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I can think just fine, thank you.

First, I am not defining killing as the same as murder. Perhaps someone else did, but not I. I know the difference.

Killing an enemy in war on the battlefield when he is armed and intends to kill you if he can is not murder, it is self-defense.

The death penalty I agree is state-sanctioned murder. Executions are murder, absolutely.

Now, to the heart of the debate:

A person need not be born to be legally a person. If one were to cut an unborn child out of the belly of a mother, killing the child, but the mother lives, the child has been murdered. There are at least two high-profile cases of prosecution for the murder of unborn children in progress as we speak.

It is a matter of basic biology that the life cycle of a human being begins at conception, not at birth. People are not born spontaneously with no preliminary development. The fact that every fetus has a unique combination of DNA establishes that even before birth it is an individual human being. No amount of talk can eliminate the fact that a child in utero is a human being at the very beginning stages of life.

Malice is a misleading word in this context. A cold-blooded thug might kill without any emotion, including malice, but would still be a murderer.

142 - "Killing an enemy in war on the battlefield when he is armed and intends to kill you if he can is not murder, it is self-defense. "

The majority of the killing in war is not hand to hand 'self defense'. The majority is government sanctioned killing. All Wars start with an 'offense', not with a 'defense'.

"A person need not be born to be legally a person."
Try leaving something in your will to a fetus, and see what happens. A fetus is not a person. It is a potential person.

Look on your 'birth certificate' - it mentions nothing about 'conception' date. You are not legally a person till you are 'born'.

"It is a matter of basic biology that the life cycle of a human being begins at conception, not at birth. "

Sorry - the life cycle begins far before conception. The gametes must be alive prior to conjugating. Life does not begin at conception, it merely changes form.

142 - "The death penalty I agree is state-sanctioned murder. Executions are murder, absolutely. "

So, will you please go arrest all those executioners, and people who enacted the laws for excution, as murder by definition is illegal, and executions are legal.