CELLING LIES (Stem Cell Myths exposed by Michael Fumento)

National Review ^ | September 25th, 2002 | Michael Fumento

[Aquinasfan]

I don't think embryonic life in the first trimester should receive legal protection, because I don't think there is any sentinence.

They're people, but because they're not sentient they should not be given legal protection? What about comatose people?

[Aquinasfan]

Those continuum thingies are tricky. That is what makes the issue of when life begins tricky.

That's what makes materialism impossible. A human being is a substantial form, not a purely material entity. The purely materialistic view of human nature gives us the errors of scientific reductionism like the category error you describe above. (And others like, if a person loses his arm is he 3/4 of a human being? Should he have 3/4 of his rights?) Essentially spiritual things (like thought/consciousness) cannot be reduced to the purely material (brain waves).

[FairWitness]

I don't think embryonic life in the first trimester should receive legal protection, because I don't think there is any sentinence.

We are not insects that go through a metamorphosis which has on one side a caterpiller and on the other side a butterfly. Human development is a seamless day-by-day progression to what is inarguably a human person. I understand your arguement, and once believed in it, but have come to the conclusion that, in the absence of certainty, the only human choice is to chose life.

[FairWitness]

chose = choose

[supercat]

supercat, that is exactly the strategy that was used to go after late-term and partial brith abortions...

Indeed. The one point where I would criticize the Republicans' "partial-birth abortion" ban is that I don't think it properly stated its constitutional justification. States do, after all, have very broad powers in defining what types of homicide are or are not lawful; it is legal, for example, for a homeowner in Texas to shoot someone who is committing criminal mischief on his property in the nighttime, even when the criminal poses no immediate threat to the life of the homeowner. In other states, such action would be attempted murder (or second-degree murder, if the shooting proved fatal).

I don't know the best way to resolve the issue. Obviously it is just plain wrong that Roe v. Wade and follow-up decisions make it essentially impossible for states to restrict even "partial-birth" abortions, but I don't know the best way for Congress to return such authority to the states where it belongs.

[supercat]

I understand your arguement, and once believed in it, but have come to the conclusion that, in the absence of certainty, the only human choice is to chose life.

It would certainly be morally wrong for someone to kill without justification something which 'may or may not' be a human being. On the other hand, should not the state, in order to charge someone with murder, have to prove that what was killed was actually a human being?

I don't think you'd have any trouble finding a jury of 12 people who would regard a 39-week fetus as a human being. Indeed, even without abusive voir dire one would have good luck picking such a jury at random. On the other hand, finding a jury which would regard a 1-week fetus as a human being would be another story. I don't think the state would be able to make a case to a jury except by excessively abusing the voir dire process.