[Havisham]

The question of when life begins is a false one and is not really what is under debate. We can be certain of few things as that the human embryo is life. It is life that in somewhere over 90% of conceptions will progress toward birth unless other "functioning, integrated, whole human beings" undertake to destroy it.

Life? A life? The practice of placing the indefinite article before the noun is linguistic sleight of hand. Now the question becomes not when does life begin but when does a life we value begin. Honesty in the debate about life founders here and is unrecoverable unless we agree that life and a life are not equivalents for the purpose of debating abortion or other destruction of embryonic human life.

[MHGinTN]

Yes, it is the central connundrum to agree upon when an individual human being is worthy of protection, hence the effort to expose the biological realities of prenatal life. The issue bears also upon how our society will deal with embryonic exploitation and cloning.

[supercat]

The question of when life begins is a false one and is not really what is under debate. We can be certain of few things as that the human embryo is life. It is life that in somewhere over 90% of conceptions will progress toward birth unless other "functioning, integrated, whole human beings" undertake to destroy it.

I didn't think anywhere near 90% of fertilized eggs implanted successfully, even in healthy women. Certainly there are some women who, because of natural conditions, have much lower implantation rates. Should such women be forbidden from having sex, on the basis that it might fertilize an egg which might be unable to implant and consequently die?