Pro-choice authors Harold J Morowitz and James S Trefil describe brain development in pre-born babies. They are counting from a woman’s last menstrual period, so when they say seven weeks, they mean five weeks from conception (embryonic age):
“At seven weeks, the eye bud is easy to see, and the various bumps and wiggles in the embryo mark places where divisions between different parts of the brain will occur later… At 11 weeks the broad outlines of the familiar human brain are already in place, although a great deal of elaboration is still to come…
All three regions of the brain develop together, and the cells that will give rise to all of them are clearly visible in the four-week embryo… The development of the brain is a smooth continuum, with no place where sharp distinctions can be drawn…
The cells that will eventually be part of the cerebral cortex begin forming in the seven-week embryo… Even at this early stage of development…the brain cannot be thought of as something that is simply a collection of nerve cells. It has a highly complex structure, and it would not function if that structure were not present.”
Harold J Morowitz and James S Trefil The Facts of Life: Science in the Abortion Controversy (New York: Oxford University Press, 1992) 91 – 92, 100, 101, 117
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