egg + sperm = zygote

A single cell containing a combination of DNA unique from that of the mother and the father.

It exists, therefore it is being.

The DNA is human.

It is not a part of the mother's body in the sense of a finger, a kidney or a skin cell.

Prior to fertilization, the egg cell was a container for half of the mother's DNA.

After fertilization, it becomes a unique human being contained within the mother.

This is a human being's starting point.

The first cell division is the first step in development.  It is now a multi-cellular organism.

It is an embryo.

It is developing according to the instructions of its own DNA.

As it eventually moves from the ovary, through the oviduct, it is an independent entity, in the sense that it is not physically attached to the mother.

When it reaches the ovary, it implants itself and begins the creation of physical connections (most notably, the umbilical chord) with the mother.

During week 4 or 5, the heart starts to beat and blood starts to flow.

Brain waves can be detected at about week 7.

There does not seem to be any hard line to cross in going from embryo to fetus, but it is generally around week 9.

A human being goes through a number of stages of development, both inside and outside of the mother, with adulthood being the last.

Some of the factors that abortion arguments orbit are when something becomes a human, whether or not it can feel pain, whether or not it is a person, when life begins, the definition of "life/alive", threat to the mother's health, self-awareness, and a shitload of extraordinarily selfish excuses.

I'm going to address these.

I will leave organized religion out of it and try to be as objective and logical as one can be, but it is a topic where pure objective thought achieves nothing.

1. I'll start with the definition of "life/alive".

Currently, then is no official scientific definition of life/alive.  I'm certainly not offering myself up as an authority, but I did give it some thought, and I came up with one that I think is decent.

I welcome scientific disagreements, but for now, it is the one that I am using for this journal entry.

If an entity's own body can utilize resources to maintain its own physical growth, then it is alive.

The means by which it acquires those resources is irrelevant.

With that, if an outside influence is directly responsible for stopping that continuing process, then that influence killed that living thing.

If anyone might wish to comment, then know that "murder" is a legal term for an unjustified killing, and if you use the term in any context other than a legal one, I will ignore it.

2. When it becomes a human.

As mentioned in the first part, at whichever stage you which to address the entity, it has a complete set of human DNA, and it is growing according to the direction of that DNA.

Quite some time ago, someone responded to that idea by saying something to the effect of, "A skin cell contains human DNA.  That's not a human."

It's also not the entirety of the being.  When the egg is fertilized, and before it makes its first division, that is the entirety of the being.

When it divides into two cells, the two cells are the entirety of the being.  And so forth.

It is a human being.  And, by the given definition, it is alive.

3. Threat to the mother's health.

It gets more subjective from here on out.

I believe that it is okay to kill something for the sake of genuine, obvious self-preservation.

If you are clearly going to die if the entity is allowed to carry on living, then I see no problem with ending the life of the entity.

That said, if the mother wishes to sacrifice herself, then I believe that is her choice to make.

4. Personhood.

Person, personhood, personality.  These are what I like to call floppy terms.  There are no clear definitions.  They are more like impressions.

A personality seems to be little more than how you relate to the characteristics of the thing which you say has a personality.  A painting can be said to have a personality.

Something's personality is your projection.

I find these words rather irrelevant to the argument.

5. Can it feel pain?

My response is, what difference does it make?

If it does, it won't be feeling it for long.

Does whether or not it can feel pain make it any more or less dead?

Is it not going to feel any other pain in it's life if it's not killed?

6. Self-awareness.

I'm afraid I don't remember the man's name, or the exact age, but there is a professor who believes (paraphrasing) that it's okay to abort a child even up to like a year after birth, because it is not aware that there is a tomorrow, therefore you're not taking anything from the child, in the child's view, or something like that.

Let's follow some logic.

If it is okay to kill a human that is not self-aware, then it is okay to kill an adult human that is in a particular stage of sleep.

One might respond, "But the adult was self-aware before", or "it's only a very short time", or "the adult will immediately regain self-awareness upon waking".

So what if the adult was self-aware before?  In the moment, the adult has no concept of self; no concept of past, present, or future.

As for regaining self-awareness, you're talking only about a time-frame; the time between a lack of self-awareness and self-awareness.

A child will also gain self-awareness.  What relevance is the amount of time it takes for it to happen?  A human in the embryonic stage will eventually gain self-awareness in a later stage.

7. The various selfish excuses.

"For the sake of _______, it is okay to kill a living human being that is not threaten to kill me or anyone else."

If you think the stage of it's development is relevant, then please explain how.

If you think the location of the human (inside or outside of the womb) is relevant, then please explain how.

Of course, all of this is simply how I see it.  I'm not claiming to be right.  I welcome logical opposition.  Maybe I missed something.

I simply want to encourage intellectual honesty, especially with oneself.