By Patrick Lee & Robert P. George
[Pro-Life InfonetNote: The following is the latestin a series of op-ed
debates between the authors and Ronald Bailey, apro-embryonic stem cell research writer for Reason Magazine. Mr. Lee isassociate professor of philosophy at the Franciscan University of Steubenville.Mr. George is the McCormick Professor of Jurisprudence at PrincetonUniversity.]
In attempting to justify the destruction of embryonic humanbeings to
harvest their stem cells, Ronald Bailey has, on the onehand, conceded
that you and I were once embryos, and, on the other hand,insisted that
human embryos are not distinct organisms at all. Thus,Bailey has managed
to back himself into the absurd position of suggesting thathuman beings
at more mature stages of development once existed as embryosbut were,
during the embryonic stage, something other than distinctorganisms (and
yet has also admitted that we are essentially physicalorganisms).
The truth, of course, is that you and I came into existenceprecisely at
the point at which the distinct human organism that is nowyou or I came
into existence. It is true to say that each of us was oncean embryo,
because the distinct, self-integrating, human, physicalorganism that is
now you or me is identical to, or continuous with, thedistinct,
self-integrating, human organism that was, at earlier stagesof
development, an adolescent, a child, an infant, a fetus,and, at the dawn
of his or her life, an embryo. If the embryo were in factsomething other
than a distinct, self-integrating organism if it were, likesperm cells,
ova, or somatic cells, merely part of another human beingthen it would
not be correct to say that you or I were once embryos, anymore than it
would be correct to say that you or I were once sperm cells,or ova, or
(in the case of someone who was brought into being bycloning) somatic
cells. So Bailey is right to concede that we were onceembryos and utterly
wrong to insist that embryos are not distinct organisms.
Bailey's denial of the fact that embryos are distinctorganisms is meant
to support his claim that when we were embryos we were not"people." We
have made two points about this claim. First, Bailey'sargument for it
turns out to be philosophical rather than scientific. Ittherefore does
nothing to fulfill his original promise to establish as amatter of
scientific fact that human embryos are not human beings.Second, the claim
is philosophically untenable. Either it mistakenly identifiesthe human
person with something other than the human organism, or itdenies that we
are intrinsically worthwhile because of what we are, asopposed to our
properties, states, talents, etc. (and thus deserve thetitle, "persons").
In our exchanges with Bailey, we have defended the followingset of
propositions:
(1) What we are is a human, physical organism.
(2) We are intrinsically worthwhile because of what we are,not just
because of characteristics we acquire at some point in ourlife.
(3) Therefore, all human, physical organisms areintrinsically worthwhile
(and hence are "people").
Not only did we present arguments to support (1) and (2),but Bailey has
at different times expressly admitted both of thosepremises. When Bailey
in his last article claims that, "we know for sure thatpeople all have
human brains," that simply begs the question. If youonce were a human
embryo (as Bailey rightly concedes) then you once existed ata time before
you had a brain, just as you existed before you had permanentteeth (or
any teeth for that matter), and just as you existed beforeyou had lungs.
And if you are intrinsically valuable because of what youare (which
Bailey has also conceded), then an entity which hasintrinsic value (and
so is a "person") exists at all times that youexist.
The only colorable ground for saying that a human organismneeds a brain
to be a "person" is to claim that one must have animmediately exercisable
capacity for consciousness. When we set forth reasons forrejecting any
such claim, Bailey replied that we erroneously accused him"of defining
human beings in terms of their being conscious or havingmental
functions." But if this is not how Bailey defines humanbeings, then why
does he think that a human organism must have a brain inorder to be a
person? If a whole human being is a person, and does notneed to have an
immediately exercisable capacity for consciousness to be aperson, then
why are those human individuals at developmental stagesprior to complete
brain development not people? (Of course, the embryopossesses from the
start the epigenetic primordia for brain development and is,indeed,
actively developing a brain, just as he or she is developingall the other
bodily organs he or she will possess at maturity.)
The only alternative is to hold that the embryo or fetusmust have a brain
in order to be a distinct organism at all, that prior to theappearance of
the brain (at eight weeks when a complete brain hasdeveloped, or at three
weeks when the primitive streak appears, which is plainlyits primordium,
or before that, when the cells appear which also constitutethe primordium
of the brain?) the embryo is (somehow) not really a distinctorganism. Is
this Bailey's position? If so, it is plainly false. Whatcould the embryo
possibly be? He or she (for the sex is determined from thebeginning) is
clearly not a part of the mother, nor a part of the father,nor a stray
cell, nor a mere clump of cells, for this highly organizedbeing is
growing in a definite self-directed manner, toward the moremature stage
of a human organism.
Not being able to maintain consistently that we once werehuman organisms
but were not people (since at different points he hasconceded each
premise of the argument that refutes it), Bailey falls backon his denial
that the human embryo is distinct a denial that ismanifestly inconsistent
with his concession that we once were human embryos.
The origin of Bailey's errors appears to be his suppositionthat the
pro-life argument is that human embryos are distinct humanbeings merely
because each has a distinct genetic code. If this were thepro-life
argument, then the facts of cloning and twinning wouldrefute it. But, as
we have pointed out, it isn't. Everyone knows that there arevarious
things that, though not human beings, have a distinct andfully human
genetic makeup a culture in a petri dish waiting to betested for strep
infection, or a beating heart on ice awaitingtransplantation, for
example. (Contrary to what Bailey implies at the end of hismost recent
article, such facts are scarcely "recent scientificdiscoveries.") The
fact is that having a distinct genetic make-up is sufficientto prove in
most cases that the developing embryo is not a part of themother or the
father. That still is true for identical twins or for anembryo who might
generate an identical twin from his or her cells. But it isobviously not
sufficient to show, nor does anyone think that it issufficient to show,
that these embryos are whole human beings. What does showdecisively that
embryos are whole human organisms (and distinct fromidentical twin
siblings, if they have any, or from donors, if they areclones) is the
self-integration and self-direction of maturation and growththat these
embryos actively maintain; they do not function as parts oflarger
organisms, but each functions as a whole organism of thehuman species,
directing his or her own integral organic functioning.
Bailey has never faced up to our original reply to hisargument that human
embryos are no different in value and worth from any of oursomatic cells
because somatic cells are like embryos in possessing a fullgenetic code.
We pointed out that this argument ignores the massivedifference between
human embryos and somatic cells: Human embryos are, and somaticcells are
not, whole organisms actively developing themselves (unlessprevented from
doing so) to maturation.
Bailey has fallen back on arguing that human embryos are notdistinct
organisms because the fact of twinning and the possibilityof cloning
disprove any great discontinuity between any of our somaticcells and
human embryos, or between the totipotent cells within anembryo before he
or she twins, and a human embryo. He argues that, "whatwe see is a series
of proper environments needed for human DNA to begin theprocess of
embryonic development." So, "there is a series ofproper environments
needed for human DNA to begin the process of embryonicdevelopment." What
Bailey actually asks us to believe is that each of ourcells, even while
it is part of us and functions as part of the whole organismthat we are,
is the same kind of thing, with the same kind ofpotentiality, as a whole
human embryo, who is directing its own integral organicfunctioning and
actively developing himself or herself to maturity. If thatwere so, then
each of our cells already would be a whole organism, onlywaiting for the
proper environment to begin maturation. But that is absurd.
The human embryo and each somatic cell are similar in thisone respect:
each has the entire human genetic code or information whichcould in the
right circumstances guide the self-development of a wholehuman organism
to maturity. But the discontinuity is undeniable: the humanembryo, but
not the somatic cell, is actively making use of that geneticinformation
for its own self-directed maturation. So, to the argumentindicated above,
numbered (1) through (3) we can add:
(4) Biology (and, in particular, the subfield of humanembryology) shows
that distinct, whole human organisms come to be when thereis generated a
distinct organism actively developing its forces andelements toward its
own more mature stages of development. (This occurs usuallywith the
fusion of the spermatazoon and the oocyte. With monozygotictwins, a
second distinct organism comes to be with the extrinsicdivision of the
first embryo that was generated by fertilization. Finally,in cloning, a
new organism comes to be with the fusion and activation ofthe chromosomes
of a somatic cell with an enucleated ovum.)
Incidentally, Bailey entirely missed the point of ourargument concerning
infant mortality. It is simply this: The highinfant-mortality rates that
characterized societies for most of human history provide nolegitimate
ground for denying the status of infants as human beings. Byprecisely the
same token, high rates of early miscarriage do nothing todisprove the
humanity of embryonic human beings.
Bailey's argument in the last paragraph of his most recentsalvo is simply
confused. It is obvious, he contends, that unimplantedembryos are not
people because no one tries to rescue them. Yet some peopledo try to
rescue them, and, as a matter of fact, that is what we aretrying to do
just now. Moreover, let us remind Bailey that the questionwe are debating
is precisely how we should treat unimplanted embryos. Itproves nothing to
argue that a class of human individuals are not personsbecause others
fail to treat them as persons, and to argue this preciselyin a debate
where one's opponents are in fact urging their readers totreat them as
persons. The analogy cannot be avoided: It is like arguingagainst
abolitionists that slaves are not persons because othersfail to treat
them as persons.