Book for Comparison: An Introduction to Christian Ethics
By: Roger H. Crook
5th Edition
ISBN #: 978-0-13-194794-8
Please use in-text and “works cited” MLA citatations
, where appropriate.
More explicit instructions to this assignment are also attached.
Try to answer all 10 guide questions to the best of your ability.
The sooner I get a response, the better, but I plead you not to sacrifice quality for punctuality.
However, the reflection is due by 7:00 PM Eastern Daylight Time (EDT) on Sunday, July 22nd, 2012.
Thank you!
PAGE
3
Rel 250 Reflection Paper: Sources and Method
1. The article which you critique must come from a professional journal, not from a news magazine or newspaper. Professional theological and philosophical journals include: Theological Studies, Chicago Studies, Studia Moralia, the various reviews of religion, theology, etc. as well as the journals of the universities which have a major theological or philosophical faculty.
Journals of other professions, such as Hastings Center Report (bioethical issues), may be used if the article cited has a moral question as its central focus.
2. Select an article in which the author takes a stand. The author asserts that something is either moral or immoral. He/she then defends his/her position with evidence and arguments. This is what you are to analyze. Overviews of the issue or summaries of the thought in the current literature are not good subjects for a critique.
3. Select an article which is at least 10 pages (2,500 words) in length. Articles shorter than this will not give you enough material to write a critique of 5-6 pages. You may choose to read a chapter in a book, if that chapter deals with a particular moral issue and the author takes a stand on the issue. .
4. In your critique, state what you intend to do in the first paragraph. Then, summarize briefly the author’s position. Don’t write a caricature. Don’t exaggerate the author’s position. State it clearly and fairly.
5. Analyze the author’s position from the perspective of the content of Rel 250. Some of the following questions should be answered. If you cannot answer the questions, you’d do best to seek another article for critique.
Helpful Questions
in Preparing a Critique for Rel 250
I . What aspect(s) of the human person does your author emphasize: physical, intellectual, emotional, spiritual, social? Find a sentence which reveals this. These reveal the non-moral, or pre-moral values important to your author.
2. What is the author’s attitude towards human freedom? I.e. does he/she perceive people as totally free, or totally conditioned by heredity or environment’? Or, does your author see a balance between freedom and determination?
3. What sources does the author use for moral values: The bible, science, philosophy, authorities (such as Church leaders, or the civil law), human culture generally understood. Cfr. Your notes on Gustafson from the first week of class. Find a sentence which reveals this.
4. What method does your author use? Does he/she cite rules (thus = deontological), goals (thus = teleological), or the virtues/character which people ought to have (thus = aretaic or character-virtue centered).
5. What concept of rights does your author espouse: rights as noninterference, or rights as access to goods, or rights as endowments of goods by societal structures? Find a sentence which reveals this in your author.
6. How does your author deal with conflict of values? Does he/she have a hierarchy of values, so that some take priority over others? Or, does your author make use of the double effect? Which characteristics of the double effect does he/she employ: indirectness of the evil, proportionality of the good? Find a sentence which reveal this.
7. What understanding of love does your author reflect? Compare the author to Crook’s understanding of love.
8. Does your author perceive ethics as basically human (presuming that anyone will understand his/her position), or does he/she propose ethics specifically for Christians (heavy use of the Bible would indicate this)?
9. Does your author reveal the kind of participation in a community of value which Crook claims is necessary for making good moral choices?
10. If your author is a Christian, which “Alternative within Christian” ethics does he/she most closely reflect? If your author is not a Christian, which “Alternatives to Christian Ethics” does she/he reflect?
COMPARE YOUR AUTHOR WITH THE CHAPTER IN CROOK THAT ADDRESSES THE SAME ISSUE(S)…
E.g. if your paper is about capital punishment, compare the author’s views with Chapter 12 of Crook. Likewise with other topics…
AN INCLUSIVE ETHICS FOR THE
TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY: IMPLICATIONS
FOR STEM CELL RESEARCHjore_408 683..722
John F. Kilner
ABSTRACT
An important contribution of Christian ethics in the pluralistic world of
the twenty-first century is to emphasize inclusivity. Rather than promot-
ing the interests of certain groups at the expense of the most vulnerable,
society does well to prioritize ways forward that benefit all. For stem cell
research, inclusivity entails benefiting or at least protecting the benefi-
ciaries of treatment, the sources of materials, and the subjects of
research. Adult stem cells are already benefiting many ill patients
without causing harm, and select adult cells may prove even more
beneficial in the future. Other types of stem cells require other bodily
materials such as eggs and somatic cells that should be obtained without
unduly harming those who provide them. Research subjects, especially
the most vulnerable, require protection as well. Should human embryos
be included among them? Considerations of location, formation, individu-
ation, and intention are here examined. Ultimately, for safety reasons as
well as workability, pluripotency, and compatibility, relatively new types
of pluripotent stem cells, especially induced pluripotent stem cells,
warrant special priority according to an inclusive ethics.
KEY WORDS: stem cell research, embryo, Tuskegee Syphilis Study, inclu-
sive ethics, vulnerable people, research ethics
SCIENCE AND MEDICINE ARE two of the greatest human endeav-
ors. Few causes are more important for everyone to rally around than
these. Yet one of the most promising venues in which science is
propelling medicine forward—stem cell research—has become more of
a battleground than a meeting place. Everyone loses if that continues.
On one side, some opponents of embryonic stem cell research are
attributing to their adversaries the outlook portrayed on signs and
T-shirts that read: “I support stem cell research, but only as a byprod-
uct of my support for killing babies.”1 The fallacious implication is that
those who support embryonic stem cell research also support efforts
to track down smiling, cute infants—and kill them. That claim is
1 A picture of this is available at http://www.tshirthell.com.
JRE 37.4:683–722. © 2009 Journal of Religious Ethics, Inc.
outrageous, and supporters of embryonic stem cell research under-
standably refuse even to discuss embryonic stem cell research with
those who would make such claims.
Meanwhile, a counterpoint to this assertion proclaims from the
pages of a major national news venue: “Nearly every American is
beginning to understand the issue in a new way: It’s ‘pro-cure’ vs.
‘anti-cure’” (Alter 2005). In other words, the message is that those who
oppose embryonic stem cell research are primarily motivated by an
active desire to make sure that people dying from a wide range of
diseases do in fact die rather than somehow get cured. That claim is
equally outrageous, and opponents of embryonic stem cell research
understandably refuse even to discuss embryonic stem cell research
with those who would make such claims.
These extremes signal the presence of many contentious (even if less
extreme) views. However, the predicament is far from hopeless.
Between the two extremes—and evident even within the extremes
themselves—is a common concern. It is a concern to help particularly
vulnerable people by making sure that they are included in efforts to
preserve life and health. An ethics for the twenty-first century will
have to make sense of this concern and give it concrete form. Christian
ethics is well suited to the challenge because it aspires to give an
account of what authentically human living looks like—not merely
some more narrow account of Christian living. Moreover, it can draw
on a wealth of historical reflection, based on the lived experience of
people with God and their fellow human beings. As argued elsewhere,
in some ways Christian ethics is better able to explain concerns about
vulnerable people and inclusiveness than other contemporary ethics
that affirm similar sensitivities (Hollman and Kilner 2006).
Arthur Dyck, at Harvard University, is a good example of a Chris-
tian ethicist who engages the challenges of the twenty-first century by
considering what authentic human living looks like. In his book
Rethinking Rights and Responsibilities: The Moral Bonds of Commu-
nity, Dyck observes that an essential dynamic of human community,
recognizable by theists and non-theists alike, is tantamount to what he
calls “loving impartiality.” Loving impartiality entails an “orientation
or relation of the self to others such that all human beings belong to
one inclusive community” (2005, 199). He rationally discerns that in
order for community and humanity to flourish, certain conditions are
necessary, prominent among them “that no human being fall outside
[that is, not benefit from] the moral responsibilities to protect life”
(2005, 308). These responsibilities are part of a larger set of individual,
parental, and communal responsibilities to nurture (2005, 121–25).
Such an inclusive ethics appears to underlie international under-
standings of human rights that go far beyond the Christian community.
684 Journal of Religious Ethics
A good example is the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human
Rights (1948). This manifesto declares that “recognition of the inherent
dignity and of the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the
human family is the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the
world.” An inclusive ethics leads directly to paying special attention to
those who are most vulnerable—for they are the ones most in need of
help.
This special concern for the most vulnerable in an inclusive ethics is
also being espoused by Christian ethicists such as Lisa Sowle Cahill
who are taking an explicitly theological approach to Christian ethics.
In her book Theological Ethics, Cahill invokes a wealth of historical
and contemporary experience that people have had with God and their
fellow human beings to discern what human flourishing will look like
in the twenty-first century. “The gist of the theological contribution,”
according to Cahill, includes “an understanding of the common good
that stresses . . . solidarity in seeking the material, social, and spiritual
well-being of all; and a ‘preferential option’ for vulnerable and marginal
members of communities and societies” (2005, 73). Christian ethics
must play a “special role . . . in enhancing solidarity with the vulner-
able” because “a fair and righteous community is an inclusive one”
(2005, 72, 230).
Cahill notes the ample testimony borne to the wisdom of this
understanding not only by traditional and contemporary religious
practice, but also by the Christian Scriptures. “Biblical foundations can
be found for such a perspective, especially in the Hebrew prophets and
in the teaching and example of Jesus, about love of neighbor and
serving the poor and vulnerable” (2005, 42). The biblical wisdom
literature contains many observations along the lines of, “Whoever
oppresses the poor shows contempt for their Maker, but whoever is
kind to the needy honors God” (Proverbs 14:31). This recognition that
even the weakest member of the human community has been created
and is loved by God provides a powerful basis for an inclusive ethics
that other outlooks are hard-pressed to match (Mitchell et al. 2007;
Verhey 2001). This ethics is fueled by a vision of future wholeness in
which “no one will be excluded” (Peters et al. 2008, 75).
Many other Christian ethicists in the first part of the twenty-first
century are recognizing the central importance of an inclusive ethics.
Together with Dyck and Cahill, they have developed approaches that
differ from each other in many ways. But a common and urgent theme
among them is the importance of paying special attention to the needs
of those who are most vulnerable. For example, in her book Disruptive
Christian Ethics, Traci West adds an important insight regarding
inclusiveness and vulnerability that suggests a way of proceeding in
this essay. A shortcoming of many discussions of controversial issues is
Inclusive Ethics: Stem Cell Research 685
that the voices of all who have a serious stake in the issue are not
heard. That deficiency is sometimes due to the fact that the voices of
the weakest and most vulnerable are often the least accessible (2006,
107–9). Accordingly, in the following discussion of the implications of
an inclusive ethics for stem cell research, it will be important to hear
from a range of major stakeholders—paying careful attention to give
voice to the weakest and most vulnerable among them.
Unfortunately, this endeavor is sometimes minimized, or sidelined
completely, in the rush to defend or advance some particular activity—
perhaps adult stem cell research, or embryonic stem cell research, or
new ways to produce “embryonic-like” stem cells. A kind of counterfeit
inclusiveness is operative here, in which including all forms of research
is considered to be an evident good, regardless of what is at stake for
all of the people involved.
It is crucial from the outset to be clear about the object of inclu-
siveness. It is all of the people with a stake in stem cell research who
are to be taken into account. There is no a priori moral mandate to
include all of the forms and activities of stem cell research in what is
ultimately pursued. Research is for people; people do not exist prima-
rily to meet the needs of research. To hear some defenses of all possible
forms that stem cell research can take, one would think that the
activities of research are more important than the people who have a
stake in what those activities entail and yield.
An inclusive ethics for the twenty-first century will need to reject an
idolatry of technology in favor of holding every potential technological
innovation accountable to the flourishing of the entire human commu-
nity, including those who are most vulnerable. Some people will be
particularly sensitive to the needs of one group affected by a technol-
ogy; others will be especially attentive to the needs of another such
group. Rather than being a problem, this diversity can be an asset if
people can embrace the fact that others have relationships and expe-
riences they do not have. All people are inherently disadvantaged in
their ability to duly appreciate the needs of some who are vulnerable.
Once we recognize that stakeholders challenging us to be more
sensitive to the needs of a particular group are not a threat but a gift,
we can welcome and listen carefully to such challenges. Here is where
our commitment to inclusivity will undergo its greatest test. We may
experience a desire to minimize the need of groups about which we are
least concerned in order to give every benefit to a group about which
we care most. That may take the form of thinking that the needs of
another group are not as significant, or even that the group itself does
not warrant inclusion among those whose needs are relevant.
Unless the argument for including the group is advanced only by a
few self-interested people, or what is at stake for the group at issue is
686 Journal of Religious Ethics
manifestly less significant than what is at stake for others, there
should be a strong presumption in favor of inclusion. The argument for
inclusion need not, in the end, convince everyone. But if the argument
raises reasonable doubt, and the stakes for the group are high, then it
will be important to include that group. Practically speaking, such
inclusion entails focusing on efforts to meet people’s needs in a way
that seeks to benefit all, rather than benefiting some groups at the
expense of others.
In the case of stem cell research, the needs of various groups are
being emphasized by different people today. Some people are quickest
to champion the needs of the potential beneficiaries of stem cell
research. These are the patients who are ill or injured and are eagerly
awaiting lifesaving and life-changing treatments that this research
will almost certainly yield. People personally committed to the well-
being of those suffering in this way play a crucial role in sensitizing us
all to the huge stakes involved in enabling stem cell research to move
forward rapidly (for example, Herold 2006; Bellomo 2006).
Other people are more concerned about those who donate the bodily
materials that the research requires. Such donors include those who
risk harm by providing eggs or somatic cells for the research cloning
necessary to produce embryonic stem cells genetically matched to the
patients using them. A growing chorus of voices is calling attention to
these potentially exploited donors (Magnus and Cho 2005; Hyun 2006;
and Beeson et al. 2006).
Still other people are particularly attentive to the subjects of the
research. Those subjects include patients on whom any form of new
stem cell treatment is tried. Many have voiced concern about the
importance of protecting human subjects in all research (Lemmens
and Waring 2006; Iltis 2005; and Murphy 2004). This includes stem
cell research (National Research Council 2005). More controversial,
though, are the human embryos most intimately involved as subjects
in one of the forms of stem cell research: embryonic stem cell research.
Should we also pay attention to those who are speaking up for them?
Only if it is reasonable to include human embryos among the vulner-
able members of the human community is there a place for them in an
inclusive approach to stem cell research. Thus, it will be important to
consider whether arguments for excluding human embryos are valid
beyond a reasonable doubt.
There are, then, many vulnerable groups connected with stem cell
research. To date it has proven counterproductive to focus on just one
group. So often when people encounter someone making an argument
about stem cell research, they either listen to it with enthusiasm or
reject it without careful consideration because it addresses or disre-
gards the needs of a group that particularly concerns them. The virtue
Inclusive Ethics: Stem Cell Research 687
of a more inclusive approach is that it gives everyone a stake in
appreciating and endeavoring to meet the needs of all who are seri-
ously affected. The goal becomes using precious and limited resources
to benefit all, rather than harming some to benefit others.
Achieving this goal as part of a larger endeavor to foster human
flourishing requires careful attention to the specifics of the technologies
involved. Many technologies are not a single technology that people
either support or oppose. Rather, there are clusters of technologies, some
forms of which may be more conducive to an inclusive approach to
human flourishing than others. “Stem cell research” is a good example
of such a cluster: virtually everyone supports some forms (for example,
adult stem cell research), but many do not support all forms. Talking
about people who oppose only one form as if they simply oppose “stem
cell research” suggests that there are only two approaches: people are
either for or against “stem cell research.” Some otherwise excellent
discussions aspiring to human flourishing unfortunately tend toward
“all or nothing” thinking at this point.2 Human flourishing instead
requires devoting greater attention to the different impacts of various
forms of stem cell research on each stakeholder group.
1. The Beneficiaries of Treatment
In terms of stakeholders, the inclusive approach needed today
would, first of all, manifestly require a deep commitment to the healing
and well-being of patients and their loved ones. Huge numbers of
people are suffering today from illnesses and injuries that most likely
can be cured or at least significantly helped by stem cell treatments.
Unfortunately, many people are not intimately related to any of these
sufferers, or at least do not appreciate what stem cell treatments have
the potential to do for them.
2 Peters, Lebacqz, and Bennett, for instance, maintain that “the Vatican holds a
prominent place among those who oppose stem cell research” (2008, 58). They add that
there are plenty of prominent non-Catholics who “oppose stem cell research” as well,
including the majority of the members of the U.S. President’s Council on Bioethics, such
as Leon Kass and Gilbert Meilaender—who are both “against stem cell research” (2008,
61–62, 69). However, such sweeping claims go too far. These people are not “against
stem cell research” but only against certain forms of stem cell research. Since stem cell
research promises so much benefit, painting the options as all or nothing can be one way
to encourage accepting all forms of stem cell research—the very position that the
Peters/Lebacqz/Bennett book advocates. But “all or nothing” language also leads, in this
book and elsewhere (such as Peters 2007), to omitting serious attention to the many
studies that have documented ways of obtaining pluripotent stem cells other than by
taking apart human embryos (e.g., iPS cells and select adult stem cells, to be discussed
shortly). In order to do justice to all groups with a significant stake in stem cell research,
an inclusive ethics must be diligent in considering the different impacts that different
technologies have on different groups.
688 Journal of Religious Ethics
This lack of appreciation is why people emotionally close to those in
need play such an important role in the current stem cell debate.
Whether it is a politician with a suffering family member, or a vocal
parent with a suffering child, such voices are needed to sensitize us all
to the huge stakes involved in enabling stem cell research to move
forward rapidly. Otherwise, the human responsibility to nurture
will remain a mere abstraction rather than a lived compassion. A
celebrity with a potentially treatable illness such as Michael J. Fox
(www.michaeljfox.org) can play a similar role. People often feel so close
to such a person that the person’s suffering can give them awareness
that they otherwise would never have.
That so many are aware of, and can identify with, very public figures
is therefore an opportunity. However, it is also a danger. Because such
figures typically have excellent access to health care, it is easy to take
for granted that those in need will receive stem cell treatments once
they become available. However, far too many people—even in a
wealthy nation such as the United States—do not have sufficient
access to the basic health care that they need. While determining what
forms of stem cell research should go forward, it is critical to address
the ethics of access at the same time. The greater the stake that
beneficiaries can plausibly be said to have in whatever treatments
stem cell research yields, the greater the importance of insuring that
those benefits will be accessible to everyone.3
Since the goal here is to benefit suffering patients without harming
others in the process, the nearly universal support for so-called “adult”
stem cell research is not surprising. This imprecisely named category
of stem cell research can encompass work on all stem cells that exist
in human bodies at any age of development, except for embryonic stem
cells derived from human embryos.4 Typically, none of the sources of
the research materials or the subjects of the research discussed later in
this article is harmed by this research, so the benefits to patients can
be celebrated by all. Moreover, the possibility that the stem cells
involved can be obtained from a patient’s own body enhances the
likelihood that treatment will be affordable and accessible.
3 On access and patenting, see Peters et al. 2008, 74, 238. See also Cohen 2007, chap.
8, on related policy issues. In fact, in terms of public spending priorities, for stem cell
research (or particular forms of it) to become a relatively high priority, its pursuit must
not come at the expense of withholding funds from even more vital and basic health care
that the most vulnerable groups in society need.
4 This categorization corresponds with whether or not the stem cells can be obtained
without causing the death of the source of the cells. Accordingly, stem cells from fetuses
are commonly considered “adult” rather than “embryonic” if they can be obtained without
killing the fetuses in order to obtain them. “Non-embryonic” would be a more precise
term than “adult” to describe the alternative to embryonic stem cells, but the more
familiar term will be employed here.
Inclusive Ethics: Stem Cell Research 689
The health benefits of adult stem cell treatments are already consid-
erable. Numerous medical conditions have reportedly been improved in
some human beings using adult stem cell treatments. The list of
seventy-three such conditions found in Bellomo’s book The Stem Cell
Divide (2006) updates the documentation in the U.S. President’s Council
on Bioethics’s 2004 report Monitoring Stem Cell Research and is itself
constantly being updated in reports, journals, and elsewhere.5 Additions
in recent years have included hundreds of research reports published or
analyzed in the Journal of the American Medical Association document-
ing patients with heart and autoimmune diseases benefiting from stem
cell treatments, as well as diabetics regaining the ability to produce vital
insulin after receiving transfusions of stem cells from their own bodies
(Burt et al. 2008; Couri et al. 2009; and Voltarelli et al. 2007).
A big question today is whether there is any evidence to suggest that
the human body is so resilient that it contains select adult stem cells
that are “pluripotent”—that is, that have the flexibility to be directed
to form whatever bodily materials are needed to heal a patient.
There is ample evidence to show that most adult stem cells are not
pluripotent. However, it is going too far to claim that there is no
credible evidence suggesting that some adult stem cells have pluripo-
tent capacity. There were indeed some studies reported early this past
decade in which claims about the pluripotent capacity of certain adult
stem cells later turned out to be invalid. That revelation established in
some people’s minds that only embryonic stem cells are pluripotent,
and that claims asserting comparable potential for any adult stem cells
are completely unfounded.
However, this view is not supported by the National Institutes of
Health (NIH) in its report “Regenerative Medicine 2006.” The report
examines fourteen adult stem cell studies published up through the
year 2003 that claimed to document pluripotency. Since criteria for
demonstrating pluripotency have only been clarified fairly recently, as
the report notes, it is not surprising that many of the studies did not
address all of the current criteria. While suggesting that a few of the
studies do fulfill the criteria, the report wisely recommends that
further research is needed after 2003 to demonstrate more conclusively
the degree of flexibility that select adult stem cells have (U.S. Depart-
ment of Health and Human Services 2006, 23).6
5 In the report literature, for example, see U.S. Department of Health and Human
Services 2006. In the journal literature, for example, see Smith et al. 2006; Prentice
2006.
6 The report indicates that further research “may eventually enhance tissue regen-
eration via this mechanism to clinically useful levels” (U.S. Department of Health and
Human Services 2006, 24).
690 Journal of Religious Ethics
Since 2003 there have indeed been quite a number of further
scientific reports suggesting the pluripotency of select stem cells. These
have appeared in such journals as the Journal of Cell Science,7 the
Journal of Experimental Medicine,8 Applied Physics,9 Cell Prolifera-
tion,10 and Stem Cells.11
Particularly impressive studies have been published in the last few
years in the journals Nature Biotechnology and Nature. The first of
these studies discusses adult stem cells found in amniotic fluid and
placental tissue (De Coppi et al. 2007). Their extraordinary flexibility
was demonstrated by inducing them to differentiate into each of the
three major cell types. Similar and additional criteria for pluripotency
were met by the study in Nature, which focused on germline stem cells
found in adult human testes (Conrad et al. 2008). This emerging
understanding of the flexibility of select adult stem cells may help
explain the amazing ability of the human body to heal itself.
All of these reports will need to be subject to the same sort of
rigorous review as those reviewed previously by the NIH. It may well
be that, as in the case of those previously reviewed studies, some will
meet all the criteria for demonstrating pluripotency and some will not.
But there is reason to be optimistic that at least one type of adult stem
cell will be able to produce the same broad range of body cells for
medical treatments that some people have thought only embryonic
stem cells could produce.
That is good news indeed for all those whose illnesses or injuries can
be helped by stem cell treatments. And that is good news for a society
seeking an inclusive approach to stem cell research that seeks to
benefit all, rather than some at the expense of others.
2. The Sources of Materials
The second set of vulnerable people with a stake in stem cell
research includes those who donate the bodily materials necessary for
7 “We report here the isolation of a population of non-transformed pluripotent human
cells from bone marrow” (D’Ippolito et al. 2004).
8 “A new, intrinsically pluripotent, CD45-negative population from human cord blood
. . . can be expanded to 1015 cells without losing pluripotency” (Kogler et al. 2004).
9 Researchers here document the discovery of “pluripotent adult stem cells with a
remarkable self-renewal ability and differentiation potency” (Kruse et al. 2004).
10 This study reports “reproducible production of . . . cord-blood-derived embryonic-
like stem cells“ (McGuckin et al. 2005).
11 Cells have “pluripotent stem cell-specific transcription factors” and “have the
potential to differentiate to all three germ layers” (Miki et al. 2005). Earlier the same
year another study in the same journal found cells “able to differentiate not only into
multiple cell types . . . but also into mesodermal (endothelium), neuroectodermal, or
endodermal (hepatocytes) lineages” (Moriscot et al. 2005).
Inclusive Ethics: Stem Cell Research 691
stem cell treatments. In adult stem cell treatment, the primary bodily
material is the stem cells themselves. Where possible, the cells will
come from the patient being treated. One reason is that such cells will
be genetically matched to the patient and therefore less likely to be
rejected by the body’s immune system. When using the patient’s own
cells is not possible, donors should be able to provide the needed cells
without incurring serious risk. This would be done much the way that
blood or tissue donors make donations already, with careful attention
to appropriate informed consent procedures.
If embryonic stem cell treatments are developed in humans,
however, the embryonic stem cells will have the disadvantage of not
being genetically matched to the patient unless a cloning process is
used to produce the embryo in the first place.12 Such a process would
involve placing genetic material from a cell in the patient’s body into
a donated egg cell. (Genetic material from donor cells would be used
during the research phase of developing the cloning technology.)
Experience with organ transplantation suggests that drugs can
lessen—but not necessarily eliminate—rejection problems if a genetic
match is not present. Moreover, the drugs themselves can introduce
new problems. So it is likely that attempts at human cloning, with the
need for a supply of eggs and genetic material, will accompany the
pursuit of embryonic stem cell research. Recent investigations suggest
that the huge supply of eggs needed will have to be human eggs,
because animal eggs appear inadequate for the human genetic repro-
gramming required (Chung et al. 2009). Moreover, not all human
eggs can be used, since only high-quality eggs appear sufficient for
this demanding process (Cervera and Stojkovic 2008; French et al.
2008).
Some believe that human egg donation is not a big problem, and
that the many eggs needed to generate embryonic stem cells geneti-
cally matched to each patient would not be difficult to obtain. However,
there is indeed a significant danger for the female donors involved. As
we formulate an inclusive approach to stem cell research, those who
call our attention to this challenge do us a great service.
12 For simplicity’s sake, the term “cloning” is used here whether the relevant
technology (called somatic cell nuclear transfer) is intended to produce a born child or an
embryo for research never intended to be implanted. This is the use of the term agreed
upon by the diverse range of experts who make up the U.S. President’s Council on
Bioethics. As their 2002 report on cloning explains, there are various ethical problems
with cloning itself that must be addressed as part of determining the ethics of embryonic
stem cell research. At least such would be the case if it is determined that optimum
medical benefit would require that the embryonic sources of the cells be produced via
cloning in order to make them genetically compatible with the patient being treated.
692 Journal of Religious Ethics
The journal Science has reported that up to ten percent of egg donors
may experience severe ovarian hyperstimulation syndrome, which can
cause pain and occasionally leads to hospitalization, renal failure,
potential future infertility, and even death (Magnus and Cho 2005). In
the notorious South Korean human cloning and embryonic stem cell
scandal in which purported successes were actually fabricated, sixteen
of one hundred egg donors required in-hospital treatment for adverse
effects—including, but not limited to, ovarian hyperstimulation syn-
drome (Cho et al. 2006). Such serious risks have prompted some
high-tech countries such as Japan to ban egg donation altogether (Check
2006).
The South Korean situation illustrates well three different circum-
stances that can all too easily arise and threaten the crucial ethical
standard of informed consent. There can be:
• informational coercion (in this case, risks were not fully
explained);
• vocational coercion (in this case, workers were urged to donate by
their boss);
• financial coercion (in this case, financially strapped women were
offered money to prompt donation that would not have occurred
otherwise).
It might seem that women should be able to assess what donating
their eggs is worth to them. However, Debora Spar argues in The Baby
Business that this is not the case (2006). The normal protections of
the market—information, competition, and transparency—are largely
absent in this situation. Customers—that is, researchers now, but
ultimately very ill patients—are desperate; the norm of rational trade-
offs does not apply. Similarly, enough money can induce poorer women,
including students, to take risks as “donors” that human beings should
not have to take in order to meet their basic needs (Papadimos and
Papadimos 2004).
This predicament has prompted the National Academy of Sciences to
insist that egg donors must not be paid—that they should receive only
reimbursement for actual out-of-pocket expenses incurred (National
Research Council 2005, recommendation 16). However, it will remain
difficult to implement this approach, as discussed in the New England
Journal of Medicine, as long as participants in other research can be
paid for undergoing risky procedures (Steinbrook 2006).
Judy Norsigian, widely known feminist author of Our Body Our-
selves, has joined a growing chorus of those arguing that this debate
misses the most important point, if we are to truly respect and protect
the vulnerable women involved here (2006; Beeson et al. 2006). They
maintain that research cloning to produce embryonic stem cells is
Inclusive Ethics: Stem Cell Research 693
unethical because the risks of multiple egg extraction from donors are
not yet well-enough studied. There is still insufficient information to
get true informed consent. At issue here is not just the immediate risk,
but also the longer-term cancer risk that has been inadequately
studied to date (Pearson 2006). In fact, Norsigian has indicated that
the ethical violation involved here is so significant that if research
cloning goes forward, she feels compelled as a mobilizer of the women’s
movement to encourage women’s health advocates to persuade women
not to donate.
“But we have to obtain those eggs,” some will say, because develop-
ing the cures to help hurting people requires it. Such thinking is
detrimental to an inclusive approach if it inclines us toward justifying
harming some in order to benefit others. We need to appreciate deeply
the suffering of patients who need stem cell treatments and the
suffering of women who can all too easily be pressured into egg
extraction. Our aspiration for inclusiveness should strengthen our
resolve to alleviate both—and certainly not to add substantially to the
suffering of one group in order to lessen the suffering of another.
The donation of other body (“somatic”) cells is not immune from
similar issues of coercion. But an even greater danger of exploitation of
the vulnerable has to do with the problem of “therapeutic misconcep-
tion” (Hyun 2006). This problem can occur when donors have no
prospect of personally benefiting from the experiment in which they
are participating. They may nevertheless think that they will benefit—
and they may participate only because of that mistaken idea. The
result is a violation of informed consent.
Somatic cell donors, for example, may donate their genetic material
for research cloning only because they assume that any embryonic
stem cells developed will give them guaranteed access to lifesaving
genetically matched treatments. If that is not intended by the research-
ers, then the informed consent process must be more proactive than it
generally is to prevent this misconception—even at the risk of losing
donors. Here again a commitment to inclusiveness will help us not to put
one group, whom we laudably endeavor to help, ahead of another
vulnerable group in a way that harms some in order to benefit others.
3. The Subjects of Research
The third group of vulnerable people connected with stem cell
research includes the subjects of that research. Regarding adult stem
cell research, standard research ethics guidelines must be followed, as
elsewhere in research (Emanuel et al. 2008; Lemmens and Waring
2006; and Iltis 2005). Adult stem cell research is subject to the same
temptation already discussed—that is, to harm some in order to benefit
694 Journal of Religious Ethics
many. For instance, in their zeal to help children with diabetes,
researchers prematurely subjected several children to a risky adult
stem cell study before experiments on consenting adults had demon-
strated sufficient benefit to justify the risk (Manier 2007). An inclusive
approach would encourage the aggressive pursuit of treatments for
children suffering from diabetes without exposing some children to
serious harm in the process.
Embryonic stem cell research presents a unique challenge, in that
the human embryos involved in the research typically are taken apart
and then die in the process. How serious a matter is that? Many people
see embryos as human beings, worthy of the same protections that
should be given to other human beings—or at least have a reasonable
doubt about the claim that embryos are not human beings in this
fullest sense. It is not simply a matter of debates over the science
involved or the religion involved, although it is often cast that way. An
entire way of thinking is involved. Because an inclusive approach to
stem cell research requires that the well-being of no affected group of
people be seriously compromised if that is avoidable, the dynamics at
work in excluding human embryos need careful attention.
3.1 Scientific and philosophical considerations
People’s concerns about embryos often begin with the science. They
may be familiar with the long-standing definition of the human embryo
provided by the National Institutes of Health: “the developing organ-
ism from the time of fertilization until the end of the eighth week of
gestation” (2009). Or as various embryology textbooks put it, the life
history of a new individual has begun at conception.13
Accordingly, many people recognize that even the early embryo, at the
blastocyst stage, is not just “human life”—as blood cells are alive and
human. Rather a human embryo is a human organism—a being that is
human—who, unless fatally disabled or injured, can typically develop
throughout the human lifespan as long as suitable nurture and envi-
ronment are provided. A child or an adult is also a human being who,
unless fatally disabled or injured, can typically develop throughout the
human lifespan as long as suitable nurture and environment are
provided. Recognizing this parallel gives many people pause.
13 Ronan O’Rahilly originated the international Carnegie Stages of Human Embryo-
logical Development for the International Terminologica Embryologica Committee which
determines scientifically correct terms for embryology worldwide. As he writes in his
basic embryology textbook, fertilization “is a critical landmark because, under ordinary
circumstances, a new, genetically distinct human organism is formed. . . . The embryo
now exists as a genetic unity” (2001, 8, 33). The Carnegie Stages are also discussed in
Carlson 2005.
Inclusive Ethics: Stem Cell Research 695
They are struck by the difference between a bunch of human cells
that are gathered together in the same place—such as a group of skin
cells—and an integrated human organism, or being, that has already
begun developing in an increasingly complex way toward adulthood.
They note that living adult bodies could also be described as “some
cells,” but that adults, like embryos, are not “just some cells.” They are
also biologically integrated (self-organizing) beings.
That human embryos are, biologically, human beings is enough to
persuade many that they warrant the protections due to all other
human beings. Other people resist making this equation because they
see something added to human beings after the embryonic stage that
gives them a more protectable status as “persons.” This addition most
commonly has to do with location, formation, individuation, or inten-
tion. Why do many find it unconvincing that some such feature adds to
the significance and protectability of human beings?
The appeal to location is that even if embryos implanted in a womb
are persons, those in dishes in a lab are not, because they cannot
develop there into born human beings. However, people are people
regardless of where someone puts them. If someone chooses not to put
adults where they can obtain what they need in order to live, that does
not invalidate their personhood; nor would that seem, to many, to
invalidate an embryo’s personhood.
It is important to avoid “genetic determinism” here. Genetics and
environment, for example, are both important influences on who people
become over time. But development over time is not the same issue as
status at a given moment in time. At a given moment, genetics helps
define whether one is human, whereas environment helps define
whether a human is thriving, not whether one is human.
The appeal to formation is that only embryos whose neurological
“primitive streak” has formed—generally by about fourteen days after
fertilization—should be considered persons, because the primitive
streak provides biological evidence that these organisms will have
human brains and related capacities such as self-awareness and rea-
soning in the future. However, if it is the biological evidence that such
capacities will develop in the future that matters, that is already
present genetically from day one. If it is the capacities themselves that
matter, rather than the biological basis for them, then it would be
acceptable to kill born children who have not yet developed such
capacities or adults who have lost them—an approach that relatively
few would espouse.
The appeal to individuation flows from the observation that early
embryos can divide and become more than one embryo, as in the case
of identical twins. Because the embryos are not in their final form yet,
it is held, they do not qualify as persons. However, embryos are
696 Journal of Religious Ethics
changing form in all sorts of ways throughout their development. So
the question really is whether division per se demonstrates that what
was thought to be something (a person) was not really that thing.
Division is not an unusual phenomenon. For instance, a country may
divide into two countries. The division does not mean that there was
not a country present before the division. Division simply suggests that
multiple entities (countries or persons) were in some unofficial sense
present previously—or at least can be in the future. One (or more) was
genuinely present prior to division.
The appeal to intention has primarily to do with embryos produced
through cloning for the purpose of embryonic stem cell research. The
idea is that embryos produced through cloning and intended to be
implanted and born may be persons; but they are not persons if they
are intended only for research and thus death before they are fourteen
days old. However, as many see it, people are people regardless of what
others intend to do to them; and such is the case with people at any
stage of their development, whether embryonic or adult.
In other words, many would say that embryos are persons with
potential rather than potential persons. Sperm and eggs—in fact, every
body cell in this age of cloning—have the potential to become persons.
So it is understandable that some may refer to them as “potential
persons.” But such language is inappropriate regarding human
embryos. They already are beings or organisms that are human. Their
moral significance is rooted in what they are, not merely in what they
have the potential to become.
In this understanding, the fact that human embryos have not yet
manifested their full potential no more invalidates their personhood
than young adults’ personhood is invalidated by the fact that they have
not yet manifested their full potential. Potential persons rightly do not
receive the same protections as actual persons. But embryos are not
potential persons, in the eyes of many; they are persons with potential.
So, it is not hard to understand why so many at least have questions
about claims that human embryos are not “human beings,” or that all
human beings are not persons. Unless all reasonable doubt on these
matters can be removed, it makes sense that embryonic stem cell
research be viewed as an example of the objectionable, non-inclusive
approach to meeting human need—that is, severely harming some to
benefit others.
3.2 Religious considerations
The discussion to this point illustrates that the basis for being
protective of human embryos is scientific and philosophical, and not
necessarily religious. In other words, this is a human concern, which
Inclusive Ethics: Stem Cell Research 697
can stand on its own without uniquely Christian or other religious
justifications. But many people find that biblical resources, which have
been sources of wisdom for so many people through the ages, are also
helpful sources of insight that affirm and help explain the significance
of what science and reason demonstrate. To be sure, biblical writings
say little about human life at the embryonic stage of development. But
they do make references to the uniqueness of human beings, with a
suggestive glimpse or two at what that might mean for their earliest
formative stage.
For instance, the book of Genesis suggests that the preciousness of
the life of human beings is rooted in humanity being created in the
image of God—a distinction that is in place when a being is established
as human as opposed to plant or animal.14 Needless to say, it is only in
light of the relatively recent understanding of genetics that this dis-
tinction is now understood to be in place genetically at the embryonic
stage.
Later biblical passages reflect such an outlook regarding early
human life. For example, in the Psalms (for example, Psalm 51), King
David comments on the earliest days of his existence—which he says
took place when he began to grow within his mother. David considers
the “me” who is speaking as an adult to be the same “me” (person) who
was conceived in his mother’s womb.
Many who look to New Testament writings such as the book of Luke
find a similar mindset there. When they read that Mary, newly preg-
nant with Jesus, meets with her cousin Elizabeth, they find that God
has become a human. God has identified completely with the experi-
ence of a human being, not by taking the form of an adult, but by
becoming a human embryo.15
Such insights do reinforce other considerations, but they are not
required in order for people to recognize human embryos as their fellow
humans. That point needs to be made loudly as Christian ethics
endeavors to make a public contribution in the twenty-first century.
Otherwise, any identification of people as “Christian” may be enough to
disqualify anything they have to say on a matter of ethics in the public
arena. Simply because someone has a personal faith, or personally
considers a religious argument to be persuasive, does not relieve others
of the obligation to engage the non-religious arguments that a person
14 According to the opening chapter of Genesis, God creates plants (1:11–12), then
animals (1:20–25), and then “God created humankind in his image” (1:27).
15 According to the opening chapter of Luke, when Mary became pregnant with Jesus
she “went with haste” (1:39) to Elizabeth’s home, where Elizabeth discerns that Jesus,
her Lord (1:44), is present and Mary is his mother, even at this presumably embryonic
stage in Jesus’s development.
698 Journal of Religious Ethics
of faith puts forward. Non-religious arguments are no less valid simply
because the person who makes them has beliefs on which those
arguments do not depend. Fairness requires recognizing that those
who consider embryos to be vulnerable human beings worthy of the
protection due to all persons often do so on non-religious grounds.
Some are motivated by religious conviction to act on or to speak up for
those views, but motivation should not be confused with argumenta-
tion. Otherwise, non-religious participants in public debates should
also typically be excluded because they are inspired by motivations
that many others do not share.
Charles Krauthammer, a Washington Post journalist who has served
on the U.S. President’s Council on Bioethics, has offered a pointed
reminder not to assume that arguments supportive of human embryos
are religious:
Many secularly inclined people such as myself have great trepidation
about the inherent dangers of wanton and unrestricted manipulation—to
the point of dismemberment—of human embryos. You don’t need religion
to tremble at the thought of unrestricted embryo research. You simply
have to have a healthy respect for the human capacity for doing evil in
pursuit of the good [2007, A19].
A fellow member of the President’s Council, Princeton law professor
Robert George, voices a similar concern (George and Gomez-Lobo
2005).
3.3 Anti-inclusive thinking
This concern over harming some to benefit others is a reminder that
the same anti-inclusive temptation is present here as it is elsewhere in
the stem cell arena. It is possible to be so overwhelmed with the
importance of helping suffering patients or protecting endangered egg
donors that the importance of sufficiently respecting the lives of human
beings at the embryonic stage of development is neglected. Those
concerned about the well-being of human embryos encounter this
neglect whenever they hear embryonic stem cell research being advo-
cated without any mention of the embryonic subjects of that research
who are harmed in the process.
They hear many advocates saying implicitly—and sometimes quite
explicitly—that it does not matter whether embryos are human beings:
so much can be done through embryonic stem cell research that will
benefit so many people to so great a degree, that this itself is sufficient
justification for the research. Such a view embodies the heart of the
anti-inclusive outlook at work here—namely, that if enough benefit can
be generated for enough people, then whatever must be done to a
minority in order to achieve that great end can be justified.
Inclusive Ethics: Stem Cell Research 699
If a minority must be treated badly enough, those responsible for
doing so may well feel compelled to bring into question the full
humanity of those mistreated, in order to better justify the mistreat-
ment. For instance, in debates over embryonic stem cell research, it
may be claimed that if embryos are human beings, surely they are not
as much so as adults or children are: people know a human being when
they see one.
Why is this line of thinking so upsetting to many people? What
concerns them is that this is a line of thinking that has been voiced
before in the United States. There was a time that using black slaves as
property was so economically beneficial that people advocated doing it.
That made some people uncomfortable unless slaves could be defined as
less than fully human. That was not hard to do because there were
obvious visual differences between these black slaves and their white
owners. Even the Supreme Court conveniently ruled in the Dred Scott
case that black slaves were mere property from which to profit, rather
than human beings sharing in the basic equality of all human beings. As
the Court saw it, it was “too clear for dispute” that Dred Scott was not
a human being (U.S. Supreme Court 1857, 393).
What unsettles many today is that it was as clear to the Court then
that Dred Scott was not a full human being as it is clear to others today
that an embryo is not a human being. It is quite easy to underestimate
what we can mentally justify, many worry, if the economic or medical
benefits that we aspire to are attractive enough. This is, emphatically,
not to suggest that weighty arguments against the personhood of the
human embryo cannot be made. Rather, it is to suggest that without
such arguments, the door is wide open for anti-inclusive thinking.
The dangers of this thinking—especially the inadequate protections
for certain groups of people that can follow—are quite substantial in
the realm of medical research. Some point to the Tuskegee Syphilis
Study, conducted in Alabama from 1933 to 1972 by the U.S. Public
Health Service, involving 399 poor African American men in Alabama
with latent syphilis (Brandt 2000). Researchers wanted to learn how
the disease would progress if left untreated. The goal was to learn
whether various medical interventions would genuinely be beneficial.
They knew that if the men learned about treatment options, those
patients might get treated, and their value to the study would be lost.
So the men were not told, nor were they treated, and many were
seriously harmed in the process.
A more recent careful review of the scientific environment of the
Tuskegee Syphilis Study helpfully cautions against attributing to the
researchers involved a malicious intent (Benedek and Erlen 1999). For
most of the study, the treatment available was not very effective or
accessible, and the disease often went away on its own. Nevertheless,
700 Journal of Religious Ethics
medical experts at the time the study was launched did not view such
considerations as reasons not to treat syphilis (Moore et al. 1932); and
both state and national law sometimes required syphilis to be treated
during the years of the study based on the best medical understanding
of the day (Benedek 1978, 43). Thus, the Tuskegee Syphilis Study in all
likelihood harmed some men and their family members without their
consent—though to what extent is hard to quantify.16
To be sure, the standard of informed consent had no legal status
until late in the study. Nevertheless, that a practice is not illegal does
not necessarily mean that it is ethical, especially where human well-
being is manifestly at risk. Further, the withholding of treatment from
the men in the study—in violation of current state law, without seeking
a legal waiver—may suggest that those involved knew that something
less than upright was being done. It is also telling, according to the
official panel convened years later to investigate, that no informed
consent requirements were observed even after they received legal
status following the formulation of the Nuremburg Code for the pro-
tection of research subjects (Katz 1973, 14).
The Tuskegee researchers likely had the same good motives as
embryonic stem cell researchers today: that is, they hoped to be able to
more effectively treat suffering patients in the future. What worries
many people is that such motives can become disengaged from inclu-
sive thinking—as they did in the Tuskegee Study, according to a senior
investigator’s official critique (Katz 1973, 14). When that happens, if
there appears to be no other way to obtain certain medical benefits,
then seriously harming some to benefit a greater number of others who
are suffering can be justified. Admittedly, few would own this rationale
were it worded so baldly. However, if those being harmed are limited
to those considered by many not to be as fully human or worthwhile as
others, then the idea becomes more palatable and persuasive.
Although Tuskegee researchers thought that they could not
achieve the medical ends in view without doing what they did, would
they have used means that normally would not have been condoned,
had they been working with people more mainstream than these
voiceless black heirs of the Dred Scott legacy? Many worry today
that voiceless embryos are being treated the same way in embryonic
stem cell research. As cited earlier, the findings of Krauthammer and
George and Gomez-Lobo are among them. The challenge here is not
16 Some sources suggest that as many as one-hundred men died of syphilic compli-
cations who might have been helped, with many more subjected to increased suffering
(for example, Jones 1993b, 275). See also Jones 1993a. Others note that another forty
wives plus nineteen babies may have been unnecessarily contaminated in the process
(for example, Ricard and Thuan 2001, 17).
Inclusive Ethics: Stem Cell Research 701
to forget the lesson of the tragic Tuskegee experience, as preserved
on the web site of the Tuskegee Syphilis Study Legacy Committee:
“Doing Bad in the Name of Good” is a temptation that society today
must fastidiously resist. The point here is not that the Tuskegee
research and embryonic stem cell research are similar in all
respects—only that anti-inclusive thinking has often been operative
in the justification of both.
As chronicled in the book Useful Bodies, this experience is a part of
a larger pattern of experiences in the United States and elsewhere
(Goodman et al. 2003). While regulations are currently in place to
constrain abuse of research subjects, the experiences in this book
document how persistent the tendency is to look at the bodies of human
beings—especially the weakest and most vulnerable—and justify using
them more as property than human beings. A comment from a leader
connected with one of the experiences discussed in this book is par-
ticularly telling: “If you think these kinds of experiments can’t happen
again, then they probably will” (Massachusetts Department of Mental
Retardation 1994, 3). When people do not recognize non-inclusive
thinking as such, it is most free to flourish.
Thus, zeal for producing medical treatments, though often quite
well-intentioned, can run into conflict with an inclusive disposition not
to mistreat some in order to benefit others. This disposition is what
causes people to recoil when they hear about the Dred Scott case. One
popular way to forestall such reaction against mistreating human
beings is to claim, as Ron Reagan did before millions of viewers at
a national political convention, that the difference between human
embryos and human beings is obvious (Reagan 2004). Rather than
engaging the biological and philosophical arguments for the full
humanity of human embryos, Reagan pursued a strategy that surfaces
all too often today. He suggested that the only reason that anyone cares
about human embryos is “theological”—and that therefore such a
concern is irrelevant in the public arena.
Wired magazine—a secular biotech publication—has published a
different view:
The stem cell argument isn’t exclusively a religious debate anymore.
Right-to-life advocates aren’t the only ones who believe stem cell research
could threaten moral integrity. . . . Now, even stem cell researchers them-
selves, and patients who could be cured as a result of stem cell studies,
are opposing them. Mary Jane Owen is one of them. She is blind, has
partial hearing loss, and uses a wheelchair because of a spinal cord
injury. [As she puts it:] “I think we’ve lost our sense of morality. . . . We’ve
become so utilitarian” [Philipkoski 2000].
Krauthammer would likely agree.
702 Journal of Religious Ethics
3.4 Beyond definitions
How convincing are the arguments that the lives of human embryos
should be protected like the lives of other human beings? Needless to say,
they are convincing to many people who oppose embryonic stem cell
research. As National Stem Cell Holding, Inc. has found, even those
supportive of embryonic stem cell research often recognize that it is
difficult to overcome the influence of at least some of the arguments
against the full humanity of human embryos.17 Jon Shields has analyzed
the many current debates over embryonic stem cell research in the
feature article of a symposium in the journal Society. He concludes that
proponents of embryonic stem cell research “have a serious intellectual
problem.” They have not been able to refute the argument for viewing
human embryos as true human beings—an argument which he believes
is “grounded in science and philosophy” (2007, 18, 20). Recent objectively
worded survey questions also suggest that a large portion—perhaps the
majority—of the U.S. population shares the view that human embryos
should not be destroyed for research purposes (Levin 2008, 51–52).
Accordingly, it is not surprising to find some supporters of embryonic
stem cell research pursuing a different tactic. They are endeavoring to
change the very definition of the word “embryo” in a way that makes
people think that embryos are not involved in producing embryonic
stem cells.
Dividing the pre-fetus embryonic stage of human development into
sub-stages has long been done. Doing so can be helpful when it adds
clarity and precision to discussion. There are differences between
pre-implantation embryos and post-implantation embryos. But efforts
to replace the term “pre-implantation embryo” with “pre-embryo” have
generally obscured rather than clarified. The embryonic period has
long referred to the earliest period of development in many species, not
just humans. So the term pre-embryo suggests, by definition, that a
being has not yet begun its earliest stage of development.
Accordingly, the NIH and various leading embryologists indicate
that an embryo is present from day one onward, as noted earlier; and
the widely accepted terminology of “embryonic” stem cell research is
based on that definition. It makes little sense to say that embryonic
stem cells do not come from embryos. Nevertheless, some embryonic
17 National Stem Cell Holding, Inc. announced in July 2007 the discovery of a group
of biomaterials produced from embryonic stem cells that appear to have special healing
ability. Nevertheless, the company continued similar research using adult stem cells and
celebrated in an August 12, 2007, PR Newswire press release their discovery of a way to
produce the same biomaterials without using, as they put it, “problematic” embryonic
stem cells.
Inclusive Ethics: Stem Cell Research 703
stem cell research supporters are suggesting a re-definition of “embryo”
along the lines of the confusing “pre-embryo” terminology—thereby
defining “embryo” as “a developing organism beginning about two
weeks after conception” (Herold 2006, 121).18 That would be convenient
for embryonic stem cell research, since it would mean that embryonic
stem cells do not come from embryos. However, as embryonic stem cell
researcher James Thomson has acknowledged, “You’re creating an
embryo. If you try to define it away, you’re being disingenuous” (Boyle
2005). Promoting deceptive language does a great public disservice,
since it dupes people into supporting technologies that they may deeply
oppose. The eventual backlash when the duplicity is revealed only
serves to foster public distrust of science.
A constructive way forward will require open and honest discussion.
Most people who are protective of human embryos would be happy if
these sources of embryonic stem cells were not actually human beings.
These advocates really are eager to help the first vulnerable group
discussed earlier—those who are ill or injured—in every ethical way
possible. The problem is not typically a lack of compassion for such
sufferers. Many people simply do not find convincing the arguments
that either deny human embryos are human beings, or claim that not
all human beings are “persons” and that only persons’ lives warrant
full protection.
But what if embryonic stem cells could be obtained without doing
harm to embryos? (For the purposes of discussion, the cells in view here
will simply be called “pluripotent” stem cells. Whether they actually
come from embryos or not, this term emphasizes the ultimate goal for
the stem cells in view here: the highly prized capacity of giving rise to all
cell types in the body.) If such cells could be obtained without doing
harm, then the major ethical obstacle would be removed. Two basic
approaches to avoiding this obstacle have been proposed. One involves
producing pluripotent stem cells without harming embryos. The other
involves using only “unwanted” embryos that will be dying anyway.
3.5 New cell sources
Producing pluripotent stem cells without doing harm could take
numerous forms, four of which are discussed in a paper produced by
the U.S. President’s Council on Bioethics (2005). One, embryo biopsy,
18 The term “pre-embryo” is sometimes used by such people to refer to the human
organism in the first two weeks of life. However, as Lee Silver has observed, the term has
recently been invented “for reasons that are political, not scientific”: “The new term is
used to provide the illusion that there is something profoundly different between a
six-day old embryo and a sixteen-day old embryo” (1997, 39).
704 Journal of Religious Ethics
typically involves removing a single cell from an eight-cell embryo,
developing an embryonic stem cell line from that cell and allowing the
embryo to continue to develop to a successful birth.
The second approach, altered nuclear transfer, typically involves a
process similar to the cloning technique of somatic cell nuclear trans-
fer. In this approach, the genetic material from a body cell is altered
before being placed in an egg whose nucleus has been removed. The
resulting entity—not a viable embryo but rather a generator of pluri-
potent stem cells—could never develop into a born human being.
The third approach, transplantation from dead embryos, operates
analogously to organ transplantation from a patient who has just died.
The idea is to remove still-living individual embryonic stem cells from
embryos that have permanently lost the biological integration neces-
sary to develop into born human beings—much as brain-dead patients
have lost that integration and the ability to develop further.
The fourth approach, dedifferentiation of body cells, involves revers-
ing the differentiation process that “turns off” or blocks most of the
genetic code in cells as they become more specialized. The goal is to
“reactivate” most of the genetic code so that the induced pluripotent
stem (iPS) cells have the pluripotency of embryonic stem cells, without
reactivating the entire code and giving the cells totipotency (that is, the
ability to develop into an entire born human being).
Since one inclusive goal in view here is to generate maximally
beneficial cells without harming human embryos, there are at least
four practical and ethical criteria that can be used to evaluate the four
proposed alternate sources of pluripotent stem cells (and any others in
the future):
1. Workability: Can the technique actually produce stem cells?
2. Pluripotency: Do any cells produced have the flexibility to give
rise to all cell types in the body?
3. Compatibility: Do the cells genetically match the patient to be
treated, in order to minimize the risks of rejection?
4. Safety: Are human embryos harmed by the technique?
How well do the four proposed approaches fare according to these four
criteria?
The first approach, embryo biopsy, may well meet the workability
criterion. Not only has it been accomplished in mice (Chung et al.
2006), but human embryonic stem cell lines also appear to have been
developed from single cells removed from early human embryos
(Chung et al. 2008; Klimanskaya et al. 2006). The cells produced, being
embryonic stem cells, would indeed be pluripotent.
However, cells produced through embryo biopsy would not be geneti-
cally matched to the patient needing treatment unless the embryo were
Inclusive Ethics: Stem Cell Research 705
produced in the first place via a cloning process using a cell from the
patient’s own body. Since even in the United States only a minority of
people consider cloning for research (that is, non-reproductive) pur-
poses to be ethical, there is a built-in hurdle attending this approach.19
The extra (cloning) step involved could also render this approach more
expensive than other ways of producing genetically matched pluripo-
tent stem cells, thereby exacerbating the “fair access” challenges noted
earlier.
While embryo biopsy aspires to avoid harming embryos, it would
only be harmless under two conditions. The seven-cell embryo remain-
ing after the single cell is removed must be able to develop into a born
infant and ultimately an adult without having been harmed by the
biopsy process. And the single cell removed must not have the capa-
bility of developing into a born human being, as when an early embryo
splits and both parts of the embryo develop into born twins.
Embryo biopsy has been done for a number of years now as a part
of preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD)—using the removed cell to
make sure that the embryo is healthy or otherwise desirable. This
procedure kills some embryos in the process and may well inhibit the
ability of others to implant in the womb (Hudson 2006). Thus, it is not
a procedure that those most protective of human embryos would want
to encourage. In fact, it is not clear yet if PGD itself would become less
reliable if the cell removed had to divide an extra time to produce one
cell for testing and another for generating an embryonic stem cell line.
Moreover, there is not yet any long-term experience available to
establish whether or not the process has caused damage to the embryos
that will only become evident later in life. The first mammal cloning,
involving the British sheep named Dolly, was initially declared a
complete success. But after a number of years, Dolly’s early arthritis
and death raised questions warranting further study before the safety
issue could be resolved.20 In the primary experiments in which embryo
biopsies generated human embryonic stem cells, the biopsied embryos
either perished or were frozen, instead of being allowed to develop to
implantation and birth (Chung et al. 2008).
As for the single cell removed from an eight-cell embryo, such a cell
appears to be able to develop successfully to the point of birth and
19 This was the overall verdict of survey results produced by Johns Hopkins Univer-
sity’s Genetics and Public Policy Center (“Biologists” 2006). These figures were also
confirmed in Levin 2008. They are also discussed in Condic and Rao 2008. This latter
study found that less than one-third of the people support research cloning.
20 According to the Science Museum of the National Museum of Science and Industry
in London, “Dolly’s arthritis and now relatively young death fuel concerns that even
clones appearing healthy at birth may have underlying genetic abnormalities” (2009).
Similarly, see Giles and Knight 2003.
706 Journal of Religious Ethics
beyond in some animals.21 Whether such is the case in humans is
currently a matter of debate.22 More research will be needed before the
totipotency of such a cell can be firmly established or dismissed.
Meanwhile, efforts are under way to carry out some embryo biopsies
earlier—at the four-cell stage (for example, Wang et al. 2008). Such
efforts increase the likelihood that new embryos are being produced
and harmed—that some cells being removed could have instead devel-
oped to implantation and birth.
The second approach, altered nuclear transfer, has not been accom-
plished yet in humans, so its workability is unknown. However, one
form of it has been accomplished in mice (Meissner and Jaenisch 2006).
Part of its attractiveness is that it would straightforwardly meet both
the pluripotency and compatibility criteria (Hurlbut 2005).
Its ability to meet the safety criterion is more controversial. Some
worry about the risks to egg donors discussed earlier, since so many
eggs would be needed for the research phase and later to produce stem
cells genetically matched to every person who needs them (McLaren
2007). Others are particularly concerned about harm done to human
embryos. The version of altered nuclear transfer accomplished in mice
involves inactivating a gene in the genetic material from the body cell
and turning it back on in the stem cells generated by the “entity”
produced through the transfer. This entity appears to some to be closer
to a genetically disabled embryo than to something truly other than an
embryo.
A more recent form of the approach, called oocyte-assisted repro-
gramming, is more widely considered likely to meet the safety criterion
(Condic 2005).23 It involves using the cytoplasm of an egg to genetically
reprogram the genetic code (that is, the genome) in the nucleus of a
body cell, as in cloning; but the new cell produced is a pluripotent stem
cell rather than a totipotent embryo. This procedure has not yet been
accomplished in animals or humans because of various scientific
obstacles (Byrnes 2007).
21 “These results show that up to the 8-cell stage, at least some blastomeres retain the
potential to develop into an animal” (Tarkowski et al. 2005). The authors cite previous
studies involving animals other than mice in which normal adults were obtained from
single blastomeres removed from eight-cell embryos, and indicate that they are the first
to accomplish the same in mice—albeit using the support of other blastomeres in the
process.
22 For example, Klimanskaya et al. 2006 doubt that single cells at this stage can
develop into a born human being, whereas McLaren argues that such cells could be
totipotent. The national German Reference Centre for Ethics in the Life Sciences
considers these cells in most cases to be totipotent (2009).
23 See descriptions on the Altered Nuclear Transfer web site, including the proposal
put forward by Grompe and George 2005. For one list of supporters, see “Production”
2005.
Inclusive Ethics: Stem Cell Research 707
The third approach, transplantation from dead embryos, appears to
some to be workable (Landry and Zucker 2004). Others have doubts.
The debate over workability stems from the fact that there is published
research claiming to demonstrate that human embryonic stem cell
lines have been produced from cells removed from embryos that have
died (Zhang et al. 2006). However, there are no accepted criteria to
demonstrate that a particular embryo has “died,” analogous to brain
death criteria for born human beings. Moreover, cells from embryos
that have stopped developing may already be genetically faulty—if not
damaged in the arresting process—and so might not consistently
produce healthy stem cell lines.
This approach fares well in terms of pluripotency. Yet, as with
embryo biopsy, the compatibility criterion would not be met unless a
controversial cloning procedure were used to produce the embryo. If the
embryos involved were dead already, then there would be no safety
concerns regarding those embryos. However, if single cells were sal-
vaged no later than at the eight-cell stage, there would be the same
ethical problem as in embryo biopsy—specifically, that the cell might be
able to develop into a born human being.
The fourth approach, dedifferentiation of body cells, is where the
great breakthrough has occurred. Although prospects for this technol-
ogy appeared remote when the President’s Council issued its paper,
they improved considerably in June 2007 with the publication of
results from three different research groups showing that normal skin
cells can be reprogrammed to an embryonic state in mice (Okita et al.
2007; Wernig et al. 2007; and Maherali et al. 2007). Before the year
was out, the same feat had been accomplished in human beings by two
different sets of researchers (Takahashi et al. 2007; Yu et al. 2007).
What sets this approach apart at the present time is its demon-
strated ability to meet all four criteria. Not only does the technique
work, but the iPS cells produced are pluripotent, they can genetically
match the patient to be treated, and their production does not harm
human embryos. In fact, major confirmation of workability and pluri-
potency came in mid-2009 when another two studies used iPS cells to
produce every type of body cell by producing live-born mice (Zhao et al.
2009; Kang et al. 2009).
One lingering problem, though, concerns a safety issue of another
type. Because the revolutionary cell reprogramming was initially
accomplished using the cancer-causing c-Myc gene inserted using a
cancer-causing retrovirus, there were concerns about the safety of
patients who would be receiving iPS cells. However, researchers very
quickly developed a way to reprogram cells without using the c-Myc
gene (Kim et al. 2008). Soon thereafter researchers learned that a
safer adenovirus could be used instead (Stadtfeld et al. 2008). Then, in
708 Journal of Religious Ethics
mid-2009, an alternative approach dispensing with viruses altogether
was announced (Woltjen et al. 2009). Such rapid overcoming of safety
risks—together with the discovery of ways to improve the efficiency
and speed of the process (Aasen et al. 2008)—bodes well for the future
of this technology.
The enthusiasm of scientists in response to this development is thus
understandable. When the breakthrough in mice demonstrated its
realistic potential, a report in Nature quoted Max Planck Institute stem
cell specialist Hans Scholer as saying, “It’s unbelievable, just amazing.
It’s like Dolly [the first cloned animal]. It’s that type of accomplishment”
(Cyranoski 2007). The similar achievement in humans generated even
greater excitement. Robert Lanza, Chief Science Officer of Advance Cell
Technology, exclaimed that production of these so-called iPS cells in
humans has reached “a tremendous scientific milestone—the biological
equivalent of the Wright Brothers’ first airplane” (“Milestone” 2007).
Soon thereafter was reported a stunning announcement by Edinburgh
University researcher Ian Wilmut, the cloning pioneer famous for
producing Dolly: he was abandoning cloning and embryonic stem cell
research because iPS cell technology “represents the future for stem cell
research” (Highfield 2008).
It turns out, then, that there is at least one emerging approach to
producing pluripotent stem cells (iPS cells) that is more in line with an
inclusive ethics than using human embryos. It is more attractive for
other ethically significant reasons as well. Yet, just as the tendency of
embryonic stem cells to produce cancer in mice has made it very
difficult to test them safely in human beings (Blum et al. 2009), so iPS
cells and all other forms of stem cells must remain accountable to
appropriate standards of human safety. An inclusive ethics supportive
of all subjects of the research requires no less.
3.6 Unwanted embryos?
What about the other proposed way to obtain embryonic stem cells
without doing harm—that is, using only “unwanted” embryos that will
be dying anyway? Proponents of using leftover embryos for stem cell
research typically hold that using such embryos is in line with the
ethical treatment of human beings. But many appropriately question
that assumption. They look to other settings where human beings are
dying, to see if it is considered ethically acceptable to remove their vital
body parts before they have actually died.
That issue has been publicly addressed at length with regard to
removing vital organs from dying patients by the U.S. Department of
Health and Human Services (n.d.). The U.S. United Network for Organ
Sharing has given similar careful consideration in its white papers to
Inclusive Ethics: Stem Cell Research 709
removing vital organs from prisoners on death row (see also Petechuk
2006). In both cases the fact that people will inevitably be dying has
been found to be an insufficient justification for killing them even
earlier. The ends in view—obtaining vital bodily materials for sick
patients—may be admirable. But harming (especially killing) some to
benefit others has been deemed unacceptable. It is profoundly at odds
with an inclusive outlook committed to the well-being of all vulnerable
groups in society.
Meanwhile, there is another basic problem with the notion that
unwanted embryos could provide an acceptable source of stem cells:
this has to do with the very assumption that these embryos are
unwanted. The number of frozen embryos in the United States has
often been estimated to be about four hundred thousand, based on a
study by the RAND Corporation (RAND Corporation 2003; Hoffman
et al. 2003). Many people mistakenly assume from this figure that
there is a huge supply of leftover embryos that must be thrown away
if they are not used for embryonic stem cell research. This misunder-
standing is illustrated by the recent book Stem Cell Wars, which
invokes the RAND study’s four hundred thousand figure to suggest
that a huge number of frozen embryos will unavoidably be destroyed
whether or not they are used for embryonic stem cell research (Herold
2006, 33). Based on the notion that four hundred thousand embryos
would need to be adopted by someone in order to spare them from
death—plus the claim that only one hundred embryos have been
adopted to date—the book mistakenly concludes that leftover embryos
have a mere one in four thousand chance of being adopted (Herold
2006, 127).
An examination of the RAND report itself reveals quite a different
picture. The four hundred thousand number itself is sufficiently docu-
mented there. However, the vast majority of those four hundred
thousand—88.2% of them—are not “left over” according to that report.
Instead, they are eagerly wanted by the very people who produced
them. Those people are planning to implant them in the future in order
to have more children.
Because only about two-thirds of the remaining 11.8% are likely to
survive thawing,24 only thirty thousand frozen embryos are likely to be
viable and unwanted by those who produced them. But even these
embryos are not truly unwanted. They are very much wanted—by
women yearning to adopt them and carry them to term in their own
wombs. There are so many such women, in fact, that there are now
24 This well-established figure for embryos produced through in vitro fertilization has
been confirmed for embryos produced through intracytoplasmic sperm injection as well
(for example, Figueira et al. 2009).
710 Journal of Religious Ethics
well over two hundred agencies facilitating embryo donation for repro-
ductive purposes.25
Some women prefer embryo adoption to the adoption of born chil-
dren because of the opportunity to ensure the healthy development of
their child while in the womb. Others are motivated by the opportunity
to rescue a young one who otherwise would perish, perhaps inspired by
the proverbial call to “rescue those being led away to death” (Proverbs
24:11).
Technically, only so-called “donation” is required on the part of the
parents who produced the embryo, since the law does not presently
recognize embryos as full persons. Accordingly, one of the larger agen-
cies is called the National Embryo Donation Center (2009), based in
Tennessee. However, other agencies, such as California’s Snowflakes
Program, go through a full adoption process as part of their affirmation
of the full personhood of the embryo (Snowflakes Program, Nightlight
Christian Adoptions, Inc. 2009).
Snowflakes alone, just one of the hundreds of agencies, has provided
approximately three thousand embryos for adoption already—and
those numbers are expected to escalate in the near future.26 Such
figures suggest that giving thirty thousand embryos a chance at life
through an expanded embryo adoption or donation effort is realistic.
Some respond by claiming that many parents with extra embryos do
not now seek out embryo donation, so society should encourage the use
of these embryos in stem cell research. Again the echoes of Tuskegee
are unsettling. Tuskegee researchers claimed that those poor black
men with syphilis would never seek out medical treatment anyway,
and so should be allowed to die in the syphilis experiments instead
(Katz 1973, 14). Was the likely fate of those black men a reason to
facilitate it—or, rather, to protest it? Today people would commonly say
that everything possible should have been done to help those men
avoid such a fate—and many are saying the same regarding the fate of
frozen embryos.
4. Conclusion
An inclusive approach to stem cell research for the twenty-first
century, then, will listen to all who are speaking up for vulnerable
25 For a list of hundreds of such agencies and their contact information, see Miracles
Waiting n.d.; see also Embryo Adoption Awareness Center 2008.
26 This figure is made available online by Snowflakes; and a weekly update is
available from the Snowflakes Program Coordinator. The anticipated “blizzard” of babies
that will be born through embryo adoption in the years immediately ahead is discussed
in Lester 2009.
Inclusive Ethics: Stem Cell Research 711
groups with a substantial stake in this research. No such groups will
be excluded unless exclusion is warranted beyond a reasonable doubt.
There are at least minimally plausible reasons for including patients,
donors, and embryos, along with other research subjects, among the
relevant vulnerable groups. How to use precious resources to benefit
all, rather than harming some to benefit others, is worthy of society’s
best efforts.
Many other important questions remain related to other aspects of
research on human beings from embryos to adults, but those will have
to await another venue. Concerning stem cell research: research using
adult stem cells is to be encouraged. Great effort should be made to
confirm whether select adult stem cells have the pluripotency to
generate whatever types of stem cell treatments patients may need.
Further development of iPS cell research particularly warrants enthu-
siastic support as well. An inclusive approach can encompass all of
these endeavors.
An inclusive commitment to all of humanity, however, would not
welcome embryonic stem cell research that requires the destruction of
human beings at the embryonic stage of development, whether they
result from cloning (somatic cell nuclear transfer) or fertilization. As
long as it appears, as it does at the present moment, that it may well
be possible to develop the full range of stem cell treatments without
harming human embryos, an inclusive approach can meet the needs of
patients, donors, and embryos alike. This is a form of “new century
vision for all humanity” that Christian ethics—though not only Chris-
tian ethics—can bring to the table (Keeling 1990, 235).
Lest such lofty resolve be relegated merely to the private halls of
Christian ethics rather than attributed to the best that human integ-
rity has to offer, we would do well not to lose sight of the Tuskegee
experience and other human experiences like it. The Tuskegee review
panel concludes its report with the recognition that the danger we
must most guard against is our anti-inclusive willingness to do bad to
some if the good to be achieved is great enough (1973, 47).27 Our safety,
argues the panel, lies ultimately not in devising many rules and
regulations, as important as those are. It is ultimately a matter of the
human spirit. It is rooted in our resolve not to harm the most vulner-
able among us—whoever they are—even in the pursuit of the loftiest
medical goals.
27 In a similar vein, the Tuskegee Syphilis Study Ad Hoc Advisory Panel concludes its
introduction to the report by favorably quoting Hans Jonas’s reminder that “society
would indeed be threatened by the erosion of those moral values whose loss, possibly
caused by too ruthless a pursuit of scientific progress, would make its most dazzling
triumphs not worth having” (1973, 22; Jonas 1969, 245).
712 Journal of Religious Ethics
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Insert Surname Here 4.
Name:
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Date:
Stem Cell Research Article Reflection.
This paper is a critique and reflection of the article on stem cell research by John F. Killer. The main arguments of the article stress on the future implications of stem cell research in the society. Consequently, the author successfully brings out ethical and social issues relating to treatment of diseases using stem cells. The author achieves the intended objective of the article by proving the social issues when dealing with stems cells. On the same token, he compares the interests of the minority who are vulnerable with the other members of the society. The social issue attributed to stem cell research is defined by the loss of life during treatment. The author supports impartiality by arguing that diseases treated using stem cells will continue to exist; therefore, man should not destroy another human life in the name of finding a cure for another infection. (Citation please)! This shows that this article is centered on the social and ethical controversies surrounding stem cell research.
The author of the article sees a balance between human determination and freedom. John F. Killer. Illustrates the United Nations declaration of Human rights by stating that every human has dignity
and should be according with the freedom to life.
(What do you mean here)? He also argues that inclusive ethics in human society entails providing individual attention even to the precise vulnerable and weak members of the society. He provides the support of Christian ethics as the fundamental of human life. Moreover, the author of the article perceives people as totally free and conditioned by heredity. He draws from community rights and historical reflection of the previous societies. The author’s position on stem cell research is that it destroys humanity and communism among people. (Do you mean communalism/community here)? In the article, ethics is perceived as a beneficial pillar of the society, which enhances cohesion in any community. Participating in preservation of life campaign is thus seen as one of the principles things which man should endeavor in the society (John Kilner, 646).
In order to convince the audience on the ethical issues concerning stem cell research, the author uses several sources. Firstly, the author draws from Christian ethics, which are governed under the biblical principles. According to the bible it, is unethical and inhuman to destroy human life in the quest of achieving a certain objective. According to Crook, biblical principles are based on the fact that life is sacred and exceedingly precious. The author also borrows from theological ethic, which states that life is a common interest, which should be preserved because it is God’s given gift. (Which author are you referring to here, Kilner or Crook)?
Fairness arises at this stage (Fairness arises at what stage)?, due to the fact that denying any person life for treatment of another person, it is unethical and inhumane. (Crook, 262). Through his article, John also proves that medicine and science are
[not]?
the best treasures for human kind. On the contrary, he argues that they do not surpass the sociological nature of human beings (Crook 262). (Citation for Kilner)?
Several methods of citation of the sources have been used by the author in the article. For instance, the author cites from Arthur Dyck, a Harvard University scholar, to prove the importance of moral bonds within any community. He also draws from well known theologians to show the importance of theological principles in the society. Human virtues and social well being of any society have been fully described in the author’s arguments. The author also refutes the idolatry of technology by citing from the impact of the innovations in science. (What are you trying to say here)?
At this point, the article diverts its attention to the importance of human dignity. (Again, at what point)? Human dignity can be persevered through respect for human life as a sacred (John Kilner, 624).
The author also espouses on the right to life. He argues that science exists for humans. For this reason, science should be manipulated to benefit every person in the society and not the minority few suffering from infections. The author reflects on the importance of human embryos, which have the potential for human life. According to studies, it has been found that remarkably many human embryos used in stem cell research end up being killed. The author reflects love for humans by arguing that the human embryos represent the vulnerable individuals in the society. (Citation for Kilner [page number)? For this reason, they should be handled with care and concern since they have the ability to provide human life (Crook 362).
In conclusion, although the author comes from a Christian background, he also uses other materials to reflect on the social issues surrounding stem cell research. The position of the author is that human life should be preserved. In this case, embryonic stem cell research should be a thing of the past because it does not encourage the love for human dignity. The author achieves the intended purpose for the article by using principles of Christian ethics and social pillars. At the final analysis, the author succeeds in reflection of the negative side of having embryonic stem cell in the society. (Citation for Kilner [page number)?
NOTE:
Please write 1.5 more pages, as what you wrote only came out to 3 ½ pages, with “works cited” pages, as a fourth page. I remind you that the paper is to be a minimum of 5 pages and maximum of 7 pages, with the citations, on an additional page. Thank you!
~ HIP_91 ~
Works Cited
John. F Killer. Inclusive ethics for the twenty first century. Implications for stem cell research. (2009). Article from Journal of religious ethics.
Crook, Roger H. An Introduction to Christian Ethics. Upper Saddle River, N.J: Pearson Education, 2006. Print.
InsertSurname Here 4.
Name:
College:
Course:
Tutor:
Date:
Stem Cell Research Article Reflection
This paper is a critique and reflection of the article on stem cell research by John F. Killer. The main arguments of the article stress on the future implications of stem cell research in the society. Consequently, the author successfully brings out ethical and social issues relating to treatment of diseases using stem cells. The author achieves the intended objective of the article by proving the social issues when dealing with stems cells. On the same token, he compares the interests of the minority who are vulnerable with the other members of the society. The social issue attributed to stem cell research is defined by the loss of life during treatment. The author supports impartiality by arguing that diseases treated using stem cells will continue to exist; therefore, man should not destroy another human life in the name of finding a cure for another infection (Kilner 467). This shows that this article is centered on the social and ethical controversies surrounding stem cell research.
The author of the article sees a balance between human determination and freedom. John F. Killer illustrates the United Nations declaration of Human rights, by stating that every human has dignity to live and should be accorded (do you mean awarded) with freedom to enjoy their own life. He also argues that inclusive ethics in human society entails providing individual attention even to the precise vulnerable and weak members of the society. He provides the support of Christian ethics as the fundamental of human life. Moreover, the author of the article perceives people as totally free and conditioned by heredity. He draws from community rights and historical reflection of the previous societies. The author’s position on stem cell research is that it destroys humanity among people of the same community. In the article, ethics is perceived as a beneficial pillar of the society, which enhances cohesion in any community. Participating in preservation of life campaign is thus seen as one of the principles things which man should endeavor in the society (Kilner 646).
In order to convince the audience on the ethical issues concerning stem cell research, the author uses several sources. Firstly, the author draws from Christian ethics, which are governed under the biblical principles. According to the bible it, is unethical and inhuman to destroy human life in the quest of achieving a certain objective. The author argues that God is the sole giver of life and every human being should have respect for one another. During the derivation of the stem cells many of the embryos are killed in the course. However, according to studies no clear definition has been given as to the beginning of life. Arguably, the embryos have the potential to bear life. The main social concern being brought up is that life is prevented from taking its course at its initial stages during the research.
According to Crook, biblical principles are based on the fact that life is sacred and exceedingly precious. Crook also borrows from theological ethic, which states that life is a common interest, which should be preserved because it is God’s given gift. Fairness arises (What do you mean by this)? due to the fact that denying any person life for treatment of another person, it is unethical and inhumane (Crook 262). Through his article, John (Kilner/John F. Kilner’s – never use only an author’s first name, in academic writing)! also proves that medicine and science are not the best treasures for human kind. On the contrary, he argues that they do not surpass the sociological nature of human beings (Kilner 468).
Lack of education about stem cell is the main issue brought about by Crook. He argues out the social consequences of having stem cell research in the society. (What are these social consequences you speak of)? Although the stem cells are donated for treatment of other infections, doctors should ensure that they do not kill the stem cells after they have use. (Is this according to Crook; regardless it needs a citation)?
They can be converted to usefulness through donation to artificial insemination. Conversely, Crook states that people should realize that stem cells are not derived from abortion
(Citation)? Most of the stem cells are derived from In Vitro Fertilization Centers. However, research has shown that to have a successful embryo from stem cells, it is possible for the IVF centers to kill millions of embryos. Stem cell research does not lead to the death of stem cells by itself; it is the In Vitro Fertilization centers that are responsible for the death of the stem cells
(Citation)? – This is a completely original paragraph, added to the initial essay that you sent, right!?
Several methods of citation of the sources have been used by the author in the article. For instance, the author cites from Arthur Dyck, a Harvard University scholar, to prove the importance of moral bonds within any community. He also draws from well known theologians to show the importance of theological principles in the society. Theological principles are based on the respect for human life. According to Crook, people should respect the right for every individual in the society to live (Citation)? Respect for human life entails giving every person the chance to live. (Is this still according to Crook? If yes put the citation indicated above here, instead – and if it’s Kilner’s perspective indicate that either by stating so or giving a citation). Human virtues and social well being of any society have been fully described in the author’s
(Kilner’s) arguments. Human dignity can be persevered through respect for human life as a sacred. The author cites the principles contained in the Bible about God being the supreme giver of life and eternity (Kilner 624).
John (Kilner/John F. Kilner) has also cited the claims of many American citizens about the issues of treatment using stem cells. This shows that the author is concerned about the social issues in regard to stem cell research. Equally important, the author also uses the critiques of stem cell research to show how it has affected many American citizens. Many people are concerned about the preservation of health and life during the process of treatment (Kilner 640).The author takes an account of Christian living. As a matter of fact, Christianity entails loving each other and championing for biblical values (Citation)? Historical reflection on life also shows the importance of valuing human life. According to history, human life is not reversible; once it has been killed it does not come back. However, the lovers of impartiality have the mandate to ensure that life has been preserved at all stages. This will help to improve how people view life from all the stages of development to adulthood (Kilner, 642). – This too is a new paragraph, right)?
The author also espouses on the right to life. He argues that science exists for humans. For this reason, science should be manipulated to benefit every person in the society and not the minority few suffering from infections. John (He) reflects upon the importance of human embryos, which have the potential for human life. According to studies, it has been found that remarkably many human embryos used in stem cell research end up being killed. The author reflects love for humans by arguing that the human embryos represent the vulnerable individuals in the society (Kilner 642). John also supports the idea on the right to live using the international principles of human rights which require every person to have respect for humanity. For this reason, they should be handled with care and concern since they have the ability to provide human life (Crook 362).
In conclusion, although the author comes from a Christian background, he also uses other materials to reflect on the social issues surrounding stem cell research. The position of the author is that human life should be preserved. In this case, embryonic stem cell research should be a thing of the past because it does not encourage the love for human dignity. The author achieves the intended purpose for the article by using principles of Christian ethics and social pillars. At the final analysis, the author succeeds in reflection of the negative side of having embryonic stem cell in the society. Through citation and research from different authors, John develops an excellent debate on the issue of stem cell research. The negative side of stem cell research has been brought clearly in the article to help the audience realize the ethical and social issues on the same. This article might help to convince the reader to disagree with any advances of stem cell research in the society (Kilner 642).
Works Cited
John. F Kilner. Inclusive ethics for the twenty first century. Implications for stem cell research. (2009). Article from Journal of religious ethics.
Crook, Roger H. An Introduction to Christian Ethics. Upper Saddle River, N.J: Pearson
Education, 2006. Print.
InsertSurname Here 4.
Name:
College:
Course:
Tutor:
Date:
Stem Cell Research Article Reflection
This paper is a critique and reflection of the article on stem cell research by John F. Killer. The main arguments of the article stress on the future implications of stem cell research in the society. Consequently, the author successfully brings out ethical and social issues relating to treatment of diseases using stem cells. The author achieves the intended objective of the article by proving the social issues when dealing with stems cells. On the same token, he compares the interests of the minority who are vulnerable with the other members of the society. The social issue attributed to stem cell research is defined by the loss of life during treatment. The author supports impartiality by arguing that diseases treated using stem cells will continue to exist; therefore, man should not destroy another human life in the name of finding a cure for another infection (Kilner 467). This shows that this article is centered on the social and ethical controversies surrounding stem cell research.
The author of the article sees a balance between human determination and freedom. John F. Killer illustrates the United Nations declaration of Human rights, by stating that every human has dignity to live and should be accorded (do you mean awarded) with freedom to enjoy their own life. He also argues that inclusive ethics in human society entails providing individual attention even to the precise vulnerable and weak members of the society. He provides the support of Christian ethics as the fundamental of human life. Moreover, the author of the article perceives people as totally free and conditioned by heredity. He draws from community rights and historical reflection of the previous societies. The author’s position on stem cell research is that it destroys humanity among people of the same community. In the article, ethics is perceived as a beneficial pillar of the society, which enhances cohesion in any community. Participating in preservation of life campaign is thus seen as one of the principles things which man should endeavor in the society (Kilner 646).
In order to convince the audience on the ethical issues concerning stem cell research, the author uses several sources. Firstly, the author draws from Christian ethics, which are governed under the biblical principles. According to the bible it, is unethical and inhuman to destroy human life in the quest of achieving a certain objective. The author argues that God is the sole giver of life and every human being should have respect for one another. During the derivation of the stem cells many of the embryos are killed in the course. However, according to studies no clear definition has been given as to the beginning of life. Arguably, the embryos have the potential to bear life. The main social concern being brought up is that life is prevented from taking its course at its initial stages during the research.
According to Crook, biblical principles are based on the fact that life is sacred and exceedingly precious. Crook also borrows from theological ethic, which states that life is a common interest, which should be preserved because it is God’s given gift. Fairness arises (What do you mean by this)? due to the fact that denying any person life for treatment of another person, it is unethical and inhumane (Crook 262). Through his article, John (Kilner/John F. Kilner’s – never use only an author’s first name, in academic writing)! also proves that medicine and science are not the best treasures for human kind. On the contrary, he argues that they do not surpass the sociological nature of human beings (Kilner 468).
Lack of education about stem cell is the main issue brought about by Crook. He argues out the social consequences of having stem cell research in the society. (What are these social consequences you speak of)? Although the stem cells are donated for treatment of other infections, doctors should ensure that they do not kill the stem cells after they have use. (Is this according to Crook; regardless it needs a citation)?
They can be converted to usefulness through donation to artificial insemination. Conversely, Crook states that people should realize that stem cells are not derived from abortion
(Citation)? Most of the stem cells are derived from In Vitro Fertilization Centers. However, research has shown that to have a successful embryo from stem cells, it is possible for the IVF centers to kill millions of embryos. Stem cell research does not lead to the death of stem cells by itself; it is the In Vitro Fertilization centers that are responsible for the death of the stem cells
(Citation)? – This is a completely original paragraph, added to the initial essay that you sent, right!?
Several methods of citation of the sources have been used by the author in the article. For instance, the author cites from Arthur Dyck, a Harvard University scholar, to prove the importance of moral bonds within any community. He also draws from well known theologians to show the importance of theological principles in the society. Theological principles are based on the respect for human life. According to Crook, people should respect the right for every individual in the society to live (Citation)? Respect for human life entails giving every person the chance to live. (Is this still according to Crook? If yes put the citation indicated above here, instead – and if it’s Kilner’s perspective indicate that either by stating so or giving a citation). Human virtues and social well being of any society have been fully described in the author’s
(Kilner’s) arguments. Human dignity can be persevered through respect for human life as a sacred. The author cites the principles contained in the Bible about God being the supreme giver of life and eternity (Kilner 624).
John (Kilner/John F. Kilner) has also cited the claims of many American citizens about the issues of treatment using stem cells. This shows that the author is concerned about the social issues in regard to stem cell research. Equally important, the author also uses the critiques of stem cell research to show how it has affected many American citizens. Many people are concerned about the preservation of health and life during the process of treatment (Kilner 640).The author takes an account of Christian living. As a matter of fact, Christianity entails loving each other and championing for biblical values (Citation)? Historical reflection on life also shows the importance of valuing human life. According to history, human life is not reversible; once it has been killed it does not come back. However, the lovers of impartiality have the mandate to ensure that life has been preserved at all stages. This will help to improve how people view life from all the stages of development to adulthood (Kilner, 642). – This too is a new paragraph, right)?
The author also espouses on the right to life. He argues that science exists for humans. For this reason, science should be manipulated to benefit every person in the society and not the minority few suffering from infections. John (He) reflects upon the importance of human embryos, which have the potential for human life. According to studies, it has been found that remarkably many human embryos used in stem cell research end up being killed. The author reflects love for humans by arguing that the human embryos represent the vulnerable individuals in the society (Kilner 642). John also supports the idea on the right to live using the international principles of human rights which require every person to have respect for humanity. For this reason, they should be handled with care and concern since they have the ability to provide human life (Crook 362).
In conclusion, although the author comes from a Christian background, he also uses other materials to reflect on the social issues surrounding stem cell research. The position of the author is that human life should be preserved. In this case, embryonic stem cell research should be a thing of the past because it does not encourage the love for human dignity. The author achieves the intended purpose for the article by using principles of Christian ethics and social pillars. At the final analysis, the author succeeds in reflection of the negative side of having embryonic stem cell in the society. Through citation and research from different authors, John develops an excellent debate on the issue of stem cell research. The negative side of stem cell research has been brought clearly in the article to help the audience realize the ethical and social issues on the same. This article might help to convince the reader to disagree with any advances of stem cell research in the society (Kilner 642).
Works Cited
John. F Kilner. Inclusive ethics for the twenty first century. Implications for stem cell research. (2009). Article from Journal of religious ethics.
Crook, Roger H. An Introduction to Christian Ethics. Upper Saddle River, N.J: Pearson
Education, 2006. Print.
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Stem Cell Research Article Reflection
This paper is a critique and reflection of the article on stem cell research by John F. Killer. The main arguments of the article stress on the future implications of stem cell research in the society. Consequently, the author successfully brings out ethical and social issues relating to treatment of diseases using stem cells. The author achieves the intended objective of the article by proving the social issues when dealing with stems cells. On the same token, he compares the interests of the minority who are vulnerable with the other members of the society. The social issue attributed to stem cell research is defined by the loss of life during treatment. The author supports impartiality by arguing that diseases treated using stem cells will continue to exist; therefore, man should not destroy another human life in the name of finding a cure for another infection (Kilner 467). This shows that this article is centered on the social and ethical controversies surrounding stem cell research.
The author of the article sees a balance between human determination and freedom. John F. Killer illustrates the United Nations declaration of Human rights by stating that every human has dignity to live and should be accorded with freedom to enjoy their own life. He also argues that inclusive ethics in human society entails providing individual attention even to the precise vulnerable and weak members of the society. He provides the support of Christian ethics as the fundamental of human life. Moreover, the author of the article perceives people as totally free and conditioned by heredity. He draws from community rights and historical reflection of the previous societies. The author’s position on stem cell research is that it destroys humanity among people of the same community. In the article, ethics is perceived as a beneficial pillar of the society, which enhances cohesion in any community. Participating in preservation of life campaign is thus seen as one of the principles things which man should endeavor in the society (Kilner 646).
In order to convince the audience on the ethical issues concerning stem cell research, the author uses several sources. Firstly, the author draws from Christian ethics, which are governed under the biblical principles. According to the bible it, is unethical and inhuman to destroy human life in the quest of achieving a certain objective. The author argues that God is the sole giver of life and every human being should have respect for one another. During the derivation of the stem cells many of the embryos are killed in the course. However, according to studies no clear definition has been given as to the beginning of life. Arguably, the embryos have the potential to bear life. The main social concern being brought up is that life is prevented from taking its course at its initial stages during the research (Citation)!
According to Crook, biblical principles are based on the fact that life is sacred and exceedingly precious. Crook also borrows from theological ethic, which states that life is a common interest, which should be preserved because it is God’s given gift. Fairness arises due to the fact that denying any person life for treatment of another person, it is unethical and inhumane (Crook 262). Through his article, John also proves that medicine and science are not the best treasures for human kind. On the contrary, he argues that they do not surpass the sociological nature of human beings (Kilner 468).
Lack of education about stem cell is the main issue brought about by Crook. He argues out the social consequences of having stem cell research in the society. Although the stem cells are donated for treatment of other infections, doctors should ensure that they do not kill the stem cells after they have use. They can be converted to usefulness through donation to artificial insemination (You still haven’t give me a citation for this)! Conversely, Crook states that people should realize that stem cells are not derived from abortion (–and this)!! Most of the stem cells are derived from In Vitro Fertilization Centers. However, research has shown that to have a successful embryo from stem cells, it is possible for the IVF centers to kill millions of embryos. Stem cell research does not lead to the death of stem cells by itself; it is the In Vitro Fertilization centers that are responsible for the death of the stem cells
(or this)!!
Several methods of citation of the sources have been used by the author in the article. For instance, the author cites from Arthur Dyck, a Harvard University scholar, to prove the importance of moral bonds within any community. He also draws from well known theologians to show the importance of theological principles in the society. Theological principles are based on the respect for human life. According to Crook, people should respect the right for every individual in the society to live
(Citation)! Respect for human life entails giving every person the chance to live (You’ve yet to specify if this is still according to Crook or Kilner, now and cite it accordingly). Human virtues and social well being of any society have been fully described in the author’s arguments. Human dignity can be persevered through respect for human life as a sacred. The author cites the principles contained in the Bible about God being the supreme giver of life and eternity (Kilner 624).
John John F. Kilner/Kilner has also cited the claims of many American citizens about the issues of treatment using stem cells. This shows that the author is concerned about the social issues in regard to stem cell research. Equally important, the author also uses the critiques of stem cell research to show how it has affected many American citizens. Many people are concerned about the preservation of health and life during the process of treatment (Kilner 640).The author takes an account of Christian living. As a matter of fact, Christianity entails loving each other and championing for biblical values (You still haven’t given a citation for this either)! Historical reflection on life also shows the importance of valuing human life. According to history, human life is not reversible; once it has been killed it does not come back. However, the lovers of impartiality have the mandate to ensure that life has been preserved at all stages. This will help to improve how people view life from all the stages of development to adulthood (Kilner 642).
The author also espouses on the right to life. He argues that science exists for humans. For this reason, science should be manipulated to benefit every person in the society and not the minority few suffering from infections. John reflects on the importance of human embryos, which have the potential for human life. According to studies, it has been found that remarkably many human embryos used in stem cell research end up being killed. The author reflects love for humans by arguing that the human embryos represent the vulnerable individuals in the society (Kilner 642). John also supports the idea on the right to live using the international principles of human rights which require every person to have respect for humanity. For this reason, they should be handled with care and concern since they have the ability to provide human life (Crook 362).
In conclusion, although the author comes from a Christian background, he also uses other materials to reflect on the social issues surrounding stem cell research. The position of the author is that human life should be preserved. In this case, embryonic stem cell research should be a thing of the past because it does not encourage the love for human dignity. The author achieves the intended purpose for the article by using principles of Christian ethics and social pillars. At the final analysis, the author succeeds in reflection of the negative side of having embryonic stem cell in the society. Through citation and research from different authors, John develops an excellent debate on the issue of stem cell research. The negative side of stem cell research has been brought clearly in the article to help the audience realize the ethical and social issues on the same. This article might help to convince the reader to disagree with any advances of stem cell research in the society (Kilner 642).
Works Cited
John. F Kilner. Inclusive ethics for the twenty first century. Implications for stem cell research. (2009). Article from Journal of religious ethics.
Crook, Roger H. An Introduction to Christian Ethics. Upper Saddle River, N.J: Pearson Education, 2006. Print.
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