An Embryo Isn't 'Just a Clump of Cells,' New Research Shows.
Can
we finally give the myth that an unborn baby is "just a clump of cells" a decent
burial?
Yesterday Eric Metaxas told you about a manipulative article from The
Atlantic that heaps scorn on the pro-life movement's use of ultrasound
technology to show pregnant women and others the humanity of the unborn
child.
Just
as a refresher, in the piece, author Moira Weigel shares such gems as this: "The
technology has been used to create an 'imaginary' heartbeat and sped-up videos
that falsely depict a response to stimulus." Katie Couric thinks kids can feel gender in the womb, but an
actual heartbeat is just a "stimulus?"
And
here's another utterly baseless claim from the article: "Ultrasound made it
possible for the male doctor to evaluate the fetus without female interference."
Huh? What if the OB/GYN is a female?!
We
shouldn't be surprised by irrational attempts to undermine the cause for life.
The case for life is stronger than ever. The abortion rate is down, and those
who profit from abortion aren't happy.
So
they're probably not going to be popping the corks off their champagne bottles
when they read a fascinating new article in Public Discourse by Ana Maria
Dumitru. It's called "Science,
Embryonic Autonomy, and the Question of When Life Begins."
What
is "embryonic autonomy," you ask? According to a recent study, titled
"Self-organization of the human embryo in the absence of maternal tissues,"
human embryos from the earliest stages of life can direct their own development
— in or out of the womb. Why
is this important? Here's how Dumitru, who is a fifth-year M.D./Ph.D. candidate
at Dartmouth, explains it:
"As
scientists, my colleagues must concede that embryos are made up of living cells,
but they don't accept the embryo as a living organism. If the early embryo is
'just a clump of cells,' then you can justify abortion. By this logic, it's not
an autonomous being, and it's definitely not a human person yet. It's just a few
cells growing in the mother's body, and so the mother can choose to get rid of
those cells if she wants to."
The
problem for this view, Dumitru writes, is that so-called "clumps" whether in a
uterus or in a lab, don't behave like clumps of cells.
Instead, they appear to act independently, or autonomously, of any signals from
the mother's body, whether in or out of the womb. And "clumps" don't do
that.
As
Ana Maria explains, "This one little cell, with its complete genetic content,
can and does begin to divide
and to grow, even in an experimental dish in an incubator in the closet space of
some unmarked lab. ... That means, as we suspected, embryos know what they're
supposed to do to live, and they try to live, whether they're in their mother or
not."
And
it means not only that the embryo is a living being, but that it's a person. This demolishes another
argument for legal abortion, that the unborn may beliving, but not
yet persons — in other words,
deserving of legal protection.
But
the research Dumitru cites undercuts this contention by showing that embryo
autonomy and personhood are "interchangeable terms," because although the
embryo's capacities — which pro-choicers say are necessary for personhood — are
not yet fully developed, they
are clearly in fact alreadypresent. They require no signals from the
mother to develop, only nourishment — which of course we all need.
Ultimately,
all this comes down, again, to worldview.
As
Dumitru says, "It's time to own up to the truth. Science has already affirmed
what we have long since suspected: we can call them fertilized eggs, zygotes,
blastocysts, products of conception, or fetuses, but that doesn't change
reality. And the reality is this: they are autonomous humans from the very
beginning."
Come
to BreakPoint.org, I'll link you to this article. Please read it, study it, and
then go have some productive pro-life conversations with your friends and
neighbors.
Originally
posted at breakpoint.org.
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