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     8 years ago (edited) 

    @steemlocomotive No, the mother is merely a source of nutrients. She doesn't have to manually manipulate the development of the cells to become something other than what it already naturally would. Your term "host" is more accurate, since the relationship is more like that of a tapeworm and the person it resides within (except that in most cases, people invite the fetus to take up residence within them so the relationship is consensual rather than a parasitic one).

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       8 years ago  

      A mother is an external agent. A fetus isn't going to grow and develop without a host.

      Suppose I take some of my own stem cells and start them dividing on a Petri dish? Are they fetuses or not?

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       8 years ago (edited) 

      @steemlocomotive According to the dictionary entries I read, it's called a fetus 2 months after conception... so no, a few cells in a Petri dish wouldn't be a fetus. Also, a batch of stem cells in a dish cannot grow naturally into a person. A whole lot of deliberate manipulation would be required from third parties.

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         8 years ago  
        1. Person in a coma used used to be alive, sentient being.
        2. Animals are alive beings. Those with neuro development higher than insects are sentient. Neither those animals nor humans (animals) deserve to die.
        3. 4 month old fetus is not a sentient animal\human. It has never even been awake (born) and cognitively experienced the environment (person in a coma has).
        4. Some rigid dictionary definition of one word does not describe complex scientific understanding of what a sentient animal is. You talk about unimportance of "aesthetic" similarities but then refer to definition of the word from dictionary. That is contradiction.
          The difference between newborn baby and 4 months old fetus is not an aesthetic difference. These two have completely different levels of development of their systems such as nervous, cardiovascular etc. Fetus is not a well developed newborn. Your simplistic and scientifically illiterate denominating of complex subject is one of the reasons why the value system in our society is still backward like in middle ages. Regardless of current technological advancements and scientific understandings.
          There is zero logic in your assertion. It seems just to be a mindless repetition of some simplisistic opinion conditioned by your lifestyle experiences. Opinion that you seem very attached to because you derive your sense of identity and lifestyle belonging from it.
        5. Abortion should be allowed with a decision left solely to mother. When the fetus is over 5-6 moths old then it should be advised to mother not to have abortion unless there is health risk to mother, mother was raped, there is no possibility for anyone to raise the child sustainably or the child is suspected to be born with serious disease/disorder. In the end, it is mother's decision.
          No one, including father should have a right to stop the abortion.
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           8 years ago (edited) 

          @logic

          1. Person in coma is still a live sentient being.
          2. Agreed (although the jury seems to still be out in regards to insect sentience. Looking forward to that one being settled better).
          3. A fetus definitely is an animal although its sentience is debatable because our ability to remember and express past experiences is practically nonexistent until we get to be around two years old so there's no way to verify this yet). The past health and awareness of the person in the coma isn't relevant to its present state. Something is no less dead just because it used to be alive.
          4. The meaning of the word is what this is all about. My initial point was merely that sperm aren't humans but fetuses are. No need to fear dictionaries. They can help us to avoid all kinds of misunderstandings. I see no contradiction but, by all means, explain if you disagree. All this is about is properly understanding objective reality and discussing it accurately. I made no moral judgments or anything else to support your notion that I'm arguing from an emotional position that's rooted in some sense of identity or whatever else. As a side note, one might suggest that your perceived a moral judgement where there was none because of your own hypersensitivity, which could be rooted in guilt or a fear of your own identity's framework being challenged... but I guess that would getting into a whole other topic.
            Of course, the older a person is, the more physically developed it is (until the brain is finished forming in our early twenties). You just said that a fetus doesn't "resemble" a newborn, which is an observation about its appearances. My point was that such a differentiation is irrelevant to the question of whether or not its human, which was the question at hand.
            Calling something illogical, mindless, or simplistic doesn't make it so and has no place in any serious debate.
          5. If you want to tackle moral questions about killing others, we can certainly do that too... although this discussion hasn't been about that thus far so it would mean venturing into a whole other subject.
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