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> fetuses It's not as if the baby somehow magically changes into something else when he or she passes the birth canal.
by otabdeveloper4 7y ago
> fetuses
It's not as if the baby somehow magically changes into something else when he or she passes the birth canal.
- empath75 7y agoMagically, no, but there is a distinct difference from the state where it is enveloped by the mother's womb, physically attached the placenta, drawing nutrition from the umbilical cord, lungs filled with amniotic fluid, to a breathing, crying, eating, independent baby. And of course prior to that, it was a fish like creature with a tail and gills, and prior to that a blastocyst. A baby also doesn't magically transform into a toddler, and a child, and teenager, and a man, and a senior citizen and a corpse, either. And yet somehow we manage to maintain different terms for these stages of life without confusing anyone unduly.
- zdragnar 7y ago> independent baby Yet, we also don't dehumanize people who are on life support in hospitals. In context of the debate around start of life and abortion in the US, at least, both baby and fetus are heavily loaded terms whose meanings are divorced from actual science. Edit: for example, CNN recently retracted certain wording on an anti-infanticide bill for babies born during botched abortions. I believe the wording was something along the lines of "fetus that was born".