I particularly enjoy when pro-choice calls the ZEF both a "clump of cells" and a "parasite" in the same post, if not in the same sentence. It cannot be both an organism and a compacted mass at the same time. One or the other.
Of course those statements are not made with the intention of being technically accurate, but instead to divorce humanity from the ZEF so as to make it easier to kill.
??? I have never called the ZEF "a clump of cells." Where do you get this stuff?
I also point out that a zygote or morula or pre-implantation blastocyst cannot correctly be termed a "parasite" on an objective basis because, even though the blastocyst does take nutrients from loose blood sources in the uterus, it could just as easily live outside of the woman's body because it is not biologically attached to her bodily tissue. In fact, it is only from implantation that one can argue that the blastocyst/embryo has a parasitic mode of biological life.
I do understand the argument that a zygote is not an organism, but I do not have a PhD in human biology or zoology. Hence, I do not consider myself a suitable specialist for the specialized scientific debate over whether it is an organism or not (because I do have two graduate degrees and therefore at least some modest respect for specialized professional competence, I think this specialized point of debate should be decided by professional specialists).
At the same time, I do make a distinction between a biological entity with the internal capacity for going through organogenesis without being biologically attached to a biological entity that has already gone through organogenesis and one without that capacity. A human blastocyst, like any mammalian blastocyst, does not have that capacity, whereas the chicken embryo inside its shell has that capacity. I also make a distinction between a biological entity that constitutes an organismic body with specialized organs, i.e., one that has gone through organogenesis, and a biological entity that does not constitute such a body. Mammalian blastocysts do not constitute such bodies.
These are among the many distinctions I make with every intention of being technically accurate.
A human zygote is a human zygote, not a human embryo. A human blastocyst is a human blastocyst and is technically not a human embryo until it begins to implant. A human embryo is a human embryo and not a human fetus. To say a human fetus is not a human is to say that, as long as it continues to be biologically attached to and biologically dependent for life on the body of a human not so biologically attached and dependent on the body of another human, it is not a separate human. That is technically accurate, because merely having unique human DNA is not a sufficient criterion for being a unique human in my book (and the books of many scientists).
To say this does not divorce a human zygote, blastocyst, embryo, or fetus from the species of Homo s. sapiens, but yes, it does divorce all of them from humanity, which is not a scientific term but a philosophical one.
This does not make a zygote, embryo, or fetus "easier to kill." Rather, it is a recognition that they are not human persons because, to be a person, you have to have certain qualities. For me, the minimum qualities are these: you can take in oxygen and nutrients for the functioning of your organism from common sources in the world external to your organism rather than taking away the biological oxygen and nutrients already taken in by another of your species for its organism. Even a conjoined twin that is not a parasitic twin can do that.
I'm frankly tired of conservative anti-abortion people misrepresenting what I say when they aim to insult or demean me. I can make a good case for abortion being legal even if one accepts for the purpose of philosophical experiment the hypothesis that a zygote is a completely developed adult human person, on the grounds of laws against rape, sexual assault, and robbery and laws allowing the use of lethal force in self-defense against those specific crimes.