SCR truths

Stem Cell Research Truths: The debate continues
By Patrick Lee & Robert P. George

[Note:  The following is the latest in a series of op-ed debates between the authors and Ronald Bailey, a pro-embryonic stem cell research writer for Reason Magazine. Mr. Lee is associate professor of philosophy at the Franciscan University of Steubenville. Mr. George is the McCormick Professor of Jurisprudence at Princeton University.]

In attempting to justify the destruction of embryonic human beings to harvest their stem cells, Ronald Bailey has, on the one hand, 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 that human beings at more mature stages of development once existed as embryos but were, during the embryonic stage, something other than distinct organisms (and yet has also admitted that we are essentially physical organisms).

The truth, of course, is that you and I came into existence precisely at the point at which the distinct human organism that is now you or I came into existence. It is true to say that each of us was once an embryo, because the distinct, self-integrating, human, physical organism that is now you or me is identical to, or continuous with, the distinct, self-integrating, human organism that was, at earlier stages of 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 fact something other than a distinct, self-integrating organism if it were, like sperm cells, ova, or somatic cells, merely part of another human being then it would not be correct to say that you or I were once embryos, any more 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 by cloning) somatic cells. So Bailey is right to concede that we were once embryos and utterly wrong to insist that embryos are not distinct organisms.

Bailey's denial of the fact that embryos are distinct organisms 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's argument for it turns out to be philosophical rather than scientific. It therefore does nothing to fulfill his original promise to establish as a matter of scientific fact that human embryos are not human beings. Second, the claim is philosophically untenable. Either it mistakenly identifies the human person with something other than the human organism, or it denies that we are intrinsically worthwhile because of what we are, as opposed to our properties, states, talents, etc. (and thus deserve the title, "persons").

In our exchanges with Bailey, we have defended the following set 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 our life.

(3) Therefore, all human, physical organisms are intrinsically 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 those premises. When Bailey in his last article claims that, "we know for sure that people all have human brains," that simply begs the question. If you once were a human embryo (as Bailey rightly concedes) then you once existed at a time before you had a brain, just as you existed before you had permanent teeth (or any teeth for that matter), and just as you existed before you had lungs. And if you are intrinsically valuable because of what you are (which Bailey has also conceded), then an entity which has intrinsic value (and so is a "person") exists at all times that you exist.

The only colorable ground for saying that a human organism needs a brain to be a "person" is to claim that one must have an immediately exercisable capacity for consciousness. When we set forth reasons for rejecting any such claim, Bailey replied that we erroneously accused him "of defining human beings in terms of their being conscious or having mental functions." But if this is not how Bailey defines human beings, then why does he think that a human organism must have a brain in order to be a person? If a whole human being is a person, and does not need to have an immediately exercisable capacity for consciousness to be a person, then why are those human individuals at developmental stages prior to complete brain development not people? (Of course, the embryo possesses from the start the epigenetic primordia for brain development and is, indeed, actively developing a brain, just as he or she is developing all the other bodily organs he or she will possess at maturity.)

The only alternative is to hold that the embryo or fetus must have a brain in order to be a distinct organism at all, that prior to the appearance of the brain (at eight weeks when a complete brain has developed, or at three weeks when the primitive streak appears, which is plainly its primordium, or before that, when the cells appear which also constitute the primordium of the brain?) the embryo is (somehow) not really a distinct organism. Is this Bailey's position? If so, it is plainly false. What could the embryo possibly be? He or she (for the sex is determined from the beginning) 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 organized being is growing in a definite self-directed manner, toward the more mature stage of a human organism.

Not being able to maintain consistently that we once were human organisms but were not people (since at different points he has conceded each premise of the argument that refutes it), Bailey falls back on his denial that the human embryo is distinct a denial that is manifestly inconsistent with his concession that we once were human embryos.

The origin of Bailey's errors appears to be his supposition that the pro-life argument is that human embryos are distinct human beings merely because each has a distinct genetic code. If this were the pro-life argument, then the facts of cloning and twinning would refute it. But, as we have pointed out, it isn't. Everyone knows that there are various things that, though not human beings, have a distinct and fully human genetic makeup a culture in a petri dish waiting to be tested for strep infection, or a beating heart on ice awaiting transplantation, for example. (Contrary to what Bailey implies at the end of his most recent article, such facts are scarcely "recent scientific discoveries.") The fact is that having a distinct genetic make-up is sufficient to prove in most cases that the developing embryo is not a part of the mother or the father. That still is true for identical twins or for an embryo who might generate an identical twin from his or her cells. But it is obviously not sufficient to show, nor does anyone think that it is sufficient to show, that these embryos are whole human beings. What does show decisively that embryos are whole human organisms (and distinct from identical twin siblings, if they have any, or from donors, if they are clones) is the self-integration and self-direction of maturation and growth that these embryos actively maintain; they do not function as parts of larger organisms, but each functions as a whole organism of the human species, directing his or her own integral organic functioning.

Bailey has never faced up to our original reply to his argument that human embryos are no different in value and worth from any of our somatic cells because somatic cells are like embryos in possessing a full genetic code. We pointed out that this argument ignores the massive difference between human embryos and somatic cells: Human embryos are, and somatic cells are not, whole organisms actively developing themselves (unless prevented from doing so) to maturation.

Bailey has fallen back on arguing that human embryos are not distinct organisms because the fact of twinning and the possibility of cloning disprove any great discontinuity between any of our somatic cells and human embryos, or between the totipotent cells within an embryo before he or she twins, and a human embryo. He argues that, "what we see is a series of proper environments needed for human DNA to begin the process of embryonic development." So, "there is a series of proper environments needed for human DNA to begin the process of embryonic development." What Bailey actually asks us to believe is that each of our cells, even while it is part of us and functions as part of the whole organism that we are, is the same kind of thing, with the same kind of potentiality, as a whole human embryo, who is directing its own integral organic functioning and actively developing himself or herself to maturity. If that were so, then each of our cells already would be a whole organism, only waiting for the proper environment to begin maturation. But that is absurd.

The human embryo and each somatic cell are similar in this one respect: each has the entire human genetic code or information which could in the right circumstances guide the self-development of a whole human organism to maturity. But the discontinuity is undeniable: the human embryo, but not the somatic cell, is actively making use of that genetic information for its own self-directed maturation. So, to the argument indicated above, numbered (1) through (3) we can add:

(4) Biology (and, in particular, the subfield of human embryology) shows that distinct, whole human organisms come to be when there is generated a distinct organism actively developing its forces and elements toward its own more mature stages of development. (This occurs usually with the fusion of the spermatazoon and the oocyte. With monozygotic twins, a second distinct organism comes to be with the extrinsic division of the first embryo that was generated by fertilization. Finally, in cloning, a new organism comes to be with the fusion and activation of the chromosomes of a somatic cell with an enucleated ovum.)

Incidentally, Bailey entirely missed the point of our argument concerning infant mortality. It is simply this: The high infant-mortality rates that characterized societies for most of human history provide no legitimate ground for denying the status of infants as human beings. By precisely the same token, high rates of early miscarriage do nothing to disprove the humanity of embryonic human beings.

Bailey's argument in the last paragraph of his most recent salvo is simply confused. It is obvious, he contends, that unimplanted embryos are not people because no one tries to rescue them. Yet some people do try to rescue them, and, as a matter of fact, that is what we are trying to do just now. Moreover, let us remind Bailey that the question we are debating is precisely how we should treat unimplanted embryos. It proves nothing to argue that a class of human individuals are not persons because others fail to treat them as persons, and to argue this precisely in a debate where one's opponents are in fact urging their readers to treat them as persons. The analogy cannot be avoided: It is like arguing against abolitionists that slaves are not persons because others fail to treat them as persons.