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Politics : Formerly About Advanced Micro Devices
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To: tejek who wrote (146042)4/23/2002 6:56:45 PM
From: TimF  Read Replies (2) of 1576374
 
How is an embryo the equivalent to the fully formed
human?

In many ways people are not equivalent to each other, for example a severely retarded person with an IQ of 55 will probably not have as much impact on the world as a normal person, let alone an Isaac Newton, an Albert Einstein or a Michaelangelo, but we are all distinct living members of the species homo sapiens and we all have some level of human potential.

Imagine a person in a deep coma, so deep that it could be considered a persistant vegitative state. If a human suffers brain damage that wipes out all higher brain functions, it is often not considered unethical. However if the person in this coma would most likely in the course of the next few weeks or months come out of it and start responding to the world then I would say it is murder if you pull the plug. I look at the early fetus and even the embryo as being equivilent to someone in this temporary vegitative state. The unborn are humans who for a time do not have higher brain function but they still have full human potential. Another analogy could be drawn to some one in some sort of suspended animation, perhaps kept that way until a cure for a fatal disease is found or so that he will still be alive when a space ship reaches some distant star. While he is in this "cold sleep", the brain does not function, the chemical processes of the body have paused, but that doesn't mean it would be ok to kill him.

Tim
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