This is a great article on the consciousness of fetuses. When I have a kid, I'm going to take the entire 9 months off and do meditative things to nurture the spiritual and emotional development of this baby. Lots of listening to music, energy work, reading outloud and envisioning of the immense power this human being will have to make positive changes in this universe. I only want one kid so I can focus on nurturing him/her and mentoring his/her development. I will try not to be overbearing and turn him/her gay.

I found this part of the article interesting:

Babies react with alarm to loud noises, car accidents, earthquakes, and even to their mother's watching terrifying scenes on television. They swallow less when they do not like the taste of amniotic fluid, and they stop their usual breathing movements when their mothers drink alcohol or smoke cigarettes.

In a documented report of work via ultrasound, a baby struck accidentally by a needle not only twisted away, but located the needle barrel and hit it repeatedly--surely an aggressive and angry behavior. Similarly, ultrasound experts have reported seeing twins hitting each other, while others have seen twins playing together, gently awakening one another, playing cheek-to-cheek, and and even kissing. Such scenes, some at only 20 weeks g.a., were never anticipated in developmental psychology. No one anticipated sociable behavior nor emotional behavior until months after a baby's birth.

We can see emotion expressed in crying and smiling long before 40 weeks, the usual time of birth. We see first smiles on the faces of premature infants who are dreaming. Smiles and pleasant looks, along with a variety of unhappy facial expressions, tell us dreams have pleasant or unpleasant contents to which babies are reacting. Mental activity is causing emotional activity. Audible crying has been reported by 23 weeks g.a. in cases of abortion, revealing that babies are experiencing very appropriate emotion by that time. Close to the time of birth, medical personnel have documented crying from within the womb, in association with obstetrical procedures which have allowed air to enter the space around the fetal larynx.