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Originally Posted by hiredgun
Would I prefer a shred of internal consistency over seeming hypocrisy? Yes, actually.
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I don't see the value of consistency when it's a consistency composed of bad ideas. Hypocrisy strikes me as preferable.
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And the reason I introduced the idea into this thread is because it's a relevant criticism of people's objections to this research.
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Or, instead, a relevant criticism of people's acceptance of collateral damage. The problem: you don't really have any control over which it is.
I could say: "Okay, you're right, both collateral damage and embryonic stem cell research should be legal."
Or I could say: "Okay, you're right, both collateral damage and embryonic stem cell research should be illegal."
Or - and this'll be my final answer, Regis - I could respond in this way:
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What's stopping you from considering embryos to be the collateral damage of curing disease and advancing human knowledge?
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War, in its entirety, should be an act of self-defense and/or defense of others. If it's neither, it is an unjust war. Collateral damage is a cost of such defense. If the war is properly justified, then the collateral damage is justified. Or rather, less worse than the alternative of no military response ever.
Embryonic stem cell research, on the other hand, cannot be properly considered self-defense or defense of others. The aggressor is nature, not man, and to respond to the injuries of nature by attacking man is wrong. Think of it this way: you wouldn't approve of harvesting organs from healthy infants in order to sustain the life of a sick adult, would you? Obviously this isn't a comparison of identical situations, experimenting with a clump of cells is a hell of a lot easier to rationalize for one, but I see a valid comparison there with no relevant difference. Beating nature isn't worth nonconsensual sacrifices of human life.
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that, I believe, is where our truly relevant disagreement lies. We may disagree on the whether collateral damage is acceptable in war, but I'm betting that we actually agree that collateral damage isn't acceptable in medical research. If not, well, then we have two relevant disagreements...but collateral damage in war remains irrelevant. Even if there is inconsistency remaining, it says nothing about whether I'm right on this issue.
The big question reverts back to this:
does the lethal use of embryos for medical purposes differ in a morally significant way from doing the same with infants?
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It is, by any measure, a smaller toll than the lives of full grown humans.
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Perhaps from the perspective of the victims' friends (embryos aren't very social), but not for the victims.