[sneakypete]

It's not? Then when does it magically become a human life?

When there is a heartbeat and brain activity.

[geopyg]

From the Ohio State Dept. of Health

2 weeks
(4 WEEKS after the first day of the last normal menstrual period)
By the 25th day, the heart begins to beat.
The human embryo is about one-hundredth (1/100) of an inch long.
Implantation began the first week and continues.

6 weeks
(8 WEEKS after the first day of the last normal menstrual penod)
The embryo is about half an inch long and has a four-chambered heart.
Electrical activity begins in the developing brain and nervous system.
The fingers begin to develop.
The embryo has nostrils.

[MHGinTN]

Then when does it magically become a human life?

Pete stated, superstitiously, "When there is a heartbeat and brain activity."

Your sad lack of scientific understanding makes it difficult if not futile to discuss cloning with you. But here's a simple non-scientific but logical question for those reading your assertion (can you recognize the superstitious paradox in pete's assertion, arbitrarily conveying 'human' on that which cannot be anything but human life from the beginning of its existence?): Has anything other than a human popped from a human womb nine months after the start of its life, during the course of recorded history?

[tortoise]

When there is a heartbeat and brain activity.

And even that is arguable, since higher brain regions don't function for many months after birth. As I recall, humans are born with essentially a reptilian brains and a mass of non-functional higher brain tissue. If I am not mistaken, the neurons for all the higher brain functions are lacking "parts" to make them functional (e.g. myelin), which is only created months after birth and the higher brain then bootstraps itself. The parts are missing because the brain wouldn't fit out the birth canal if you had them.

Of course, this puts some people's claims of "remembering" their birth in a highly suspect light, seeing as how there was nothing to remember it with (since they lacked any type of higher brain at the time). But then, that was usually the domain of New Age hippies anyway...

[Remedy]

Are unborn children human beings? Are they persons? No doubt about it. The following essays argue the pro-life case...

• When Do Human Beings Begin? -- by Dianne N. Irving, Ph.D. In this essay, former NIH bench research biochemist Dianne Irving demonstrates the scientific fact that the lives of human beings--and human persons--begin at conception.
• Personhood Begins At Conception -- by Peter Kreeft, Ph.D. Professor Kreeft explains what exactly a "person" is and why the various philosophical positions which deny that the unborn child is a person are themselves inadequate.
• Is the Unborn Less Than Human? -- by Francis J. Beckwith, Ph.D. In this essay, Dr. Beckwith lays out the scientific facts surrounding human development and explains why it does not make sense to argue that a human being is created at implantation, quickening, or birth.
• When Does a Human Become a Person? -- by Francis J. Beckwith, Ph.D. Continuing the previous essay, Dr. Beckwith demonstrates why other functional criteria given for personhood--such as sentience, brain development, and viability--are inadequate. He then refutes the "gradualist" position, which incorrectly asserts that the unborn becomes more and more human as the pregnancy progresses. Finally, he discusses the positions of various abortion and infanticide advocates like James Rachels, Mary Wollenkott, and Michael Tooley.
• Does Life Begin At Implantation? -- by Francis J. Beckwith, Ph.D. In this essay, Dr. Beckwith addresses the phenomena of monozygotic twinning, hydatiform moles, choriocarcinoma, blighted ova, cloning, and fertilization wastage. He then shows how these phenomena fail to disprove the position that human life begins at conception.
• Scientific and Philosophical Expertise: An Evaluation of the Arguments on Personhood -- by Dianne N. Irving, Ph.D. In this essay, biochemist Dianne Irving argues that positions which assert that early human embryos are not persons are based on inadequate philosophical principles and faulty scientific data.
• The Human Rational Soul in the Early Embryo -- by Stephen Heaney, Ph.D. In this essay, Professor Heaney discusses the various theories of "ensoulment" that permeate philosophical (and theological) discussions on abortion.
• A Survey of Arguments for Immediate versus Delayed Animation -- by Scott Sullivan. In this essay, Thomist Philosopher Scott Sullivan critically analyzes the theory of mediate animation.
• The Tiniest Humans -- an interview with the renowned geneticist Jerome Lejeune and the father of modern embryology, Sir Albert William Liley

Some abortion advocates are willing to concede that unborn children are human beings. Surprisingly enough, they claim that they would still be able to justify abortion. According to their argument, no person-no unborn child-has a right to access the bodily resources of an unwilling host. Unborn children may have a right to life, but that right to life ends where it encroaches upon a mother's right to bodily autonomy. The argument is called the bodyright argument, and it is refuted in the following essays...

• The Bodyright Argument: A Pro-life Response -- By Brian D. Parks. In this essay, your webmaster gives a comprehensive analysis of the bodyright argument, including a discussion of the various pro-abortion analogies to pregnancy, and a refutation of the positions of Philosophers Judith Thomson, Susan Mattingly, Patricia Jung, Frances Kamm, Margaret Little and others.
• The Changing Pro-Life Argument: Does the Humanity of the Unborn Matter Anymore? -- by Francis J. Beckwith, Ph.D. In this essay, Professor Beckwith introduces and refutes the famous argument from "bodily rights".
• A Woman's Right Over Her Body? -- by Stephen Schwarz, Ph.D. In an excerpt from his book The Moral Question of Abortion, Dr. Schwarz addresses arguments in defense of abortion that are based on a woman's "right" to control her own body.
• Unplugging a Bad Analogy -- by Doris Gordon. In this essay, Doris Gordon, the National Director of Libertarians For Life, refutes a famous argument put forth by philosopher Judith Jarvis Thomson.
• Abortionists, Violinists and Burglars -- by Christopher Kaczor, Ph.D. In this essay, Professor Kaczor addresses Thomson's arguments from a different angle.
• A Fetus is NOT a Parasite -- by Thomas L. Johnson, Ph.D. In this piece, chordate embryologist Dr. Thomas L. Johnson attacks the popular misconception that a human fetus is the equivalent of a biological parasite.
• Begging the Question -- by Edwin Viera. In this brief essay, Dr. Viera explains why the statement "a woman has a right to control her own body" begs the basic question in the abortion debate--is she only affecting her own body when she aborts?

Why would it be wrong to kill an adult? Why would it be wrong to kill a baby after it has been born? Questions like these seems trivial, but their answers are extremely important to the abortion debate. What many people fail to realize is that most of the arguments used to justify killing unborn children could be used with just as much force to justify killing newborn children and, in some cases, even full-grown adults. The wrongness of killing is discussed in the following essays...

• I Was Once a Fetus -- By Alexander Pruss. In this essay, mathematician and philosopher Dr. Alexander Pruss offers an identity based argument against abortion.
• The Real Problem with Abortion -- by Mark McNeil. In this essay, Mark McNeil examines two competing positions on the issue--the position of moderate pro-life advocate Don Marquis and the position of liberal abortion advocate Mary Anne Warren. McNeil concludes that neither position sufficiently explains why it is wrong to kill human beings, and introduces his own viewpoint.

[carenot]

When there is a heartbeat and brain activity.

What is it before that?

[hocndoc]

The development of the human begins *before* the heart beats or the brain has "activity." Otherwise, there wouldn't be a human heart or brain.

[beavus]

When there is a heartbeat and brain activity.

My cat has a heartbeat and brain activity. Should it have the same rights as you and me?