[Buddha-l] Moment of individuation [was: This pope] (Ziobro II)

[Stephen Hodge]

Dear Stanley,

> If the status of the question is open, then perhaps you are concluding too
> quickly that the Church's doctrine and scientific fact are at odds.  In
> short, the issue may be a theological conundrum or the conundrum may be
> more apparent than real.
Since I am neither a Catholic theologian nor an embryologist, I merely 
raised the issue in response to a news report that I mentioned I had read 
without strongly prejudging the issue.  Hence I was curious to know how the 
Church was dealing with this matter since it seems that some in the Vatican 
also see a potential problem here that needs addressing.

> Very early on (within a few hours at most) one of these
> cells separates from the other and begins to develop as the twin embryo.
This seems to be the crux of the problem in biological terms.  A quick trawl 
through the internet indicates that opinion is strongly divided on the 
matter, each party tending to have its own overt or covert agendas -- the 
pro-lifers take the position you outline, while many embryo stem-cell 
researchers disagree.  I am not in a position to judge the truth or even 
factuality of these competing claims.

> There is nothing to my
> knowledge about Catholic doctrine(s) on the soul that would prohibit the
> newly fertilized ova to be initially infused with two souls.
This is the kind of solution that I imagined would be deployed because of 
the dangers that would arise from accepting the pre-embryo concept -- though 
there would be no way to test this solution empirically.  The problem does 
not arise for me, as a Buddhist, since I do not believe in the existence of 
a soul.  Nevertheless, the similar problem of individuation for some 
Buddhists doctrines could be solved in a like manner by those who believe in 
rebirth, substituting pratisandhi-vij~naana for the soul.

> Also, there is no denying that human life
> begins precisely at conception, not, as you surmised, 14 days afterwards.
Actually, I did not surmise anything of the sort !  A problem only seems to 
occur if you believe in souls as defined by the Catholic Church and others. 
I am quite happy to accept that new life or possibly continued life arises 
at the moment of conception and I see no need to privilege the human form of 
life either.  Thus, as I do not believe in souls and the implied uniqueness 
of humans, what I really find abhorrent is the way in which many humans 
think they have the right to murder and torture animals for food (with 
certain exceptions as a necessary evil), amusement, medical, scientific and 
cosmetic research and testing.  The soul theory seems to me to be a 
pernicious doctrine in that it facilitates or even encourages such 
actitvities.  Humans aren't so special -- they probably won't be around for 
much longer anyway the way things are going, certainly not in any great 
numbers.

Best wishes,
Stephen Hodge

PS:  I note that you are Stanley Ziobro the Second -- are you a member of a 
minor European royal dynasty or did your father aspire to cloning before it 
was possible :)