16/04: Human-Animal Hybrids:
Category: Religion & Public Policy
Posted by: an okie gardener
This story from Britain is now a bit old, but the issue will not go away.
Scientists are mixing human and animal DNA to produce hybrid organisms.
The government says that the scientific advantages of allowing the creation of hybrid embryos for research purposes could help millions of people to recover from illness or disease.
Religious leaders, however, have argued against the bill, with the leader of Catholics in Scotland, Cardinal Keith O'Brien, using his Easter Sunday sermon to brand the bill a "monstrous attack on human rights, human dignity and human life" which will allow experiments of "Frankenstein proportion".
I have expressed myself already on this issue here and here. Basically, I think that
One of the foundation stones of our culture has been the idea/belief that humans are unique. We hold ourselves to standards we do not apply to animals--a dog may be put down for killing a person, but will not be put on trial. A man may be charged with killing a dog, but it will not be a murder charge. We may protest the construction of a new dam on a river, but will not hold a protest at the site of a beaver dam. If while driving, the only two choices are hitting an animal, and having a head-on with another car, we run over the animal. If we are stranded with another person and a dog, and have only enough food for two persons, we feed the other person and let the dog starve, or eat it. And so on.
Animal-human hybrids raise profoundly disturbing questions. But, science has no mechanism within itself to consider whether or not something that can be done should be done. Science cannot ask or answer "should" questions. We must turn to philosophy and religion.
Scientists are mixing human and animal DNA to produce hybrid organisms.
The government says that the scientific advantages of allowing the creation of hybrid embryos for research purposes could help millions of people to recover from illness or disease.
Religious leaders, however, have argued against the bill, with the leader of Catholics in Scotland, Cardinal Keith O'Brien, using his Easter Sunday sermon to brand the bill a "monstrous attack on human rights, human dignity and human life" which will allow experiments of "Frankenstein proportion".
I have expressed myself already on this issue here and here. Basically, I think that
One of the foundation stones of our culture has been the idea/belief that humans are unique. We hold ourselves to standards we do not apply to animals--a dog may be put down for killing a person, but will not be put on trial. A man may be charged with killing a dog, but it will not be a murder charge. We may protest the construction of a new dam on a river, but will not hold a protest at the site of a beaver dam. If while driving, the only two choices are hitting an animal, and having a head-on with another car, we run over the animal. If we are stranded with another person and a dog, and have only enough food for two persons, we feed the other person and let the dog starve, or eat it. And so on.
Animal-human hybrids raise profoundly disturbing questions. But, science has no mechanism within itself to consider whether or not something that can be done should be done. Science cannot ask or answer "should" questions. We must turn to philosophy and religion.
