Ellen Goodman's recent letter was characteristically narrow-minded in saying that banning cloning for biomedical research (CBMR) will be "criminalizing medicine" and that "the real argument is not about science, but politics".

      The president's decision on federal funding of embryonic stem cell research established the precedent that scientific research is a moral endeavor--one in which some human goods (cures for the sick, transplantable organs, increased knowledge of human development and genetics, the value of scientific freedom) must be considered in light of other human goods (the dignity of human life and procreation; attention to the unintended consequences of research and the use of technology).

      It is inadequate to argue this controversy based on the "life principle" that calls for protecting, preserving, and saving human life. Arguing this angle creates two sides different only with respect to whose life matters most: the lives of sick children and adults or the lives of human embryos.

      I would like to summarize the Council's majority view that opposed CBMR. Even most supporters of CBMR think the embryo is due special respect, more than other human cells. However, it is unlikely that biotechnology companies or scientists routinely engaged in CBMR would carry solemn respect for human life each time a cloned embryo was destroyed. Things exploited tend to lose their special value.

      It is incoherent and self-contradictory to claim that human embryos deserve special respect and then endorse their creation, use, and destruction. Having high- minded purposes does not show that the means of these purposes are respectful. True respect for a human being would nurture and encourage its own flourishing.

      The embryo is a fully equal member of the species Homo sapiens, a human life in process, with its complete genetic identity intact. No other view is biologically or morally sustainable. The embryo does not yet have the full range of characteristics that distinguish the human species from others, but one need not have all those characteristics in order to belong to the species. We may observe different stages in someone's life--a beginning filled mostly with potential, a peak at which they're in full bloom, a decline in which little remains of what is most distinctively human. At no point do they lose their humanity because they lack distinguishing characteristics. None of these stages is the human being itself. That being is, rather, human life in a continuous process from zygote (2 cells) to death.

      We are likely to grieve the death of an embryo less than the death of a new-born child. We are also likely to grieve the death of an eighty five year old father less than a forty five year old father, a newborn less than a twelve year old. These appropriate emotions would be misused if we measured the amount of respect we owe each other on the basis of such responses. In fact, we are obligated to try to develop our emotional responses in accord with the moral respect we owe to those whose capacities are the least developed. How we respond to this weakest among us tests not the embryo's humanity but our own. It challenges the depth of our commitment to equality. As Hans Jonas remarked, true humanism recognizes "the inflexible principle that utter helplessness demands utter protection".

      CBMR opens the door to other moral hazards such as cloning to produce children (CTPC). Suffering from diseases never comes to an end, and likewise, our willingness to use embryonic life for research is unlikely to find any natural stopping point. What disturbs us today we can eventually get used to. As history so often demonstrates, powers gained for one purpose are often used for other, less noble ones. The only way to prevent CTPC would be to prohibit, by law, the implantation of cloned embryos for the purpose of producing children. Scientists already accept important moral boundaries in research on human subjects, and they do not regard such boundaries as unwarranted restrictions on the freedom of scientific research.

      The proposed medical benefits of CBMR have not been proven. Furthermore, promising results with non-embryonic and adult stem cells suggest that progress in regenerative medicine may be made without engaging in CBMR. Since morally innocent alternatives exist, we must show not only that cloned embryo research is desirable, but that it is necessary to gain the medical benefits. Indeed, the Nuremberg code of research ethics contains this principle--that experimentation should be "such as to yield fruitful results for the good of society, unprocurable by other methods or means of study". Because of all CBMR's uncertainties--and the many other available avenues of research--that ethical code requirement is not met.

      By opposing CBMR, 10 of the 17 Council members acknowledge that progress must come by means that do not involve the production, use, and destruction of cloned human embryos. Relief of suffering, though a great good, is not the greatest good. As highly as we value greater health and longer life, life loses its value if it is not principled. We want science to contribute only in ways that respect human life, the weak and the strong, and that honors moral limits--to a world in which the seeds of the next generation are viewed as so much more than raw materials to satisfy our needs. Justifying using (and destroying) human embryos would force us to ignore the truth of our own continuing personal histories from their embryonic beginning and weaken the commitment to human equality that has been so slowly developed in our culture.

Annie Bukacek MD