“I always took for granted,” wrote political philosopher John Rawls, “that the writers we were studying were much smarter than I was. If they were not, why was I wasting my time and the students’ time by studying them?” There is no doubt that Rawls, a man who is often referred to as the most significant political philosopher of the 20th century, was a much, much smarter man than I will ever be. While I don’t subscribe to his particular form of liberalism, I do think his views should be afforded due consideration.
“If I saw a mistake in their arguments,” continued Rawls, “I supposed those writers saw it too and must have dealt with it. But where? I looked for their way out, not mine. Sometimes their way out was historical: in their day the question need not be raised, or wouldn’t arise and so couldn’t then be fruitfully discussed.” To my knowledge, embryo destruction was not an issue raised by the Harvard professor. But I think Rawls work could shed much needed light on this ethically troublesome area.*
One concept that I believe is particularly useful is the infamous and controversial thought experiment first articulated in A Theory of Justice. Beginning with a minimal assumption about human nature and morality, he attempted to develop the principle of justice under which it would be most reasonable for people to choose to live. The just social life, according to Rawls, could be derived from a thought experiment in which people imagined an "original position" where they decide upon social rules. In order to maximize fairness, the philosopher proposed that the rules be developed from behind a "veil of ignorance" which prevents their knowing anything about their own situation in the hypothesized society:
Among the essential features of this situation is that no one knows his place in society, his class position or social status, nor does any one know his fortune in the distribution of natural assets and abilities, his intelligence, strength, and the like. The principles of justice are chosen from behind a veil of ignorance. This ensures that no one is advantaged or disadvantaged in the choice of principles by the outcome of natural chance or the contingency of social circumstances. Since all are similarly situated and no one is able to design principles to favor his particular condition, the principles of justice are the result of a fair agreement or bargain….The original position is, one might say, the appropriate initial status quo, and thus the fundamental agreements reached are fair. This explains the propriety of the name “justice is fairness”: it conveys the idea that the principles of justice are agreed to in a state that is fair. (pg. 12)
Rather than revisiting the well-trampled arguments for whether this line of reasoning is valid, I’ll simply concede that assumption and use it as the terra firma upon which out current controversy can stand. How then can we apply the veil of ignorance to embryo destruction? The initial starting point, I believe, is to determine what category (if any) the embryo belongs.
Normally, the concept of personhood comes into play when evaluating the moral status of embryonic human life. But throughout history denying “personhood” has been a way to rationalize the injustice done to members of the human species. Surely if any category should be held in suspension behind the veil it is the determination of who is and is not a “person.”
Regardless of the semantic games we choose to play with these beings, the undeniable genetic and ontological fact is that embryos are members of the human species. To exclude humans based on the particular stage of developmental they happen to be passing through would be contrary to the thought experiment's concept of justice. Moral considerations based on functional criteria, such as intellect and awareness, are strictly verboten behind the veil. Embryos can't be excluded from protection without also jeopardizing the moral status of the senile, the temporarily comatose, and even patients under general anesthesia.
Since we cannot reasonably exclude humans passing through the embryonic stage of development, we must determine what actions should be allowed or disallowed in regards to their treatment. The relevant question, in this case, is whether justice allows human beings to be killed without their consent in order to advance the cause of biomedical research. It is a safe assumption to conclude that no one favors being killed in order that scientific research may progress unimpeded. What we would not consent to have done to us, we should not allow to be done to our fellow humans. “Each person possesses an inviolability founded on justice that even the welfare of society as a whole cannot override,” said Rawls, “For this reason, justice ... does not allow that the sacrifices imposed on a few are outweighed by the larger sum of advantages enjoyed by many."
*What follows is, at best, a prolegomena to a defensible, well-articulated argument. The limits of space (and attention) afforded in a blog post prevent me from doing more that sketching a broad outline. The details will have to be addressed and defended at another time.
(HT: Crooked Timber for the first quote.)
1
I like the drift of your thought, but I'm not sure Rawlsian "justice = fairness" can help you here.
Here's the problem: who sits in the meeting?
Is it all of us, in the condition we actually are in, with only our own status in the New Order wiped from our thoughts? If so, how will an embryo have a voice at our conference?
Is it all of us in a completely hypothetical state, in which we are adults, articulate, yet un-shaped by any actual life experience? How then will we have any good sense about what's fair or not in the world?
More to the point: those who don't think the embryo is capable of having a meaningful voice will not think so in Rawls thought-experiment, either; and those who do, will. This will only reify existing divisions of opinion, I'm afraid.
I *want* to find the argument that's persuasive on the subject, because I agree with you, but I can't think this is going to be it.
Cheers,
PGE
2
I agree with Pgepps' objection.
Perhaps Joe's argument could be saved, though, by allowing the embryo to have his hypothetical future voice speak on his behalf.
I have a different objection.
Joe objects to questioning the personhood of embryonic human life.
But consider someone with a gangrenous arm. He must amputate the arm in order to preserve the rest of his body.
Is amputating the arm a kind of killing of human life? Technically speaking it is, but no one would ever think of it in those terms when trying to decide whether to amputate the arm.
If one day a scientist can extract stem cells from a three-day-old blastocyst and use it to save someone's life (or their mind), perhaps that is not any worse than amputating a gangrenous limb.
And seeing how ancient and medieval tradition viewed ensoulment as contemporaneous with quickening, at about 40 days gestation, there doesn't seem to be any prima facie biblical prohibition of such a procedure either.
The problem here is that you either allow a procedure to be done or you don't, and people are going to be divided into two camps over it.
It's not enough to just announce your position and explain why it makes sense. You also have to demonstrate why the opposite camp doesn't have a leg to stand on, and that is much more difficult.
And if you can't convincingly demonstrate why the other camp is out of order, then some sort of compromise will have to be negotiated. At least, that is what will have to happen once we leave the world of theoretical bio-ethics and actually deal with making policy with real-live embryos and sick people.
posted on 06.02.2005 2:05 AM3
MG, I believe your amputation example fails for the reason that amputating an arm is not being done to kill the whole person, but to save the rest of the person. It isn't in any sense killing a human life. Removing the stem cells from an embryo that is specifically created for the use of another person, kills a person to save a person.
A more valid example is taking a heart out of another living, healthy person, and putting it into someone who needs a heart transplant.
PGEPPS:If so, how will an embryo have a voice at our conference?
Substitute infant for embryo and see how the argument plays out.
I *want* to find the argument that's persuasive on the subject, because I agree with you, but I can't think this is going to be it.
I agree. No one can completely shed past experience and beliefs to follow this line of reasoning.
I think the persuasive argument that may work is just starting to form and it involves taking the procedure to its logical conclusion. As I understand it, if ESCs were to find some useful medical use, you couldn't just use any ESCs. The ESCs have to match your DNA. So, they literally have to clone you to get the ESCs. Suddenly, the argument that the ESCs are coming from IVF left-over embryos is mute. Now, we are talking about egg harvesting (at present, not necessarily a harmless procedure), cloning, and specifically killing the clone.
I've seen a couple of articles by people who support ESCR, who once they understood the ramifications are a bit more wary of what is happening.
posted on 06.02.2005 6:11 AM4
The point of the Original Position is not that it is actually a place where we might all (or our representatives might) deliberate, but rather it's simply a device for getting us out of our skins, as it were. It's a way to try to get us to think as if we weren't who we are - so I don't think PGE's worries are that big of a deal.
posted on 06.02.2005 9:08 AM5
Chris,
Your point is quite correct: the blastocyst, which has a separate identity of some sort, is destroyed or "harvested".
But my point still remains: is tearing apart a blastocyst really any more violent and harmful than cutting off a limb? I personally would tend to think it's a much less serious thing to do, although I readily see where you and Joe are coming from.
And a peron's limb, while obviously not a separate individual with any right to life, does have just as much structure and life and functionality as a 3-day-old blastocyst (considerably more actually).
Perhaps if technology ever gets that far, a limb might even have the potential to generate a separate person through some sort of cloning process, so that even that distinction between a blastocyst and a limb might become largely moot.
posted on 06.02.2005 9:41 AM6
Aren't a certain percentage of these embryos destroyed by simply thawing them out?
-
7
You introduce early on in this discussion the concept of consent.
But herein lies the real problem with trying to present a reasoned argument.
An embryo cannot consent. A fetus cannot consent. Nor can either be held "responsible" for anything.
Yet without such capacities you still seem to think that "personhood" applies.
If you really are to maintain any semblance of consistency in your argument, then please explain why experimentation on any living tissue is not as morally repugnant as experimentation on embryonic tissue.
Please do not glibly reply that a fish egg or a seed or a plant frond is not a person, because the criteria used by you for personhood certainly does not require any "actual" attributes normally ascribed to personhood.
posted on 06.02.2005 11:01 AM8
Matthew--It is certainly more harmful to the blastocyst. Removing a limb, in general does not destroy the person; tearing apart the blastocyst does destroy it. Plus there is the concept of informed consent. If a person has a gangrenous limb, the limb is only removed after the person (or his medical attorney in fact) is informed of the risks and consequences of leaving or removing the limb and consent is obtained. Who gives consent for the human being at the blastocyst stage of development?
posted on 06.02.2005 11:08 AM9
eddie--An infant also has those same characteristics (unable to provide consent or be held legally responsible for actions), as does a toddler. Do you have a problem applying "personhood" at those stages of human development?
posted on 06.02.2005 11:12 AM10
In a related story
http://americablog.blogspot.com/2005/06/bushs-snowflake-adoption-program.html
------------------
Couples must agree to adoption-like procedures: receiving families are screened and must undergo counseling, and Snowflakes allows donating and receiving families to designate criteria for each other, meet and maintain contact after birth. Adopting couples must agree not to abort any embryos.
Those conditions were fine with Bob and Angie Deacon of Virginia Beach, Va., who donated their 13 embryos after having twins and being discouraged from another pregnancy by a doctor. "With another program, to be honest with you, they could have been adopted by lesbian parents, and I'm totally against that," said Mr. Deacon, 35.
It took two and a half years to bring themselves to fill out the papers. On their forms, they said the adopting family must be conservative Christians
------------------------
Let's see. Last time I checked, discrimination of this sort by a program taking government funds was unconstitutional.
11
Pgepps is right in that you can never divorce yourself from your life experiences. There is no possible way you can determine your position on an issue if you had been exposed to different life experiences than you were, for your present life experiences even direct that hypothetical train-of-thought. The original argument is that of philosophical origin, not religious- I think this is the main point that can be extracted from the Rawl's argument. Greg Koukl does exactly the same thing in determining there are only 4 reasons someone can justify abortion (including destruction of human embryos): size, location, functionality or level of development, and level of dependence.
There is no comparison between human tissue and human life. An arm is composed of living human tissue which is a part of the human "life" (the person). An embryo is that person, at a earlier stage of development, size and functionality, and happens to be temporarily located in a womb (or freezer these days).
Matthew Goggins: And a peron's limb, while obviously not a separate individual with any right to life...
MG, isn't this the point at which you conceded your argument?
seminaryblogger
posted on 06.02.2005 12:45 PM12
I think I agree with the argument that "there is no comparison between human tissue and human life." I think a closer analogue would be, if I'm allowed to conflate bioresearch and foreign policy, war, especially with a conscripted army. If it's not permitted to sacrifice a few for the possible survival of many in bioresearch, is it not forbidden to do so to protect a nation? There are arguments against this, e.g. the impossibility of consciencious objection on the part of an embryo, but, in general, it seems to me that if you go wading through the liberal waters, the pacifism crab is eventually gonna bite your foot. I feel this way about Christianity, too, incidentially.
posted on 06.02.2005 1:12 PM13
eddiehaskel :
You have a very good point here, and is one reason that many people are strongly morally opposed to this devaluation - yes, devaluation of human life.
It is positively Orwellian: by equating zygotes (don't like that word? how about embryo: An organism in its early stages of development, especially before it has reached a distinctively recognizable form) with people, these "pro-life" folks are in effect devaluing human life, making it easier to equate human life with non-life.
To these people, living, breathing humans as well as late term fetuses are equal to organisms that have not reached a distinctively recognizable form.
And they call themselves "pro-life"?????
posted on 06.02.2005 1:13 PM14
ColinM:
A person's limb actually does have a "right to life;" (albeit because it is a dependent part of a person) that's why it's considered a wrongful action when somebody cuts it off.
posted on 06.02.2005 1:15 PM15
mumon, you're missing the point. The human embryo is a HUMAN embryo. Not a fish or frog or fern. HUMAN and nothing else.
The question is when this HUMAN becomes a PERSON. If at some stage of development, then what? Precisely, exactly, what stage? At moment X it is a human non-person, and at moment X+.001 second it is a human person.
What's that point? How do we measure it?
Scientifically, the moment of conception IS that instant. When the first sperm penetrates the egg, an instantaneous chemical reaction takes place that prohibits any other sperm from getting in. At point X, you have an egg surrounded by a million sperm. At X+.001s, you have a fertilized egg, a unique combination of human DNA.
If that's not the starting point of personhood, what is?
btw - the gangrenous limb argument is specious. A limb is not a person; it is a part of a person.
It's not wrong to experiment on human tissue. However, it IS wrong to kill a person to obtain the tissue. There is no functional difference between ESCR and Mengele's experiments on Jewish prisoners. In both cases, the experimenter convinced himself that the subject was not a person.
16
@Chris--
I'm not sure I think this argument would hold up on infanticide, even. Of course, my issue is with the suasive power of this argument, not with Joe's position. I think Rawls has sharp limits, and these are they . . .
@QD--
Of course, Rawls meant this as a thought exercise. Its conclusions, though, will be useless, as they will only reify existing divisions of opinion. The only thing Rawls allows us to factor out is *conscious* objectivism/utilitarianism where it cuts *against* what would otherwise be our "moral" inclination.
I mean, when I was a college debater, we used Rawls all the time. He was a hecka lot of fun. But then, we also used Hegel to justify the assertion that maximum freedom was achieved in the most totalitarian State. ;-)
Cheers,
PGE
17
Colinm:
An embryo is that person, at a earlier stage of development, size and functionality, and happens to be temporarily located in a womb (or freezer these days).
It occurs to me that one potentially significant difference between a blastocyst and an infant or adult is that the blastocyst lacks what, for want of a better term, I might call "integrity of identity"
If you cut a piece off an infant or an adult, you'll have an injured person and a piece of meat. There is no problem distinguishing which piece is the person and which is the meat. If you cut piece off a blastocyst, you have two genetically identical blastocysts neither of which is readily identifiable as the orginal blastocyst and both of which can go on to develop into different people.
If you smash two adults together, you get two bruised people. Do it hard enough and you get two messily dead people. If you smash two blastocysts together (with care), you can get a new, viable chimeric blastocyst that is not identical to either of the original blastocysts.
Both of these processes can occur naturally to early embryos but not to adult people.
This constitutes a significant difference between blastocysts and those entities that we all agree are people. If accepted, this argument would imply that fetuses are people, since they have "integrity of identity" like infants and adults (therefore abortion = bad). But blastocysts are not people(therefore ESCR possibly acceptable).
Joe:
Surely if any category should be held in suspension behind the veil it is the determination of who is and is not a “person.”
Not according to Rawls. You quote: "Each person possesses an inviolability founded on justice that even the welfare of society as a whole cannot override." Since Rawl's argument is all about justice to people, determination of personhood would have to be performed prior to application of Rawl's thought experiment. If not, what is the logical reason for restricting Rawl's argument solely to the species Homo sapiens? Why should personhood but not species lie behind the veil of ignorance?
posted on 06.02.2005 2:02 PM18
Nick:
If you take a professional swimmer and submerge him underwater for three minutes, then bring him back up, he will start breathing on his own. If you take, say, a grandmother and do the same, she likely will not be breathing on her own, and will be dead without medical intervention that may or may not be successful. In either case, they are both ontologically human persons. Each has different physical characteristics determined by their stage of development.
This is where your logic fails. Hopefully we can agree that a fertilized egg is an embryo. This embryo may have physical properties different from you and I as it is developing, but that doesn't change its ontology. Because it can be split by scientists into parts unrecognizeable to the human eye means, well, nothing. Your logic progresses from a developmental and physical difference to a sudden proclamation that blastocysts are not people.
seminaryblogger
posted on 06.02.2005 2:56 PM19
The only way I can see to coherently believe it is OK to dissociate a blastocyst is if you believe human life has no transcendent meaning, is ultimately absurd. Lots of people clearly do believe that. Do they understand the inevitable consequence?
If you believe there is no transcendent meaning to life, as far as I can see you are left with sentiment, "feelings", or power. How does that feel to you? Do you trust unrestrained human ambition and emotion? I surely don't. Neither do the 100 million people who died last century under Marxist regimes that denied transcendence.
A blastocyst is human (well, a human blastocyst is human!) and is clearly alive. Left in its normal environment, it will develop into a fully functioning human being just like you and me. The whole "personhood" definition is just a dodge, a rationalization to allow people to do what they want rather than what is right.
On some level, we all know that a species that kills its own young is headed for disaster sooner or later. I think there is room for hope here, however. The most outspoken leftist intellectuals have the lowest birthrates, and so in a few generations Darwin would predict that they will die out. Catholics, Evangelicals, and Muslims will inherit the earth...
posted on 06.02.2005 3:19 PM20
corrie :
The question is when this HUMAN becomes a PERSON. If at some stage of development, then what? Precisely, exactly, what stage? At moment X it is a human non-person, and at moment X+.001 second it is a human person
Why do you assume it has to be all at once at a discrete, single point in time?
Scientifically, the moment of conception IS that instant.
No, not "scientifically," but rather according to your particular viewpoint, at your particular relativist morality.
And yes, relativist: when's the last time you knew someone who had a funeral service for a zygote that failed to implant (the result of 1/3 of all conceptions)?
A limb is not a person; it is a part of a person.
Limbs have stem cells, which, under the right conditions...could become persons.
Jim:
The only way I can see to coherently believe it is OK to dissociate a blastocyst is if you believe human life has no transcendent meaning, is ultimately absurd. Lots of people clearly do believe that. Do they understand the inevitable consequence?
posted on 06.02.2005 3:29 PM21
Because it can be split by scientists into parts unrecognizeable to the human eye means, well, nothing.
That's not even close to what I wrote. I wrote that a blastocyst can be split (or can split naturally) into parts that are clearly recognizable as multiple embryos. Similarly, multiple embryos can be combined (or recombine naturally) into what is clearly recognizable as a single embryo.
An early embryo has the potential to develop into a person. It has the potential to develop into two or more people. It has the potential to develop into part of a person. It can do all this without artificial manipulation. This characteristic of embryos is relevant to their ontological personhood, while the ability to hold one's breath is not. Can one be simultaneously one person, many people, and part of a person?
posted on 06.02.2005 3:35 PM22
A blastocyst is human (well, a human blastocyst is human!) and is clearly alive. Left in its normal environment, it will develop into a fully functioning human being just like you and me. The whole "personhood" definition is just a dodge, a rationalization to allow people to do what they want rather than what is right.
But most are not in their 'normal environment'. Most are frozen in IVF labs where they are 'extras' and will either be destroyed when they are thawed out or will 'spoil' in a few years.
posted on 06.02.2005 3:41 PM23
That's one of the great myths. Most are still "possibles" for implantation, and there are embryo adoption services that are taking up many of the rest. We don't really know how many years they stay viable.
It is true that our IVF labs have produced a lot of extra embryos. I would argue that producing so many people is, in itself, unethical. Germany agrees; they have about 30 orphaned embryos, total.
Besides, so what if they are unwanted? Why is it OK to kill them for research, just because they aren't wanted by their parents? Is it ok to kill an unwanted homeless person? We observed African-American men with syphilis rather than treating them less than 60 years ago. Was that OK? Would it be OK to empty orphanages to do research on the children?
posted on 06.02.2005 3:51 PM24
Nick:
Can one be simultaneously one person, many people, and part of a person?
You mean like being Father, Son and Holy Spirit at the same time?
I agree I misunuderstood your statement about the embryo being unrecognizable, etc. But that doesn't take away from my point, or that your logic isn't valid.
You are very confident about things scientists only "believe" happen. (See http://www.ama-assn.org/ama/pub/category/print/13564.html from the AMA about blastomere separation). Having the potential to be two persons, or even containing two persons in one entity, is a developmental trait, like I specified. Siamese twins are two people in one body; or two bodies currently joined together, kind of like the cells in a blastocyst.
seminaryblogger
25
Here's the problem: who sits in the meeting?Who sits in "the meeting" for the coma patient, the mentally ill and/or retarded? I have a problem with the whole thought experiment I haven't ironed out - but someone will be representing those that cannot represent themselves at the meeting.
Larry
So nice of your to drop by with your unresearched strawman:
discrimination of this sort by a program taking government funds was unconstitutional1. Went to the link you cited; and to Snowflakes. There is no evidence of government funding.
Nightlight is a 501(c)(3) non-profit agency. All fees paid by adoptive parents as well as any fundraising efforts throughout the year cover all agency expenses.2. I found this interesting:
The adoption agreement and relinquishment forms are legal contracts between the two families. As there are no laws regarding adoption of embryos, we have created the contract to match the current position of the courts that the embryos are property. The contract covers the transfer of property and also includes additional adoption language. These legal forms are signed and executed prior to the embryos being shipped to the adoptive parents clinic and before the embryos are implanted in the adoptive mother.In private adoptions, do you get to pick the new parent of your child? Of course you do.
Just a little ethical thought experiment for you: would you prefer to have the embryos die in the freezer, or be flushed down a toilet, or go a parent of the property owners choice.
Eddiehaskell
please explain why experimentation on any living tissue is not as morally repugnant as experimentation on embryonic tissue.Because the middle finger of your right hand does not have an independent future like yours
Tyler Simons
war, especially with a conscripted army. If it's not permitted to sacrifice a few for the possible survival of many in bioresearch, is it not forbidden to do so to protect a nationWhy don't we have conscription? The country was ripped apart not only over Vietnam, but the draft itself. I doubt it will ever come back - and certainly not in a cause the country doesn't generally support. Once you take conscription out of your argument - my 24 year old daughter decided herself to join the Navy.
Mumon
breathing humans as well as late term fetuses are equal to organisms that have not reached a distinctively recognizable form . . . And they call themselves "pro-life"?I generally have a lot of respect for your opinions - but really - this is awful. First, the saying is pro-life; not pro-human. Second, you have no rational, scientific basis for your opinion either - it just allows you to justify the taking of lives with a future like yours. The physicians code of ethics for taking care of mothers who are pregnant refers to the infant as equally the doctor's patient - his responsibility to protect. It does not say a clump of cells gradually becoming a patient that he/she then has to protect. The AMA's positions are that a doctor should follow the law; and that the law should never force a doctor to perform an abortion. [Because there is no "science" that can say when humanness or personhood begins]
Limbs have stem cells, which, under the right conditions...could become persons.Can you link something that shows how a stem cell taken from your arm can grow into an individual with a future like yours? And you have to avoid anything having to do with cloning. I am not a biology wiz but I think this was a real reach.
Nick
If you smash two blastocysts together (with care), you can get a new, viable chimeric blastocyst that is not identical to either of the original blastocysts.Again, could you link this process? I think if you combine two embryos with separate DNA - however carefully - you will have something that has no chance of a future like yours. They have enough problem in actual animal cloning with unexplained degeneration of the genome - with resultant and frequent tumors; that I doubt you could make the case that you "smushed together" blastocytes could ever develop into a person. Hence, your "integrity of identity" thesis is wrong. posted on 06.02.2005 4:37 PM
26
Colinm
You mean like being Father, Son and Holy Spirit at the same time?
Cute, but do you really believe that human persons share that characteristic of God.
You are very confident about things scientists only "believe" happen. (See http://www.ama-assn.org/ama/pub/category/print/13564.html from the AMA about blastomere separation).
Yes, and that article does nothing to shake my confidence. The article refers to two possible ways monozygotic twins can be generated: either by blastomere separation or by division of a blastocyst. I was not referring solely to blastomere separation. In fact, I was thinking more of blastocyst splitting. Either way, formation of identical twins must involve division of a single embryo into two embryos. That is in no way a "belief" of scientists. How else would sexual reproduction result in two genetically identical organisms?
In addition to identical twins, I was also referring to tetragametic chimeras which are formed by fusion of two independent embryos that then develop into a single adult. This also occurs naturally.
Having the potential to be two persons, or even containing two persons in one entity, is a developmental trait, like I specified.
Yes, so you asserted. And I have asserted that having the potential to be two persons is incompatible with actually being one person. I would agree that having the potential to be two persons is compatible with having the potential to be a person but not with actually being a single, specific person.
Siamese twins are two people in one body; or two bodies currently joined together, kind of like the cells in a blastocyst.
Yes, siamese twins are two people in bodies that are joined together. They result from incomplete twinning of a single embryo. But are you really arguing that the cells in a blastocyst are like that -- dozens of different people joined together in a ball of cells? Or are you simply agreeing that the cells in the blastocyst are potentially multiple people? That is different from the state of siamese twins as actual different people.
If an early embryo is a person, the following questions should be easy to answer:
Assume an embryo is person A. If it splits into two embryos, do we now have person A and person B? If so, which one is person A?
Or do we have person B and person C. If so, where did person A go?
Same deal with tetragametic fusion. If embryo A and embryo B fuse, is the result person C? if so, where did A and B go?
27
Just posted this on the Huffington thread, but thought it might see more action here:
Somebody please humor me on this:
If we could guarantee that the ending of a life would be absolutely painless to and strike absolutely no fear or regret or sadness in the life being ended; and that absolutely no one left behind would care at all, would the ending of a life in and of itself be all that terrible? Again, the conditions are that the life being ended at one moment is experiencing normal everyday hubbub, the next instant, his experience is no more. AND The life and emotions of absolutely no one left behind are affected at all. On what grounds would one object to this, and, under these conditions, who would do the objecting?
posted on 06.02.2005 5:21 PM28
Ed, you are brilliant. You just solved the homeless problem. I think we can posit that a drive by shooting with an expert marksman with a high power hunting rifle would not cause pain. And being a good utilitarian, you could even argue that it is even better than "not affected at all", it actually improves conditions in the city! Killing one decrepit individual raises the total happiness level in the world.
[I would, of course object. Being a decently raised person who didn't take too much philosophy, the very idea horrifies me. Why? Who cares?]
posted on 06.02.2005 5:53 PM29
Ed
If we could guarantee that the ending of a life would be absolutely painless to and strike absolutely no fear or regret or sadness in the life being endedI'll humor you slightly; but this is perhaps the scariest question I have ever seen asked. Are you trying to talk yourself into killing some sleeping hermit you know? [The question of how this affects others is not an issue to me]:
1) Guarantee - how?
2) regret is the only part of the fear, regret and sadness I think even matters - and it only slightly. This entity has future experiences, activities, projects, and enjoyments which it would lose - whether aware of those or not; or regret them or not.
For instance, since a one day old infant isn't aware of all this - it isn't enough for me that the entity will not feel regret. Also, a sleeping person could die the way you say and never feel regret, fear, sadness. Someone who is deeply depressed and suicidal may welcome death - but the anti-depressants a doctor may prescribe may turn that around.
So, I will only grant this discussion for someone who objectively has no future experiences, activities, projects, and enjoyments objectively worth having. How do you measure that?
So, show me the terminally ill patient in continuous pain and/or agony with no desire to live and no hope of recovery - maybe we can talk. The brain dead patient on life support maybe we can talk. Terry Schiavo maybe we could talk.
But even in those three cases - who would do the objecting? Perhaps (and perhaps not) God. And since no one can prove God doesn't have an interest in this matter - why play this word game.
30
Jim,
I don't know that any process, such as gunfire, that doesn't utilize some sort of chemical process within the body would be absolutely painless. But, for the sake of interaction, let's assume it would be. So a homeless guy is killed absolutely painlessly and experiences absolutely no mental anguish at the prospect beforehand. How do you object to it? Going further, let's say you are the homeless guy. Absolutely zero pain, absolutely zero mental anguish. And as for those left behind, no one is upset, a greater good is served. On what grounds do you object? Sort of asking, if a tree falls in the woods and no one's around AND the tree doesn't even experience it, does anyone or any tree care? Assuming that for now we are dealing purely in the realm of theoretical possibility, I'm wondering if pro-lifers would object to such a scenario involving the unborn, and on what grounds.
posted on 06.02.2005 6:16 PM31
JCH,
Just know that I'm replying to you right now but wanted to immediately stress that I'm attempting to apply the scenario to the unborn and that the homeless guy question was Jim's.
More soon
posted on 06.02.2005 6:19 PM32
JCH,
1) Guarantee - how
First of all, it is entirely theoretically possible, and I'd wager even practically possible. Anaesthesia, anyone?
JCH: So, I will only grant this discussion for someone who objectively has no future experiences, activities, projects, and enjoyments objectively worth having. How do you measure that?
What does any of that matter if the person absolutely never knows the difference?
JCH: since no one can prove God doesn't have an interest in this matter - why play this word game.
Since no one can prove God is there or does have an interest in the matter, why take the possibility of his concern into account? Furthermore, if the person experiences no physical or mental ("spiritual") discomfort whatsoever, why would God object, except at having his undefeatable "plan" defeated? Even furthermore, since no one can prove the real creator of the blue and white sky isn't a very shy smurf who made up Christianity to conceal his true identity, why not take that possibility into account?
posted on 06.02.2005 6:32 PM33
JCH: So, I will only grant this discussion for someone who objectively has no future experiences, activities, projects, and enjoyments objectively worth having. How do you measure that?
Ed: What does any of that matter if the person absolutely never knows the difference?
Further to this, if that does matter, do you weep for all of the souls never even created who could have had future experiences and never knew the difference?
posted on 06.02.2005 6:34 PM34
Ed's hypothetical is a scary question, and can only arise in a culture that has lost its transcendent basis for morality. No matter how you killed the person, there would always be two losers: the killed, who loses his/her future, and the killer, who begins to lose his humanity. My German physician predecessors (I'm an MD) killed the old, sick, retarded, etc. as "lives not worth living." They ended up exterminating 6 million or more using the same humane methods they pioneered for euthanasia (cyanide gas.)
posted on 06.02.2005 6:38 PM35
JCH: This entity has future experiences, activities, projects, and enjoyments which it would lose
Dealing with the unborn, said unborn would be trading that for an immeasurably greater good: either the atheist's heaven (absolute unconsciousness) or the Christian heaven (pure metaphysical bliss). Say you're given a choice, knowing no one (including God and the Smurf) will be bothered by either decision: either a life of want and the short-term antidote for want, satisfaction, OR a painless passage to some heaven of one sort or another. Being a rational person, you choose... [fill in the blank]
posted on 06.02.2005 6:49 PM36
Jim,
The analogy to German prisoners would only apply if they had no clue and every measure was taken to ensure they felt nothing. It would be hard to say they had no clue. On the other hand, I think it is safe to say that the unborn would have no clue the dose of anesthesia was coming, and would further be clueless as to the possible intentions of the anesthesiologist.
posted on 06.02.2005 6:55 PM37
JCH,
I'm puzzled here. You care only about the death and not the death pains (physical and mental) or those left behind, whereas I'm unconcerned with the death, only with the death pains and those left behind. The catch is, I've yet to hear the case be articulated as to why your view is more rational than mine.
posted on 06.02.2005 7:00 PM38
I anticipate that someone will ask me if I would like this scenario applied to myself. My answer: sure, under the conditions of the hypothetical. The catch: it would be worlds more difficult for me to be completely unsuspectingly administered anesthesia, plus some folks left behind would be upset. So as you can see, actually fulfilling the conditions of the hypothetical are not very practical with a developed intelligence, but if they could be fulfilled, I could raise no objections. The unborn (whether a fetus or something less developed, whatever), as illustrated above, are another story.
posted on 06.02.2005 7:10 PM39
Joe, I'm sorry for the large number of individual posts in a row. I'll try not to post again until someone else does. I may not know what I'm talking about here, but I was just wondering, if a blastocyst has no nerves with which to feel anything and no brain with which to fear anything, and no parent's hopes for their own little blastocyst are dashed by harvesting said blastocyst, what of said harvesting?
posted on 06.02.2005 7:19 PM40
"Your logic progresses from a developmental and physical difference to a sudden proclamation that blastocysts are not people."
Someone up above wrote this.
Hilarious.
Blastocysts are not people.
Blastocysts are not dogs.
Blastocysts are not leeches.
Blastocysts are (drum roll) blastocysts.
Can you imagine?
Yes, blastocysts belonging to rich white Americans are more valuable than Iraqi children, especially when killing Iraqi children allows Christians to continue to drive their pick-up trucks to Wal-Mart.
Amen!
posted on 06.02.2005 7:24 PM41
Jim writes
"Ed's hypothetical is a scary question, and can only arise in a culture that has lost its transcendent basis for morality."
Jim's statement is very scary and can only arise in a culture that has become unmoored from reality.
Please everyone -- back to planet earth! Last time I checked people were dying of terrible diseases that might be cured through the use of embryonic cell lines which will never develop into human beings.
Try to stay focused. Stop following slick power-hungry preachers like Jim Dobson and his pathetic ilk.
posted on 06.02.2005 7:28 PM42
Ed
"The catch is, I've yet to hear the case be articulated as to why your view is more rational than mine."
If you keep talking to FleetGuy long enough, eventual he'll mumble something about the "eternal ramifications" of your "worldview".
At that point, you'll realize that your efforts to engage FleetGuy in a "rational" discussion have failed. FleetGuy is clearly worried above all about going to hell for an infinite length of time if he believes "wrongly" -- not "incorrectly", mind you, but "wrongly". That is why FleetGuy will avoid answering many questions directly. It is evidently okay with FleetGuy's deity to obfuscate and feign ignorance of obvious facts and conclusions. But FleetGuy can't go all the way.
That's why FleetGuy won't dismiss the creationists at the Discovery Institute as lying anti-science propagandists. And that's why FleetGuy doesn't want to live in a world where two gay people are married.
The question is: why doesn't FleetGuy lament the wasted deaths of thousands of people at the hands of our dear president, George Bush? He's remarkably silent on this point. FleetGuy's deity must approve of the killing of those innocent Iraqis. That must be why so few of FleetGuy's Christian comrades are motivated to speak out against that killing.
It's fascinating, isn't it Ed?
You should have been here when folks like FleetGuy were foaming at the mouth over bad old Saddam and his stockpiles of "WMDs". Those were the days!
posted on 06.02.2005 7:40 PM43
Ed,
You care only about the death and not the death pains (physical and mental) or those left behind, whereas I'm unconcerned with the death, only with the death pains and those left behindSo, the only reason it would be immoral for me to creep into YOUR bedroom tonight and kill you painlessly and instantly is those that would mourn you if you died? And I linked a 21 page paper outlining my position - so I think I did a pretty good job of justification.
As you may have noticed, I am not necessarily against active euthanasia - and pain and/or agony was a point I brought up.
posted on 06.02.2005 7:59 PM44
JCHFleetguy: First of all, please thank your daughter for me. She is both defending my liberal ass and, as I have argued elsewhere, women in the military are doing more to advance the feminist cause than all the gender studies professors combined.
I don't know if your comment was truncated, but you wrote "If you take conscription out of your argument" and didn't seem to finish your thought. Even without conscription, when a general or admiral decides on a course of action that he knows will result in the loss of lives, when another course has a lower chance of fulfilling the immediate objective, but won't risk the lives of his troops, is he not sacrificing human life unneccesarily?
When we know our bombing campaigns in iraq are going to cause some amount of collateral damage to innocent iraqis, and we could fulfill the same objectives without such bombing campaigns, but with a bigger loss of life to our own troops, who, remember, volunteered to risk their lives, is not this the closest possible military analogue to embryonic stem cell research? We're going to have to kill a few innocent iraqis in order to protect the rest of the population from the very real disease of tyranny?
Note: I support the vast majority of our military's official actions with regard to the war on terror, and I really hope that things go well with the new government there and with all our brave troops.
posted on 06.02.2005 7:59 PM45
Larry,
Just for the record (although I believe I said this before in a thread you were involved in - so it won't do any good)
1. I didn't support the invasion of Iraq
2. Even when EVERYBODY (including Kerry) believed there were WMD's in Iraq - I didn't. And I never believed that was real reason for invasion anyway.
3. I voted for KERRY, despite his position on abortion - because President Bush was responsible for the lie about WMD's, whether he was fooled or not. And the invasion of Iraq was wrong. So I put 100,000 or so deaths over 2 years ahead of 2,600,000 deaths from abortion. Aren't you proud of me?
I post a secular paper on abortion because abortion is both incorrect and wrong.
posted on 06.02.2005 8:17 PM46
JCH: So, the only reason it would be immoral for me to creep into YOUR bedroom tonight and kill you painlessly and instantly is those that would mourn you if you died?
Painlessly and completely unbeknownst to me--yes. Precisely. I think I said that. Also, if those left behind are rational, they won't mourn me-since I passed painlessly (mentally and physically) into a state of bliss-but rather the loss of whatever contribution I made to their lives that they valued. Now, if you could perform a similar operation upon those that fit that description before they learned of my death, and upon everyone who fits that description relative to all of them, etc, then sure. If I'm a homeless guy, things are much simpler. Anyway, I think the possibility that a developed intelligence might awake and realize what was happening is perhaps enough of a deterrent away from applying this to a non-hospitalized developed intelligence. As stated previously, an unborn is another story, as I think we all agree it would have no idea the anesthesia was coming, no idea what it would do, and no idea of the possible intentions of the anesthesiologist.
If your linked paper suggests that any future short of a future of complete bliss is more desirable than an immediate, painless and dread-less passage into complete bliss, then, I think we can agree, you've linked 21 pages of rubbish.
posted on 06.02.2005 8:20 PM47
JCHFleetguy:
First, the saying is pro-life; not pro-human...
Hey, I'm not a vegan, and I respect life...
Second, you have no rational, scientific basis for your opinion either - it just allows you to justify the taking of lives with a future like yours.
A future like mine? Remember, we're talking about entities that have never been attached to a uterine wall, and may never be attachable.
We're talking about for frozen embryos, entities that cannot have a future unless an intervention happens that places them there. They are, in effect, neither alive nor dead.
I actually do have a rational basis for what I wrote therefore.
Actually, I'd previously read the article to which you linked; it's got a false dichotomy problem.
But your article actually debunks your own position, because of the status of embryos and zygotes themselves, assuming you subscribe to the author's tenets.
Larry Lord:
Yes, blastocysts belonging to rich white Americans are more valuable than Iraqi children, especially when killing Iraqi children allows Christians to continue to drive their pick-up trucks to Wal-Mart.
Iraq of course also betrays the conservatives hostility to the morality of life, and shows just how really pro-death they are.
I read today that a) unemployment is up, and b) recruitment in the armed forces is down (for now).
Any connection?
All those Wal-Mart shoppers are wanted by the Armed Services to go to Iraq without proper armor, and be charged for meals once they're wounded.
And while self-proclaimed "bio-ethicists" prattle on about embryos, the killing, the blithe ignorance of public health threats like bird flu, SARS and AIDS, and the general devaluation of life for those who don't have a trust-funded future goes on. They, to the current regime, are not quite life not worthy of life, but certainly expendable in wars of subjugation.
48
Tyler,
Thanks for the kind words. The truncated thought is that my daughter's life is risked at her own choice, and responsibility. So no, I do not think it analogous to stem cell.
But I am not opposed morally to using leftover embryos from IVF (with proper safeguards) for stem cell research.
The political question is why use limited tax dollars to fund something that is so divisive?
posted on 06.02.2005 8:26 PM49
Ed
If you are saying it is alright to kill you because you will be in Heaven - well, we do not share that theology.
Besides, my position is secular in this regards.
posted on 06.02.2005 8:30 PM50
JCHFleetguy :
BTW, I respect your position on Iraq; on abortion, though, I think the position is far more complicated than is often treated.
I think in vitro fertilization, for example, should not really create any moral problems for anyone; until we learn how to grow fetuses into babies without the use of a woman, and at low cost (since those resources could be used elsewhere), it really is absurd to argue, I think, that every fertilized egg is equal to a person, and again, I'd say that the position is fundamentally immoral because the potential for conciousness, for experience simply is not the same as that of a person, that is someone who was born.. Period.
On the other hand, I think you can make a case that abortion in late term is morally wrong, because the potential for conciousness, for experience is more likely, but still not the same as that of a person.
On the other hand, I think even though that is the case, you cannot make a good case for legally prohibiting abortions, even in late term, categorically, because the degree of moral culpability - even by the standards you set forth- is hardly the same.
posted on 06.02.2005 8:36 PM51
JCH:
First of all, there is a secular heaven--a blissful complete lacking of consciousness, same as before you were born. Secondly, don't all painlessly and dreadlessly aborted fetuses and harvested blastocysts go to heaven in your theology?
posted on 06.02.2005 8:36 PM53
Mumon
Actually, I'd previously read the article to which you linked; it's got a false dichotomy problem.I would love to get this discussion up a notch from the overbroad biology issues and the overnarrow personhood issues
What false dichotomy problem?
If we are going to crank this up a notch, Marquis actually explicitly left the embryo out of his argument between fertilization and implantation - the narrow little gap that embryonic stem cell research drives down the middle of. I have stated my personal "fill in the gap": out of body fertilization - no future; in body - future.
And the post I responded too didn't narrow your position to embryos outside the body which is why I said what I said. That and your implication that believing life began at conception cheapened life and made calling yourself pro-life hypocritical.
posted on 06.02.2005 8:43 PM54
Mumon,
I'm not sure this is the right thread for this, but the war in Iraq is a liberation, not a subjugation.
We're establishing democracy where there was recently a murder/torture/oppression regime.
We're empowering the Iraqi people, not putting them down.
If you don't believe me, read some Iraqi blogs and some military blogs too. They document the thuggishness and murderousness of the insurgents. They document the burning desire of Iraqis to have democracy and freedom.
To claim we're subjugating Iraqis is to say night is day.
posted on 06.02.2005 8:50 PM55
Ed
You cannot not put "blissful" - an emotion; and "lack of consciousness" in the same concept.
posted on 06.02.2005 9:09 PM56
Larry Lord,
Hey, make your arguments but please go easier on the bile! Gosh, the cynicism really gets old.
The other Jim
posted on 06.02.2005 9:19 PM57
JCH,
Check your Webster's.
Main Entry: bliss·ful
1 : full of, marked by, or causing bliss
2 : happily benighted; ex: 'blissful ignorance'
If that bothers you so much though, forget I used it. Now, how about the rest of the contents of my numerous postings?
posted on 06.02.2005 10:01 PM58
JCHFleetguy,
Sorry, I didn't mean to leave you out before. I of course disagree with your position on Iraq too.
I was reading the posts in backwards chronological order when I responded to Mumon, so that's why I addressed my comments to him.
Question: Did World War II reveal FDR's horrible depravity and indifference to the value of human life in Germany and Japan (and we killed plenty of civilians in France and throughout the Pacific as well)?
Question: Should we have fought the Taliban in Afghanistan? What if 100 civilians died -- or 1000 -- or 100,000 -- do the actual numbers make a difference?
Bonus questions: some estimates of civilian casualties in Iraq run from 5,000 to 10,000. If Saddam was killing and/or starving 5,000 each year, does that mean our invasion was justified? What if he was killing off 15,000 a year, or only 500?
posted on 06.02.2005 10:18 PM59
Sperm and ovum are also a stage of human development. They are human and living, and together contain the full complement of genetic information necessary to create distinct human being. All contraception--including by abstinence--constitutes the destruction of human life.
As far as Rawls's perspective is concerned, I see no great difference in whether the social rules allow my opportunity to develop into a feeling, thinking being to be terminated by preventing the sperm and egg from combining or killing the embryo shortly after fertilization. If I had to choose between the two, I would tend to favor the latter if it would allow my tissue to be of use to others, for the same reason that I am an organ donor.
posted on 06.02.2005 10:25 PM60
Scientifically, the moment of conception IS that instant. When the first sperm penetrates the egg, an instantaneous chemical reaction takes place that prohibits any other sperm from getting in. At point X, you have an egg surrounded by a million sperm. At X+.001s, you have a fertilized egg, a unique combination of human DNA.
The fact that we may not know which particular sperm is will fertilize the egg does not mean that the sperm does not exist, or that the sperm and egg together do not contain all of the genetic material to create a complete, thinking, person. How does our ignorance make them less human?
And remember, we also don't know which fertilized eggs will develop into humans and which will die naturally (as do many as half, by some estimates). So why should or ignorance be important in one case but not the other?
posted on 06.02.2005 10:32 PM61
tgibbs
The biology/humanness arguments (when does life begin?) are too broad; and the personhood/sentinence arguments are too narrow. I think there is better
Ed
I answered your post with 21 pages of theory. And no, that we either go to oblivion, heaven, or hell does not make killing moral - even if no one cares what happens to us. If you are suicidal because you think oblivion is better than your future experiences, activities, projects and enjoyments - I am sorry.
Matthew
Entry to Iraq: If I had been presented with Saddam as a buther deserving of slaughter as a reason to invade - then that would have been one thing. That is not how it played out. (And I do not think we can use military force against every butcher in the world). I would not BTW supported invasion under those pretexts either.
Pacifism: I am not a pacifist. I supported Kuwait 1991. In fact, that is when Saddam should have disappeared from Iraq. Especially, when we watched him slaughter the Shia we encouraged to rebel - and then left hanging out to dry. I also supported Afganistan - the unfinished business there is one of the reasons I opposed the invasion of Iraq.
Policy now: We cannot leave them hanging out to dry again. We must stay until there is a stable government capable of defending itself.
posted on 06.02.2005 10:53 PM62
JCH,
I asked on what grounds can one object to the painless, dreadless ending of a life that won't be missed and will never know the difference and you effectively said, "On the grounds that there is a difference to be known." Man, I had hoped we could rise above the "it will come down to your heart, not your head"- and "philosophy gave me a headache in school"-style stuff. Wouldn't you love to make a liar out of Larry Lord? There's still time...
JCH is bailing so soon. Anybody else disagree with me and care to attempt to type a string of characters sufficient to cause my beliefs to change?
posted on 06.02.2005 11:10 PM63
BTW, from above,
JCH: the anti-depressants a doctor may prescribe may turn that around.
Well aren't you glad some in the medical profession realize that behavior is a function of natural chemical processes in the brain? The suicidal person has free will and an incorporeal soul, yet a chemical can apparently determine his choices, huh? Naturalism is a wonderful thing.
posted on 06.02.2005 11:21 PM64
Ed,
I never said anything vaguely resembling "it will come down to your heart, not your head" [that is my answer to how can God be proven]. And "On the grounds that there is a difference to be known" is a pretty thin paraphrase of 21 pages.
People do not relate to life the way you state - so its probably all academic. The empiracal evidence is that while people are really good at holding other people's lives cheap - they themselves fight tooth and nail for every last breath.
Read Marquis. Start from there if you are sincerely seeking a discussion. I gave you a COMPLETE answer to your question - yet you "chase me around".
Larry is a fool - I do not care if he is a liar.
If you are seeking my permission to mercifully and painlessly exterminate people who no one cares about - I will not give it. I am sure you would not be alone in using that for population control.
posted on 06.02.2005 11:28 PM65
Ed,
Maybe you haven't been around me much: science and religion answer two different sets of questions. Depression and mental illness are in my world - my wife suffers from both. And I have seen medicine, and prayer, both work - clearly. And no psychiatrist she has ever had has been cavalier about the power of faith to work powerfully in chronic mental illness.
If you are just in troll mode - I have completely answered your questions. If you sincerely want a discussion, read Marquis and get back to me.
posted on 06.02.2005 11:34 PM66
JCHFleetguy,
Thanks for your answers. I respectfully disagree on some key points.
George Bush sold us the invasion of Iraq as a pre-emptive war.
The rationale was that after 9-11, we couldn't leave Saddam sitting on billions of dollars of oil, in a perpetual state of war against us (due to Saddam's violations of the cease-fire agreements), when he could very easily provide covert support to Islamist terrorists, even to the point of supplying them with weapons of mass destruction.
Nothing in this war rationale required that Saddam actually possess any of the WMD's that he used to have; all that really mattered was that he was a homicidal psychotic who had the means and the willingness to help terrorists execute another 9-11 style attack against us.
When Tony Blair talked President Bush into going to the U.N., Bush had Colin Powell hype the WMD's threat to the Security Council. But the president always made clear that we were acting pre-emptively, before the gathering threat of Saddam's regime had the chance of becoming an imminent threat. And that's exactly what we did.
In addition, President Bush always emphasized that he was also gambling on establishing a key beachhead for democracy in the Arab Middle East. So far that gamble looks like it will pay off very well indeed, although the outcome is still somewhat uncertain.
posted on 06.02.2005 11:38 PM67
Matthew,
Well, we agree on what to do tomorrow.
posted on 06.02.2005 11:41 PM68
"On the grounds that there is a difference to be known" is a precise paraphrasing of your answer. I say, "They'll feel no pain!" That's not your concern. I say, "They'll never fear it coming!" That's not your concern. I say, "They'll never know the difference!" That's not your concern. That there is a difference to potentially be known (future to potentially be had) is your concern. Why is this valuable? I'll paraphrase you while quoting Richard Pryor: "Just cuz, jack." "Just cuz, jack" trumps ending the misery of millions of the diseased who would know the difference if you didn't take significantly steeper measures to ensure they never saw the anesthesia coming. What exemplary compassion you have! Let's clarify the above: You have more compassion for those kept (painlessly and dreadlessly) from knowing the difference, than for those who already know the difference in some respect and are possibly kept in misery as a result of the prioritization of your compassion. Wow.
posted on 06.02.2005 11:44 PM69
JCHFLeetguy,
We agree, but I don't believe you and Ed will...
Good night!
70
JCH: And I have seen medicine, and prayer, both work - clearly.
Sorry to hear about your wife. But, on the above point, have you ever studied any anthropology? Ethnographers have seen - clearly - shamanic magic work. People sincerely believe a curse or a non-lethal potion will kill them, and they die of shock when it takes place. If prayer works for your wife, what makes you think it's not a placebo affect, and how do you tell the difference between the behavior she is caused to exhibit by the drugs and the behavior caused by the prayer, whether it was a placebo or not?
posted on 06.02.2005 11:52 PM71
Well Ed,
1. I said read 21 pages of explanation that I do not want to paste here. That is not "just cuz". I do not have to care whether my opinion is better or worse than yours - its mine and I advocate for it.
2. If you want to perform active euthanasia on everyone you think would be better off dead [are your going to ask them first?]- well, hopefully someone will stop you before you get too far. Hey, for a bonus - my position on euthanasia is in the 21 pages too.
posted on 06.03.2005 12:02 AM72
Actually Ed, I do not KNOW - but then that is my wife's and my observation (and you would find more than one of her doctors unsure); and you do not KNOW either. Just one of those questions science will never answer.
The interesting thing about anti-depressants and anti-psychotics - the doctors do not know why they work yet. And they do not work well. And they also are as pinpoint in their effect as carpet bombing.
posted on 06.03.2005 12:08 AM73
JCH, I will look at the 21 pages. Again, applying my scenario to the born would not violate the logic of the argument itself, so I don't necessarily deny it. However, the question was concerning the scenario's applicability to abortion and stem cell harvesting. The only reason to hope that someone would not subject developed intelligences to the procedure is for fear that they would botch the job and violate the conditions of the hypothetical. Again, on the other hand, you would pretty much have to put forth effort specifically to ensure you botched the job on an unborn, especially an early-in-development one.
posted on 06.03.2005 12:18 AM74
JCHFleetguy,
Again, could you link this process? I think if you combine two embryos with separate DNA - however carefully - you will have something that has no chance of a future like yours. They have enough problem in actual animal cloning with unexplained degeneration of the genome - with resultant and frequent tumors; that I doubt you could make the case that you "smushed together" blastocytes could ever develop into a person. Hence, your "integrity of identity" thesis is wrong.
The phenomenon, when natural, is called a tetragametic chimera. When artificial it is called blastocyst aggregation. In both cases, a single embryo results from fusion of two separate embryos, and a normal adult can develop. That adult will have cells derived from each of the two embryos. Each individual cell contains the genome of only one of the original embryos (derived from two gametes), but since cells from both original embryos are present, the resulting embryo has contributions from four different gametes (hence tetragametic).
The artificial technique is much less challenging than cloning, and it has been used for many years with mice.
Here is a paper describing a natural case of tetragametic chimerism:
http://content.nejm.org/cgi/content/extract/346/20/1545
In case you don't have access to New England J. Med, I'll summarize: Genetic testing revealed that a woman was unrelated to her two children. This isn't uncommon in fathers, for obvious reasons, but is pretty surprising in a mother. More extensive testing revealed that she has two separate genomes. It was confirmed that each of these genomes had a normal chromosome complement; in other words, she didn't just have one or two extra chromosomes due to a defect in cell division. Since she was healthy, she did not have two different genomes combined in a single cell; tetraploid human embryos are not viable. The conclusion is that she contains cells derived from two different, normal embryos. Both genomes contributed roughly equally to her body as a whole, but some organ systems have more contribution from one genome or the other.
The original test was done on her blood, which is derived from only one of the original genomes, and her children came from egg cells derived from the other genome. In this case, both of the original embryos were female, so the woman developed normally. There have been other cases described where fusion of a male and female embryo leads to ambiguous genitalia and or hermaphroditism in an otherwise healthy individual.
The article cites other cases of natural tetragametic chimerism in humans and artificial chimerism in mice and sheep.
Tetragametic chimerism is probably more rare than the opposite phenomenon, twinning, but there may be selection bias. Identical twins are obvious. Chimerism is only uncovered when it leads to a phenotype like hermaphroditism or when extensive genetic testing is performed.
Anyway, as I posted above, I think both chimerism and twinning are relevant to the question of "integrity of identity" and whether an early embryo is a person or a potential person.
"Integrity of identity" also speaks to the question of whether early embryos have a future like ours. If I recall correctly, Donald Marquis argued that killing fetuses is wrong because they have a future like ours. Killing eggs or sperm was different; since they have many possible futures, they do not have a future like ours. Twinning and chimerism suggest that early embryos also have multiple potential futures, fewer than a gamete but more than a fetus. So, arguably, early embryos also do not have a future like ours. (Leaving aside for a moment the question of whether "a future like ours" is really the reason killing is wrong. Marquis bases his argument on that presupposition, but I think it really requires an essay of its own first).
posted on 06.03.2005 8:06 AM75
Ed:
If we could guarantee that the ending of a life would be absolutely painless to and strike absolutely no fear or regret or sadness in the life being ended; and that absolutely no one left behind would care at all, would the ending of a life in and of itself be all that terrible? Again, the conditions are that the life being ended at one moment is experiencing normal everyday hubbub, the next instant, his experience is no more. AND The life and emotions of absolutely no one left behind are affected at all. On what grounds would one object to this, and, under these conditions, who would do the objecting?
My response:
1. Everybody dies.
2. If there are moral objections to your hypothetical, then there are - must be- moral objections to a deity who lacks the sense of proportionality for a single man and woman's transgression millenia ago. Otherwise, one's morality is not in any sense of the word anything other than relativist.
3. Death - all death- given its inevitability, is neither bad nor good, but our very lot in life. I get the feeling that some folks want to be so "pro-life" out of a massive fear and denial of death.
4. I have no problem with your hypothetical (I'd agree), but I'd say in an instant that it doesn't actually apply to any human beings.
76
Matthew Goggins:
I don't want to go off on an Iraq tangent either, but there are interesting parallels to the questions being raised here.
You say "liberation" - and point to Saddam Hussein, hopefully not in his skivvies, and of course the Islamist fundamentalist murderers. I say "subjugation" and point to all those maimed Iraqis, the folks in Abu Ghraib, the Iraqis whose jobs were taken away by the provisional government authority, the missing oil, etc., and the Sunnis and Iraqi Christians that are getting the royal treatment, so to speak, under this new regime.
In effect, you see, there is a moral justificaton for either position, and either position entails what at least one side calls the taking of a life unjustly.
So, um, you'd have to admit that if you're going to say "pro-life," this inconsistency must be brought out, especially if you assert a "Pascal's Wager" type argument in which you'd like to minimize the risk of a possibility that you're wrongfully harming life.
posted on 06.03.2005 8:36 AM77
JCHFleetguy :
I believe- it's been a while since I read the article in depth, so I'm relying largely on memory, that the author wants to maintain a rigid distinction between "pro-life" and "pro-choice" folks, and I, personally don't think that dichotomy is entirely accurate or useful.
Indeed, the religious right admits this through their actions: an incremental strategy that chooses to put restrictions on abortions succeeds in fact because large amounts of the public want abortion legal in some circumstances but not others.
Now a strawman from Marquis would say that this is because the public is inconsistent, but I would argue that it is not, but rather, that there are competing moral imperatives in play.
That's why, for example, you can be morally opposed to abortion in any particular circumstance but still argue for its legality, in much the same way as one would want 99 guilty people to go free because it is more morally reprehensible to imprison or execute an innocent man.
posted on 06.03.2005 8:43 AM78
Mumon,
I have Christian friends who supply relief to Iraq, and who have intimate contact with Iraqi Christians, who most definitely are not getting "royal" treatment, no matter how relatively you may use the term.
Tangent indeed.
posted on 06.03.2005 8:54 AM79
The biology/humanness arguments (when does life begin?) are too broad; and the personhood/sentinence arguments are too narrow. I think there is better
Marquis argues that what deserves protection is a future "like ours." But his argument (like the biologically nonsensical "beginning of life" argument) founders on his inability to deal with the fact that sperm and ovum also have a future "like ours," which would make all contraception, including by abstinence, a violation of their right to a future. Ultimately, he is reduced to arguing that they have no right to their future because we do not know which sperm is going to combine with the egg. So it becomes a quantitative argument, in which the right of human life to continuance depends upon our level of ignorance. However, we are also ignorant of which fertilized eggs actually have "a future like ours." Many, perhaps most, do not--they die naturally of genetic incompatibilities. So it becomes a quantitative argument in which an arbitrary line is drawn based on our level of ignorance. How is that different from picking a point in development, or birth, for that matter?
posted on 06.03.2005 8:56 AM80
You're all caught up in an "infinite regression" argument, of sorts. This thread shows how ludicrous it gets -- we start from wondering about "the moral status of embryos" and eventually end up discussing the moral status of amputated arms and "smushed together" blastocysts.
Let's face up to a practical fact: regardless of where it's drawn, the line that separates "alive" from "not quite alive enough" will be arbitrary and indefensible from the standpoint of pure reason.
And let's admit the corollary: where any of us chooses to draw the line will be driven solely by details of personal faith and belief.
It seems to me that evangelicals and others of similar beliefs have gotten stuck defending silly notions of the moral status of embryos when what they really feel is a much more reasonable revulsion at the abortion of nearly-viable babies.
Similarly, by promoting the concept of an absolute "Culture of Life", they're left with the impossible task of reconciling this slogan with other practical political beliefs (such as their views on war in general, Iraq in particular).
It seems accepting the arbitrary nature of the tipping point between alive and not takes none of the force out of the anti-abortion viewpoint, and in fact strengthens it by avoiding the silly sorts of discussion one is forced into otherwise.
posted on 06.03.2005 9:17 AM81
Nick,
Thank you for the primer on embryonic twinning and fusion. But I have a question to ask you about this little bit:
"If an early embryo is a person, the following questions should be easy to answer:
Assume an embryo is person A. If it splits into two embryos, do we now have person A and person B? If so, which one is person A?
Or do we have person B and person C. If so, where did person A go?
Same deal with tetragametic fusion. If embryo A and embryo B fuse, is the result person C? if so, where did A and B go?"
Why can't one say this in reply?
A splits. B and C result. (I don't assume yet that either B or C is not identical to A.) It would be arbitrary to either say that A was identical to B and not to C or to say that A was identical to C and not B. Thus we can say neither. But of course A cannot be identical to both B and C. One thing cannot be two things. Thus we must say that A ceased to exist when it split. Here then is the view: I began to exist as a certain embryo at a time when it could still twin; had that embryo twinned I would have ceased to exist, but it did not and so here I am.
I'm sure you can guess what I'd say about fusion.
This view seems coherent to me. Is anything wrong with it?
82
Hi Franklin,
Your answer is certainly internally coherent, but I'm not sure it really solves the dilemma. I notice you used the phrase "ceased to exist" rather than died. That makes sense, because when an embryo splits nothing has died. There's no corpse, no necrotic tissue, nothing but two live embryos. Same deal when two embryos fuse.
However, is there any precedent for a person to "cease to exist?" For Christians, even death doesn't cause a person to cease to exist. Once a person exists, that person will exist eternally. Most Christians believe that even the damned will continue to exist; very few believe in complete obliteration.
So it would be pretty amazing if an embryonic person could cease to exist. If an embryo is a person, that person still be present when the embryo splits. And when two embryos fuse, the original two persons should still be there. But since twins grow into two different people and fused embryos grow into one person, I think a reasonable conclusion is that early embryos are potential people, not yet a person.
posted on 06.03.2005 10:40 AM83
Nick,
I understand the difficulty that one seems to encounter from a certain point of view about the identity of persons and their existence after the body that they once inhabitated (is this the right term?) ceases to exist. But I hope to cobble together a view of my own about the genesis of we human beings, and I do not share that troublesome point of view about the genesis, and destruction, of persons.
I'm curious about the phrase 'potential people'. I wonder in what sense an embryo is a potential person. Do you mean to say that it's a potential human being? Or do you mean that it's already a human being but only potentially a person? What do you think that you are? Are you a human being, or a person (or both)? Does 'person' mean 'human being', or does it mean something more?
Thanks.
posted on 06.03.2005 11:40 AM84
JHCFleetGuy
"1. I didn't support the invasion of Iraq
2. Even when EVERYBODY (including Kerry) believed there were WMD's in Iraq - I didn't. And I never believed that was real reason for invasion anyway.
3. I voted for KERRY, despite his position on abortion - because President Bush was responsible for the lie about WMD's, whether he was fooled or not."
Glad to hear it, FleetGuy. I would have been more glad to hear your views before the election but you were hiding somewhere else. Please keep on expressing your views re the Iraq War. They are very relevant to these policy discussions re the "value of human life."
I think Goggins mentioned the possibility that only 5,000 Iraqi civilians have died since we began the invasion -- that is absurd, in a sickening way.
posted on 06.03.2005 12:22 PM85
Hi Franklin,
I started using the term "person," because that is what was used upthread. But, I suppose I mean it to be synonymous with human being but not synonymous with biologically human. There are obviously entities that are biologically human which are not human beings. I suppose human soul might be roughly synonymous. What do you think, are human souls and human beings roughly equivalent?
I would argue that human beings have a beginning, but once they exist they do not cease to exist. By "potential person" or potential human being, I mean that an embryo can develop into a human being or, more rarely, into several human beings or part of a human being. If an embryo were already a human being, it would not have that potentiality, because its identity would already be fixed as a single, specific human being/person/soul.
Anyway, that's my argument. I'd be interested in alternate definitions of human being that could encompass this capability of embryos.
Note that this argument would only apply to very early pre-implantation embryos. Aborting a fetus would still be killing a human being.
posted on 06.03.2005 1:14 PM86
re fused embryos, the two original persons ceased to exist and a third person now exists. All three were known by God from before the beginning of time. Same with eggs that don't implant. Do you hold a funeral service? Not if you don't know you were pregnant, of course. Do you grieve a miscarriage at six weeks gestation, after the first missed period and the positive pregnancy test? It's been known to happen.
The question is when this HUMAN becomes a PERSON. If at some stage of development, then what? Precisely, exactly, what stage? At moment X it is a human non-person, and at moment X+.001 second it is a human person
Why do you assume it has to be all at once at a discrete, single point in time?
Scientifically, the moment of conception IS that instant.
No, not "scientifically," but rather according to your particular viewpoint, at your particular relativist morality.
No, scientifically, because that moment is clearly and precicely defined, precisely observable, and totally agnostic. We're not talking about "ensoulment" but rather the instant that a complete and unique set of human DNA appears.
Human beings created from stem cells harvested from an amputated limb would be clones, I believe. So would embryos created from stem cells harvested from an embryo. Of course, in that case the original person would have been destroyed (physically) in order to harvest the cells.
Ed - it would still be wrong. Period.
technical note - I don't see the Post button, just the Preview and a "base href=" tag. I can click preview and then Post, though.
87
Corrie
"re fused embryos, the two original persons ceased to exist and a third person now exists. All three were known by God from before the beginning of time."
Yeah, that's a rational argument.
posted on 06.03.2005 3:44 PM88
Mumon
the author wants to maintain a rigid distinction between "pro-life" and "pro-choice" folks, and I, personally don't think that dichotomy is entirely accurate or useful.Actually, he talks about two views on when, in the embryo to person spectrum, the entity becomes the "sort of being whose life is seriously wrong to end". He describes a narrow view based around fetuses not being "rational beings", or "persons", or "social beings" - and attributes this to the pro-choice camp - and shows that this is too narrow. He talks about a broad view that fetuses "have life present at conception", "look like babies", or "possess a characteristic like DNA that is both necessary and sufficient for being human" - and attributes this to the pro-life camp - and shows this to be too broad. He talks about ways both sides try to "patch up" these positions so that cancer cells are not protected by the first; and newborns left out by the second. Reading these threads I cannot see how he has left anyone out: everyone will have some blend of the humanness vs personhood arguments in where they place their moral "line in the sand" in this spectrum.
Nick
I think both chimerism and twinning are relevant to the question of "integrity of identity" and whether an early embryo is a person or a potential person.My initial reaction was that this doesn't matter - but Marquis argues in the section on contraception that you cannot cover a separate egg and sperm because too many futures are lost [see comment below to tgibbs]. Now chimerism really equates with one of two fraternal twins dying of natural causes. No problem there, unless the chimerism is driven by an outside, intentional act. Embryos and people die of natural causes - there is no killing involved.
Twins are actually the situation where it is unclear. Of course, since twinning is complete, or near complete, before implantation (or right after) - all this process is done and moot by the time the mother could know she was pregnant. Practically, it really only impacts the question of morning after pills. Of course, at any time in this process there is either one actual subject of harm, or two actual subjects of harm (in either case nonarbitrarily identified) - so I do not have to give up even this very tiny patch of ground.
tgibbs
founders on his inability to deal with the fact that sperm and ovum also have a future "like ours," which would make all contraception, including by abstinence, a violation of their right to a future. Ultimately, he is reduced to arguing that they have no right to their future because we do not know which sperm is going to combine with the eggHe agrees with you that contraception "prevents the actualization of a possible future of value". Further, he would agree this is would be prima facie immoral IF it was argued that we need to maximize futures of value - he does not make that claim; nor is it part of the ethic presented. He presents that there can be one and only one "candidate for harm" [see comment to Nick above] and that neither the sperm or the egg individually take precedence over the other because assigning harm to either is arbitrary. He says contraception is not immoral because there is no single "nonarbitrarily identifiable subject of loss" until fertilization (and actually skips to implantation). posted on 06.03.2005 4:17 PM
89
Franklin Mason: What do you think that you are? Are you a human being, or a person (or both)? Does 'person' mean 'human being', or does it mean something more?
A person is the product of his/her experience and genes. Unique genes alone have no value--virtually every life form on earth discards them readily. But when those genes result in the development of an individual with a functioning brain, who is born, grows and interacts with the world to develop a "personality," then we have a person.
corrie:We're not talking about "ensoulment" but rather the instant that a complete and unique set of human DNA appears.
The complete and unique human DNA is created during development of the sperm and the egg, when crossover occurs at meiosis. Absolutely nothing is added when sperm and egg fuse that was not there before. The notion that a mere rearrangement of membrane lipid molecules constitutes the creation of human life makes little sense, even if you ignore the obvious fact that sperm and egg are clearly both living and both human.
Human beings created from stem cells harvested from an amputated limb would be clones, I beli