Stem cell research brings up the idea of advanced technology. If a person has the technology to do something, does that necessarily mean that we have the obligation or expectation to do so? C.S. Lewis once said that, “Man’s power over nature turns out to be a power exercised by some men over other men with nature as its instrument. Man’s final conquest has proved to be the abolition of man.” In a sense, the destruction of man by man seems fitting in the case of stem cells. What it’s all boiled down to is the pushing and prodding of blank cells to grow and take shape in order to become something for the human body. A human body is essentially a growing life, and stem cells in little test tubes grow one cell at a time. Meaning, that even the
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The committee states that the, “embryo merits respect as a form of human life, but not the same level of respect accorded to an individual,” (Kristol and Cohen). This can be translated to mean that the embryo should be respected in its abilities to develop further, but should not be abused. That respect does not extend to treating it as a living person. The question of ethics on this issue brings up many pro-life supporters, which are against abortion. The idea of abortion is applied in the sense that the embryo is fully a human being and therefore may not be killed. This religious-based view is not shared among every religion, but many communities supporting this view still stand. Although, it should come as a surprise that many Christians do not feel this way; in fact there’s a shared belief that they are people, “who see the embryo not as another human person but a cell with extraordinary potential to divide and develop into a person, and therefore of less value in its present state than, say, a baby (Cole-Turner, …show more content…
As of now, the law allows abortions to occur up to the 6th month of a pregnancy. After this point, the fetus is deemed viable or able to live outside of the womb. This idea came into law after the famous law case of Roe versus Wade in 1973 where abortion was legalized. This concept of viability is the basis of this moral debate. The way the law uses the peculiarity of words, viable means to be able to live and breathe on its own, providing the basic functions of life for itself. Those that believe the embryo is a living entity at fertilization do not contend with the concept of viability. The argument does not revolve around the assumption that an embryo can or can’t survive on its own. The idea is that the unborn embryo was a person in the whole sense, and obtained personhood upon conception or soon thereafter (Parson 134). The morality of the issue rests on the conceptual understanding of what is living and what is not. Just like this case, an individual’s position for stem cell research is seeing the embryo being a living human or just a
The committee states that the, “embryo merits respect as a form of human life, but not the same level of respect accorded to an individual,” (Kristol and Cohen). This can be translated to mean that the embryo should be respected in its abilities to develop further, but should not be abused. That respect does not extend to treating it as a living person. The question of ethics on this issue brings up many pro-life supporters, which are against abortion. The idea of abortion is applied in the sense that the embryo is fully a human being and therefore may not be killed. This religious-based view is not shared among every religion, but many communities supporting this view still stand. Although, it should come as a surprise that many Christians do not feel this way; in fact there’s a shared belief that they are people, “who see the embryo not as another human person but a cell with extraordinary potential to divide and develop into a person, and therefore of less value in its present state than, say, a baby (Cole-Turner, …show more content…
As of now, the law allows abortions to occur up to the 6th month of a pregnancy. After this point, the fetus is deemed viable or able to live outside of the womb. This idea came into law after the famous law case of Roe versus Wade in 1973 where abortion was legalized. This concept of viability is the basis of this moral debate. The way the law uses the peculiarity of words, viable means to be able to live and breathe on its own, providing the basic functions of life for itself. Those that believe the embryo is a living entity at fertilization do not contend with the concept of viability. The argument does not revolve around the assumption that an embryo can or can’t survive on its own. The idea is that the unborn embryo was a person in the whole sense, and obtained personhood upon conception or soon thereafter (Parson 134). The morality of the issue rests on the conceptual understanding of what is living and what is not. Just like this case, an individual’s position for stem cell research is seeing the embryo being a living human or just a