Diesel

[CBAreject]

To address some of your questions...

"Life does not start at conception. Science proves that...."

Science cannot demonstrate the existence of a soul in the first place. So if we allow science to be our guide in moral issues, we're going to arrive at some pretty dim conclusions.

"If you were to take a fetus out of the womb up to 3 weeks, what happens... It dies. No lungs...Life means to be independent right?"

Biological life is different from spiritual life. If we are strictly molecules and cells, with no spiritual component, then there's really nothing sacred about life to begin with. A living being is no more than a bag of chemical reactions. If that's the case, we shouldn't really argue about whether abortion is justified. However, I believe that we have a spiritual component that is more important than the flesh, as do you. Therefore, we should pay great attention to this issue.

Also, if a 6 month old baby is left on his own he will die in a matter of days. The fact that he cannot take care of himself does not mean that he is not a human being. Similarly, the fact that a fetus cannot sustain itself outside the womb does not mean that it is not a human being.

"By the same token, isn't the woman responsible for the death of her child whenever she has a miscarriage? Shouldn't there be invistigations to every miscarriage and still birth?"

There's a difference between accidents or natural causes of death and premeditated murder. If your 5 year old child dies of a congenital heart defect, you are not guilty (clearly), but if you smother your 5 year old with a pillow, you clearly are. The same reasoning should hold true for mothers and their fetuses.

"I think that some of these "morality" issues have been politicized in order to polarize people... It's wrong."

Yes, morality issues do polarize people, but who says that's wrong? (I don't think the intention is to polarize, though; rather the effect is polarization...there is a difference). When many within the church were working to abolish slavery, that was a very polarizing issue. Polarity is not wrong in and of itself, then. The fact is, a heinous crime was going on, and those in the church had every reason to be concerned about it. All things equal, we'd like people to be in harmony versus disagreement, but we can't take a stance that's counter to truth just to be agreeable.

Good talking with you. I appreciate the questions.

[Diesel]

Ah.

The question of ensoulment. When does the soul begin(enter the body)? If you believe that God is all knowing, you immediately run to Jeremiah's conversation with God... God says that before you were in the womb, I knew thee...

I agree. However, this is not a victory for those who believes that life begins at conception. In fact, this is a victory for the other side....

Diesel How?

If God is all knowing, then why would he destroy a soul or allow a soul to be destroyed? If God knew Jeremiah, that would mean that he also knew weather Jeremiah would live or die and obviously that he controlled the situations that caused them to work out to his favor. Joseph told his brothers, what you meant for bad, God meant for good. Just to show that God controlled the situation.

God is not some nonpowerful referee that sits idlely by and has no power to control. The take home lessons from God's dealing with Pharoah was that God is all powerful and Soveriegn... He will do what he will in order to make what he wants to come to pass.

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Yes, morality issues do polarize people, but who says that's wrong? (I don't think the intention is to polarize, though; rather the effect is polarization...there is a difference).

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Oh, it was intended to do just what it did... Polarize...No..? Look at The issue of Gay Marriage... Each individual state has never had a problem with recognizing or not recognizing marriage. So why did this become such a big issue this yr? It was made that way to get the Christians and the conservatives in a frenzy... To polarize them... That part is WRONG. Believe me, I am against Gay marriages because I know that God ordained marriage between a man and a woman. However, I think that it's WRONG to use devisive issues that are not relevant to the conversation to polarize people. This is what they do... Take something that people feel strongly about...

Let's say drug dealers who sell drugs to children.

Make it a political issue.

All drug dealers who sell drugs to children should be put in the electric chair.

Then they say that their opponents are against it.

The Democrates are for drug dealers who sell drugs to children.

The truth of the matter is that there are already laws on the books that deal with drug dealers.

Everybody loves a child and they hate drug dealers.

This is the Karl Rove school of polarization.

Pretty soon, good religious people are against the democrats because they have been told that they are for drug dealers who sell drugs to children.

You say where has that happened?

One question.

Is John Kerry for Gay Marriage?

Bottom line. The Karl Rove Echo machine did it's job.

[CBAreject]

"If God is all knowing, then why would he destroy a soul or allow a soul to be destroyed?"

I'm not quite sure I know what you're asking. If by 'allowing a soul to be destroyed', you mean allowing someone to die, He does that with everyone of us, fetus to adult (or 3 month old baby, which isn't all that different from a fetus, really). Death is fallout of man's choice to sin, whether it occurs in a fetus or a 90-year-old.

I think you meant something more, so let me know if I've missed the point. After all, I'm a med student, not a philosopher. Also, if this was your argument from the beginning, why even address science? Science has become a naturalistic discipline and often refuses to consider the supernatural, hence much of my frustration with it.

[Diesel]

The Science and the idea of ensoulment are different but not really.

AGAIN.

When God made man. He made a body... Then he breathed into that Body the breath of life and man became a living soul. THIS is ensoulment. What it states is that there was a physical body... But it didn't live until there was breath. In the instance of fetus.... I said before that life means independence and if you take a fetus out of the mother can it live on it's own... That's the physical life but at the same time, it would also seem to be the start of ensoulment. That is to suggest that true life doesn't start until breath can be taken.... according to the Genesis account.

The idea that life starts at conception has no merit either Physically or in terms of ensoulment.

[CBAreject]

You never addressed this point...

"Also, if a 6 month old baby is left on his own he will die in a matter of days. The fact that he cannot take care of himself does not mean that he is not a human being. Similarly, the fact that a fetus cannot sustain itself outside the womb does not mean that it is not a human being."

You're jumping back to the viability argument for when life begins. Viability cannot be our test, because we can show that a baby, following birth does not have the capacity to survive on his own. Is he less human, then, than an adult? No, because all humans are created equal, regardless of their physical fitness. The frailest of human beings is every bit as human as the most viable. You see, we are not equal in the flesh, but equal in spirit. That's why it's dangerous to equate the spirit with the flesh.

I reject the idea that the 'soul' is nothing more than 'breath', which is the inspiration of environmental oxygen for cellular metabolism. Simple aerobic organisms do that, and who would argue that they have souls? Of course, we have biblical basis for arguing that they don't. Besides, if the 'breath' in Genesis refers to the spirit, then it probably is figurative and has nothing to do with physical breath. God has no need to breathe. Why, then, would we conclude that his figurative "breathing life into man's nostrils" has anything to do with O2? Besides, if using oxygen is what determines when a human being lives, then it's easy to show that even the simplest embryo uses oxygen, albeit through placental transfer. They just breathe liquid instead of air. Technically, a man doesn't have to breath at all if he can be given an oxygen concentrated solution in his lungs. Does he not have a soul in this case?

If you argue that life is nothing more than chemical reactions (which is what you're suggesting), you haven't shown what makes man different from animals. If you don't believe that man is different from animal, we cannot have a productive discussion, as that difference must be accepted on faith. Even though there are clear differences in reasoning capacity, the spiritual side cannot be observed; rather, it can only be experienced. Consider the consequence of your conclusions here. The body very obviously dies at some point, even for the most healthy. What is it that lives on after death, then? If the soul were nothing more than the mechanics of breathing, you couldn't very well make a case for its continuing to live after the lungs have ceased to function.

Many do not believe in life after death, but Christians do. We believe that the soul may live after death of the body in perpetuity. This is what makes the life of a human being sacred. We are more than Krebs Cycles.

"That's the physical life but at the same time, it would also seem to be the start of ensoulment. That is to suggest that true life doesn't start until breath can be taken.... according to the Genesis account."

If this is to be the basis for your case, you should consider here that the first man and woman were created, according to the Genesis account, not developed in the womb. In that case, they lived when their cells began to function, just as an embryo does, at conception. If Genesis 2:7 were our only guide, then, we could make an even case either way. It is not our only guide, though, and if we believe the Bible to be true, we must believe that man has a spiritual component apart from his physical component.

[Diesel]

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Also, if a 6 month old baby is left on his own he will die in a matter of days. The fact that he cannot take care of himself does not mean that he is not a human being. Similarly, the fact that a fetus cannot sustain itself outside the womb does not mean that it is not a human being."

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There is a difference in taking care of himself and living. A fetus cannot live outside of the womb. Until birth it is just an appendage.

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I reject the idea that the 'soul' is nothing more than 'breath', which is the inspiration of environmental oxygen for cellular metabolism.

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I never said that. I said that God breath into man, "the breath of life" and man became a living soul. My point was that there was a body... but not ensoulment.

So the question is when does life occur... At birth is my answer. Why not at conception....because from conception to birth there is a process. This process is not life. In fact. Let's bring science in to make this more clear....

If you argue that life begins at conception.... Then what about twins. The process of cell division is constantly taking place after conception. The bad thing is this... Scientist have been able to Separate a fertilized egg on the 8th day... and after birth there were twins.

Now if that life was there on day 1... what happened on Day 8? Were scientist somehow able to split a soul? My contention is that there was no ensoulment...To belive otherwise is to say that Scientist are as able as God. This refutes a catholic belief, but what is the basis for that belief?