I wrote this a while ago as a rant after an online discussion and i never got the chance to post it. So here it is:
A human embryo has the potential to become a human being. An embryo has no claim to humanity other than the DNA/other gubbins it contains. Change the DNA for another chunk of DNA and you no longer have a human.
So does the information in the DNA count as humanity? I hope not, if we have sequenced the DNA of a human, then each copy of this I delete puts me as a murderer.
You cannot make judgement based on something's potential. The obvious example is I have the potential to be a murderer, but you don't arrest me. Any woman is equipped to be a prostitute, but you don't send her to jail.
When the day comes that we can take a computer representation of a cell and hook it up to a machine which will spin a cell from that, then every computer in the world will have the potential to be a father/mother.
Is it intelligence then? I'd argue most dogs show more intelligence than a new born baby, so why do they have different rights? How about disabled adults who either mentally or physically can't perform functions we'd expect of a human.
No, there is no scientific answer to when a human becomes a human; you might as well ask where a rainbow starts.
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