The two terms certainly do apply. But they require finer resolution of meaning that what we might find in a stock Webster dictionary.
Each fertilized ovum has a human character, a logic (or "nature"), if you will, that is biologically compatible with every other human and that can biologically transmit humanity via any other human within the human sexual scheme. Yet, each fertilized human ovum is a unique genetic individual instance of humanity- unlike any other human instance. Accordingly, it's developmental expression is unique inasmuch as it occurs with different physical material, within different space and time from all other instances of humanity. The term "self-expresion" applies even to the fertilized ovum because it develops of its human biological character along the same human trajectory as all other humans, but in its unique and personal way.
This process of individual human self-expression continues in humans until the human no longer takes part in the carbon cycle. It is responsible for such uniquely human yet personal expressions as cell-division, which produce such uniquely human and yet personal expressions as brains, arms, legs and eyes, which produce such human and personal expressions as thought, hugging, walking and sight, which produce such uniquely human and personal expressions as personality, feelings and ideas through speech and art. Your definition was correct, but highly imprecise. It began in consideration of only some arbitrary point in the middle of humanity. A truer definition will begin at man's very beginning - which is conception.
The term "offspring" now obviously applies to fertilized human ovums, since such unique but human instances necessarily have "sprung off" from the human bipolar scheme mentioned above. |
