Keep saying that to yourself. It doesn't change the fact that we think and the law doesn't think your theory is supported by science.

__________________
Remember the Turkey Genocide.

But it is the determiner of whether any given entity is a member of a particular species. If you wish to use the language in an improper way in an attempt to redefine what a human being is, then the weakness of your argument is brought into high relief.

You fail to grasp the context of the argument you are picking words from. My point was that skin cells, or whatever cells are alive, but not individual human beings while an unborn, even at the single cell level of development is an individual human being.

And upon the completion of fertilization, that potential has been realized. It no longer represents a potential human being. The zygote that exists where the egg was is an individual living human being.

Perhaps you would like to bring forward some credible science to corroborate "your" definition.

Your argument is just one more in a string that requires that we redefine what is a human being in order to make it work.

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Rem tene, verba sequentur.

A newborn doesn't think any more after it is born than it did before it was born and yet, according to you, it has somehow become a human being by virtue of a magical 7 inch trip down the birth canal.

And again, do feel free to provide some credible science that suggests that I am proposing a theory. Or continue with your blatant dishonesty calling it theory even though you can provide no proof that it is.

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Rem tene, verba sequentur.

If that is your reasoning, then you are an idiot.

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Rem tene, verba sequentur.

Of course it's easy to say names and name call without bringing any sort of reason to your argument. Well done. Sound reasoning, Quality posts.

__________________
Remember the Turkey Genocide.

Nope. My argument is that once it develops a functioning brain then that would probably be the time an abortion should be illegal. I have no idea when exactly that point happens, but an expert would probably know. It would probably safe to say that late term abortions (whatever it's called) should be illegal under my argument. Obviously you can't grasp that the brain doesn't form while the baby is being born. It forms while in the mother's womb. Go back to school kid.

Provide evidence that suggests your theory isn't a theory. You haven't done so.

__________________
Remember the Turkey Genocide.

No need. I provided credible, peer reviewed science that stated explicitly that unborns are human beings from the time they are concieved. To date, you have not effectively dealt with that bit of science that proves your argument to be worthless.

In fact, you haven't provided any evidence to support anything you have said. You have lost the discussion and at this point, you are just throwing a temper tantrum. It is sad, but also interesting in a car crash sort of way. I am curious to see just how far you will prostitute your intellect in an attempt to salvage your lost argument. You are already in the gutter, but how low will you really go?

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Rem tene, verba sequentur.

Actually, you haven't. Your sources are non-legit. If you looked at your own quotes they simply make statements as if they were fact. Say for example I said "You are stupid, because you have no idea what you're talking about." I would agree with that quote and many others might agree with it as well. While even if it probably is true (and a much more truthful statement it is compared to your own) I have no studies or relevent information to back it up. Such as it is with your own sources. To date you haven't backed them up. Do me a favor and tell me why I should trust your sources. Take one and interpret it and tell me what is so factually correct about it?

What have I said that isn't factually correct? Respond telling me if these 5 statements are or are not factually correct.

1. A developping human (as you say it is) is not necessarily similar physically in many ways (or atleast a few ways) compared to a fully formed born human being.

2. A human without a brain can't think.

3. A human without a brain can't feel.

4. A human without a brain can't experience.

5. A human that has never had a brain can't have ever experienced.

What of those 5 things are correct or incorrect?

__________________
Remember the Turkey Genocide.

Do feel free to provide some credible evidence that medical school textbooks on the subjects of embryology, fetology, or human developmental biology aren't legitimate sources of information on those very subjects.

Till you can provide such evidence, any claim that they are not legitimate is a logical fallacy known as begging the question. You are simply assuming that they are not legitimate and are basing your arguments upon that assumption. Till you can prove that the assumtion is true, any argument based on that assumption is not worth the time you took to write it.

You may not be aware of the fact, but logical fallacy does not constitute legitimate argument.

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Rem tene, verba sequentur.

Please note that I said "as the term is being used here." We are not using it in a scientific context but in a moral one, which is outside the purview of science. Science defines terms for its own purposes, which are amoral and entirely concerned with the modeling of natural processes. In any case, no, "human being" is not used in science.

Again, this is a definition in a specific context for a specific purpose, in this case that of law. It has no bearing on our discussion, which is moral, not legal.

It doesn't matter whose making it's a fabrication of. There is no such thing as a "correct" definition of a word, and certainly it isn't proper to take a definition from one context and transfer it to another unrelated context, and absolutely in doing so one has not gained any authority.

We are discussing morality here, not science or law. It doesn't matter what science says about what a "human being" is, even if science said anything, which it doesn't, because science has nothing to say about morality.

There is no such thing as a moral position supported by science. Science has nothing to say about morality.

Of course they are, but we are not discussing embryology, fetology, or human developmental biology. We are discussing morality. These other subjects have a bearing on our discussion only insofar as our morality is dependent on the facts of human development, which our core values are not.

Let me explain what I mean. The science of human developmental biology can tell us when in the course of gestation a fetus has particular characteristics: when its heart and lugs are functional, when the various parts of its brain come on line, when it is capable of surviving outside the womb. What it cannot tell us is when in the course of this process the fetus acquires human rights. We must decide that for ourselves, based on our core values.

It is one of my core values that human rights begin when human feelings and intelligence begins; that a human organism prior to the development of human feelings and intelligence does not have rights that outweigh a woman's right to control her own reproductive behavior. It is, apparently, one of your core values that human rights begin with a complete set of human DNA, and do not require human feelings or intelligence. I'm not sure just why you feel that way, but I accept and recognize that you do.

Science can tell us when a fetus acquires a full set of human DNA, and it can tell us when it has human feelings and intelligence, but it cannot tell us which of these things are determinative of when it obtains human rights. We must decide that for ourselves on a non-scientific basis, because it is a moral question and science has no competence to answer moral questions.

Arguments from definition are always misleading and invalid, especially when you mix contexts and apply a definition from one context to another where it does not belong. Words are only tags we use to describe reality, and the reality remains unchanged if we change the tags we apply to it. The reality is as I've described above. If you manipulate the meaning of the term "human being" so that it applies to an embryo at conception, it will remain nevertheless true that an embryo at conception has no human feelings or intelligence, and therefore, according to my core values, it will have no human rights. All you will have succeeded in doing is bringing me to a point where I must say that not all "human beings" have human rights, only those with human feelings and intelligence do. I don't particularly want to go there, I don't find it useful, and so I would prefer not to define the word that way. But if you insist on doing so, it will not win you the argument.

But whether it is a "member of a particular species" isn't what we're talking about. We're talking about whether it is a person, with human rights. That's a moral question, not a scientific one.

Please do not be insulting. This only weakens your rhetorical case by making it seem as if you cannot make it without throwing spitwads. Of course I grasp the context.

What exactly is an "individual human being"? What objectively are you talking about here?

An embryo at conception has a set of human chromosomes which are, in half, distinct from those of its mother. In only that sense and the sense that it has the potential to become what common sense would call a "human being" is it different from any cell of the mother's body. In only that sense -- not even in the sense of potential -- is it different from an unfertilized ovum.

Granted that these senses exist, why should I care? Why should these points serve to give the embryo human rights?

The comparison with skin cells, etc. is actually meant to clarify a common anti-choice argument that an embryo represents "human life." Now, this is true, it does -- but so does any other living cell of a human body. The fact that it is human life is irrelevant; what you need to show is that it is a "human being" in a sense that requires giving it human rights.

Really? It has full-fledged human feelings and intelligence? It can learn to talk and walk? It has all the properties of a newborn infant?

I don't think so. As I said, if you manipulate the definition of "human being" so that it can apply to an embryo at conception, the reality of what that embryo is will be unchanged. It will still have no human intelligence or feelings, and therefore not be entitled to human rights. What you call it has no bearing on that question.

As it is not a definition offered for scientific purposes, that would be pointless. Science has nothing to say on the subject. In any case, as I said, a definition cannot be true or false. It is only chosen or not chosen, for convenience of communicating ideas. Offering "scientific support" for a definition is absurd. Scientific support may be offered for facts, but a definition is not a fact.

Arguments from definition, as I noted above, are always invalid, but in this case you are also factually wrong. An embryo at conception has never been considered a human being in morality or law until quite modern times, and then only in the context of the anti-abortion movement.

In any case, as I said, a word is only a tag. An embryo at conception has no human intelligence or feelings and therefore does not merit human rights. If you define "human being" so that it applies to an embryo at conception, then it is a human being without human rights. You cannot win this argument in this way. You need to refer to reality, not merely to words.

You've seemed to have ignored those 5 points. Are you not going to respond?

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Remember the Turkey Genocide.