Bricker, that’s a very legitimate answer, but it doesn’t address the question. Wishing something doesn’t make it so. The current practice with in vitro fertilization is to fertilize as many eggs as possible at a time so the woman can go through a harvest as few times as possible. Also this is done because the fertility drugs cause the production of multiple eggs, and the current practice is to take all of them, as they are a valuable commodity.
Now I neither approve or disapprove of the current fertility practices, but they are what they are. If you want to change that system, go ahead, but we work in the system that is available, so my question stands as asked.
It is immoral to use organs from people who were murdered? It’s not like fetuses are aborted because women and doctors have a burning desire to harvest their stem cells. The stem cell harvesting is incidental to the abortion, just as the organ harvesting from a murder victim would be.
Though now of course I see that we’re talking about frozen embryos, not aborted ones. :smack: Don’t want to hijack this to an abortion debate, but the point about “incidental” benefit remains, I think.
No, but he have the opportunity to listen to a mind-numbingly detailed speach about the benefits of research at his very own convention before voicing his support of it.
OTOH, we have Mrs. Bush giving her first position speach in at least 4 years on a topic providing misinformation. No stem cell research can be done, because the approved lines are no longer available. We can make cures from this line of research, and they may not be around the corner but they sure as hell won’t get any closer without opening up the research.
I question both the source, the information that she presented, as well as why the hell she was chosen as the messenger in this case.
Well, actually, Mrs. Bricker had a part in the procreation as well. I assume you mean, “…able to procreate without assistance from medical technology…”
Since “how arrogant” is nothing but an ad hominem fallacy, I construe your argument to be along the lines of, “You can afford to adopt that view, since you sourself did not need fertility treatments to become a parent; if you had needed such treatments, you would feel differently.”
While it’s impossible to know for sure how I would feel, I can only respond that the validity (or lack) of my stance is not measured by that yardstick. In other words, it’s immoral – if I, tempted by my earnest desire to become a parent, were to ignore that immorality, that wouldn’t change the immorality.
Of course, I absolutely acknowledge that the immorality I claim exists here is not an unquestioned fact. In fact, it’s clearly open to debate, and when the people on the various sides of the debate do not share a common definitive source for moral authority, it’s well-nigh unresolvable.
But of all the arguments that might be raised against the immorality of this sort of in vitro fertilization, “You’d do it too if you needed to!” is not a particularly persuasive one.
What you call “a couple of microscopic cells” I call “a human being.”
Now, in fact, I did not allege that the suffering of Mengele’s victims and the suffering felt by the embryos is remotely similar. I said that I was drawing an analogy between the two instances, and the relevant points of the analogy have nothing to do with the relative suffering. If this were a measure of suffering, then there would be little contest: embryos, having no developed nervous system, cannot be said to really suffer at all on a physical level.
No, the analogy was intended to point out that we cannot always simply shrug and say, “There’s no helping the fact that bad things are happening; let’s get some good out of it.” If the bad things are bad enough, the moral course is to eschew all involvement.
It was on that basis that the comparison was drawn.
Because the moment at which the egg becomes fertilized is the moment at which human life comes into being.
I believe the current practice is immoral. While I agree that “wishing doesn’t make it so,” your question is precisely why I raised the spectre of Mengele earlier: to sit complacently by while the immorality of in vitro fertilization occurs and then say, “Well, nothing I could do about that – now that we’ve got these un-used embryos around, better get some value out of 'em!” is inherently wrong. Just as, BY ANALOGY, it would be wrong to ignore Mengele’s tactics and use the data he developed without regard for its source.
No, it’s not immoral to use organs from the murdered.
But if there were a human slaughterhouse, say, with hundreds of murder victims being fed through it – say, a decision to speed things up and empty Death Rows all across the land – then, yes, I’d say it would be immoral, not to mention ghoulish, to use the organs of the dead.
Well I appreciate that. It seems that when thinking of these things as humans, a real slippery slope is created. As mentioned by another poster, what about sperm? Is masterbation genocide? etc, etc
I really have a hard time considering a clump of cells (yes we’re all clumps of cells, you know what I mean) to be a pain feeling human that we’re killing with these experiments.
Of course. It’s utterly counter-intuitive. Anyone can look at a week-old baby and see it’s a person… but a clump of cells? There’s no connection to humanity at all, except in the most theoretical of ways.
But I am nontheless convinced of the essential humanity of that clump of cells: that, as you correctly point out, we are all clumps of cells, and the mere fact that some of us have some growing to so doesn’t change the essential quality of humanity that exists from the moment of conception onwards.
As I say, I freely acknowledge this view is unprovable and I fully understand how others just don’t buy it.
Pay me the courtesy of not putting words in my mouth or “construing” what you think I think you would think, or whatever. I couldn’t care less how you might or might not feel if you were unable to have children through the act of intercourse. You, yourself, couldn’t possibly know how you would feel in such an event, seeing as how you aren’t, and never will be, faced with such a situation. And given that, it is highly arrogant of you to pass judgment on others who avail themselves of the available medical science so that they might enjoy what you enjoy.
That’s just a bunch of fucking bullshit doublespeak to try to weasel out of comparing cells to living, breathing, feeling human beings. There is no analogy, plain and simple. That you would even attempt to draw one is outrageous and absurd, especially since you admit there is no suffering on the part of a blob of cells, even if you wish to refer to that blob of cells as a human being. Nor is anyone making the supposed argument that invitro-fertilization is a “bad thing” that we must accept is happening for the sake of medical science. Ergo, there’s no analogy under either scenario.
Bricker, if I understand you correctly, you believe that in-vitro fertilization is immoral because embryos are created and destroyed in the process of creating human life.
The same is true in the more natural process of conception. My doctor has said that it is not unusual for a woman to conceive and pass an embryo without ever having been aware that she was pregnant. And of course, many women lose babies that they are unable to carry to term. Others carry their children to term only to have the babies die during delivery.
In those cases, does the act of lovemaking become immoral in retrospect? Is it immoral all of the time because we are taking the chance of creating and then destroying an embryo?
Could you look a child born of in-vitro fertilization in the eye and tell that human being that the act that conceived her or him was immoral?
Then let’s look at the reality of the current situation. In-vitro fertilization is not going away until something better comes along. That is pretty much a given. Those embryonic cells will continue to be destroyed. Trashed. Incinerated.
Meanwhile, a full term newborn infant in a nearby hospital is dying because of limits on stem cell research. A seven year old little girl has her insides rot out because of limits on stem cell research. A woman who has been married two months is losing her ability to remember who her husband is because of limits on stem cell research. And a newly conceived child will never be carried to term because of limits on stem cell research.
Don’t think in terms on clumps of cells or embryos or fetuses. Please thing about real human beings like yourself and your family and everyone you cherish – who love and suffer and live in anguish because well-intentioned people such as yourself are refusing to accept that it isn’t a choice anymore of creating the embryos or not creating the embryos. The choice is whether
to use the embryos that will be created in the process of in-vitro fertilization to bring life and healing, love and joy to human beings or
to trash the embryos and allow the suffering and loss to continue in the name of “morality.”
I truly understand that we disagree on the morality of invitro fertilization as the process is done today and you certainly must live with your own sense of what is moral. But given that we are left with the two choices above, what then?
I find it a propos in this context to mention that like Bricker, John Kerry believes life begins at conception; however he still wants to use embyonic cells for research. FWIW.
To that point, the use of organs taken from a person put to death by the State is illegal in every U.S. jurisdiction that I’m aware of – despite, according to a quick Google search, occasional attempts to change things (including a proposal in Georgia to use the guillotine to facilitate exactly that :eek: ). And human rights observers have no small amount of criticism of China’s policy of using the organs of the executed.
Those are babies that die, not babies that are killed.
In a sort of “they know not what they do” sorta way, yes. Of course, you would not say that to a child, though.
They are hurting because they are sick, not because of a lack of stem-cell research.
Please realize that if I and Bricker are right, you would be murdering utterly innocent human beings for the * chance* that their body parts could be canabalized to cure someone elses disease.
Isn’t that not really a relevant question, and more an appeal to emotion? For example, I think sex outside of marriage is immoral. But I’d never say to somebody who was conceived outside of marriage that the act that conceived him or her was immoral, because, firstly, it’s not his fault he was conceived that way, and secondly, and more importantly, it would be a cruel thing to say and could hurt him. But that wouldn’t change my belief that the act that conceived her or him WAS immoral.
It sounds like, with that question, you’re asking if Bricker is tactful, more than anything else.
If it were possible to clone embryonic stem cells (and there’s ample reason to suppose it may be someday soon) would THAT be OK? And would it work? Would it sidestep the objections that the right-to-lifers have, leaving them with no grounds whatsoever to oppose it?
Bricker, I understand the argument you are making (in least tactful way possible) and on some level I agree with you, however, I maintain my stance. If we go with the Mengele analogy, would you say that organs harvested by those killed by Mengele should not be used for transplant?
You agree that murder victims organs are fair game (which they are, by the way, if the family agrees) the should not those victims be used for the greater good?
There are many things about in vitro with with I disagree (selective reduction because some nimrod Dr. decided to implant 14 embryos) but the embryos exist. I therefore think that until we change the system, that we may as well use the embryos for research. The greater good, until the system is changed.
There is currently a problem with embryo abandonment, where the parents of the embryos no longer pay storage fees, and the facilities simply thaw, and destroy the embryos, to make space. I suggest we use these for furthering research.
Call me cold hearted, but until there is better regulation of fertility clinics, I see no better options.
I’ve tried to see this issue from the perspective of others. I failed. Thinking a blob of protoplasm created in a lab with no nervous system or even any organs is “human life” in the sense that has any moral meaning whatsoever is really really really fucking stupid. It’s a position not borne out of any sort of reasoning I’ve been able to see.
Since you reject my attempt to construct an argument for you - for which I apologize, seeing as how it was evidently not the argument you intended - I am unable to discern what your argument actually is. “You are arrogant,” is not exactly an argument remarkable for its cogency, since my arrogance doesn’t have the slightest thing to do with the rightness or wrongness of my point. That’s why ad hominem attacks are a logical fallacy: they invite the audience to infer that because the proponent of a belief is personally reprehensible in some way, their point is somehow weak. I don’t know if you intended that inference or not, but it’s unclear to me what other argument you are making. Let’s assume that you’re right, and it’s highly arrogant of me to pass judgement in this instance. What has that to do with the issue of whether the judgement is right or wrong?
Once again, I feel constrained to point out that “fucking bullshit doublespeak,” while a nice turn of phrase, is hardly a cogent rebuttal. And in fact, “living, breathing, feeling human beings” are, by some accounts, made up of a large bunch of cells.
Right. Because, as I previously pointed out, the issue of the amount of suffering endured by the small group of cells (the embryos) and the large group of cells (the adult human victims) was not part of the analogy. If I draw an analogy to corporate culture by mentioning a pack of hyenas, I hope your attention will be drawn to the hyenas’ competitive and fierce jostling for position, or perhaps their tendency to feed on the dead carcasses others have killed, rather than carping at me about the fact that hyenas have fur and paws and most corporate executives do not.
The analogy goes to the issue of profiting, even as a unintended side effect, from the fruits of immorality and evil.
As with all moral acts, I contend that intentionality is the key. When a husband and wife make love, open to the possibility of transmission of life, they are intending just that - the possible creation of new life. If it happens, through no fault of their own, that a conceived embryo undergos a spontaneous miscarriage, that’s no one’s fault.
It’s not a task I would enjoy. But is this question really probative of the truth? I would not enjoy looking a child that was the product of rape or incest in the eye and telling him that the act that conceived him was immoral. That would be cruel.
But we cannot conclude that rape and incest are moral from that exercise, can we?
I could make the same argument about the fruits of Nazi research. I could point out that the evils of the Nazis are a done deal; meanwhile, why not use the research on men repeatedly dunked in freezing water to help develop cures for hypothermia victims?
Indeed, there’s a case to be made for doing that. And at this remove, years after the horrors of Mengele are over, I might even agree. But if you had come along during the time that Mengele was perpetrating his horrors and suggested that we may as well use his research, since “[he] is not going away until something better comes along…” I would have opposed it.
I admit there is a practical argument to be made, and you’re making it.
But I can’t stomach the thought of benefitting from what amounts to a horrendous act.