The author examines both the so-called “Catholic” and “lay” theses on the identity and status of the early human embryo. He points out that some assumptions shared by both theses are biologically equivocal. Moreover, some authoritative experts validate those assumptions by using linguistic artifices which confound the understanding of this sensitive issue. He disputes the ambiguity of the expressions “human life,” “human being,” and “genetic identity.” He concludes his essay listing some terms, which do not assign univocal meaning, and which are exploited to alter objective data and biological concepts for corroborating the “lay” thesis.
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References
1.
As will be highlighted in this essay, instead of distinguishing between “catholic” and “lay” theses, we should more correctly distinguish between “scientific” and “unscientific” theses, because some hypotheses shared by both theses do not seem to be definitively demonstrated. See my “Is the Pellucid Membrane of the Early Human Embryo an Extraneous ‘Zone’ or a Constitutive External Part of It?”Linacre Quarterly75 (2008): 245–256.
2.
As A. Giuli rightly asserts, in Inizio della vita umana individuale. Basi bio-logiche e implicazioni bioetiche (Rome: Aracne Ed., 2005), “it is not the development process which generates an organism; rather it is the same organism which continues to change and develop.” Therefore to assert the “Catholic” thesis, it is more and more correct to write “the beginning of the embryo development process” or “the beginning of the developing embryo,” instead of “the beginning of the embryonic development process … during which—as it is asserted by secular experts—the embryo (more precisely, the so-called “entire” or “very and proper” embryo!) begins to develop as an individual being.
3.
VescoviL., and SpinardiL.“La natura biologica dell'embrione,”Medicina e Morale1 (2004): 55.
4.
FordN.M.When Did I Begin? Conception of the Human Individual in History, Philosophy and Science (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1988), 179; Italian version: Quando comincio io? Il concepimento nella storia, nella filosofia e nella scienza (Milano: Baldini & Castoldi, 1997).
5.
Vescovi, and Spinardi“La natura biologica,”60.
6.
Otherwise called “il processo biologico di riproduzione,” “il nuovo processo teleologico,” “il processo della generazione,” “il processo riproduttivo.” C. Flami-gni and M. Mori, “Le ragioni dei quattro's,” Diario 5.2 (2005): 115, 105, 106. See MoriM., Aborto e morale (Milano: Il Saggiatore, 1996), 60.
7.
See Ponficia Academia per la Vita, L'embrione Umano nella Fase del Preim-pianto. Aspetti Scientifici e Considerazioni Bioetiche (Vatican: Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 2006), 11 (12, 13), 16, 20; A. Serra and R. Colombo, “Identità e statuto dell'embrione umano: il contributo della biologia,” in Identità e statuto dell'embrione umano, eds. Juan de Dios Vial Correa and Elio Sgreccia (Vatican: Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 1998), 130-131; M.L. di Pietro and E. Sgreccia, Procreazione assistita e fecondazione artificiale, tra scienza, bioetica e diritto (Brescia: Ed. La Scuola, 1999), 46; Ford, When Did I Begin? 116, picture 4-4. In this picture, the pellucid membrane is visible using optical microscopy. Thus it would have to have been depicted during subsequent stages of embryo development as well—as it is in the Ponficia Academia per la Vita, L'embrione Umano, 8, picture 1. But it has not. Why does Ford omit a drawing of the zona pellucida? Most of the experts committed to topical debate on the status and identity of the human embryo consider the pellucid membrane an extraneous zone. In fact, they name it the following: mechanical barrier, micro incubator, acellular barrier, extra(i.e., extraneous)-cellular covering, holder, envelope, fertilization capsule, protective shell, container, fertilization wrapper, glycoprotein zone net, case, scaffold, casing, baby buggy, extra(i.e., extraneous)-cellular matrix, retaining zone, covering zone, embryo-cloth, retaining band, sac, etc. This zone is likened to a post box and, given that the embryo's cells are imprisoned inside it, it is even equated with a seclusion cell, from which the (entire?) blastocyst leaves or frees itself so that it can freely adhere to the uterine mucosa. Take note that accepting this hypothesis means that the entire mature oocyte, the entire zygote, and the entire pre-implantation embryo are as such contained inside the pellucid zone. Scientific evidence shows, on the contrary, that the pellucid membrane has to be really a constitutive and essential (vital) part of them. That is, they are entire only with their own pellucid membrane. On this specific question see my “Is the Pellucid Membrane.”
VescoviA.La cura che viene da dentro (Milano: Mondadori, 2005), 58.
10.
G. Benagiano, E. Mordini, and A. Pera, “Sulla natura del cosiddetto pre-embrione,” Medicina e Morale 4 (1993): 784. Ford refers also to a “totipotency in a weaker sense.” Ford, The Prenatal Person: Ethics from Conception to Birth (Victoria, Australia: Blackwell Publishing Company, 2002), 56; idem, Quando comincio io? 191; Serra and Colombo, “Identità e statuto,” 151-152; N. Ford and M. Herbert, Stem Cells (Strathfield, NSW, Australia: St. Pauls Pub., 2003), 10, 74; SerraA.L'uomo-embrione: il grande misconosciuto (Siena: Cantagalli, 2003), 34. See letter “f” under “Conclusions” of this essay.
11.
FinkelE.Stem Cells: Controversy at the Frontiers of Science (Sydney: ABC Books, 2005), 47: “Human beings begin life as a single cell—the fertilized egg…. As the egg multiplies….” See also Vescovi, La cura che viene, 58.
12.
FordThe Prenatal Person, 66; Ford and Herbert, Stem Cells, 74.
13.
If an “embryo” is not an individual yet and thus deprived of its inestimable (absolute) value, then it can be exploited for experimental purposes without any ethical reservations. That is, it can be used as a means to a good aim. Scientists, researchers, health advocates, policy makers, and even philosophers offer numerous (too many!) good goals to justify making use of human early embryos (those deliberately created solely for research purposes, or the so-called “surplus,” “excess,” or “spare” embryos resulting from IVF clinics). Amongst the innumerable potential promises and benefits in the not too distant future offered by stem cells taken from the embryo's inner cell mass—promises that would, however, nearly always be hypothetical, theoretical, virtual only, considering the intrinsic biological limits to using such cells (due to the “fundamental” biological dynamic human body complexity) (F. Cramer, Caos e ordine: la comp-lessa struttura del vivente [Milan: Bollati Boringhieri, 1994], 231), and therefore, honestly, such cells cannot be proposed as a possible source for therapeutic cures—those who advocate embryonic stem cell research put special emphasis on the following: a) advancing knowledge, b) the well-being of humankind, c) saving millions of human lives (?), d) rooting out all diseases, e) alleviating human suffering, f) re-generating injured or sick tissues and organs, g) generating “so-called ‘spare’ tissues and organs” through in vitro technology (D. Marquis, “The Moral-Principle Objection to Human Embryonic Stem Cell Research,” in Stem Cell Research: The Ethical Issues, eds. L. Grabel, L. Gruen, and P. Singer [Boston: Blackwell Publishing, 2007]), h) preventing developmental diseases, i) discovering new drugs; l) curing sterility, m) preserving youth and preventing old age, n) curing or treating spinal cord injuries and burns, as well as insulin-dependent diabetes, Alzheimer's, and Parkinson's disease (B. Alvarez Manninen, “Respecting Human Embryos within Stem Cell Research,” in Grabel, Gruen, and Singer, Stem Cell Research). If all these goals and promises are not enough to ameliorate quality and length of life—but, above all, to justify huge funds required to finance medical research on embryonic stem cells—such experts refer, in addition, to the unfailing justification of the bravest (and the most expensive) experimentation on which all researchers, politicians, patients and non-patients unanimously agree: n) to cure cancer! As if searching for the very causes of cancer, when finding the causes of cancer in our “living” and “working” environments is the unique way to really beat the challenge, were exclusively dependent on experimentation on human embryos! In this connection, see my “Generare e riparare tessuti e organi con cellule staminali,” Berit Internacional (Chile) 11 (November 2010): 15-38.
14.
Vescovi, and Spinardi“La natura biologica,”57.
15.
See note 44 below.
16.
Vescovi, and Spinardi“La natura biologica,”55.
17.
FordThe Prenatal Person, 55.
18.
FordQuando comincio io?257.
19.
Vescovi, and Spinardi“La natura biologica,”55, 56.
20.
Vescovi, and Spinardi“La natura biologica,”, 56.
21.
Ponficia Academia per la Vita, L'embrione Umano: “che darà origine ai tessuti propriamente embrionali e ai tessuti extraembrionali.”
22.
Comitato Nazionale per la Bioetica, Identità e statuto dell'embrione umano (Roma: Presidenza del Consiglio dei Ministri, 1996), 12, 14, 15.
23.
Vescovi, and Spinardi“La natura biologica,”60.
24.
An “embryo” (fetus) which as such, being only an inner part (defective of its own vital embryonic-fetal membranes) of the whole (unique) human embryo (fetus)—who begins its (individual) life at conception and who, as a matter of fact, is entirely constituted with those genetically identical external, but not extraneous, embryonic (fetal) membranes!—is clearly only a “half” embryo (fetus). Thus it is a false one. In fact, the “lay” thesis's “embryo”(-fetus) is biologically incoherent and not alive and, as such, it could not survive in a maternal womb! Finkel, to transform into “whole fetus” the internal part only of the very whole fetus—as such defective of its (genetically own) external-flexed fetal “organs,” which originate from the trophoblast (placenta, amniotic sac, umbilical cord) and which will be detached from the whole fetus only after birth (by cutting its own umbilical cord), therefore an inexistent “whole fetus” because, without those “organs” it could not survive in the mother's womb—names them “non-animate [?] tissues” which “surround [?] the embryo [?]” (Finkel, Stem Cells, 26; cf. Ford, The Prenatal Person, 65).
25.
The term “person” used here appears to imply that ensoulment coincides with conception, that the human individual (a biological concept) and person (a philosophical concept) do (theologically) coincide (they are coextensive). Even if I personally agree with this position—because, according to the Catholic thesis, personhood is not given by the stage of development of the individual but by his human nature (i.e., it is not the shape of the human individual that is created in God's likeness, it is his nature)—as ensoulment is not part of this discussion, and as a biologist I do not express an opinion—I simply assert that “he is already a person.”
26.
An excellent article on the issue, which reveals numerous conceptual manipulations “scientifically” performed by secular experts, is: IrvingD.N., “When Do Human Beings Begin? Scientific Myths and Scientific Facts,”International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy19.3/4 (1999): 22–46.
27.
Terms may have ambiguous meanings for the following reasons: a) even if two or more terms are only slightly different (but they have very different meanings), they have an identical meaning assigned to them (that is, they are confused, exchanged, made to coincide); b) to one term which has only one meaning are assigned two or more very different meanings.
28.
In this essay, other but not less important mistakes have been listed in the section titled “Conclusions.” Mistakes have neither been punctually revealed nor adequately pointed out by the most authoritative experts of the “Catholic” thesis. In this connection, refer to my master's thesis in bioethics Il c.d. pre-embrione è generato unicamente nel linguaggio (Roma: Pontifical Institute Giovanni Paolo II, 2002), and to my “Riduzione ‘laica’ dell'embrione-individuo,” Anthropotes 21.1 (2005): 121-131 (English version: “‘Lay’ Reduction of the Human Embryo-Individual,”Linacre Quarterly74 [2007]: 122–134).
29.
Or, being very ambiguous allows a very authoritative “scientist” to sustain his views using both opposing theses—even in the same article (at the same time!) (see further on).
30.
According to the interpretation of embryonic development resumed from classic tradition (Aristotle, Thomas Aquinas), a human embryo would develop in a continuum of inclusive, subsequent, and different forms (shapes, phases, stages, periods, acts) of life. These forms have a progressive determination: “vegetative life,” “animal life,” and finally “rational life.” In this connection see M. Mori, “La capanna dello zio Tom,” Diario 5.2 (May 6, 2005): 96. According to modern (materialistic, mechanistic, reductionistic, functionalistic, actualistic) and so-called “scientific” interpretation—to which secular ethicists profess to refer (as Mori asserts referring to U. Scarpelli, Bioetica laica [Milan: Baldini & Castoldi, 1998], 211)—”human life” develops through forms which are similar to those just above indicated: 1) organic or cellular life only, which is called a “human being” (as an entity which is human in nature but not individual yet) (Lockwood, quoted in Ford, “The Prenatal Person”), “biological organism,” “biological entity,” “human organism,” “zygote or embryo” (Ford); 2) cellular and also individual life, which is called a “human individual” or “human embryo” (Ford), “human individual being” (but not personal being yet); 3) individual and also personal life, which is called a “human person” (Ford), “personal human being.”
31.
ColomboR.“Vita: dalla biologia all'etica,” in Quale vita? La bioetica in questione, ed. ScolaA. (Milan: Mondadori, 1998), 180; Serra and Colombo, “Identità e statuto,” 109, 111-112. Marquis, “The Moral-Principle,” 53: “It seems safe to consider the class of human beings a subset of the class of human lives.” Cf. Ford, When Did I Begin? 85.
32.
DanieliG.A. (Dipartimento di Biologia Università di Pd), personal communication “Genetica, Individuazione, Individualità,” 2007.
33.
It is correctly written, for instance, here in Giuli's essay title Inizio della vita umana individuale, quoted in note 2 above.
34.
Ford, and HerbertStem Cells, 67; cf. A. Abboud, “The Stem Cell Debate,” in Stem Cell Research, ed J. Healey (Sydney: The Spinney Press, 2003), 25.
35.
VescoviLa cura che viene, back cover: “Angelo Vescovi (1962) … has been supervisor of the Health Ministry's project for the creation of a bank of human stem cells, assistant manager of Neurospheres Limited of Calgary University, consultant of both the British Chamber of Lords’ Select Committee on Stem Cells and the Pontifical Academy for Life, and both the Irish and Austrian Commissions on stem cells. At present, he teaches cellular biology at Milano-Bicocca University, and he is joint manager for research on stem cells at San Raffaele Institute in Milan. He has founded and he manages the Onlus Neurothon Association to cure neurovegetative diseases, and he is a member of the Italian Commission on stem cells.”
36.
VescoviLa cura che viene, back cover: “Angelo Vescovi (1962) … has been supervisor of the Health Ministry's project for the creation of a bank of human stem cells, assistant manager of Neurospheres Limited of Calgary University, consultant of both the British Chamber of Lords’ Select Committee on Stem Cells and the Pontifical Academy for Life, and both the Irish and Austrian Commissions on stem cells., 94.
37.
VescoviLa cura che viene, back cover: “Angelo Vescovi (1962) … has been supervisor of the Health Ministry's project for the creation of a bank of human stem cells, assistant manager of Neurospheres Limited of Calgary University, consultant of both the British Chamber of Lords’ Select Committee on Stem Cells and the Pontifical Academy for Life, and both the Irish and Austrian Commissions on stem cells., 88, 91. He has used the same sentence in an interview by a daily newspaper (“Bugie staminali,” Il Foglio, January, 22, 2005).
38.
Catholic experts, to unequivocally indicate the whole embryo who begins at conception, in order to very precisely distinguish him in respect to other (and different) kinds of embryos—the pre-embryo and, in particular, the “entire,” “true and proper,” or “properly named” embryo, which begins, inside the former at the fourteenth day of the embryonic development process—should include the latter, being “half” and a “false” embryo, at least in quotations. Or, even better, they should not consider or name it as such! Unfortunately, both “embryos” are not rigorously distinguished in a recent essay by the Pontifical Academy for Life (L'embrione Umano, 17) or even by Serra and Colombo (“Identità e statuto,” 137-138), by Giuli (Inizio della vita, 219, 224, 225, 227, 229, 259, 267, 277, 314, 315), or by Vescovi and Spinardi, here cited (“La natura biologica,” 56, 60).
39.
Vescovi, and Spinardi“La natura biologica.”
40.
The quotation, even though it is clearly ambiguous, given the absolute inaccuracy of the terms used, has been cited also in the editorial of a Catholic journal (see note 3 above), and it has even been undersigned by A. Fiori, R. Colombo, and E. Sgreccia. Surprisingly and unfortunately, it has been considered by the three most authoritative Catholic experts to be “scientifically and bioethically incontrovertible” (sic!). In this connection refer to my Artifici linguistici e concettuali della tesi “laica” del pre-embrione (Pro manuscripto, Caorle, 2003).
41.
Manninen. “Respecting Human Embryos,” 8. In this respect, cf. Grzeskow-iakA.“The Juridical Aspects of the Making of Laws in Pluralistic Society for the Right to Life,” in The Dignity of Human Procreation and Reproductive Technologies: Anthropological and Ethical Aspects, ed. Juan de Dios Vial Correa and Elio Sgreccia (Vatican: Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 2005), 192.
42.
The following expressions are Ford's definitions of the early embryo (i.e., of his “proembryo”): a) “simple cellular aggregate”; b) “mechanic combination”; c) “homogeneous assembly of cells”; d) “imperfect” and “rudimental structure”; e) “support”, “which precedes the formation of a definitive individual”; f) “a potentially human reality, not determined yet” (from which “emerges and develops a determinate and real human individual”); g) “first imperfect organism genetically human”; h) “group of cells” which have to “lose their separate existence before becoming heterogeneous living parts” and which have to “amalgamate,” “combine,” “aggregate,” and “melt” together, to “form a new and bigger individual living body” or “to sensitize a unique human individual”; i) “[an empty] nest to which follows the synthesis of a definitive embryonic human individual at the stage of primitive streak”; l) “a preparatory organism,” inside which the “same cells begin to form a new ontological individual” (Ford, When Did I Begin? xv, 90, 170, 120, 135, 136, 137, 139, 146, 149, 162; see also idem, Quando comincio io? 223, 256, 257, 300, 335).
43.
The quotation is taken from Ford's essay “The Prenatal Person,” 8. Cf. Finkel, Stem Cells, 35.
44.
Vescovi asserts: “From the moment of conception the original cell evolves, objectively, in a continuum, without any pauses and interruptions, through the diverse phases of life” [does “diverse” mean different or only varied (numerous)?] (Vescovi, La cura che viene, 62). Anybody could ask, is that “life” cellular and also individual in each of the varied (numerous) phases? Or, is that “life” different, i.e., cellular in some of the early phases and individual only further on (in some other phases)?
45.
See again note 30 above.
46.
GrabelL., GruenL., and SingerP.Stem Cell Research, 2 and 4: “an ‘organism’ [in quotations!] which, when implanted in the uterus, is capable of becoming [!] a human being.” “The final product of development is an organism [take note that, in such a case, this organism is a different one, because it is not indicated between quotations!].” Therefore, there are two kinds of organisms—the pre-embryo and the “true and proper” embryo—subtly distinguished from each other only by the quotations!
47.
GrabelL., GruenL., and SingerP.Stem Cell Research, 21.
48.
It is an essential mistake, accomplished by secular experts, that adds to another essential mistake: to affirm that the pellucid membrane of the morphologically mature ovum (female gamete), zygote, and pre-implantation embryo is not only an external “zone” but is also extraneous to them. So, each of them, as whole ones, would be and develop inside that (their own!) “zone” (till its natural degeneration, which occurs at the fifth day). In this connection, refer to my “Is the Pellucid Membrane,” already cited.
49.
Serra, and Colombo“Identità e statuto,” 116n15.
50.
“It is still not clear what is the effective degree of complexity of this genetic activity network.” “There is, actually, a complicated interaction network among genes, inside which a product of a gene controls the activities of other genes, which determines an intimate relationship between nuclei and cytoplasm, because there are the signals of the cytoplasm which have a fundamental role for transcription and, therefore, determine either the activation or inactivation of genes.” L. Wolpert, Il trionfo dell'embrione (Milan: Sperling & Kupfer, 1993), 109 and 102.
51.
SerraL'uomo-embrione, 35 (emphasis added): “Questi dati … dimostrano che il nuovo genoma, stabilitosi alla fertilizzazione, è la base e il supporto continuo della unità e unicità strutturale [?] e funzionale dell'embrione.” “E’ lui [?] che, con la sua attività che implica la collaborazione di migliaia di geni, sottende e mantiene la unità morfologica [?] e soprattutto funzionale dell'embrione fin dal momento del suo apparire alla fusione dei gameti.” Serra, “Lo stato biologico dell'embrione umano. Quando inizia l’ ‘essere umano’?” in Commento interdisciplinare alla Evangelium Vitae, ed. Pontificia Accademia per la Vita (Vatican: Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 1997), 588. Cf. Serra and Colombo, “Identità e statuto,” 132, 139, 141, 143. See note 55 below.
52.
It is the scheme of the organization of gene expression of DNA, as I have defined in my article “Quando inizia ad esistere l'individuo umano?”Medicina e Morale1 (1999): 82–83n15.
53.
R. Colombo, “Vangelo della vita e scienze della vita,” in Evangeluim Vitae di sua Santità Giovanni Paolo II, Enciclica e Commenti, ed. Pontificia Academia pro Vita (Vatican: Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 1995), 278; See also idem, “‘Statuto biologico’ e ‘Statuto ontologico’ dell'embrione e del feto umano,” Anthropotes 12 (1996): 142, 154; idem, “Vita: dalla biologia,” 142, 154, 187. See also Serra, “Chi e cos'è l'embrione umano,” in Bioetica ed educazione, eds. M. Di Pietro and E. Sgreccia (Brescia: Editrice la Scuola, 1997), 130; Serra, “Pari dignità all'embrione umano nell'enciclica Evangelium Vitae,” in Evangelium Vitae e bioetica, un approccio interdisciplinare, eds. SgrecciaE., and SacchiniD. (Milan: Vita e Pensiero, 1996), 153.
54.
To give some examples, the difference of complexity between genetic and biological is the same as between the following: a) the disciplines of genetics and biology (the first is included in the second), b) the users’ list of a telephone book and the network of calls among them, c) the piano keyboard and the piano sonata; d) Human Genome Project (HGP) and Human Proteome Project (HPP). A conceptual “difference,” that between genetic and biological, which secular bio ethicists—and, unfortunately and maybe unintentionally, Catholic experts too—by using linguistic misunderstanding, confusing biological facts, and spraining scientific concepts, have been able to “shorten” and reduce until they have completely eliminated it. About this “scientific” reduction, refer to my article “‘Lay’ Reduction,” already quoted.
55.
SerraL'uomo-embrione, 35: “These data … show the new genoma, established at fertilization, is the base and continuous support of both the embryo's unity and the embryo's structural and functional singularity.” Idem, “Lo stato biologico,” 588: “It is him [the genome?] [could a molecule be “him”?] that by its [his] activity, which implies a collaboration among thousands of genes, subtends and keeps up the embryo's morphological [but, this is given also by the essential contribution of the pellucid membrane! (compare again with note 24 above)] and above all the functional [close] unity, from the moment of its appearance at the fusion of gametes.” Cf. Serra and Colombo, “Identità e statuto,” 132, 139, 141, and 143.
56.
Regarding the “moment” when “identical” twins begin to be, see note 69 below.
57.
In Ford's and Mori's thought—Mori, by the way, is one of the most authoritative Italian secular experts (quoted also by K. Devolder and C.M. Ward, “Rescuing Human Embryonic Stem Cell Research,” in Stem Cell Research, ed. Grabel, Gruen, and Singer, 108)—the pre-implantation embryo's biological identity (individuality) does not exist at all, because they identify it with genetic identity (individuality). In fact, Mori distinguishes only between genetic identity (genome, DNA)—which (obviously) does not permit one to single out “identical” twins inside the embryo—and somatic (or corporal) identity (individuality)—which permits it, but only from the fourteenth day on and when coming into sight is signed (observing the embryo through an optical microscope) by the primitive streak. See MoriM., “Embrioni e gemelli,”Analitici & Continentali (February 1998), http://www.swif.uniba.it/lei/rassegna/9802.pdf; idem, La fecondazione artificiale (Rome-Bari: Laterza, 1995), 70, 153; idem, “Il CNB e lo statuto dell'embrione: un'analisi critica del documento e linee di una prospettiva alter-nativa,” Bioetica 3 (1996): 455; idem, presentation under the title “L'embrione e la vita,” Le Scienze, pamphlet n. 100 (1998): 2; idem, Embrione, “A proposito di un intervento di M. Lombardi Ricci,” Rivista di Teologia Morale 30 (1998): 95.
58.
See the below section “Conclusions,” at (e).
59.
In Ford's opinion the human individual would begin exactly at the fourteenth day: “at the primitive streak and not prior to it,” “after this stage,” ” but not before it,” “until the appearance of the primitive streak,” “and not before it,” “once the primitive streak stage is passed” (Ford, When Did I Begin? xviii, 172, 173, 181, 182, 27).
60.
Serra“Lo stato biologico,”578.
61.
Ford, jumping from one meaning to the other, repeatedly (punctually) generates confusion between the two identities (individualities). He identifies them—well fancy that!—only on the occasions the two embryos’ forms should have been distinguished. Very often he identifies them using “or,” and sometimes he distinguishes them using “and.” A succession of jumps is very frequent on page 262 and very subtle on page 192 (Ford, Quando comincio io?; idem, When Did I Begin?. In fact, he writes (emphasis is mine): “Genetic and ontological individuality … genetic or biological identity or (?) genome” (117); “genetic individuality or genome,” “biological or (?) genetic human individuality (61, 63); “genetic or (?) biological identity.” Yet he writes: “genetically human life” (five times) and “biologically human life” (two times) (97, 98, 99); “genetic individuality or (?) identity”; “genetic, [and] biological and psychosomatic unity and identity”; “continuity of genetic identity”; “genetic or (?) biological individuality (117)”; “genetic continuity of life process,” “continuity of biological life”; “biological human nature” [or (?)] “human genetic nature; understood in a genetic or (?) biological sense,” “speaking genetically and biologically”; “human individuation … understood genetically (?)”; “same constitution or nature,” “biological nature,” “human genetic constitution or (?) nature.” Ford also affirms that “human genetic individuality is not to be confused with human ontological individuality” (When Did I Begin? xvi). That is right, because exclusively biological individuality coincides with ontological individuality. To understand more deeply the concept of individuality under the three (genetic, biological, somatic) individual identities, cf. E. Morin, La vita della vita (Milan: Feltrinelli, 1987), 191-195.
62.
A mistake which has been undervalued or which has not been well stressed—or revealed—by the most authoritative experts of the Vatican (especially the experts of Catholic University of the Sacred Heart's Bioethics Centre in Rome).
63.
A) A first stage, of genetic identity-individuality, referred to as a pre-embryo nobody: to deny the unity-identity-individuality of the pre-implantation embryo till the fourteenth day of embryonic development; B) a second stage, of somatic identity-individuality, referred to as the embryo-somebody: to assert the unity-identity-individuality of the so-called “entire” or “true and proper” embryo from the fourteenth day on.
64.
Colombo“Vangelo della vita,”278. See also Serra, “Chi e cos'è l'embrione umano,” 130; idem, “Pari dignità all'embrione,” 153.
65.
Obviously only because His Eminence Cardinal Ratzinger has not been correctly informed. Cf. Colombo, “Vangelo della vita,” 278; idem, “Statuto biologico,” 142, 154; idem, “Vita: dalla biologia,” 154, 187. Regarding this issue, refer to my essay Dalla bioetica alla bio-menzogna. L'embrione umano: una questione di scelta tra la “cultura della vita” e la “cultura della morte” (Pro Monuscripto, Hobart, 2005). Also see note 5 in my “Riduzione ‘laica,’” already quoted; and ch. 4, § 1, “Identità genetica e identità biologica,” in my essay “Dal DNA all'Intelligenza” (under examination for publication).
66.
RatzingerJ. presentation to journalists on Evangelium vitae, L'Osservatore Romano, March 31, 1995: 15, emphasis added.
67.
Cf. Ratzinger, “Non uccidere. Titolo della Presentazione dell'Enciclica Evangelium Vitae,” in Pontificia Academia pro Vita, Evangeluim Vitae di sua Santità Giovanni Paolo II, 157.
68.
Given the organizational (both functional and, because of the pellucid membrane, morphological) closure of this scheme, the so-called “totipotency” both of each embryonic cell and of the pre-implantation embryo to give rise to “identical” twinning cannot be a real capacity but rather a mere possibility. That is, it is not a “totipotency” but a totipotentiality only! Therefore, as the possibility of cloning a human individual does not negate his individuality, so the pre-implantation embryo's “identical” twinning, being a possibility only, does not negate its individuality.
69.
The unity-identity-individuality of a pre-implantation embryo could be invalidated by the rare and fortuitous phenomenon of “identical” twinning, which seems to give the incontrovertible evidence that all of an embryo's cells are as totipotent as the zygote is. However, given that a pellucid membrane is only constitutive of the zygote, it is the only truly totipotent human cell. Consequently, the twinning phenomenon does not show for each of the embryo's cells the same and identical zygote's totipotency (a natural active-actual intrinsic capacity). Besides, it does not demonstrate the totipotency of each of the embryo's cells to become a new embryo, nor of each embryo to divide into many new embryos. In all cases, considering also the rarity and fortuitousness of such a phenomenon, that totipotency is a totipotentiality only (a mere natural passive-remote extrinsic possibility). A very different interpretation of “identical” twinning respects those given by secular and Catholic experts, which avoids the following: a) postponing the beginning of “embryo”’ (in double quotations!) development till the sixth or the fourteenth day on; b) the beginning of twin embryos from a pre-embryo—or the premature death of the former embryo, “without leaving any dead body” (Ford, When Did I Begin? 120); c) the generation of a “son embryo” from “a former ‘father embryo,’” who continue together their independent development (Serra and Colombo, “Identità e statuto”)—a new interpretation which strengthens even more the thesis of a unique individual embryo from fecundation on and the capacity of an embryo to “compensate-repair-recover” from an accidental critical perturbation (as it were an injury) in order to maintain, in any case, its individuality; refer to my “El embriòn no es nunca nadie, es siempre alguien,” Berit Internacional 1.1 (December 2003): 69-88; my master's thesis in bioethics, Il c.d. pre-embrione; and my Pro manuscript Interpretazioni della gemellanza “identica.”
70.
FordWhen Did I Begin?151, 182. Cf. note 59 above.
71.
Colombo“Vangelo della vita,”278.
72.
Colombo“Statuto biologico,”142.
73.
John PaulPopeIIEvangelium vitae, n. 60.
74.
On this specific question, I offer a detailed answer in my “Is the Pellucid Membrane.”
75.
ColomboR.“Embrione umano,” in Dizionario Interdisciplinare di Scienza e Fede. Cultura scientifica, Filosofia e Teologia, 1, ed. Tanzella-NittiG., and StrumiaA. (Vatican: Urbaniana University Press, 2002), 446-461, cf. sec. 4, “Cellularità e organismicità dei blastomeri”; idem, “Statuto biologico,” 160n84; cf. idem, Il volto umano dell'embrione (Castel Bolognese: Itaca Tools, 1998), 26; M. Mori, “Presentazione del fascicolo L'embrione e la vita,”Le Scienze 100 (1998): 4. Until now, the unique “Catholic” expert who accepts the hypothesis that the pellucid membrane is constitutive of the mature oocyte (the female gamete), the zygote, and the pre-implantation embryo is the former secretary of the Pontifical Academy for Life Monsignor Emilio Silvestrini. See E. Silvestrini, L'embrione umano in gravidanza ectopica (Milan: Ancora Ed., 2007), 118, 123, 124.
