Abortion Essay Research Paper Fetal tissue research

Abortion Essay, Research Paper

Fetal tissue research is the process of using fetal tissue, derived from legal

abortions, for scientific research into fundamental biological processes and

human development. In addition, transplantation research uses fetal tissue to

study potential treatment of life treating diseases. Recent legislation

attempting to allow federal funding for stem cell research, a form of fetal

tissue research, has caused this subject to be drawn into debate.

Fetal tissue research often is morally and ethically controversial in that it is

confused with the issues of abortion. Many people try to justify their position

on fetal tissue research by proving or disproving the humanity of the fetus;

however, in this paper I plan to give the fetus the benefit of the doubt by

giving it the status of a full-fledged person. This allows for the elimination

of any issues associated with the morality of the abortion and allows for the

separation from the equivocal points involved in the abortion debate. I also

intend to only deal with the problems affiliated with consciously aborted

fetuses. This is due to the fact that, generally, researchers deal less with

spontaneously aborted fetuses and stillbirth fetuses because they are often

associated with genetic defects. I intend to argue that fetal tissue research

is a morally legitimate standpoint.

By accepting the assumption that fetuses are persons then abortion would be a

form of murder. If killing innocent persons is murder and fetuses, according to

the assumption, are persons; then killing fetuses is murder. Hence, it must

follow that in order for research on aborted fetal tissue to be proven as

morally admissible; then research on murdered person’s tissue must also be

proven admissible. The following is a situation where research on murdered

person’s tissue is comparable to that on aborted fetal tissue:

Suppose that twenty-five year old persons (verses fetuses) were found to possess

cells that the scientific community believed might have a beneficial effect on

humanity. While trying to study these cells the scientists came across a

problem. They found themselves unable to perform research on the individuals

because the tests that they needed to perform in their research caused an

instant death to its subjects. Nonetheless, they found themselves able to

perform the tests on persons that were previously dead. They started a program

where they attained murdered bodies of twenty-five year olds that have gone

unclaimed in order to perform research on them.

In our society would the scientists’ program be morally sound. The answer lies

in the rights of the person who has been murdered. If the murdered persons were

to maintain any rights (e.g. life, liberty and the pursuit of land) then the

scientists’ rights to research would be out weighed (lest the individual allowed

the research). What rights can murdered persons (i.e. aborted fetuses) have that

would outweigh any scientific claims to their bodies.

The one right that is possibly entitled to deceased people is the right to

funerary service. Throughout time the principle pertaining to the preservation

of funeral rights has become quasi-archetypal for modern culture. Some cultures,

such as ancient Greeks, have even gone as far as to claim that these rights

should be held higher than that of life itself. If this were the case, then a

deceased persons right to a funeral would outweighs any scientific claim

associated with the research of his/her body. This would cause the scientists to

not be morally justified in the creation of their program above.

In reality, murdered, lifeless individuals do not possess the right to a

funeral. They, in actuality, do not possess any rights at all. The reason for

this is as follows: in order to have rights you must also have the will to

execute those rights. E.g. in order to have the right to bear firearms you must

be able to choose whether or not you are going to bear arms. Inanimate objects

such as aborted fetal tissue are not able to have rights. Take a painting, an

obvious in animate object, for example. Does it have a right to any thing

connected with it. Throughout the greater part of western civilization paintings

have been given frames. This fact may lead you to believe that paintings do have

the right to a frame. On the contrary, a painting, in order to possess any

right, must be able to behave in accordance with its choices or wills. They must

be able to choose a frame according to their desire in order to maintain the

right to a frame. In other words a painting must contain a Freedom of

Voluntariness in order to retain a right to a frame; however it is absurd that

any inanimate object possess this freedom, as it is a right held only by

persons. It would follow that a dead person, someone who is void of all criteria

pe

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