# When life begins and ends...

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-life-begins-and-ends/186928>\
**Category:** Great Debates\
**Created:** [July 8, 2003, 3:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-life-begins-and-ends/186928 "2003-07-08T03:44:49Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 4\
**Page:** 3

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**Author:** ![antechinus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/fbc32d/32.png) [@antechinus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/antechinus)\
**Post date:** [July 18, 2003, 1:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-life-begins-and-ends/186928/41 "2003-07-18T01:49:59Z")

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> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by robertliguori \*  
> \*\*Damn but this OP has been hijacked to all hell and back.
> 
> If I may rephrase the OP slightly: We agree that when someone stops having certain recognizable features (heartbeat, breathing unaided, brain activity, etc.) they are dead. Does this imply that before they have these features they aren’t alive, and if so, why not? \*\*

Yes, when these features are nonexistant, the person is called ‘dead’ - that is, we can say with a high degree of confidence that their **concious self has permanently ceased to exist**. But, of course, there is life in the body that continues. The persons own DNA will continue to exist for a while and even replicate. There are billions of organisms in the body that also continue to replicate.

Before a body has these features, it does not have a concious self. When we refer to someone as ‘alive’ we are not refering to any life that the body possesses, but rather their concious self.

So again, it a matter of the concious self stopping and starting, not ‘life’ stopping and starting. Life is a continuum.

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**Author:** ![wonky](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wonky/32/393_2.png) [@wonky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wonky)\
**Post date:** [July 18, 2003, 2:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-life-begins-and-ends/186928/42 "2003-07-18T02:05:50Z")

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> [@](#):
>
> \*Originally posted by antechinus \*  
> \*\*Life is a continuum. \*\*

I thought it was a cabaret?  
So, would everyone in the thread agree that “dead” isn’t the opposite of “alive,” and thus the matter of determining the moment of death doesn’t have an analogy in the “moment” of life, or am I jumping the gun?

Julie

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**Author:** ![anmittal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/41988e/32.png) [@anmittal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/anmittal)\
**Post date:** [July 18, 2003, 10:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-life-begins-and-ends/186928/43 "2003-07-18T10:48:28Z")

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Life begins when you start dreaming…you start hoping…you start caring…  
and subsequently life ends when you stop dreaming/ hoping/ caring…!!!

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**Author:** ![newcrasher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/b3f665/32.png) [@newcrasher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/newcrasher)\
**Post date:** [July 18, 2003, 5:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/when-life-begins-and-ends/186928/44 "2003-07-18T17:05:43Z")

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Oi vey!

What an entrance to the Straight Dope…

Welcome aboard **anmittal** …

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