Lecture #4: Human Development & "When Does Human
Life Begin?"
I. HUMAN
DEVELOPMENT (Fig 46.16; Fig. 46.17)
1. Fertilization
2. Implantation
in 6-7 days.
3. Pulsation of
cardiac muscle in 23 days.
4. Fetus (1 gram)
in about 7 weeks (first becomes recognizable as a human).
5. Spontaneous
movements by 13 weeks.
6. Fetus has a
chance of surviving by 24 weeks.
7. Birth at 40
weeks (280 days).
II. THE ABORTION
ISSUE (The morality of an act is dependent
on the state of the system)
1. Alan
Guttmacher, M.D., resident at Johns Hopkins Medical Institution.
2. In 1929,
a series of events led to a modification in his views:
a. a 16-year-old
died from a multiperforated uterus.
b. a mother of
four died of blood poisoning.
c. a self-inducer
fatally misinterpreted menopause as a pregnancy.
d. a 12-year-old
afro girl was brought to him because of incest pregnancy.
3. In 1969,
his testimony led to adoption of the ALI Law (rape, incest, or maternal
health).
4. In 1973,
in Roe vs Wade, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled 7-2 that "the fetus is
not a person until birth, and Constitutional rights are guaranteed only to
persons." Therefore, anti-abortion statutes were declared unconstitutional
on the grounds that they interfered with the right of privacy guaranteed to
women by the Constitution.
5. In Reagan
Administration, rulings against money for military and welfare abortions.
III. WHEN DOES
HUMAN LIFE BEGIN???????
A. THE DEBATE
GOES ON
1. Is an embryo
(or fetus) a human? When does it become a human?
("God first called Adam, "Adam", when Adam
drew the "breath of life".")
2. Is an egg a
chicken? Is an acorn a tree? Is a catapiller a butterfly?
B. THE PRO-LIFE
ARGUMENT
1. The fertilized
egg is certainly alive, since it can die.
2. The fertilized
egg is certainly human, since it belongs to no other species.
3. The fertilized
egg comes from human parents, which confirms its human nature.
4. The fertilized
egg constitutes a genetically distinct potential human organism.
5. We need
simply to expand our definition of "human being" to include the
zygote.
C. THE
UNANSWERABLE QUESTION: "WHEN DOES HUMAN LIFE BEGIN???"
"WHEN DOES A MAN BEAT HIS WIFE???"
1. If you say
that human life "begins" at some specific point in reproduction, then
it must have "stopped" at some earlier point, yet eggs and sperm are
alive.
2. Life as a continuum:
a. Human life
does not begin, it exists through a continuity of life cycles.
b. Life is "transmitted"---not
begun---through the process of reproduction.
3. Thus, the
right question is: "WHEN DOES A HUMAN INDIVIDUAL BEGIN???"
a. To answer
this, we must first define what we mean by "individual".
b. In Latin: in
= not, dividuus = divisible (i.e., an indivisible entity).
c. Therefore, a
person must have the characteristics of indivisibility.
d. Yet, a zygote
divides, and therefore, it cannot be an individual.
(1) after the
1st mitotic division, it is not two halves of one individual.
(2) the conceptus
separates into the embryoblast and the trophoblast.
(3) the fetus
becomes a new born baby only when it divides from its mother.
4. A dead
fetus can, with impunity, be thrown out, incinerated, or flushed down a
toilet.
5. Is it
appropriate to use the reciprocal of when human life ceases?
6. In 1982,
Congress debated the issue again and concluded:
a. "humans
are mammals, and
b. conception is
synonymous with fertilization"
7. N.A.S.
concluded that "science cannot verify that the term 'person'
includes "all human life", and that "the issue must
remain a matter of moral values."
8. Again, "the
morality of an act is dependent on the state of the system" (WAR)