difference between a fertilized and unfertilized egg but it is just an arbitrary difference to me. I listed several examples of my willingness to kill human beings, what makes you think killing a fertilized egg would give me any grief?
You're projecting your issues onto me. As an atheist I have no expectation of fairness in this world. You believe in a higher power that establishes fairness, I do not.
fairness is a lofty goal, but not always expected.
Right! The command is "thou shall not murder".
Premeditation.
You need to learn some science rather than making up capricious and arbitrary standards to assuage your guilt.
You are the one being arbitrary, not me.
No. I'm not projecting anything upon you, dummy. I'm trying to get you to see reality and be honest with yourself.
Then stop making moral arguments. Be an animal. Be Darwinian. Wolves don't apologize to sheep for eating their young and sheep don't see wolves as evil for eating their young.
God Blessed you, and opened your heart! Your lesson contemplated and learned, is spot on! Now to stay on that righteous path, will be harder than ever....tempted. Put your armour of God on...know the Word, and stay true to what you just pronounced....I can't remember all the times I've said... un-Christian-sounding things about this or that person (mostly those in the political realm), but I remember one time a day or 2 ago: I called Maxine Waters a scary witch. Well, I was being honest w/ how i view things, but what I'm mostly repenting of now is having such a bad attitude toward her-- when really it is her POLICIES I hate, like her policy of encouraging people to harass Republicans when they are at restaurants and other places (couple years ago). I hated that. But I can't hate her because, even though it's (very) hard to remember this, God made that person.
I know... I almost feel like laughing when I say that because these elite liberals act like they've lost their "made in God's image" thing and have even become demons.
Well, God didn't make them demons, they chose to be that. It's difficult (to impossible) to see a residual of God's image there..
But as long these people are alive, there is hope that they will come to their senses.
If they hear a lot of hate from "the other side" of the aisle, well, that's not going to help... will likely just inspire them to double down on their evil ways.
We just have to remind ourselves that Jesus died for everyone - and doesn't want anyone to remain in their sins and end up in Hell.
I said a prayer for her as a penance for having such a hostile attitude toward her and the amazing thing was... I could feel that prayer actually doing something good... (I didn't expect to feel that)
