News for hackers. Stuff that matters.
Re:Why the Guardian is changing the language it uses to desc... by bryanlarsen on Friday June 07, 2019 @12:23PM (#20126190)
It doesn't pump blood. It's not a heart.
Re:Why the Guardian is changing the language it uses to desc... by joelrunyon on Friday June 07, 2019 @02:09PM (#20127194)
I like these types of definitions, but in that case - a heart that "stops" - isn't a heart anymore?

The hard part about drawing lines like this is that it requires it to work on both sides of the life/death spectrum.

Re:Why the Guardian is changing the language it uses to desc... by andrenth on Friday June 07, 2019 @12:33PM (#20126303)
Is it also not a human being? Is it not a life?
Re:Why the Guardian is changing the language it uses to desc... by gtf21 on Friday June 07, 2019 @12:51PM (#20126499)
Inasmuch as a the millions of sperm/eggs that don't make it is a human being, it doesn't really have any human characteristics yet.
Re:Why the Guardian is changing the language it uses to desc... by sparrish on Friday June 07, 2019 @01:07PM (#20126646)
That's just not true. The science is very clear on that.

"Weeks 6 to 7

Arm and leg buds start to grow. Your baby's brain forms into 5 different areas. Some cranial nerves are visible. Eyes and ears begin to form. Tissue grows that will become your baby's spine and other bones. Baby's heart continues to grow and now beats at a regular rhythm. Blood pumps through the main vessels."

https://medlineplus.gov/ency/article/002398.htm

Re:Why the Guardian is changing the language it uses to desc... by gtf21 on Wednesday June 12, 2019 @09:36AM (#20164418)
Ok, that's fair. I was being a little hyperbolic with "it doesn't have any human characteristics yet", which is obviously untrue.

I think the point still stands that at some point you draw an arbitrary line of when mere potential for human life becomes human life, and I wouldn't draw that line early on in the embryo stage.

Re:Why the Guardian is changing the language it uses to desc... by andrenth on Saturday June 08, 2019 @08:00PM (#20136037)
It’s mind-blowing that this comment is flagged.

HN is not afraid to go anti-science when doing so fits the preferred narrative.

Re:Why the Guardian is changing the language it uses to desc... by bryanlarsen on Monday June 10, 2019 @09:23AM (#20146472)
> Baby's heart continues to grow and now beats at a regular rhythm. Blood pumps through the main vessels.

This implies that the heart is pumping the blood; yet I believe that at this point it's still the mother's heart doing the pumping. The author is likely fully aware that readers will be making incorrect assumptions; therefore it should be downvoted to oblivion.

Re:Why the Guardian is changing the language it uses to desc... by sparrish on Friday June 07, 2019 @12:50PM (#20126491)
At the end of the 4th week of gestation, the heartbeats of the embryo begin.

The heart, whose development starts at the 3rd week of gestation, has rapid and irregular contractions capable of pumping the blood inside the vessels.

At this period, the developing circulatory system allows maternal- embryonic nutritive and gaseous changes at the chorionic villi.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3279166/

May not be 'blood' but it's a heart; doing the function of a heart.

It's life.

Re:Why the Guardian is changing the language it uses to desc... by bryanlarsen on Friday June 07, 2019 @03:04PM (#20127647)
In other words, it's not pumping blood.