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To: hocndoc
The difference between the gametes and the zygote is obvious.

I don't think that is in dispute. Why is that fact relevent to my point?

What is your interest in pinning down the exact moment of the beginning of an individual's life?

I'm a bit saddened since I've already explained it to you at length in prior posts. Maybe I just wasn't clear. The point is simple. The physical world works along a time continuum. Quantum mechanics may give exceptions, but those are well below the molecular scales we are discussing. So then you come along, and I learn that the universe moves along smooth continua, except for during one stage in the process of sexual reproduction. If this exception is true, then it is an earth-shattering revelation to our knowledge of physics. As such, it ought to be substantiated. There must be some nonarbitrary dividing point where 10^-30 seconds afterwards we obviously have a human being, and 10^-30 seconds before we obviously don't--some skip in the normal continuous flow of time.

376 posted on 11/21/2003 4:35:00 PM PST by beavus
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Interesting ... how to prove time 'flows'??? Well, lessee, I wonder if the poster can prove any event in the present of the event, rather than cite observational (as in measurable phenomena) reflection upon data that is evidence of a past occurrence?
377 posted on 11/21/2003 7:26:05 PM PST by MHGinTN (If you can read this, you've had life support from someone. Promote life support for others.)
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To: beavus
You're mixing apples and oranges.
Events happen within the continuum. Those events have physical manifestations that have beginnings that are discreet points in time.

I push a button, and pixels change on my monitor. We know there are events that lead up to my seeing the letters, we know there are events between the actual change on the montitor and my perception of the light changes and then more before I "know" what I'm seeing. Nevertheless, at one point, there's a white patch then there's a letter.
379 posted on 11/21/2003 9:28:00 PM PST by hocndoc (Choice is the # 1 killer in the US)
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