You are in a research facility, when all of the sudden a fire breaks out. You have an injured co-worker next to you, and a large container of 500 frozen embryos. you can only save one. which do you save, the co-worker or the embryos?
Those embryos likely contain no more than 150 cells, realistically. That's really more of a blastocyst than an "embryo".
Something I have wondered though, how many 6-week old fetuses would it take to equal a newborn baby? Personally, if I had to choose between saving two 20 week old fetuses and one newborn baby, I would choose the fetuses. But if you asked about 18 week old fetuses, it would really get me questioning. That would be a tough dilemma. Also, is a newborn baby somehow less valuable than a 2-year old child? I mean, if we had to choose between saving a hundred 2-year olds versus 101 newborn babies, just hypothetically.
I would save the Yeast in my Beer first!! Or else I could be labeled a Murderer or Beer Spiller!! AboveAlpha
That still doesn't excuse the woman. It might be less wrong than killing a baby, perhaps by a substantial degree, but that doesn't make it perfectly fine.
I'd save the co-worker. Now what I would be doing in a place with 500 frozen embryos beats the stuffings out of me.
Anyone with a brain would save the actual human being....only whackjobs who had a kinky thing for embryos would save the embryos........
Primarily because it is NOT a human being, it is a blastocyst....funny how we use different names for different things ain't it. No matter how hard you folks try you cannot change simple biology to suit your needs, nor do you get to use whatever names you like for whatever you choose.
While this might seems like a perfectly reasonable hypothetical question to ask it is a false dilemma fallacy as the question assumes there are only two possible outcomes. Outcome 'a' is where the co-worker is saved Outcome 'b' is where the frozen embryo's are saved The question does not allow for either both to be saved or none to be saved.
I would save the person holding my Beer. Embryo's are NOT HUMAN BEINGS!! They are not even POTENTIAL HUMAN BEINGS unless they are properly implanted in a Uterine Wall....and even then they are not Human Beings. A HUMAN BEING....is CLASSIFIED AS.....a MULTICELLULAR, MULTISPECIES BIO-MECHANICAL CONSTRUCT that cannot survive or even develop or grow without having a symbiotic relationship with many SPECIES within this Human Bio-Mechanical Construct. A person could not grow or live without the many species of Bacteria that act as our Digestive System, Excretory System.....etc. Our Immune Systems would not work. Thus a bunch of frozen or not Human Embryo's ARE NOT HUMAN BEINGS!! AboveAlpha
I would like to point out that a fetus fits your description. It has a symbiotic relationship with the mother. The fetus gets to grow, the woman gets to reproduce and pass down her genes.
But as the U.S. Supreme Court has rules a Fetus remains a Fetus and is not classified as a HUMAN BEING until it obtains PERSONAGE. How does it obtain personage? The Fetus must be BIRTHED either Naturally or via C-Section or other....be completely seperated from the Female and this means the Umbilical Cord must be cut....and it can live on it's own or be kept alive by mechanical means but it must be seperate from the Female. At this point it obtains peronage and is classified as a Human Being as well it immediately begins to take on the symbiotic relationships with other species of bacteria as without these other species the Baby can neither develop or grow or deveop a proper immune system as without these other species the baby would die as a Human Being cannot exist as a Bio-Mechanical Construct without them. AboveAlpha
Yes, according to pro-choicer logic it's not a person until the umbilical cord has been snipped. And therefore it's okay to abort it, if the woman so chooses.
It's not Pro-Choice Logic....it's a U.S. Supreme Court Determination based on the science. No one wants an abortion to take place but there are cases that not only is abortion ethical it is necessary.....such as in cases where the woman's health and life are at risk....as well as a Fetus that is non-viable. The solution is education of children at an early age upon the use of Birth Control as well as abstinece, STD's and if unprotected sex occurs every child should be taught that by the simple use of Plan B or Morning After Pills if a Fertilized Egg exists it will not be able to implant itself in the Uterine wall...thus no possibility of pregnancy no possibility of abortion. If such an educational program was done abortions would be lowered by over 90% to 95% immediately as that is the goal...lower the total number of abortions. AboveAlpha
Not disputing that at all .. however that doesn't change the fact that the question is a false dilemma fallacy, not so much for a pro-choice person but certainly for a pro-life person. - - - Updated - - - not as rare as elective late term abortions, or elective abortion just before birth.
From the information I have found, false dilemma doesn't apply to thought experiments: "Like an actual lab experiment, a thought experiment seeks to isolate and investigate only certain variables...Working with just the variables I’ve provided, what result do we obtain? Put another way, given the choices presented, what would be the morally right thing to do"--Ryan Born, pointofcontroversy.com This thought experiment works very well to show that no one actually believes an embryo is equal to an actual born person.
It does apply to pro-lifers though, their ideology is that the embryos have as much value as the co-worker and as such to leave either behind is morally unacceptable ergo by forcing the limits of the question to make them consider an immoral act is creating a false dilemma especially as no reasoning is given as to why only the co-worker or the embryos can be saved. The same sort of question would be to ask a person whose ideology is not that the embryos and the co-worker are equal, but to change the embryo's to a child which most people would consider equal ie
