What exactly are human embryos? The Royal Commission on New Reproductive Technologies was forced to consider this question for a very basic reason: part of its mandate was to decide what to do about embryo research.
There has been a decided push in the last several years to encourage public acceptance of experimentation on human embryos. Ever since In Vitro Fertilization (IVF) became possible (and more widely accepted), researchers have also had the problem of what to do with “extra” embryos.
Usually doctors use specific hormonal drugs to cause a woman seeking IVF to have several of her eggs, or ova, to ripen at the same time. These are then removed surgically and are ready to fertilize with someone’s sperm. The resulting embryos are usually inserted into the uterus. There are many variants to this process, and it can become quite complicated, but the general outline still holds true.
The problem arises when there are more embryos than a woman would want inserted. These “extra” or “surplus” embryos raise serious moral problems.
In dealing with the Commission’s viewpoints in the area of embryo research, it is necessary to point out that they are not generally shared by Commissioner Suzanne Rozell Scorsone, who eloquently disagrees and lays out her reasons for doing so in over a hundred pages of very carefully reasoned argument.
What exactly are embryos anyway? The Royal Commission never really answers this question, even though it boils down to a very simple proposition. Everything in the world is either a person or a thing, living or inanimate, human or animal. Generally, we believe that you are either a person or a thing and not in between. In Chapter 22 of the report, the Commissioners start to deal with this: “What form of respect is owed to the embryo and at what stage of its development? What forms of research, if any, are consistent with respect for human life? What is the legal status of the embryo outside the womb? Are they property or something else altogether?”
Clearly the Commission hit a quagmire here. The report quotes a researcher as saying that defining what a person or human being is actually really impossible because it all depends on different cultural presumptions, and we, as a society, could never really agree. They then proceed to take a definition anyway.
Oddly, they agree with some startling facts. “We share the concern that zygotes (embryos) be treated with respect. It is clear that the embryo is human in the sense of having the genetic, biochemical and cellular composition of the species homo sapiens. Similarly there is no doubt that the embryo is alive, although it is not viable outside the woman’s reproductive tract for more than a few days. Zygotes are further connected to humanity because they have the potential to become human beings.”
Here is the crux of the problem, and perhaps it all comes down to people not paying enough attention during their philosophy classes. Much of the present confusion comes down to the idea that we all have potential. It said so on your report card, though you may not have lived up to it. You have potential to do and to be in certain ways. The reason that you have that potential is that you are already a human being. (Saying that you are a person just means that you are a legally recognized and protected human being, that can change quickly depending on social whims—just ask slaves, Jews, political dissidents or preborn children.)
Like it or not, a human being will only stay a human being. We do not become one gradually, or stop being one gradually. You are alive or dead: a person or a thing. While sperm and ova have potential to be human if brought together, separately they will stay the same limited reality. Together there is unlimited possible reality.
The Commission would like to take a “graduated” view of human nature. Gradually, they feel, one takes on more and more human characteristics and becomes more and more worthy of protection and respect.
But, again, what are we respecting? There is a serious difference between sperm and eggs, and the embryo or fetus. Something new has happened. The Commission admits that this new entity is alive, human and unique, but they failed to include that it is also separate and distinct. This is grade nine biology. If you have something that is a separate, unique living human being, then you do not use her or him as a thing. Whether you have religious principles or not, this is a basic fact that we drill into our children, reinforce in adolescents and try enforce in law. The potential development of a human being is part of the definition of being alive.
Since in nature, it seems that many embryos either do not develop, or spontaneously abort, the Commissioners feel they cannot be fully human. This is very poor logic. They worsen it by that, with IVF, the “success” rate is drastically low. Too bad that the Commissioners did not look at the infant mortality rates in vicious slums, or in war zones, or at times of epidemics of childhood diseases. In place where only half, or few, children survive infancy, do we then see them as less than human? Survival rates do not define humanity.
To try to use potentiality as a criterion for humanhood, does not work. The Commissioners try to get around its failings, but fail themselves. Embryos are not just connected to humanity: they are part of it, of us. They may be small. They may not be fully developed, and other people may want to use them for research or exploitation, but that is neither an original problem, nor one of the past. The problem will not be solved by appealing to lawyers to set up a new class of semi-property for embryos, or appealing to vague ideas of “respect for embryos while freezing, killing, manipulating and experimenting upon them. Odd respect indeed.
If a governing political party wants to stay in power, it often tries to move the boundaries of constituencies so as to get the best combination of voters. This is called gerrymandering. The Commissioners have tried linguistic gerrymandering, and it is a shoddy attempt.
