Are you the same as a cell from your finger?
One student at Oakland University (OU) said, “If you cut off your finger, then you can take the cells and turn them into reproductive cells which can be turned into a human being. So why is the embryo so important?”
Two factors in play here, dehumanization and confusion of wholes with parts.
He is confusing wholes with parts when he equates an individual cell that is part of a human being (the cell in your finger) with a cell which is a human being (a human being at an early stage of development). The cell in your finger can never act as a whole living organism. You leave it alone and it dies. The embryo in you womb is a living human being. You leave it alone and he grows into a fetus, infant, toddler, adolescent, teenager, etc.
Theoretically, it may be possible to create a new human being by manipulating an individual cell taken from the “parent.” Once that process is complete it would be a new human being. But until then, it’s only a cell from the “parent.”
He then uses this theoretical possibility of asexual reproduction to equate a baby in the womb with a cell in your finger. It’s just another way of dehumanizing the unwanted human being that he intends to kill.
Tags: Genocide Awareness Project, Oakland University, untermensch
This entry was posted on Wednesday, June 4th, 2014 at 2:38 pm and is filed under Campus Debate (GAP), Pro Life Apologetics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
June 13th, 2014 at 9:06 am
Meredith Eugene Hunt says:Cells from a finger only have PASSIVE potential to develop INTO a human being. Meaning, something (a human cloner) has to act upon them to make the change. A human embryo, however, has ACTIVE potential to develop AS a human being. Left alone in her natural environment, she will show you what she has been from the beginning.