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From: liberte@uiucdcs.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.abortion
Subject: Re: definitions - (nf)
Message-ID: <44700020@uiucdcs.UUCP>
Date: Sun, 29-Apr-84 20:09:00 EDT
Article-I.D.: uiucdcs.44700020
Posted: Sun Apr 29 20:09:00 1984
Date-Received: Thu, 3-May-84 19:40:51 EDT
References: <1968@tekig.UUCP>
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Nf-ID: #R:tekig:-196800:uiucdcs:44700020:000:1048
Nf-From: uiucdcs!liberte    Apr 29 19:09:00 1984

#R:tekig:-196800:uiucdcs:44700020:000:1048
uiucdcs!liberte    Apr 29 19:09:00 1984

/**** uiucdcs:net.abortion / hercules!archiel /  3:48 am  Apr 28, 1984 ****/
  When does the fetus become a human being?  
When the incision is made?  When the baby is
actually removed from the womb?  When the decision to do the surgery
is made?  When the procedure starts?         /* ---------- */

No one has responded to my suggestion that the fetus becomes a human being
(in the important sense) at the first breath.  If it never takes a first
breath, no matter how it was grown and born, then it never becomes human.
(I'll agree there is human life in a biological sense long before.)

This is a serious suggestion.  Consider it.  What are the problems with it?
Are there cases where a "clearly" alive human being does not breathe, 
whether or not they are hooked up to a machine that helps them breathe.
I am not suggesting that breathing is the essense of human life, just that
the first breath is a good starting point.

Daniel LaLiberte,  U of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, Computer Science
{moderation in all things - including moderation}