Life starts after 14 days, say Anglicans

The Age (Australia) ^ | November 5, 2003 | Peta Rasdien

[nickcarraway]

Life does not begin when sperm meets egg, but 14 days after, according to the head of the Anglican Church in Australia.

Primate Peter Carnley told the Fertility Society of Australia in Perth yesterday this meant objections to IVF, genetic testing and stem cell research should fall away.

Archbishop Carnley said that until it was implanted in a womb lining, a fertilised egg was not a human life but rather a genetically novel kind of cell.

The fertilised egg must also pass the point that it could split to become an identical twin, which was at about 14 days. After that, the embryo should be accorded the status of an individual human with rights to care, protection and life.

Dr Carnley's position clearly contradicts that of the Catholic Church, which holds that life begins when an egg is fertilised.

But Dr Carnley said the debate about the beginning of life within the Christian faith did not come to that view until 1869, when Pius IX declared all abortion was wrong from the beginning of conception.

Dr Carnley argued that scientific knowledge had moved forward since then and must be taken into account.

If conception was defined as the meeting of gametes - egg and sperm - then the cloned sheep Dolly was not conceived, because Dolly was the product of cell nuclear transfer, where the ovum nucleus was replaced by DNA from an adult cell.

"I think it is now clear that we must begin to think of conception less as a moment and more in gradual and continuous terms as a process," Dr Carnley said.

He said since 1984 Anglican moral theology had concluded that conception was a 14-day process and this helped shape legislation around the world.

"Given that twinning can occur up to the 14th day of this process, it is not logically possible to talk of the conception of a unique human individual prior to the completion of this process.

"Each of us can say that we came to be in the sense that we were each conceived, as a potential human individual, 14 days after the fertilisation of an ovum, not before." He said the natural 60 per cent wastage of ova during IVF procedures need not be considered the killing of conceived human individuals.

"We do not have some 70,000 frozen people on ice at various places around Australia," he said.

Embryo experimentation and stem cell research were also morally acceptable.

"If there is a utilitarian argument for the possible benefit to mankind of experimentation on embryos, this could be tolerated in a controlled way under licence up until the 14th day in a way that after the 14th day it would not," he said.

"Stem cell research becomes also thinkable, for stem cells are harvested well within the 14th day period."

[mcg1969]

BTW, my understanding of the "rhythm" method of contraception is that it's intended to maximize the likelihood that in the event that an ovum gets fertilized it will not manage to implant successfully. Doesn't that mean people practicing the rhythm method are actively trying to kill any embryos they might conceive?

No, this isn't the case. Generally speaking, ovulation occurs primarily at a point in the cycle that is quite favorable to implantation---when the uterine wall is well-prepared. So the primary effect of the rhythm method is to prevent conception, not implantation.

I do believe that it is possible for a woman to ovulate outside of that time frame on occasion. I've heard it can be in response to some stimulus (like sex) or spontaneous. I guess in that case there is a lower chance of implanation. But someone practicing the rhythm method isn't necessarily encouraging this phenomenon any more than someone who is not.

Someone please correct me if I'm wrong.

[mcg1969]

Well fine, MHGinTN, glad you can admit it, but it doesn't excuse it. Nobody's asking you to tolerate sin and evil. The fact is that we're both fully against abortion, but in the spirit of intellectual honesty I'm saying that I'm still not convinced that life as God sees it begins at conception. For that suddenly label me in your mind as some sort of dehumanizer or drunk on the devil's koolaid is just silly and childish. And frankly it works against the purpose of uniting against the enemies of the unborn.

[hocndoc]

"It's actually not that bad a place to draw a line. Without implantation the blastocyst will not continue development into a fetus."



Humans can be killed or die naturally at anytime after fertilization or the quickening of a clone (however or if that's ever possible). But, that doesn't change that the beginning is before implantation. A somatic cell or gamete can't become a blastocyst - aren't actual developing and differentiating beings.

[Porterville]

Is that 14 days after anal sex??? does that mean that they feel "life" in a new way after 14 days after their first experience with the same sex???

[hocndoc]

The fact of species does not develop.

[supercat]

No, this isn't the case.

Hmmm... you're probably right. It's been ages since I've had sex ed, and with no wife I've no reason to worry about such things. Though I don't remember whether the ovum has necessarily lost all viability before the body begins the process of menstruation. Oh well, it's late and I'm tired. 'Night.

[hocndoc]

An acorn is not a tree, but neither is a sapling a tree.
Even a 10 year old oak may not have *all* the characteristics of that species of oaks, but it's still an oak, and must " it must forevermore either grow or perish."
A human embryo is a human individual,a member of the species, even if he's not an infant, a toddler, or an adult capable of reproduction.

[ComradeBork]

As near as I can tell Life began on the 23rd of November 1936 Sorry, couldn't resist...

[hocndoc]

All but the first of your list is established at fertilization. What you would do if you were to establish your list as law is create a discrimination between those embryos within women and those which begin outside of the body. You would create/perpetuate 2 classes of humans - those created by external manipulation of gametes and those conceived within women.
Louise Brown and all the IVF babies are no less human than I am.

Twinning is one of the natural possibilities of humans at the earliest stages of development. Simply because we cannot at this time detect which zygotes are destined to twin does not make them any less individuals of the human species.

Once we begin to discriminate which humans may be killed at the whim of others, the powerful may kill any they choose to discriminate against.

[mcg1969]

Supercat, your analysis of the situation mirrors mine very closely. We certainly know the physiological process with considerable precision. But that physical process differs in no material way from the process that animals are conceived and born (particularly mammals). And they aren't regarded by God with the same sanctity of life as humans. Obviously that is because we are unique, being created in the image of God, and we have been given by Him a spirit which allows us to interact with Him. The mechanism by which the gift of spirit is integrated into the physiological process is a mystery and will always remain so.

So I simply cannot be certain that human life, as God defines it, is completely and fully formed at conception. That doesn't change my belief that abortion is wrong, because in truth we don't know the mechanism by which God endows a human with spirit, and specifically when it occurs. So we have to err on preserving the life.

Yeah that doesn't make a nice tidy piece of dogma to trot out at the latest abortion debate, and it therefore may not be politically popular in pro-life circles to believe that way. Oh well.

[hocndoc]

"Are you aware of any farmer who would look at a field of corn and consider the number of corn plants out there to be the number of stalks plus the number of seeds?"

Bad analogy.

What is the purpose of the count? If it is to find the true number of individual plants, the number of viable seeds would need to be included. If corn plants were valued as human beings are nominally valued, then each seed would be equally valuable and protected from intentional killing along with the their parent plants. If you doubt that, switch to Marvin's example of condor eggs.

[mcg1969]

To reply to my own post, I find it incredibly dumfounding that some of the same people that would fight to the death to preserve the right of a woman to a partial-birth abortion would chain themselves to the front door of a Kentucky Fried Chicken to convince them to slaughter chickens in a more "humane" way (and indeed would prefer that they cease doing so altogether).

[NYer]

Archbishop Carnley said that until it was implanted in a womb lining, a fertilised egg was not a human life but rather a genetically novel kind of cell.

Tell that to the mother of this child, who grew and developed outside the womb, in her abdominal cavity. Archbishop Carnley certainly can't tell it to this "genetically novel kind of cell", that happened to survive.

Rare baby survives outside womb

I suppose the headline should be changed to .... Rare Genetically Novel Kind of Cell Survives Outside Womb.

[Wampus SC]

A comment or so for the learned Primate:

human egg + human sperm = fertilized egg.

Starting at the moment it becomes fertilized, it's impossible for it to grow into anything except a human. Not a cow, pig, goat or wombat. Only a human.

It's a human life from the instant it can't grow into anything but a human. It's simple, and that's why he had to go into all those verbal gyrations and doubletalk.

[beavus]

Sperm are alive, as are many things, but they are not living creatures.

You said earlier that a sperm is not a life. Now you say that a sperm is alive. Make up your mind, please.

a·live ( …-lºv“) adj. 1. Having life.

[E.G.C.]

BTTT!!!!!!

[beavus]

The sex cells of reproduction are sub-units of organs (ovaries and testes). What the union of chromosomes from the sex cells conceives is an ORGANISM.

Thank you for adding some clarity. Still, two questions still seem unanswered. First, wouldn't culturing of an animal cell be sufficient to demonstrate that the cell is "an individual form of life"?

Second, the good Primate refers to a "human life". I know what is human (e.g. human hepatocyte) and I know what is alive (e.g. human hepatocyte). But somehow the Primate doesn't seem to think, e.g., that a hepatocyte is a human life. It's rather like thinking that a car that is red is not a red car.

Notice, a hepatocyte is diploid. So it isn't clear to me why you made the diploid/haploid distinction when defining "organism".

or·gan·ism ( ôr“g…-n¹z”…m) n. 1. An individual form of life, such as a plant, an animal, a bacterium, a protist, or a fungus; a body made up of organs, organelles, or other parts that work together to carry on the various processes of life.

in·di·vid·u·al ( ¹n”d…-v¹j“›-…l) adj. 2. Existing as a distinct entity; separate: individual drops of rain.

[Pippin]

No matter what the Anglicans or the Catholics or anyone else says, only God can determine when life begins, not man.

Just like I believe only God should determine when life ends.

[beavus]

Thank you very much for those descriptions. I don't disagree with any of it. In particular, I agree with you that a sperm is alive.

However, it doesn't explain to me what the good Primate meant when he refered to "human life" as apparently excluding all forms of human life except the implanted fertilized egg. You and I agree that a human sperm is alive (when it is not dead). We also agree that it is human. Do we agree that it is a human life?

[Aquinasfan]

Carnley said that until it was implanted in a womb lining, a fertilised egg was not a human life but rather a genetically novel kind of cell.

He'll find that he's in good company with the AMA which in the early seventies changed its definition of the beginning of life from the moment of conception to implantation so that "the pill," which oftentimes prevents implantation, would not be classified as an abortifacient.

This kind of thinking is demonstrated by his statement that "We do not have some 70,000 frozen people on ice at various places around Australia." Rather than face this terrible truth he has chosen to define these human beings out of existence.