Tisthammerw said:
Care to be a bit more specific? What is the biologically correct term to refer to a preborn child at any stage during the pregnancy? It isn't fetus, since that only applies to the 9th week on. Nor is it embryo, for that only refers to the period between implantation to the end of the 8th week. Nor is it zygote, for that only refers to the fertilized egg in the first ten days or so (the end of the zygote period is the implantation).
The correct biological term that would apply to any stage from fertilization to birth is
conceptus.
Sort of. It's really not potential per se but the nature of the organism itself. Think of it this way: why allow a human newborn to live? It has no more intelligence then my pet cat, nor can it contribute much to society etc. Yet the fact is we have a life form with human DNA (genetically complete) that grows up to be an adult member of its species. So the life form is a person, even if the life form is not fully developed yet. To the very least it's a consistent set of criteria, arguably less arbitrary than the birth criterion.
I'm going to throw a new wrench into the discussion on this point. Currently, at least in some species, we have the ability to use somatic cells to produce clones (i.e., Dolly the sheep). Yes, it's currently inefficient, imperfect, and we still need an oocyte to accomplish it (though, the nucleus is removed, so all of the genetic material comes from the somatic cell). However, as technology progresses, it's quite possible given the current status of this research that the necessary factors in an oocyte for conferring totipotency can be isolated and identified and a somatic cell treated with those without need for any gametes. Regardless of whether we ever choose to use such technology, hypothetically speaking, if it became
possible to use it, then any cell in your body would have the
potential of being used to make a clone. We all know that Dolly was cloned from a mammary cell; would that mean that no woman could ever get a mastectomy, even if she would otherwise die of breast cancer, because all of the remaining healthy tissue being removed that surrounds the cancer would have the potential of being another person?
There are some who do not draw the line at fertilized cells, but consider gametes equally special for consideration of potential (those who oppose birth control); does that mean a woman should also never be permitted to have a hysterectomy with oophorectomy (removal of the ovaries), even if she has ovarian cancer? What if the cancer is only in one ovary? Should she risk it spreading to the other by not removing it because of the potential of all the oocytes in it?
In other words, the term "potential" is very ambiguous. We are now approaching the level of technology where one could argue any cell in your body has "potential" to be another person. Thus, it becomes more important to distinguish a more concrete property of the conceptus (or of specific stages, zygote, embryo, fetus), that makes it unique or special from any other cell in a woman's body.
I would argue a consistent line be drawn at the beginning of life as for the end of life. That line would be the time at which life can be sustained independently of outside support of the circulatory and respiratory systems, two functions that are internally regulated and without which, survival cannot occur. This would not mean you couldn't choose to provide these supportive measures, either via the placenta/umbilical cord or via heart/lung machines, but it would mean it is not murder nor ethically/morally wrong to not provide that support and to instead allow the natural process of brain death to follow. The same conditions would apply to someone choosing to suspend life support for a prematurely born infant as for a terminally ill adult, as for a conceptus still dependent upon maternal circulation. Any other criterion that allows for technological intervention and consideration of "potential" would be subjective relative to the current status of technology, thus is an insufficient criterion. Something either is or is not a person, and the term "potential person," by definition, means something is not a person.
By the way, such a criterion would also eliminate the need to draw artificial lines based on time of gestation for when it is too late to have an abortion. If a fetus is removed from the woman's body and does not require life support to survive, it can be called a baby and conferred with all the rights of personhood. This would generally apply to third trimester pregnancies, and the possibility of viability independent of technological intervention during this trimester is one of the reasons it is legally treated differently from the first two trimesters. Such a test of requiring the fetus to be delivered to determine viability if abortion is sought in the third trimester (or if the fetus is determined in advance to be sufficiently developed that it is highly likely it will be viable independent of technological intervention), would not be inconsistent with even the majority of pro-choice proponents views, mainly because an abortion for any other reason than threat to the life of the woman or discovery of severe developmental abnormalities is a decision usually made well before the third trimester, and if a woman's life is at risk if she continues the pregnancy, it's hard to imagine a scenario where she wouldn't want the option to try to save the baby if possible; likewise, if severe developmental abnormalities are at issue, the survivability of the removed fetus would be unlikely as such decisions that late in pregnancy are usually made because the survivability of an infant with those abnormalities is slim to none.
Another consideration if we use the "potential" argument rather than a viability without technological intervention argument, or if we make the case that viability with technological intervention should be considered, then to what extent are we obligated to provide technological intervention to sustain a miscarried conceptus? If a conceptus is considered a person from the earliest stage of development, and a woman miscarries in the first trimester, do we need to attempt to implant the embryo into another surrogate? What would make a miscarried conceptus different from an aborted conceptus? A miscarriage can occur due to a problem with the conceptus or with the woman's reproductive system, thus it is not always the case that miscarriage implies the conceptus has no potential
per se, but that the woman carrying that conceptus has something wrong with the way her body functions in supporting a pregnancy. Thus, again, the only way to make this distinction would be to use the criterion of viable without technological intervention. I further specify respiratory and cardiovascular support as the deciding intervention, because those are the systems that distribute oxygen and nourishment to all the other tissues of the body, and without which, brain death is imminent (brain death being the generally accepted criterion for the end of personhood). This also errs on the side of caution of not excluding medical interventions that may not be immediately necessary for maintaining life, but may extend lifespan or improve quality of life, such as high blood pressure medication or insulin for diabetics. I know I would balk at a criterion that would allow me to declare a diabetic a non-person, although one might also argue that we are under no obligation to force a diabetic to use their insulin or monitor their blood sugar. Nonetheless, none of these other medical interventions is
immediately necessary to avoid brain death.
This criterion is then consistent from fertilization through adulthood, regardless of whether we are talking about an entire organism or a few cells. This criterion also does not
require that life support be withheld, it only specifies that one is not morally obligated to provide life support. This leaves the question of "Is there a time when it is wrong to provide life support/keep a person alive?" as a separate issue.
