Among the many false assertions and misconceptions which muddle the abortion controversy is the proper answer to a simple question: When does life begin? Knowing the correct answer is fundamental to understanding all the implications and consequences associated with the act of eliminating a human fetus.
The pro-abortionist’s answer to this question is one of many attempts to eliminate any remorse and guilt in the purging of an innocent human life. It displaces any sense of morality and ethics associated with fetal destruction by redefining terms through legal means. It is also a cunning attempt to create a legal stepping stone towards the erasure of our natural rights by disregarding natural law and the biological sciences. By contrast, the anti-abortionist’s answer is based on an instinctive sense of protecting a fetus during the most vulnerable and defenseless phase of human existence. The religious overtones are as obvious and unavoidable as they are a completely reasonable and valid justification to oppose abortion. Faith-based motives also unintentionally follow the precepts of natural law which is the true source of our natural rights. However, though not everyone is willing to accept religious faith in God as a reason and would belittle it a priori, only those staunchly oblivious to reality would deny that there is an order to the universe, expressed through natural law. In the end, whatever reason asserted to conserve human life, rather than destroy it, is a clear and acceptable position to hold. Essentially, the anti-abortionist’s position does not have to resort to deceptive schemes ignoring morality, ethics, or guilt.
So, just what are the answers that these two, opposing groups rely upon?
The pro-abortionists will cite the law and proclaim that life begins at birth. This legal view is also codified into U.S. Law under 1 U.S. Code § 8 which defines “person”, “human being”, “child”, and “individual” as including (a) born-alive infant. This law was enacted by the 80th Congress in 1947 and modified by the 107th Congress in 2002. It unambiguously defines human life as beginning at birth.
Most anti-abortionists will intuitively proclaim that life begins at conception or fertilization and this view seems closer to the truth. Other pro-lifers, in an attempt at a legal compromise, will concede that human life begins at a certain point during gestation. In my view, this conciliatory position is just as far away from reality as the argument of the pro-abortionist. The tactic of legal appeasement will eventually fail because the anti-abortionists have allowed the pro-abortionists to set the terms and settings for this debate. This allows the pro-abortionists to redefine the terms life, embryo, fetus, pregnancy, and personhood using legalese only vaguely informed by the biological sciences and sets the stage for them to carry out their true objective – the extraction of natural law as the source of our humanity and our natural rights as natural persons.
There is a clear and obvious danger in allowing politicians, judges, and lawyers to play with the source of our humanity and surrendering to what is permitted by some law code. Any anti-abortionist who unwittingly slides into the legality trap of the pro-abortionist allows them to turn our natural person status on its ear and forces us to defend our position within their false parameters of legal personhood. It is a self-evident truth that human beings are not ratified or chartered into existence with privileges permitted to us by a higher, legal authority.
So, what is the reality?
Does Human Life Begin at Conception, at Birth, or Somewhere in Between?
The legal assertion that life begins at birth is sheer idiocy of the highest order. It is certainly not informed by the biological sciences. In fact, the concept is not even based in rational thought. It is also exactly the kind of claim I would expect from politicians. At the very least, the idea completely ignores the entire field of embryology. No member of our species has ever spontaneously generated themselves into existence upon the ejection from the birth canal. The same can be said about the idea that life begins at a certain point during gestation. This notion, although a good intentioned attempt to restrain unfettered abortion, is merely a forced legal compromise. However, this too is not informed by the biological sciences and just as cynically uses codified law to define our humanity. The idea that the vitality of a developing fetus is somehow infused into it after fifteen weeks, or between nineteen and twenty-two weeks, or at any other point, is as ridiculous as claiming its life begins with birth.
And what about life starting at conception?
Well, it does seem intuitive that if you are standing in front of another individual and you knew something about biology, you might think that would be a reasonable conclusion. However, you would be wrong. Human life does not begin at conception; it continues at conception. It is an obvious, biological fact that life comes from life. We have a tendency as rational beings to perceive ourselves as individuals. However, when we are talking about natural law and the biological sciences, we must first regard ourselves as members of the species Homo sapiens. It is the birthright of our species that endows us with the unalienable natural rights afforded by natural law. Our individual claims to those rights come from the process that gave rise to our species.
The realization that conception is actually a continuance of human life rather than its onset has far-reaching ramifications.
Firstly, it means that our natural rights precede conception; they exist even before fertilization. It also means that gestation is a transient phase of human existence, and the developing fetus has a claim to the same protections of their natural rights as every other member of our species. Specifically, they are walled-off from, and have equal standing with, the mother’s rights at the moment of implantation into the endometrium.
Secondly, the embryo and fetus represent the repository of a biological archive of thousands of generations and millions of people that preceded that person and the millions that will follow them. The biological purpose of life is the transmission of code or intelligence over time through physical bodies. Understanding this clear view of the reproductive process completely eviscerates any falsely fabricated ethical or moral attempt to legally deny an embryo or fetus their natural rights by politically re-defining life, taking away his or her natural personhood, and assigning them a legal personhood. If the unstated, leftist mission of the pro-abortionist is accomplished here, what other phase of human existence could be next?
The idea of continuance reinforces the anti-abortionist’s position. However, is there truly an argument for an outright ban on abortion? I answer this question and much more in my essay The Nuances of Abortion – What They Really Mean and Why it Matters.
Dr. Thomas V. Giordano is the author of the book, “UnaLIENable: What It Really Means and Why It Matters”.