Pro-lifers must be precise when we discuss our position. Often, if you make an extemporaneous, imprecise, or simplistic statement you will get a rebuttal that misses the point and derails the discussion. Let us use the examples of statements such as “life (or human life) begins at conception.” This is so general that it becomes liable to rebuttals such as this: “Despite many claims to the contrary, life does not begin at conception: It is an unbroken chain that stretches back nearly to the origin of the Earth, 4.6 billion years ago. Nor does human life begin at conception: It is an unbroken chain dating back to the origin of our species, hundreds of thousands of years ago.” This rebuttal was given by prominent atheist Carl Sagan in his book Billions & Billions: Thoughts on Life and Death at the Brink of the Millennium, page 201. He is correct that biological life and human life began long ago but the response is irrelevant. You open the door to meaningless and long discussions by offering general statements that can be refuted with inconsequence. It has happened to me a couple of times in the past by stating something such as “life begins at the moment of conception.” This is a popular way of saying things, not a precise way. Conception is itself a process, not a moment; a process that takes some hours. Pro-lifers know this but often we descend into a tag line. It is just easier but it can be detrimental. A guy took me through days of discussing every detail of that process as if it had anything to do with the real issue (and there are variant theories of when it ends). Instead of saying “human life begins at conception” it would be more precise to say, “A human organism begins to exist at conception” or “The life of an new individual human being begins at conception.” Obviously, you or I as individual human organisms did not start to exist billions of years ago and Sagan could have just erased his absurd retort.
Posted on: Mon, 09 Jun 2014 15:42:58 +0000
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