Does scientific life necessarily coincide with moral life

[Seraph]

Not that far back, I posted the bellow question. I was given a
response (further bellow,) but not an answer. Can anyone give me an
answer please?

A friend of mine recently gave me a copy of an official report
released by the United States Senate Subcommittee. Apparently they
invited medical and scientific officials from all across the world to
discuss the scientific status of a fetus. There wasn’t any debate. All
agreed that human life began at some point during the initial
conception except one who said he didn’t know. Here’s a quote from the
report.

“Physicians, biologists, and other scientists agree that conception
marks the beginning of the life of a human being - a being that is
alive and is a member of the human species. There is overwhelming
agreement on this point in countless medical, biological, and
scientific writings.”

Subcommittee on Separation of Powers to Senate Judiciary Committee
S-158, Report, 97th Congress, 1st Session, 1981

I did some further snooping on the internet and found that the medical
and scientific community is in universal agreement on the fact that
human life begins upon conception. This leads me to a few questions.
Does scientific life necessarily coincide with moral life? In a
secular society do we have room to make judgments based on moral
perspective when science is out of sync with our observation?

I mean, Obama promise to ‘put science in its rightful place.’ But, if
we do that doesn’t that mean we have to overturn Roe v. Wade? I mean,
I know Roe v. Wade didn’t expressly say that a fetus wasn’t human. But
if it is human-and scientifically it apparently is-then why do the
laws concerning born children not apply? Is it any less constitutional
to legally require a woman to carry a child for 8-9 months than it is
to force a parent to labor for eighteen years to provide for a born
child?

Thank you for you time.


---
Peter Smith:
Let's agree that, from the moment of conception, we have a living
thing -- and, if the parents are human, this living thing belongs to
no other species than homo sapiens. So what? That fact doesn't in
itself determine the moral status of the product of conception.

Here's one possible view: as the human zygote/embryo/foetus develops,
its death becomes a more serious matter. At the very beginning, its
death is of little consequence; as time goes on its death is a matter
it becomes appropriate to be more concerned about.

In fact, that view seems to be exactly the one most of us take about
the natural death of human zygotes/embryos/foetuses. After all, few of
us are worried by the fact that a high proportion of conceptions
spontaneously abort: few of us are scandalized if a woman who finds
she is pregnant by mistake in a test one week after conception is
pleased when she discovers that the pregnancy has naturally terminated
a few days later. Similarly for accidental death: suppose a woman
finds she is a week pregnant, goes cross-country horse riding, falls
badly at a jump, and spontaneously aborts. That might be regrettable,
but we wouldn't think she'd done something terrible by going riding
and running the risk. (Compare: we do think it is a matter for moral
concern that there are high levels of infant mortality in some
countries; we would be scandalized by a woman celebrating the death of
an unwanted newborn baby: we would be appalled at someone risking the
life of nearly nine-months old foetus by going in for some potentially
dangerous sports.)

So: our attitudes to the natural or accidental death of the products
of conception seem to suggest that we regard them as of relatively
lowly moral status at the beginning of their lives, and of greater
moral standing as time passes. It would be consistent with such a view
to take a similar line about unnatural deaths. For example, it would
be consistent with that to think that using the morning-after pill is
of no moral significance, while bringing about the death of an eight
month foetus is getting on for as serious as killing a neonate, with a
gradual increase in the seriousness of the killing in between.


Now, the point I'm making here isn't that this "gradualist" view is
right (actually, I think it is, but you don't have to agree for
present purposes). The point is that it that it isn't obvious that it
is wrong. In other words, it isn't obvious that an all-or-nothing
attitude to members of the species homo sapiens has to be right. It is
not obvious that agreeing that the products of human conceptions are
also human means that we should assign them all the moral

---
Quick note: The morning after pill isn't a form of abortion, that's a
myth. It's birth control. Doesn't work on zygotes, embryos, of
fetuses. At least that's what the lady at Planned Parenthood told me.