Letter to the Editor: Questions
BY Anton Schnitzer, Bartlesville
Sunday, March 10, 2013
3/10/13 at 4:19 AM
A recent letter poses two questions. The first question was, "If life does not begin at conception, when does it start?" Life does not start at conception; it is transmitted, passed on from one generation to another. Two mature people provide living cells that unite at conception, meld their DNA, become a zygote, then an embryo, then a fetus and at birth, a baby, i.e., a person. If the contributed cells were not living, reproduction would not occur.
So when did life start? Nobody knows, but there are several theories. One is that it started some 7,000 years ago in the Garden of Eden when God created animals and humans. Two, it started three or four billion years ago in a primordial soup. There are other theories, including one that life began in space and came to Earth as microorganisms and meteorites.
Where? Take your pick.
The second question is, "If a fetus is not a person, what is it?" A fetus is not a person. One can see a person, touch it, talk to it, listen to it, argue with it, laugh or cry with it, play games with it, work with it, eat lunch with it, etc. While it may be dismaying and a little crass to say so, a fetus meets the definition of a parasite. If you don't want to call a fetus a fetus, be careful what you do call it.
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