The bullshit "Christian Right" politicos, which are neither by the way, claim that life begins at conception. I claim they are so closed minded they cannot see the wrong in that statement for all the wrongness they spew.
Life began eons ago. At least on this planet. When the right set of chemicals got together, or some lightning shot this some formerly inert mass and started a biological chain of events that led up to the polluting maggots we are who are trying to destroy the only planet we have to live on, so far.
From that first mitosis. the first time cells were created to be like the other cell which a few minutes ago was just one and is now two. From the first hints of DNA and the little swirly bits we see in all the science show and occasionally in textbooks. THAT'S when Life began.
And it changed and evolved and became single celled paramecium and then plants and fish and dinosaurs and grass and trees and rats and birds and mammals and eventually, people.
Life will not be stopped. A seed blows halfway up a cliff and gets wedged into a crevice. A year or two later, we see a tree. That pesky grass that grows everywhere it wants, except where you planted it, even after a gallon of Round-Up. People who have almost nothing to eat or wear give birth on a daily basis.
I saw the shows on Discovery channel about fish who lay a hundred thousand eggs and maybe only a very small percent survive, but the species continues. The eggs that don't make it are food for others who need that nourishment to continue with their Life. There are animals living at depths of the ocean that would kill a human not protected by a bathysphere. Their methods of survival are mind boggling.
On the desert plains, in Utah, Arizona, and Nevada, there are places where humans are not allowed to tread. There are microscopic plants that live on the top layer of crust. They take tens of years to gather enough moisture and strength to reproduce, but they continue with their Life.
Mayflies live as flying beings for only a day, but reproduce so that the species can go on. Humans live as long as 110 years, but reproduce only in the middle years. Rats procreate several times a year, whales are pregnant up to 18 months.
Some flowers shoot up, flower and die in a matter of a week or two. Redwoods on the California coast germinated before the Common Era. But in both cases, and all those in between, there is a developing and scattering of seed to continue that Life they had.
Why am I thinking about this now? What caused those synapses to fire at this time? Actually I've thought about this since getting the IM from my daughter that she was pregnant. After we got her home from her overseas adventures, I did the stupid dad Q&A thing. "Weren't you on the pill?" "Yes, I was." "What about other protection?" "Oh, yeah, he dressed for the occasion." "Okay, soooo.." " After I called him, he said he thought the condom broke." "Oh"
See what I mean? Life will BE. You just can't stop it! Some say it's a miracle. I am of the opinion that whatever caused that initial electrical pulses in that primordial slop, also gave it perseverance. It will not be stopped. Parts of it will be killed off. Species may disappear because the fester that is man destroys their habitat or hunts them into extinction. But Life itself continues.
As humans, we have invented ways to prolong Life, at least in our own species. There are medicines, herbs, machines, transplants from other beings, surgical techniques, therapies, and whatever else devoted to lengthening the time we have on this planet. Most of the time it is for the benefit of the richest among us, many of those times just for vanities' sake. Sometimes, it just prolongs a suffering life, either emotional or physical or spiritual. Some of those lives are better off left to end when they are supposed to end, rather than be hooked up to tubes and cables just to give an Illusion of living. But since we feel we are the highest form of evolved beings around, we feel it is our Duty to continue to burden this planet with the consumption of its resources.
All of the other life forms live as long as they can and accept the fact they will, at some point in time, no longer be here. And that is most likely why they have not had to invent gods or other heavenly beings to share an afterlife with. Just be born, live out your life as your genetic code and environment dictate, procreate, and die.
Simple.
Life doesn't go on because of an individual. It continues starting back in the ooze straight through to day, and on until the sun goes supernova because of this simplicity. The extension of one life artificially doesn't mean a thing. But the evolution of each species as they have done over the last several million years does. One life means little. Each procreation generates a small change in the species that, over long periods of time, adapts that species to better survive until that supernova occurs.
Included here is a photo of the cause of these musings:
