Phil Plait of Bad Astronomy has a penetrating and thoughtful article about proposition 48 in Colorado. This proposition would declare a fertilized human egg "a human", thus elevating nonpersons such as zygotes and blastocysts to full human status. This is an obvious ploy to outlaw abortion and embryonic stem cell research without challenging them directly. Read the article, and if you are a Colorado voter, please, come down on the side of reason, not religion:

When is a human human? (Bad Astronomy):
…There are other vital issues, like how granting civil rights to a collection of cells takes away many civil rights of women, and the huge increase in governmental involvement this would mean in people’s lives. These are important to be sure, but not the point I want to make here. Also, these are age-old arguments, and in fact I can see where intelligent people can come down on opposite sides of them.

The real point is, Prop 48 isn’t about science, and it’s not even about legal issues. It’s about religion. This proposition is obviously based solely on religious beliefs; there is little reason outside of that to even bring the argument up that a fertilized egg is entitled to rights as a human being. It is only the belief that the human soul enters the cell at that moment that this is an issue at all.

Proposition 48 is religion trying to create legislation, pure and simple.…