The Ethics of Stem Cell Research

[Mato Kinze]

I was reading one of Erin's old Blogs about how the Soul of an individual chooses how it will be born, to whom and what purpose it will serve in this life and that got me to thinking about Embryonic Stem Cell research and the ethical debate so bitterly contested in the world today.

The controversy over ES cells is, in essence, a religious and ethical debate. The definition of what is considered a human being differs between culture and religions. The most conservative view I've found is the Christian Catholic belief that an embryo is considered a human being from the moment of fertilization of the egg, therefore destruction of a fertilized egg is essentially murder.

Protestants have a more pluralistic view—and there are many others, such as that embryos gain personhood gradually (such as in Erin's description), and therefore early embryos may not be considered human.

Seems to me, should the more conservative view be adopted, research of hES cells would essentially constitute the termination of potential human lives.

According to Judaism, pregnancy is divided into six stages, during each of which the fetus’s rights as a human being change, and it is only considered a full human being when it is born. This does not mean that the embryo does not have rights. According to Jewish law, embryonic cells outside of the uterus are not considered to have any legal rights because they are not part of a human being. The embryo gains status as a fetus only after the first 40 days.

Blastocysts are considered the same as sperm or eggs, but they cannot be “wasted” unless it is for the sake of saving human lives.

Islamic law permits the use of early embryos for medical purposes as long as it is before the embryo “gets its soul,” which is around day 40 of pregnancy. Again this seems to coincide with Erin's views on how the Soul comes into the body during pregnancy.

If the Blastocysts are created in a lab by artificially introducing a sperm to an egg, is there any spiritual connection - and therefore consequence - to this process?