THE MEANING OF "FULLY HUMAN" AND "HUMAN GENETIC MATERIAL"
<<<You believe that Jews are fully human and fetuses are not. But I want to know WHY you believe that? What are your specific criteria for saying this set of complete human genetic material is fully human and this set is not? You still haven't answered this for me.>>>
You, Christopher, say that what an embryo or early fetus is, is "a set of complete human genetic material," and you use the term "fully human" to describe it.
You haven't said that it is a human being, I see. You have certainly tried to imply it with the two phrases "a set of complete human genetic material," and "fully human," which act is the written equivalent of fast-talking.
But you can not say outright that it is a human being, because it is not!-- as you know. It is, in fact, a blueprint for a human being. "Human genetic material" plus certain biological circumstances and the passage of time will become a human being. Without those, it will not.
And, incidentally, an ovum and a spermatozoon, even before uniting, represent a "set of complete human genetic material," albeit one still separated by, perhaps, the thin membrane of a condom. And this "set" is "fully human," -- and each of its parts, ovum and spermatozoon, are, individually, "fully human," too -- though it is not, of course, a human being. (Yet the religious community, some of it, on a rationale which while not precisely identical, will feel much the same to its victims, forbade the sale of contraceptives to those of other persuasions. Given their beliefs, I dare say you defend this behavior.)
So you imply, to the hasty reader, with the phrase "human genetic material," that the embryo is a human being; and you do it also by describing it with the words "fully human."
But does your slickly obfuscatory term "fully human" really equate to "human being"? Of course not.
(BTW, a kidney is "fully human," even if it's been removed from its owner, unless it is the kidney of a pig, or dog. And so is a human appendix, or fingernail, or breast, or tooth, or leg, "fully human." But none of them are human beings.) |
