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When does life begin? This is an important question because many people have abortions thinking that they are not committing murder, but if the unborn baby is alive, then it is murder.

The ethics view (not the legal view) of the word "murder" is that it means killing a person unjustly. "A person" is any being capable now or in the future of intelligence superior to that of animals. Born babies are capable of superior intelligence in the future, so unborn babies are too. This is why this definition was used: a born baby is considered a person despite not having superior intelligence now. A "being" may be "a single existence capable now or in the future of conscious thought." A being need not have conscious thought now because a sleeping person is considered a being. An unborn baby is capable of conscious thought in the future.

However, is this enough to be considered a being, or must one also be alive? Since we don't know what life is, we should define "being" by life's aspects. Only things that affect one's classification as "being" directly should be included in its definition. The important possible aspects of life are birth, death, and conception. Aside from breathing, there are no important physical changes at birth, and we cannot classify based on spiritual changes because we cannot know them, and one does not necessarily stop being a "being" when one stops breathing, so birth should not affect this definition.

Death stops one's classification as a being, and the physical changes at death are cessation of cell activity and cessation of brain activity. Cessation of cell activity can cause one to stop being classified as a "being," so it should be added to the definition.

Brain activity only affects life in that without it, cell activity stops being maintained, so it does not cause death directly, and not all living existences have brain activity to begin with, so it should not affect this definition through life. It does bring up an important topic, though. Should a change in mental state through growth of the brain then birth be equated with a change in mental state through waking up? It can be said that in both cases, the existence has the potential for a more conscious mental state, but the difference is that one has the potential for it to occur now, while the other only has the potential for it to occur later. It is then more accurately equated to someone in a coma who will eventually wake up, and such a person is still considered a being.

This does not

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