Defining initiation of life ethically?

 

“Amid all the talk about the ever-increasing availability of in vitro fertilization techniques, one issue is almost never mentioned; namely, what happens to all those extra embryos?”

 

Often surplus embryos are involved in process of IVF to substantially enhance the chance of pregnancy .Whether they are laboratory artifacts or not and when life begins are obvious questions. This puts a question mark on the “sanctity-of-life”. So, theologists argue that we should give the embryo the “benefit of the doubt” and consider life at the very beginning [10]. and humans should be spatio-temporally continuous with the embryos and fetuses they once were. if human life initiates at fertilization then ivf is experimentation upon a human being and should follow the norms of that type of research. moreover, discarded zygotes or embryos lost in unsuccessful implantations, at present a foreseen possibility of ivf, would be human.

 

Report suggests that out of 150 attempts to implant human embryos only 4 actually were successful and only 1 was carried to term. Knowingly and willingly wasting human beings is unethical. On the other hand, if there is evidence that human life does not begin until after implantation, then IVF would not be unethical from the point of view of the zygote because only animal life would be present. The following query sums up this aspect of the issue: Is the zygote human life with potential or potential human life?

“Human life must be respected and protected absolutely from the moment of conception. From the first moment of his existence, a human being must be recognized as having the rights of a person.”

 

When this fundamental moral line is violated or obscured, categories of people become devalued and they become easily used for utilitarian purposes. Human life is precious from the moment of conception; but, unfortunately this respect for human life is being eroded in our contemporary society