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The New Biology and the Question of Personhood: Implications for Abortion

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 February 2021

T.H. Milby
T.H. Milby*
Affiliation:
Perkins School of Theology, Southern Methodist University, Louisiana State University, University of Oklahoma; University of Oklahoma
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Abstract

Opposition to abortion is based in part on the assumption that personhood is achieved at or shortly after fertilization of the egg. This interpretation of personhood arises from a contemporary application of the ancient doctrine of preformationism, a doctrine which holds that there is a preformed individual, in an ontological sense, within the developing entity. The assumption that the fertilized egg is unique in its capacity to develop into a human being is at least in part responsible for the opinions of those opposed to abortion. Yet, the uniqueness of the zygote in its capacity to develop into an adult organism is qualified by the discovery that development may be possible in a number of other ways. Consideration of the phenomena of cloning, parthenogenesis and chimerism can relieve moral ambiguity about abortion and may reduce opposition to that practice.

Type
Articles
Information
American Journal of Law & Medicine , Volume 9 , Issue 1 , Spring 1983 , pp. 31 - 41
Copyright
Copyright © American Society of Law, Medicine and Ethics and Boston University 1983

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References

1 410 U.S. 113 (1973).

2 Since 1976, Congress has passed various versions of this restrictive legislation known as the Hyde amendment, Pub. L. No. 94-439, § 209, 90 Stat. 1418, 1434 (1976) (reenacted in Pub. L. No. 96-123, § 109, 93 Stat. 923, 926 (1979)). This amendment was upheld by the Supreme Court in Harris v. McRae, 448 U.S. 297 (1980). For a general discussion of congressional proposals to alter the current status of abortion, see Westfall, Beyond Abortion: The Potential Reach of a Human Life Amendment, 8 am. J.L. & med. 97, 97-102 (1982)Google ScholarPubMed.

3 See, e.g., the Helms-Hyde human life bill, S. 158, 97th Cong., 1st Sess. (1981), H.R. 900, 97th Cong., 1st Sess. (1981). See generally Westfall, Beyond Abortion: The Potential Reach of a Human Life Amendment, 8 Am J.L. & Med. 97, 97-102 (1982)Google ScholarPubMed.

4 “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction, the equal protection of the laws.” U.S. Const. amend. XIV, § 1.

5 This question should be distinguished from the inquiry into when life begins. Clearly an unfertilized ovum and an individual sperm are living entities. See infra, Section IV.

Many of the issues discussed in this paper are applicable to the process of in vitro fertilization as well as to abortion. In vitro fertilization refers to the union of egg and sperm outside the body of the mother in an artifical environment. This process may eventually significantly reduce the occurance of female infertility.

6 “[S]ome right-to-lifers believe that the zygote should be classified as fully human in the moral, as well as genetic sense, not for what it is, but for what it might become. The zygote differs from an inorganic blueprint because, if nurtured properly, it might grow into a person.” A. Merton, Enemies of Choice: the Right-to-Life Movement and its Threat to Abortion 5 (1981).

7 Cloning is defined as “the technique of producing a genetically identical duplicate of an organism by replacing the nucleus of an unfertilized ovum with the nucleus of a body cell from the organism.” Webster’s Deluxe Unabridged Dictionary 341 (2d ed. 1979).

8 A chimera is “an individual, organ, or part consisting of tissues of diverse genetic constitution. .. .” Webster’s Third New International Dictionary 389 (1976).

9 Parthenogenesis is “reproduction by development of an unfertilized ovum, seed, or spore. . . . [A]rtificial parthenogenesis is the development of an ovum stimulated by chemical or mechanical means.” Webster’s Deluxe Unabridged Dictionary 1306 (2d ed. 1979).

10 See, e.g., 5 Reproduction in Mammals, Artificial Control of Reproduction (C.R. Austin and R.V. Short eds. 1972); Beatty, R.A. Parthenogenesis and Polyploidy in Mam Malian Development (1957)Google Scholar; Tyler, Artificial Parthenogenesis, 16 Biological Rev. 291 (1941)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

11 See Wogaman, Abortion as a Theological Issue, The Washington Post, Aug. 16 , 1977, at 19Google ScholarPubMed, col. 3.

12 See Watson, & Crick, Molecular Structure of Nucleic Acids, 171 Nature 737, 738 (1953)CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed; Watson, & Crick, Genetical Implications of the Structure of Deoxyribonucleic Acid, 171 Nature 964 (1953)CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed.

13 Nuclear DNA may be likened to machine tools in a workshop. Machine tools (such as lathes, presses and drills) are the instruments which produce the products of the shop. But not only can machine tools produce manufactured goods, they can be used to make the components of which they themselves are made. Thus a lathe can be programmed to produce bearings which may be used in tractors and locomotives, or it may be directed to fabricate axles and cylinders with which new lathes and other machine tools can be made. Machine tools therefore perform the same function within the factory that DNA molecules perform within the cell nucleus: both have the power not only to fabricate the components of the larger world of which each is a part, but also each has the power to replicate itself.

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17 Id.

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28 For example, thousands of unfertilized eggs are lost through the normal process of attrition and this event is properly not an occasion for remorse, nor intervention.

29 President’s Commission for the Study of Ethical Problems in Medicine and Biomedical and Behavioral Research, Guidelines for the Determination of Death, 246 J. A.M.A., 2184 (1981)CrossRefGoogle Scholar (Report of the Medical Consultants on Diagnosis of Death.)

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31 410 U.S. at 162 (1973).