Personhood

Paper Summary:

This paper examines how scientific advances such as human cloning have forced us to examine our definition of life and death, whether in utero or on a death bed and how we find these concepts too huge to adequately encompass. It evaluates how we draw muddy lines in reality, lines based on our own biases and beliefs, but there will always be individual situations that give rise to unease. It draws on the opinions of different experts of what constitutes a life and what makes us a human being.

From the Paper:

"Pojman points out that in nature herself, events occur that should make us question the idea that the newly formed zygote is actually a person. One common phenomenon is twinning, which can take place up to the third week of pregnancy. If an embryo is a person, how can it divide into two people? Another common insight that strengthens this argument is that miscarriages occur quite often in nature. It is estimated that 20% of conceptions end in miscarriage and oftentimes so early that women are unaware of it. If nature herself is "killing" people, what are we to think of that? Pojman offers an even more clever insight: if a single-cell zygote has an inalienable right to life, then we should never wash our hands or brush our teeth, since we are killing thousand sof cells. And since with the possibilities of cloning, we may soon find that any cell in our own body could become a person, we should never allow any human cell in the world to die, ever."

More papers on Personhood:

• Analytical Essay # 32400 : "Abortion and the Concept of Personhood"
• Term Paper # 124777 : "Euthanasia and Personhood"
• Comparison Essay # 45030 : "Can "Personhood" Be Universalized?"
• Term Paper # 142511 : "Confucian Views of Personhood"

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