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Journal of Medicine and Philosophy 2008 33(2):140-157; doi:10.1093/jmp/jhn001
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© The Author 2008. Published by Oxford University Press, on behalf of the Journal of Medicine and Philosophy Inc. All rights reserved. For permissions, please e-mail: journals.permissions@oxfordjournals.org

Four Queries Concerning the Metaphysics of Early Human Embryogenesis

A. A. Howsepian

University of California at San Francisco, Fresno, California, USA

Address correspondence to: A. A. Howsepian, Fresno Medical Education Program, University of California at San Francisco, Fresno, CA, USA. E-mail: avak.howsepian{at}va.gov.


  Abstract

In this essay, I attempt to provide answers to the following four queries concerning the metaphysics of early human embryogenesis. (1) Following its first cellular fission, is it coherent to claim that one and only one of two "blastomeric" twins of a human zygote is identical with that zygote? (2) Following the fusion of two human pre-embryos, is it coherent to claim that one and only one pre-fusion pre-embryo is identical with that postfusion pre-embryo? (3) Does a live human being come into existence only when its brain comes into existence? (4) At implantation, does a pre-embryo become a mere part of its mother? I argue that either if things have quidditative properties or if criterialism is false, then queries (1) and (2) can be answered in the affirmative; that in light of recent developments in theories of human death and in light of a more "functional" theory of brains, query (3) can be answered in the negative; and that plausible mereological principles require a negative answer to query (4).

Keywords: abortion, brains, embryo, stem cells, twinning


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