Just because it could be legal in a country abiding by Islamic law to abort a foetus after 40 days, doesn't make it any less immoral.

And yes, there will more than likely be manned space flights to the outer edge of the Solar System some day. Wouldn't you want to go down in history as the first human to leave the solar system?
Obviously it isn't going to happen for a while... maybe 100 years?
We need more knowledge of what's going on out there (why are Voyagers 1 and 2 so far off course??), and money. Unmanned space flights are so much cheaper just as effective, it's hard to justify the much greater cost of a manned flight.
Provided humanity survives long enough, it is a guarantee that we will at least try to leave the Solar System. Millions of years into the future we will need to flee Earth and the Solar System as the Sun heats up and then balloons into a Red Giant.

Scott Lowe, Sandbach, UK

about abortion and Islam.
In Tunisia abortion is legal

Mestiri, AVIGNON, France

Obviously the scholars are stating thier beliefs
“We believe that on the 40th day the soul is placed in the embryo, and then it develops in its own right."
They are STATING their beliefs on the transofmation from an innert being to a human - THERE IS NO SCIENTIFIC PROOF EITHER WAY, but obviously they are entitled to their beliefs like members of other faiths

Terry Dell, many islamic scholars have medical qualifications - try Dr. Zakir Naik for a start.

J Ferris, Poole, Dorset

That sounds like a common though eronous "Christian" belief about when human life begins. If I remember it correctly it is 40 days males and 80 days for females or the reverse. I guess that is sensible since Islam is a split off from Christianity. That belief does not actually come from the Christian bible as the bible equates the moment of life with the presense of the spirit as is shown in the story of creation where Adam is not a living being until the Spirit enters him. I thought Islam had the same story.

kerwin, Champaign, IL

"Only a lunatic would ... hurtle to the edge of the Solar System with no chance of return." Given that some religious lunatics choose to destroy knowledge and life as they travel towards their own Rubicon, maybe some atheist believers might want to strike a moral blow for their cause by enhancing knowledge as they travel towards their Rubicon on the edges of space?

Nigel, Woking, UK

The theory of our embryo turning human on the 40th day of its formation, or procreation sounds incredible,baseless and highly superstitious. I don't challange or refute the basis of it, as suggested by the Islamic clerics and their theosophical beliefs. There aught to be some scientific basis, an in depth research before propounding or flaoating such ideas or dogmatic views. Gullible and naive minds shall unduly be influenced by it.
How come our soul, if at all it exists ???? , waits for good long 40 days to enter the human foetal body . Are our cells, DNA strands and gene structures, till first forty forty days not "human".Strangely enough, christanity don't believe in Soul-theory.
Perhaps what muslim clerics believed or suggested was, till the foetus in the embryo takes up the shape and definite structure to resemble a "homo sapien" being , it remains in a state of flux . A foetus of an animal or human being may look alike, identical and undemarcated till then. So far so good.

Witty, New Delhi, India

So-called Islamic "scholars" base their insight on the interpretation of a book consisting of nothing but gibberish. Their opinion is scientifically worthless.

ed lancey, London,

What qualifications have islamic scholars in medicine or biology?

Terry Dell, Weybridge, UK