Over at ProWomanProLife, Andrea Mrozek suggests that the media coverage of the science of fetal development, if not the science itself, depends on the context: wanted or unwanted. Unwanted unborn children do not feel pain up to 24 weeks, but, “With wanted babies, we are told science shows us that babies are learning in the womb. That prior to birth they are listening to their mothers voices. Responding to cues in their environment.” Of course, this is only the natural consequence of defining the meaningfulness of a child’s life (and thus whether to protect it in law or not) on the intention of the mother to carry the child to term or not.
