Wszyscy jesteśmy eksembrionami. Główne kryteria oceny statusu ludzkiego embrionu

• Authors: Edmund Kowalski

Title variants

EN

We are all ex-embryos. Main assessment criteria of the status of the human embryo

• Languages of publication: PL

Abstracts

EN

The essay investigates some basic issues surrounding ability (or inability) to arrive at viable criteria according to which it would be possible to define a ‘moral status’ of the human embryo. According to the external criteria (originating from external factors), which are very fluid and subjective, the human embryo cannot be accorded any innermost value. Not only the embryo, but every human being is a collection of tissue and cells, processes and interrelationships which basically do not differ from the analogous phenomena occurring in other living organisms. In this context the author points to some internal criteria relating to the fundamental characteristics of the embryo. In the light of these criteria the human embryo does possess a human and individual biological status from the moment of conception. The author goes on to show that the bipolar criterion goal – means, or absolute – relative can and should be used as an ethical category, on condition that one accepts a radical and irrevocable distinction that acknowledges the human being as a proto-category of all and each ethics: human being is the aim in itself and must not be reduced to a category of means. Each and every living man is an ex-embryo. His life had begun at the embryonic stage and has been developing ever since with all its unique attributes and individual personality.

Keywords

EN

human embryo; moral status; internal criteria; external criteria

• Publisher: Uniwersytet Warmińsko-Mazurski w Olsztynie
• Journal: Forum Teologiczne
• Year: 2011
• Volume: 12
• Pages: 163-175

Contributors

author

Edmund Kowalski

• Accademia Alfonsiana a Roma