How would liberals and conservatives react to this type of hypotherical scenario?
A doctor in Scotland has been secretly performing medical research using stem cells obtained from aborted fetuses. The work is complete and the result is a perfect cure for Terri Schiavo’s condition.
Would the liberals who are on the side of removing Ms. Schiavo’s feeding tube admit that medical cures can always be just around the bend and that it’s in a person’s best interest to stay alive as long as possible?
Would the conservatives admit that if they really cared about the life of this woman, that their religious beliefs should not get in the way of modern medicine?
I understand these viewpoints do not represent ALL liberals and conservatives.
Here on Earth, you can’t do brain transplants, and all the neurogenic stems cells in the world would not restore Terri Schiavo the person, because that person died when her original brain cells died. If you want to contemplate replacing Terri in her present state with something like an adult infant, be my guest.
I sure wouldn’t. As best we can tell, her wishes were not to be preserved artificially. That means “I don’t want to live as a vegetable,” not “I want to be preserved for decades, then used as a guinea pig.”
I think at this point we’re beyond hypotheticals and into “fairies dancing on the lawn” territory here.
But sure, if someone came up with a way to regrow your brain and restore all of your memories and personality, I’d admit that truly astounding medical breakthroughs might be just around the corner at any time. Hell, I already admit that. I still wouldn’t think that it’s necessarily in anyone’s best interests to stay alive as long as possible in hopes of such a breakthrough coming in time to save them, any more than I’d think it’s in someone’s best interests to stay alive as long as possible in hopes that whatever higher power they believe in is going to miraculously heal them. The fact that something might potentially maybe be possible doesn’t mean you should hold your breath waiting for it to happen.
I’m with Loopydude here. What you’re proposing here is like hitting Terri Shiavo’s reset button. It’s likely that the person created by such an operation would be similar to Terri in some (perhaps many) ways, but it wouldn’t be the old Terri.
However, an operation that would restore the old Terri Shiavo is monumentally unlikely. Impossible, I would say, without some way to examine her undamaged brain from 15 years ago in enough detail to reconstruct it. As such, it is not in the person’s best interests to stay alive a long as possible, even if the OP’s medical technique is just around the corner.
I never said it was likely, or even possible. It’s a hypothetical scenario that I made up. The point is, how strongly do you hold onto your principles? Even to the point that they hurt a person that you are currently trying to help?
The thing is, it’s not even theoretically possible to regrow a brain complete with all the memories and personality traits that made made that person an individual. Everything that was “Terri” has been permanently erased. Even if you could regrow all the brain tissue (which is little more than a far out, sci-fi scenario) it would be a brand new person akin to a new born baby.
Essentially, you’re talking about a brain replacement procedure, so you might as well bring magic or miracles into your hypothetical. Hypothesizing a “cure” for Terri sciavo is like hypothesizing that a method is found to bring dead people back to life.
I understand what you’re getting at, but the possibility is so far outside the realm pf plausibility that it’s not effective in the way that you meant it to be.
But just to anser your question - if Terri Schiavo were magically (and I do mean magically) cured by any means at all, then of course, that would change everything. But a major part of the reason this decision was made is that no such eventuality is possible.
I don’t think the probability of the hypothetical occurring can be divorced from the principle in question here. The liberal principle in question here seems to be that, given the best information available at the time, if the person has only a sufficiently small (negligible?) chance of ever waking up, then that person should be removed from life support. We’re always working with incomplete knowledge of the situation, but we try to do the best we can with that. While it’s possible that a cure is just around the corner, if we have no reason to believe that it is–if the best evidence we have suggests that it isn’t–I see no problem in neglecting that possibility, and allowing the patient to die. If a cure is developed the day after Terri dies, it will be unfortunate (for her), but it will not invalidate the principle in any way.
If, on the other hand, the principle here is respect for the patient’s wishes (as Marley23 states), then a cure would have no effect on the situation. In either case, I would hold onto the principle.
Liberal here (no, *not * the Liberal; *a * liberal).
The question seems to be, “should we sentence what’s left of Terry Shiavo to a *certainty * of not-life, against her express wishes, in the hope of a *possible * cure at some undefined time in the future?”
If that’s the question, then my answer is, no, of course not. Not when she has made clear what her wishes are. I imagine everyone out there with a Living Will would agree with me on that.
She’s been in this state for - what? Fifteen years? Attended by scads of doctors and the like; if there were any treatment that was even close to offering hope any time soon, surely they’ve tried it by now.
Let’s extend that out a bit, Genghis Bob. Should we mandate cryogenic freezing for all mostly dead people (those recently killed) so that they may be unfrozen when cures for their inflictions are found?
Assuming Cryogenic Freezing *and * Thawing are technically feasible, it still comes down to the same issue for me - consent of the patient. I guess that rules out mandates.
All sorts of brand new legal and social wrinkles get introduced when you consider the possibility of Freeze-and-Thaw; but I suppose that’s a conversation best left to another thread.
Of course, you are right, but in this case, there has apparently been a clear determination of the desires of the wishes, yet some are calling for her to remain in a vegetatively “frozen” state in case some future cure becomes available. It seems to me only a step away from doing that for everyone.
I was about to say the same thing. Embryonic stem cells are not harvested from aborted fetuses, but from unimplanted embryos in the cryo vaults of fertility clinics.