The Obama decision on embryonic stem cell research, issued on Monday, came in his seventh week in office, a stark contrast to his predecessor, who took almost seven months to reach his on the same issue. Of course, Mr. Bush faced the issue as one of first impression, while Mr. Obama had the benefit of his predecessor’s judgment to guide him, in this case to a different conclusion.
Presidential styles and approaches to the job aside, the Obama decision is, much as the Bush decision before him was, abundantly controversial, if for no other reason than because the religious fundamentalists in the country insist on making it so. From their perspective, the debate centers on the existence of the human soul. Sometimes this point isn’t mentioned (almost as if the fundamentalists don’t want to admit their argument’s intellectual vacuity when faith is included in the discussion), but it should be emphasized to provide a clear understanding of what Mr. Obama’s decision really represents.
The definition of the “soul” will vary from religion to religion, but for purposes of the present debate, let’s use the generally accepted Catholic and majority Christian view that it is an identifiable spiritual existence that attaches to a fertilized egg and then exists for eternity. It’s an interesting concept, certainly, one that has been the cause of untold numbers of literary classics, Dante’s trilogy, “The Divine Comedy” (“Inferno,” “Purgatorio,” and “Paradiso”), coming immediately to mind.
But is it a concept that justifies the denial of scientific research when that research may provide cures for some of life’s most horrific maladies (spinal paralysis, Alzheimer’s, diabetes, perhaps even chronic heart disease)?
The answer to that question must surely depend, in part at least, on the degree of certainty that the research can yield these positive results juxtaposed against the likelihood that conducting research on embryonic stem cells actually results in the destruction of a “soul.” (I will not delve into the question of whether the research results in the destruction of existent human life, since that point is really a just a makeweight in the debate: no one credibly argues that a zygote consisting of eight tiny cells is actually a sentient human being.)
So, here, with apologies to all who may be offended by my admittedly unsophisticated depiction, is the way the religious view works:
· God as creator of all, has created a soul for every human body;
· The soul attaches itself to the fertilized egg at the instant of conception;
· It is then effectively “born” to the eternal existence it will thereafter have;
· While the human body to which it is attached lives in the here and now, it will remain attached to that body;
· It will reap the benefits and bear the burdens of that human body’s actions (its degree of sinfulness in life);
· On the death of that body it will be consigned to its eternal existence either in Heaven or Hell, unless, as apparently is often the case, it is required, because of the sins of that human body, to spend some time in a nether place called Purgatory, or, because the human body died (or never came into existence) before any “record” could attach to it, in a place called Limbo, which isn’t as bad as Purgatory, but isn’t as blessed a final home as Heaven either.
I know it sounds complicated. Dante, for those wanting more intimate details, has it all laid out very nicely in the aforementioned literary work.
In any event, let’s consider what the opponents of embryonic stem cell research require intellectually in order for their argument to prevail in this debate.
1. That a particular kind of God* exists (one who intentionally created human beings and arranged for them to have something we call a soul).
*The alternatives for this assumption are almost too many to list, but they certainly include these possibilities:
a. That no such God exists
b. That such a God does exist, but that He/It did not have any particular view of humans in mind (rather, as seems more likely from scientific evidence, that He/It merely created a universe out of which humans developed).
c. That a God exists, but not one that created anything (more like the pantheistic view of God in everything).
2. That the “soul” described above actually does exist.
3. That the “soul” does not come into existence until the moment of conception (the fertilized egg idea).
4. That the “soul” is never destroyed once formed, but may end up in Heaven, Hell, Purgatory or Limbo, depending on when the physical body to which it is attached ceases to “live.”
5. That the places we call Heaven, Hell, Purgatory or Limbo do actually exist.
Surely any rational debate must acknowledge that all five of these points (along with the alternatives as to the first) are nothing more than imponderables, completely devoid of any basis of proof and resting entirely on, for want of a more charitable word, faith.
To be specific, none of the five points bear any resemblance to anything that any human being has ever witnessed in the here and now.
All of it, belief in God (and in a particular type of God), belief in a soul, belief as to when that soul comes into existence and how long it remains in existence, and belief in the various options for its dwelling place in an “afterlife,” are all completely unknowable by anyone who professes fervently to believe in any of it.
On the other side of the debate is the scientific experimentation which human experience verifies is capable of finding remedies and discovering cures for the ailments that currently diminish the length and quality of life.
The bottom line is clear. Embryonic stem cell research should not be restricted on the basis of religious beliefs. Opponents, if they are intellectually honest, must acknowledge that faith alone cannot sustain their position.
Perhaps it can work wonders, but faith has yet to defeat the scourges of life’s bodily ailments. In that field, science reigns supreme (as surely God must have intended).
When the Guv pushed through the embryonic stem cell research bond early in his administation, it was clear the embryonic approach was where the money is. Adult, umbilical or other non-life-taking systems are apparently limited in gaining patent exclusivity in that the recipient is usually getting the stem cell from his/her own body or that of a close relative. Process patents aren’t as enforceable or profitable as creative ones.
The goal of the embryonic promoters is to devleop exclusive, broad use cells that can cure anybody with a given malady, kind of like a good antibiotic or aspirin derivative. The possibilities are endless, but profit is the motive – usually anethema to the totalitarian mindset if broadly applied. Dr. Mengela, the patron saint of human experimentation was working on ways to heal wounded Nazi (National Socialist) soldiers.
For those of us with a faith in God, there is the eternal mystery of how far back is eternity past, or what is beyond the furthest galaxy. Like our limited view of God, our minds just don’t grasp those dimensions. Science is a commendable search for the solutions to problems and the applications of the “things our heavenly Father has prepared for us” to discover and put to use. It took a few hundred years for the Catholic Church to gel from the 12th Century Cathedral School at Chartres to the 1500’s to nail down the scientific method our atheist friends are so proud of today. Christian belief in absolutes as opposed to the Muslims’ absolute and variable will of Allah is the philosophical basis for why scientific method took hold in Christendom and not elsewhere. One example is the Periodic Table of the elements wherein there was a gap that logically needed to be filled with a missing element. The discoverer knew exectly what he was looking for and as a result finished the Table. Tom woods has specifics: http://www.thomasewoods.com/
To assume all our activities have no boundaries is foolishness. You don’t light a match looking for a gas leak! We do embrace fully the idea of life, liberty and the pursuit of happienss. Our difficulty is when mere mortals fly in the face of common sense and natural law to determine just who is truly human or has attained the privileges of personhood. Even our vaunted Supreme Court has screwed that one up more than once.
As for the veracity of the stem cell argument, there are literally hundreds of successes in the application of adult stem cells in producing demonstrable and repeatable cures, while embryonic stem cells have only produced mutations, tumors and when successful in a cloning application, creatures with terible health problems. Ask Dolly the sheep’s cloner what he thinks.
As for Heaven, Hell, Limbo and Purgatory, who knows for sure, but if we are eternal beings, as Ben Franklin and George Washington expounded upon, then there are places. Even atheist Carl Sagan, who knew his zodiac sign, in his movie had the star traveling to some peaceful place when he died via a wormhole in space. Not bad for a limited view of eternity.
The best sermon I ever heard on the subject was by my former pastor who got defrocked for his drugs and homosexuality. I still love him for all his problems. He asked the congregation, “Is there a Hell? If so, What’s it like? and Does God send people there?” He quoted Scripture from several places to indicate there was one. What’s it like? It is total separation from the love of God and others for all eternity. Dante was a bit more descriptive of a physical fire, but I suppose that’s adequate for abject poverty of love. The key, does God send people there? No, we send ourselves!
As for Purgatory, it’s like a shower and dress up before meeting an important visitor. No one in Purgatory ever ends up in Hell… it is merely a preparation for seeing God “face to face”. I had a lot of ecumenical contacts in years past and knew the pastors of a number of Protestant churches. I lost contact with most, but one day ran into the pastor and his associates of a non-denom church here in a Bakersfield coffee shop. The pastor was happy to see me and kidded me about still being Catholic – Mary, saints, Mass, Purgtory, etc. I smiled back and said, “Didn’t you know Purgatory was made for Protestants?” What??? Yeh, I said, “Nobody doubts your salvation, but all that rebellion has to be dealt with somewhere.”
“Faith is confident assurance concerning what we hope for, and conviction about things we do not see. Because of faith, the men of old were approved by God. Through faith, we perceive that the worlds were created by the Word of God and that what is visible came into being through the invisible.”
Hebrews 1:11
The patent issue is something that I have considered but have read little about. It sounds like a few people who planned for this occasion and already began to buy up patents over the last 10 years are going to make a lot of money. This protection might drive R&D, but it might also make the first generations of cures derived from this technology a very exclusive luxury.
I also wonder what relationship stem-cell regulation has with abortion regulation. If stem cells are regulated mainly for religious purposes, implied is the government position on abortion that those who abort are sinners but the state (must) allow (some) abortion because of privacy rights, rather than keeping overt religion out of regulation and saying that life begins at the second trimester or whatever the arbitrary line Blackmun thought up was. Stem cells evidently do not trigger a policy right, so the state does not need to allow sinners to use embryonic stem cells. It assumes that but-for privacy rights of the impregnated person, the state can regulate prenatal circumstances on the basis of religious conceptions of the soul and not scientifically established notions of human life.
I know that regulation can be chopped up to “morality” much too often, but where is the social ill in stem cell? Is it a moral issue because the religious right read about stem cell research in a medical journal and decided to call their political stance moral? It isn’t grounded in any real tradition because the technology is new, so where is the argument here beyond religion?
I got soul…and I’m super-bad.
I’m no biblical scholar, but I’m fairly certain that the New Testament makes no mention of either Limbo (for very flexible souls, maybe – ‘How low can you go?’) or of Purgatory. Somewhere along the line the Church added these concepts but with little assistance from scripture. I haven’t studied the history myself, but I think these were becoming commonly taught concepts by the time Dante came around and then he really popularized them.
I’m somewhat doubtful that today’s evangelicals, Protestants (mainstream and otherwise), non-denominational Christians, and other born-again non-Catholic believers who oppose stem cell research do so because of the idea that destroying embryos condemns a soul to limbo, but I may be wrong. I bet few could even recite half of the doctrine you’ve described here. It is so closely associated with much of Catholic doctrine which these groups have traditionally rejected for or a supposedly more New Testament-based doctrine. (This precept falls apart when you get to the concept of the “Rapture,” a doctrine taught by some protestant groups that was developed with little aid from scripture and a lot of aid from a 19th century preacher.)
I would have assumed the basis of their argument is that even the destruction of potential life is abhorrent, except, of course, if we need to bomb the hell out of some country. There’s also this hang up about sex and reproduction in general and the mere existence of embryos in a lab appears to legitimize sex and reproduction occurring in some other way than what they would consider a traditional context as described in the “good book.”
There’s a lot of fear of science and scientific research and, unfortunately, not all scientific research has been for the betterment of mankind. I believe that it’s more that fear that drives the debate and a fear that science will radically change the way people live. It’s also a fear that science will become irresponsible (see Ocoto-Mom or California designer babies) or will give mankind too many choices to do evil!
To some degree, I share the trepidation concerning biological and genetic research. I don’t believe that fear should drive policy, however, but should only inform it. I also appreciate Jerry Todd’s concern regarding the profit motive involved in the research. That can skew all of the noble scientific aspirations of the research.
The bottom line – I support stem-cell research and believe that the benefits to so many people suffering from so many afflictions far outweigh the risk. I also would support strict guidelines and oversight of such research. But then again, I’ve probably read WAY too many science-fiction stories, watched way too many horror movies, TV shows and cable TV science programs.
I appreciated Pete and Scott’s responses to my tome. I agree, and so does the Church, that Limbo is not biblical, but conjecture to try to put some definition on what does happen should the tenets of our faith hold true. I still like my descriptions of hell and Purgatory, either of which could be defined as being required to sit in on a women’s studies class, even to quell my “repressed guilt.” I’d have to go with the latter since its only temporary. BTW, the concept comes from the OT, 1 Macabees which states, “It is a good and proper thing to pray for the dead.”
Having adopted our own kids before Roe v. Wade and ran a maternity home with my wife for the last few years, I can understand how the system since the Great Society has reduced the value of life to whatever some bureaucrat decides it is. Both have been a great blessing in our lives, but, oh the drama with the expectant young ladies, the last four I defined as; The Felon; The Drama Queen; The Contessa and the Bag Lady. Yes, we had all four at once, so acting as a father figure for the lot, even Ed can’t aggravate me to a rage. Only the Bag Lady gave hers up for adoption. The others needed a meal ticket from the taxpayers.
I understand the argument for embryonic stem cells, save that if there is such a patent profit potential, let the private companies deal with it and don’t insult me by making me pay for it. I can find great comfort in quoting Bill Clinton yesterday when he stated, “There’s no moral problem with embryonic stem cell research as long as they aren’t fertilized.” I rest my case. (Is that good lawyer talk?)
Great quote ”as long as they arn’t fertilized” Jerry. I also agreed with Pete’s ending on viewing too many science fiction movies which makes me ponder creepy scary outcomes.
Between Roe Vs Wade which allows women to eliminate a fetus at will, and Octo Mom’s 14 embryos being implanted into a woman with obvious mental issues, I have to seriously question our scientific wonders. Her father claimed it was the will of God she carried 8. People choose God to defend some pretty outrageous concepts. Since God has been opening wombs (based on my beliefs) for centuries, why would in vitro be needed if you claim this unshakable belief in God’s will?
Our Govt does not interfere or regulate women’s wombs, leaving a black hole on the ethics or moral issues that arise from such decisions based on scientific ”miracles” that have no regulation. Not one easily frightened by scientific research, stem cell research conjures up too many bad horror movies.