Why current UK legislation on embryo research is immoral. How the argument from lack of qualities and the argument from potentiality have been applied and why they should be rejected

Bioethics

Volumn 19, Issue 3, 2005, Pages 251-271

  Deckers, Jan ^a  

^a NEWCASTLE UNIVERSITY   (United Kingdom)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

EMBRYO RESEARCH; EMBRYONIC STEM CELL; FERTILIZATION; FORENSIC MEDICINE; HUMAN; MEDICAL LITERATURE; MEDICOLEGAL ASPECT; MORALITY; RESEARCH ETHICS; REVIEW;

ANALYTICAL APPROACH; BIOMEDICAL AND BEHAVIORAL RESEARCH; GENETICS AND REPRODUCTION; HUMAN FERTILISATION (RESEARCH PURPOSES) REGULATIONS 2001 (GREAT BRITAIN); LEGAL APPROACH;

ADVISORY COMMITTEES; BEGINNING OF HUMAN LIFE; CLONING, ORGANISM; EMBRYO; EMBRYO RESEARCH; GOVERNMENT REGULATION; GREAT BRITAIN; HUMAN RIGHTS; HUMANS; LEGISLATION; MORAL OBLIGATIONS; SPECIES SPECIFICITY; STEM CELLS;

EID: 21044435416     PISSN: 02699702     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-8519.2005.00440.x     Document Type: Review

References (77)

1. I am grateful for helpful criticisms on a previous draft by Derek Bell, Stephen Clark, and two anonymous reviewers.
2. The term 'embryo' will be used to refer to the 'human embryo' and to refer to early human lives from the beginning of fertilisation onwards until the eighth week of development. The term 'early embryo' will be used to refer to any embryo below the age of fourteen days.
3. Statutory Instrument 2001 No. 188. The Human Fertilisation and Embryology (Research Purposes) Regulations 2001. Norwich. The Stationery Office Limited.
4. Chief Medical Officer's Expert Group (Reviewing the Potential of Developments in Stem Cell Research and Cell Nuclear Replacement to Benefit Human Health). 2000. Stem Cell Research: Medical Progress with Responsibility. London: Department of Health;
5. Department of Health. 2000. Government Response to the Recommendations Made in the Chief Medical Officer's Expert Group Report 'Stem Cell Research: Medical Progress with Responsibility'. Norwich. The Stationery Office Limited.
6. Chief Medical Officer's Expert Group. Stem Cell Research: Executive Summary: conclusion no 24-25 and recommendation no 1.
7. House of Lords. 2002. Stem Cell Research. Report From the Select Committee. Published by Authority of the House of Lords. London. The Stationery Office Limited: section 4.21 and recommendation no 7.
8. Ibid, section 4.7.
9. An anonymous referee of an earlier version of this paper remarked correctly that infant thought, action, and communication cannot be ruled out with certainty.
10. House of Lords, op. cit. 6 section 4.7.
11. See for example M. Tooley. 1998. In Defense of Abortion and Infanticide. In The Abortion Controversy. 25 Years After Roe v. Wade. A Reader. Pojman and Beckwith, ed. Second Edition. Belmont. Wadsworth: 209-233: 231: Infanticide is defended on the basis that an infant may not be 'capable of possessing the concept of a continuing subject of experiences and other mental states'.
12. House of Lords, op. cit. 6, section 4.7.
13. House of Lords, op. cit. 6, section 4.22 and 4.2 (d); Other reasons that are provided for the relevance of the appearance of the primitive streak are that it would mark the start of the embryo's individuality and the start of a continuity in the embryo's identity. These are addressed extensively in my 'Why Eberl is Wrong'. Unpublished manuscript under review by Bioethics.
14. Chief Medical Officer's Expert Group. Stem Cell Research: section 4.2.
15. M. Warnock. 1985. A Question of Life. The Warnock Report on Human Fertilisation and Embryology. Oxford. Blackwell.
16. Ibid, paragraph 11.20.
17. Ibid, xv.
18. B. Steinbock. 2001. Respect for Human Embryos. In Cloning and the Future of Human Embryo Research. Lauritzen, ed. Oxford. Oxford University Press: 21-33:26;
19. B. Steinbock. 1999. Why Most Abortions Are Not Wrong. In Bioethics for Medical Education. (Advances in Bioethics: 5) Edwards and Bittar, eds. Stamford, Connecticut. Jai Press: 245-267: 247-249.
20. Steinbock. Respect for Human Embryos:23;
21. B. Steinbock. 1996. Life Before Birth. The Moral and Legal Status of Embryos and Foetuses. New York/Oxford. Oxford University Press: 5, 9.
22. Steinbock. Why Most Abortions Are Not Wrong: 249.
23. Steinbock. Respect for Human Embryos: 29.
24. Steinbock. Respect for Human Embryos: 30.
25. Chief Medical Officer's Expert Group. Stem Cell Research: Executive Summary: Conclusion no 17.
26. Steinbock, op. cit. 19, 252.
27. House of Lords, op. cit. 6, section 4.7.
28. Ibid: 252-253.
29. Ibid: 252.
30. Ibid: 253.
31. Ibid: 254.
32. Ibid: 254-255.
33. Ibid: 252, 263.
34. Chief Medical Officer's Expert Group. Stem Cell Research: section 4.26;
35. House of Lords. Stem Cell Research: section 4.23.
36. Steinbock, op. cit. 19: 248.
37. M. Meyer and L. Nelson. Respecting What We Destroy. Reflections on Human Embryo Research. Hastings Center Report 2001; 31(1): 16-23: 17:
38. Reference is made to M.A. Warren. 1997. Moral Status: Obligations to Persons and Other Living Things. Oxford. Oxford University Press: 148-177.
39. I b i d.
40. J.M. Hawkins, R. Allen, ed. 1991. Oxford Encyclopedic English Dictionary. Oxford: Clarendon Press: 1230.
41. H. McLachlan. Persons and Their Bodies: How We Should Think About Human Embryos. Health Care Analysis 2002; 10: 155-164: 158;
42. Warnock. A Question of Life: 62-63, 66 (paragraphs 11.15, 11.17, 11.22).
43. McLachlan. Persons and Their Bodies: 158.
44. B. Steinbock. Respect for Human Embryos: 30, 32;
45. Chief Medical Officer's Expert Group. Stem Cell Research: section 4.29 and Conclusions and Recommendations number 26;
46. House of Lords. Stem Cell Research: section 4.25 a) and b): The Committee also expresses concern about the notion of 'serious disease' being undefined by the Regulations (sections 8.7 and 8.8).
47. D. Callahan. Human Embryo Research: Respecting What We Destroy?. Hastings Center Report 2001; 31(4): 4.
48. I owe this point to an anonymous referee of an earlier version of this paper.
49. Chief Medical Officer's Expert Group. Stem Cell Research: section 4.17 and Executive Summary conclusion no 26.
50. House of Lords, op. cit. 6: section 4.2 (d).
51. See note 12.
52. House of Lords, op. cit. 6: section 4.12.
53. See also L. Pojman. 1998. Abortion. A Defense of the Personhood Argument. In The Abortion Controversy. 25 Years After Roe v. Wade. A Reader. Pojman and Beckwith, ed. Second Edition. Belmont. Wadsworth:275-290:283: Pojman argues that, 'given the prospects of cloning, any cell of your body could be developed into (...) an adult' and that the 'only difference between other diploid cells in our body and the zygote is the location' where the latter 'fortuitously has gotten into the incubator, whereas the others have not'.
54. House of Lords, op. cit. 6: section 4.12.
55. M. Reichlin. The Argument From Potential: A Reappraisal. Bioethics 1997; 11: 1-23: 2-9;
56. refer to Reichlin's paper for a more elaborate treatment of this issue; A similar account of these two different kinds of potentiality is developed in a utilitarian context in D. Jacquette. Two Kinds of Potentiality: A Critique of McGinn on the Ethics of Abortion. Journal of Applied Philosophy 2000; 18(1): 79-86.
57. For this difference, see also Aristotle. 1924. Aristotle's Metaphysics. Ross, ed. Oxford. Clarendon Press: 1049a.
58. R. Alta Charo. 2001. Every Cell Is Sacred: Logical Consequences of the Argument from Potential in the Age of Cloning. In Cloning and the Future of Human Embryo Research. Lauritzen, ed. Oxford. Oxford University Press: 82-89: 86.
59. House of Lords. Stem Cell Research: section 4.10;
60. A strikingly similar example is in A. Campbell, G. Gillett, G. Jones. 2001. Medical Ethics. Third Edition. Oxford. Oxford University Press: 102-103 where they argue that a student who still needs to sit final examinations cannot be regarded as one who is already qualified;
61. See also R. Gillon, Is There a 'New Ethics of Abortion?'. Journal of Medical Ethics. 2001; 27 suppl II: ii5-ii9: ii6:
62. Gillon makes an analogy which has featured repeatedly in this discussion, at least since 1971 (when it was mentioned in J.J. Thomson. A Defense of Abortion. Philosophy and Public Affairs 1971; 1: 47-66): It is the view that since acorns are less valuable than oak trees, embryos are less valuable than mature human beings. The analogy is invalid, as the reason why oak trees are valued more than acorns resides in their greater instrumental value to the ecosystem in which they are situated and their aesthetic value for humans, rather than in a difference in intrinsic value. I believe that humans, however, should not be valued differentially relative to their importance for the ecosystems to which they belong or their aesthetic value for other humans. A referee of an earlier version of this paper also pointed out that oak trees may have more value than acorns because they have realised the potential which acorns have. Yet, once again, I believe this should not be transferred to the human domain. We may admire people of old age, yet we should not think that they are more valuable than younger people.
63. Pojman. Abortion: 275-290.
64. An anonymous referee of an earlier version of this paper pointed out rightly that egalitarian speciesism should not be taken to imply that the embryo has the full set of rights (including, for example, the right to vote), yet suggested wrongly that the view that the embryo has a right to life should also be questioned. Embryos have equal rights to life, yet no equal rights to vote. Withholding the latter from the embryo does not challenge egalitarian speciesism as arguing that the embryo has the right to vote is meaningless. Also, humans do not gain more moral value once they have attained, for example, the right to vote. We owe the same respect towards a twenty-one year old as towards a twelve year old, regardless of any difference in rights.
65. M.E. Zimmerman. 1994. Contesting Earth's Future. Radical Ecology and Post-modernity. Berkeley. University of California Press: 308;
66. A good example of such discrimination is M.L. Gross. 2002. Abortion and Neonaticide: Ethics, Practice, and Policy in Four Nations. Bioethics 2002; 16: 202-230: 217: The foetus is marginalised by exaggerating the difference with a newborn baby, who becomes, with birth, 'the undisputed master of his body'.
67. S. Schwarz. 1998. Personhood Begins at Conception. In The Abortion Controversy. 25 Years After Roe v. Wade. A Reader. Pojman and Beckwith, ed. Second Edition. Belmont. Wadsworth: 257-274: 272.
68. nd ed. London. Jonathan Cape.
69. Ibid: 6.
70. C. Darwin. 1986. The Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection or the Presentation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life. Edited with an introduction by J.W. Burrow. Harmondsworth. Penguin:237:
71. Speciesism has also been grounded by W. Murdy (1983. Anthropocentrism: A Modern Version. In Ethics and the Environment. Scherer and Attig, ed. Englewood Cliffs. Prentice-Hall: 12-20: 13) in Darwin's view that 'any part of the structure of any one species' could not have been 'formed for the exclusive good of another species' (pp. 228-229), yet I do not share Murdy's suggestion that this should be taken to imply that nonhuman animals are of no direct moral concern.
72. M. Midgley. 1984. Animals and Why They Matter. Athens. University of Georgia Press: 105-106.
73. D. Hume. 1978. A Treatise of Human Nature. Second edition with text revised and variant readings by P.H. Nidditch. Oxford. Clarendon Press: 470-471.
74. H. Rolston. 1983. Is There an Ecological Ethic?. In Ethics and the Environment. Scherer and Attig, ed. Englewood-Cliffs. Prentice-Hall: 41-54: 48.
75. Steinbock, op. cit. 19: 252.
76. T. Fuchs. The Notion of 'Killing'. Causality, Intention, and Motivation in Active and Passive Euthanasia. Medicine, Health Care, and Philosophy. 1998; 1: 245-253: 248-249.
77. T.L.S. Sprigge. Utilitarianism and Respect for Human Life. Utilitas 1989 (March): 1-21: 20.