excerpt:

Moving past a binary concept of life and death is, for most of us, an uncomfortable process. It’s worth considering how various cultures think about the beginning of life. Tibetan monks believe a new life begins around the time of a mating couple’s orgasm; many Catholics posit that it starts at the union of an egg and sperm; Roe v. Wade effectively established a legal threshold of life at 24 weeks of fetal gestation; some consider meaningful life to begin at birth; the Navajo think a baby is fully human when it laughs for the first time.

Read the full article | Print this article