Do you think that a five-day-old embryo should be accorded the staus of a human person?

Question

If so, do the potential benefits of ES cell research outweigh the ethical objections? Explain

Answer 1

The short answer...

Is it a human person? Based on genetics the answer is yes.

In regard to the benefits of ES cells, the beauty of science is that even if we do not use ES cells, we will find a way to make cells stem-like for therapeutic use. So, we don't NEED them, but we are a curious bunch and will study anything we can get our gloved hands on.

The long answer...

Simply put, the debate of where life begins is moot to most scientists. Ask a scientist where life begins and they may mention the prebiotic soup or an RNA world billions and billions of years ago. The facts are that sperm and eggs are already alive. Put them together and the fertilized ovum is alive too. That is a 100% human cell with a complete genetic code once they combine. Only time and environment are needed for that fertilized egg to become an embryo, fetus, or infant. Therefore, genetically they are the same as you and me.

In politics, the legal status comes into play. An embryo at five days doesn't even have a brain or heart. That ball of cells doesn't pay taxes and can't vote for or against laws pertaining to right to life. That leaves the battle to time and the environment. In this case, the environment is a Petri dish and in most cases it is not killed. It is only not allowed to mature.

The right to a woman's own life or death is a legacy she is given by her ancestors, and she should be entirely trusted to decide how to lead or end it. So, if she wants to abandon eggs to a doctor or scientist, she should have the right to decide. Just to cover all the bases, pun intended, I think the maternal and paternal consent form (egg or sperm donor, respectively) should include an option to NOT allow the creation of ES cells for research.

Furthermore, as long as women have the right to kill the unborn, scientist should have the right to study ES cells (the unborn). The only question left is if this leads to loss of respect for human life.

US politics has already decided we only respect life after it is born, or if it is killed by someone and mom did not want them to kill it. So, what respect human life still has in the US, it should still be intact if we study ES cells.

In conclusion, scientist will study just about anything. The potential benefits of ES will be realized by both making cells return to an ES-like state and by researchers who are outside federal bans on research. Science will not be stopped from discovering the potential benefits of ES cells, and nothing is safe from the scientific method as long as scientists are around.

Answer 2

this is from wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Embryo

An embryo (Greek: ἔμβρυον, plural ἔμβρυα) is a multicellular diploid eukaryote in its earliest stage of development, from the time of first cell division until birth, hatching, or germination. In humans, it is called an embryo from the moment of fertilisation until the end of the 8th week of gestational age, whereafter it is instead called a fetus.

But if you look at the picture that follows on that page, it shows a human embryo at 4 weeks, and it seems to have an eye forming. In my opinion it's when a heart is formed (a heartbeat) that determines if a human being has been formed. When people die they can be brain dead but the heart still beats so they are still kept alive.

The question then is does the matter become a fetus at 8 weeks because the heart beats? I don't know. A baby doctor needs to answer that.

I believe that no research should be made on babies, embryos or fetuses or anything inbetween. Research can be on any part thrown away, but not killing babies or ending babies lives just to pretend that that was a part that was thrown away. If there were laws on this they were be abuses, and that's why we don't want the laws. When laws are put together for review then additions are made and also people will take things out of context so any law on this is very dangerous. In time those laws could also include the aged, those disabled, those malformed at birth, and eventually to anyone who isn't a genius, it would be a law to kill, and I do not condone killing.

Answer 3

>Do you think that a five-day-old embryo should be accorded the staus of a human person?

Certainly not! At five days, the embryo is less developed than most insects, never mind a human. Philosophically, if you're going to consider something with that level of brain capacity as human, you might as well consider your goldfish or even your computer games as human. No, when you look at the actual capacity of an embryo to care about what happens, it becomes quite clear that it is not human in any relevant philosophical sense.

>do the potential benefits of ES cell research outweigh the ethical objections?

So much it's not even funny. The religious fundamentalists simply don't have an argument anymore.

Answer 4

The attempt to define moral status based on objective markers identified through biology or religion is bound to fail. Judgments of "humanity", personhood or any similar determination of moral protectedness are not a matter of definition, of finding the intrinsic biological property of an entity taht makes it morally protectable, but are instead the outcome of a complex moral choice involving many competing considerations. Biological occurrences are processes rather than events. Along the continuum of human development we have to make achoice based on these competing considerations.
In my opinion, based on this balancing, to give embryos the full moral status as a person is outweighed by the benefits that research offers for the treatment of diseases.

To illustrate the difficulty with regard to the moral status of an embryo as a person consider this: Some studies suggest that in normal healthy women, between two-thirsds and three quarters of all fertilized eggs do not go on tho implant in the womb or are lost. If ebryos have the same moral status as children we would be faced with the loss of thousands or millions of lives each year due to spontaneous abortion. Yet the way we respond to the natural loss of embryos suggests that we do not regard these events as the moral or religious equivalent of infnat mortality. Otherwise wouldnt we carry out the same burial rituals and the same rites of mourning for the loss of an embryo that we observe for the death of a child?

Below I have listed some sources that might be helpful to form your own judgment

Answer 5

Clearly at some point it is a human, whether it is 5 days, 5 weeks, or 5 months. Pretending that embryonic stem cell research is the panacea is a gross exaggeration that many proponents make. Of far greater value is learning just how cell differentiation works. Perhaps in our primitive state of knowledge, ES research will help in some ways until we advance beyond the need for using them.

Answer 6

If a fertilized egg is a human being, then any woman who has sex a week before her period is a serial killer. The "ethical objections" to this research always seems to come from people who don't know much about science, and are just going along with the rally because people of their same religion or same political party have decided to jump on it.

And please, the argument of "the only people who favor ES cell research have already been born" is about as valid as saying "We never hear what the squid have to say about us eating calamari".

Answer 7

Firstly, I do not have a religion, therefore my views might differ greatly from others.

Personally, I believe that the potential of embryo research should be greatly encouraged, as there are lots of knowledge that can be gained from such research. The research can be used to enhance the lives of lots of patients suffering from many types of illness.

Ethics, to me is simply some man-made rules and regulations, a barrier that man needs to overcome to achieve great knowledge. Besides, how exactly does one define ethics?

Sometimes, some sacrifices must be made in order to achieve great things.

Answer 8

When you were a five-day old embryo your mother did not abort you, call her and thank her. If an embryo is not a human person, then you are not pregnant because a woman can only get pregnant with a baby...not 'tissue'.

Have you ever noticed that the only people who favor ES cell research have already been born?

Answer 9

A member of the species homeosapien, yes. A human being, no. I am personaly undecided when it comes to ES research.

Answer 10

These are more religious questions than scientific. When does life begin? How do we define life? Why 5 days old? The moment the ferilised egg starts dividing, it has acquired the status of a person.