{"id":250158,"date":"2021-08-02T06:49:38","date_gmt":"2021-08-02T11:49:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.liveaction.org\/news\/?p=250158"},"modified":"2021-07-30T01:17:02","modified_gmt":"2021-07-30T06:17:02","slug":"preborn-children-constructed-develop","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.liveaction.org\/news\/preborn-children-constructed-develop\/","title":{"rendered":"Preborn children aren\u2019t constructed like pizzas \u2014 they develop"},"content":{"rendered":"
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(NRTL News<\/a>) In one Seinfeld <\/em>episode, the character of Kramer argues with a restaurant owner, Poppie, about when a pizza becomes a pizza.<\/p>\n

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\u201cIt\u2019s not a pizza \u2019til it comes out of the oven,\u201d exclaims Kramer.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a pizza the moment you put your fists in the dough,\u201d counters Poppie.<\/p>\n

Sound familiar? This exchange takes place, not coincidentally, in an abortion-themed episode, and it\u2019s meant to be silly. But it actually provides some insight into how people often view unborn children.<\/p>\n

Think about pizza. Pizza is an artifact<\/em>. It might sound strange to call it that, but an artifact is simply a constructed object, or a collection of parts we have put together in a particular way. We build a pizza step by step. At what point in that process do we call it \u201cpizza\u201d? Probably not until at least most of the key elements are in place (like the crust, sauce, and cheese), and maybe not even until, as Kramer says, it comes out of the oven. Contra Poppie, no one thinks a pizza is there from the beginning.<\/p>\n

As that Seinfeld <\/em>episode hints, some people think of human prenatal development in the same way they think of the building of a pizza. Human embryos and fetuses, according to this view, are like artifacts constructed part by part. When is an embryo \u201ccomplete\u201d enough to be considered one of us? Maybe when she has a heart and a brain. Or when she resembles an infant in her appearance, with identifiable arms and legs, eyes and ears. Or when she is conscious and self-aware. Definitely not, though, when she is a single cell at conception.<\/p>\n

In a New York Time<\/em>s op-ed, sociologist Dalton Conley writes<\/a> that \u201cmost Americans \u2026 see a fetus as an individual under construction.\u201d In Slate<\/em>, Elissa Strauss claims<\/a> that human beings undergo a \u201cgradual passage to personhood,\u201d which is \u201ca long, complicated, and often messy experience.\u201d Unborn children just aren\u2019t quite the same kind of being that we are\u2014not yet. They are still under construction. And that makes it hard to think they have the same rights<\/a> or deserve the same moral consideration.<\/p>\n

If this view of young humans were right, it would raise troubling questions. Who gets to say when an embryo or fetus becomes one of us? Is an infant one of us? What about a disabled person lacking ordinary human abilities? When we lose some of our faculties, are we no longer who we were? Are the more developed or more able-bodied or more \u201cnormal-looking\u201d people more \u201chuman\u201d than the rest? If human beings are like artifacts, then the answer is probably yes.<\/p>\n

READ:\u00a0First trimester babies aren\u2019t blobs of tissue \u2014 they\u2019re amazingly complex<\/a><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

But here\u2019s the problem: Human beings\u2014indeed, all living things\u2014aren\u2019t like that at all. Whereas artifacts are constructed, living things develop. Whereas artifacts are put together piece by piece from the outside, living things direct themselves from within. Whereas artifacts don\u2019t become themselves (they aren\u2019t \u201ccomplete\u201d) until at least most of the parts are in place, living things are themselves from the very beginning, actively unfolding the capacities they already have because of the kind of being they already are.<\/p>\n