conception, identical twins, and the catholic church

magicbastarder

i saw this, and i thought of god:

Semi-identical twins discovered

Scientists have revealed details of the world's only known case of "semi-identical" twins.

The journal Nature says the twins are identical on their mother's side, but share only half their genes on their father's side.

They are the result of two sperm cells fertilising a single egg, which then divided to form two embryos - and each sperm contributed genes to each child.

Each stage is unlikely, and scientists believe the twins are probably unique.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/6498215.stm

does that mean they have one and a half souls between them, or two?

Sangre

2?
I doubt Christians claim identical twins only have one soul.

But since this thread is no doubt in jest....ogga boogga boo.

magicbastarder

Sangre wrote:

2?
I doubt Christians claim identical twins only have one soul.

i've never seen someone claim that, but i understand that the position of the catholic church is that life begins at conception; that's when a soul is created.

since identical twins are the result of a single conception - that the egg splits after conception, there's only one soul to go around...

Dades

This thread is in danger to be terminated early unless it shown to be sufficiently mature.

magicbastarder

if i posted photos of previously terminated threads, would that prevent it?

robindch

> does that mean they have one and a half souls between them, or two?

Or what about one? Because then, only one of them has to be a christian who believes the right things in order to have their eternal (shared) soul saved, while the other can believe whatever they like. Or maybe, each of them just has to half-believe it? Perhaps the beliefs of two agnostics will equal the belief of one Christian? Who knows? I think the bible should be more specific anyway.

Zombrex

It is one of the common arguments against the idea that a zygote is a "being"

If the zygote is a "human being" (call him Bob), but then the cells split to from twins that will eventually become children (call them Frank and John), what happened to "being" that was Bob. Did he die? Or did he simply never exist in the first place. If that is true then the zygote clearly isn't a human being.

Things get more difficult when the idea of gods and souls comes into it. Anti-abortion Christians would say that God knows that the zygote will eventually split, and as such has two souls ready to go, rather than just one. Therefore by terminating the zygote you are actually killing two souls (double homicide)

Having an all knowing, all powerful deity in an argument makes anything possible.

Zillah

Wicknight wrote:

Having an all knowing, all powerful deity in an argument makes anything possible.

"GOAL!!! Wait a second....where did the posts go!?"

lostexpectation

The Atheist wrote:

This thread is in danger to be terminated early unless it shown to be sufficiently mature.

ahh I thought it was both amusing and an intriging thought,

but there plenty of soul to go around