Florida State University Department of Philosophy Embryos, Souls, and the Fourth Dimension Author(s): David W. Shoemaker Source: Social Theory and Practice, Vol. 31, No. 1 (January 2005), pp. 51-75 Published by: Florida State University Department of Philosophy Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/23558687 Accessed: 02-02-2020 13:29 UTC REFERENCES Linked references are available on JSTOR for this article: https://www.jstor.org/stable/23558687?seq=1&cid=pdf-reference#references_tab_contents You may need to log in to JSTOR to access the linked references. JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org. Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at https://about.jstor.org/terms Florida State University Department of Philosophy is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Social Theory and Practice This content downloaded from 128.205.114.91 on Sun, 02 Feb 2020 13:29:38 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms Embryos, Souls, and the Fourth Dimension Human embryos are not mere biological tissues or clusters of cells; they are the tiniest of human beings. Thus, we have a moral responsibility not to deliberately harm them Why would someone believe that an embryo is a human being, albeit an exceedingly tiny one? It is merely a cluster of cells, after all, and it in no way resembles ordinary human beings like you and me, entities with the functional abilities to think, feel, locomote, laugh, love, and actually be seen by the naked eye. Furthermore, even if embryos were human be ings, why would that fact alone generate a moral obligation on our part to refrain from harming them? In other words, what precisely is it about human beings that warrants their moral protection? These sorts of questions have played a major role in the longstanding abortion debate, of course, which nevertheless generally focuses not on the embryo but on the fetus. Specifically, abortion theorists typically want to figure out (a) what the ontological status of the fetus is, that is, into what category of the world it fits, and (b) what its ontological status implies, if anything, about its moral status, that is, how entities catego rized-like-that ought to be treated.2 Fetuses, though, especially late-stage 'Statement (1999) from Do No Harm: The Coalition of Americans for Research Eth ics (Washington, D.C.), quoted in Ted Peters, "Embryonic Stem Cells and the Theology of Dignity," in Suzanne Holland, Karen Lebacqz, and Laurie Zoloth (eds.), The Human Embryonic Stem Cell Debate: Science, Ethics, and Public Policy (Cambridge, Mass.: The MIT Press, 2001), pp. 127-39, at p. 129. 2There may be some concern that my talk of ontological categories in this respect (according to which one such category might be that of "human beings") is misleading, given that ontological categories are actually much more general in nature (e.g., catego ries of fact, property, particular, substance, and so on). On this more general terminology, "human being" would not constitute an ontological category; rather, it might be some thing that belongs to a particular ontological category. This is indeed true. What we are concerned with here is the "what is it?" question, the answer to which will place the par ticular under a substance category. So "human being" is, we shall assume, one type of substance category, with built-in specifications both for what that thing is and what its persistence conditions are across time, and our question will be whether or not fetuses or embryos fall under that subcategory. See, for example, Eric T. Olson, The Human Ani mal: Personal Identity Without Psychology (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1997), ) Copyright 2005 by Social Theory and Practice, Vol. 31, No. 1 (January 2005) 51 This content downloaded from 128.205.114.91 on Sun, 02 Feb 2020 13:29:38 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms 52 David W. Shoemaker fetuses, at least resemble clear-cut hum rather closely, and so granting them th ings is a rather easy pill for many to s comes in establishing a coherent and/or about the fetus's moral status from there.3 However, the debate over stem cell re therapeutic cloning, and other forms of lar in this formal respect to the abortio ferent regarding the subject of the bro embryo from which the enormously sig for example, and it is (for now, anyway rich potential. Once an embryo has dev ing potential is lost. So there are differe the various procedures: abortion is typi expected utility for the mother/parent the like are typically desired on the bas the grandest of schemes, humanity in offered against both procedures typicall fact: both abortion and the harvesting tion of a living human organism. And i actually a human being, and it is (for w human beings, then it would be wrong tion. Now, as I have already noted, lateclear-cut human beings (of the infant v their status as human beings, which wou first of our two general questions. But to r why should we think an embryo is a hum pp. 28-29. Nevertheless, both for the sake of brev terminological tradition in the literature on ab "ontological status" as a gloss on this form of cat 3See, e.g., Don Marquis, "Why Abortion is Im (1989): 183-202, reprinted in Julie McDonald Diverse Society (Belmont, Cal.: Wadsworth Pub lish, "Abortion and the Concept of a Person," C 233-43; and Judith Jarvis Thomson, "A Defense fairs 1 (1971): 47-66. I should make it clear that I am not "fudging status, nor do I want to attribute such an equivoc Mary Anne Warren, "On the Moral and Legal St Joel Feinberg (eds.), The Problem of Abortio 1997), pp. 59-74], at pp. 65-66, for a succinct ar There are two distinct topics of potential explora a human being, a member of a particular categor (b) what is it about members of that category, if certain moral protections (moral status)? I am e This content downloaded from 128.205.114.91 on Sun, 02 Feb 2020 13:29:38 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms Embryos, Souls, and the Fourth Dimension 53 The stem cell issue is primarily a public policy issue, but despite the fact that this debate is taking place within secular democracies like the U.S. and the U.K., religious arguments against such research are regu larly heard and taken into consideration by various public advisory committees, leaving many secular liberals with their collective jaws agape.5 But while there are very good reasons why such religion-based arguments should be rendered weightless as justifications for public pol icy, I propose instead for now to take them quite seriously, for two rea sons. First, a large number of citizens accept these religion-based argu ments about human beings, and their beliefs about the limits of public funding for certain scientific pursuits flow directly from such arguments. Failing at least to address these arguments, then, leaves the impression that the government is silencing a significant portion of its citizenry, and the undercurrent of resentment produced by such a perceived silencing may express itself in less peaceful ways in the future (think here of abor tion clinic bombings). Second, even if the religion-based view is dis counted at the political level, it still represents a moral stance, one pro ducing various publicly expressed (if not politically legitimate) judg ments about Tightness and wrongness that may ultimately be influential in generating enough public pressure to stop certain scientific pursuits altogether, despite the absence of any legal constraints. My aim in this paper, then, is to deal with these arguments head-on. More specifically, I hope to show that the best developed and most popu larly cited religion-based argument(s) about the ontological status of em bryos/fetuses, focusing on the nature of human beings and the beginning of life, yields, upon close inspection, an overwhelming number of prob lematic theological and metaphysical implications, many of which have not been discussed before. But because this is an issue in which the bio logical details are crucially significant, we must start there. Biological Basics We begin, as I suppose we should, at conception. When an ovum is fer tilized, it is a zygote. Fertilization takes place in the oviduct, and in the days following fertilization, a number of divisions take place, as what is now a very early-stage embryo travels down the oviduct into the uterus. For the first five days of development, the cells (called "blastomeres") question in this paper. I certainly recognize that the two questions are often conflated, but I believe that we can, and that it is important to, deal with them separately here. See also n. 10 below. 5See, for example, Erik Parens, "On the Ethics and Politics of Embryonic Stem Cell Research," in Holland et al. (eds.), The Human Embryonic Stem Cell Debate, pp. 37-50. This content downloaded from 128.205.114.91 on Sun, 02 Feb 2020 13:29:38 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms 54 David W. Shoemaker are entirely undifferentiated; that is, at this act like any particular specialized cells of them is yet committed to any particular dir could potentially form any such cell, or eve fledged infant (a capacity known as "totipo after fertilization, a significant developmen at the outer layer separate off from the in trophectoderm, a kind of protective circle enables implantation of the embryo into the ally form part of the placenta. This stage of ICM and surrounding trophectoderm) is cal blastocyst is implanted, mediated by the tr soon differentiate, becoming other cell typ tential is now much more restricted.6 Stem cells are derived from a pre-implanta collections, the ICM is separated from the t are already differentiated), those ICM cells cells ultimately derived from those ICM cel which can "proliferate and replace themselv the developmental potential to form any cell By now the possible benefits of stem cell several months of culture, they have the cap cell of the human body, from blood to nerv us to have unlimited supplies of specific, tra treatment of anything from leukemia to Par establishing stem cell lines requires separat phectoderm, a procedure that, of course, dis both are by now constituent parts. Therefor implantation embryo is already a human be for culture (which effectively deprives it of fetus and beyond) kills a human being. Thus There is one last significant biological con incredible plasticity of the pre-implantatio capable of both fission and fusion. If, for e cells are divided, each half (once implanted) into its own normal individual fetus. This i formed. On the other hand, though, if two 6I have borrowed much of this exposition from J Embryonic Stem Cells," in ibid., pp. 15-17. 7Ibid., p. 17. This exposition should make clear, the the cells of the embryo itself; they are rather cells ult ICM) of a pre-implantation embryo. 8Ibid„ p. 15. This content downloaded from 128.205.114.91 on Sun, 02 Feb 2020 13:29:38 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms Embryos, Souls, and the Fourth Dimension 55 embryos are pushed back together (or fuse naturally), they can intermin gle to form a single embryo that may be brought to term as a single, indi vidual infant. In addition, it is theoretically possible to fuse together two early-stage embryos, each composed of cells of different genotypes, to produce a single infant with four parents.9 This remarkable possibility will be important for the arguments to come. We may now turn to the more philosophical issues at stake. Specifi cally, we have before us the crucial question of ontology: is the pre implantation blastocyst-stage embryo a human being? I begin with an exposition of a very familiar reply. Religion and Public Justifications The most popular contemporary immaterialist answer to this question, based on the stated view of the Roman Catholic Church, is as follows: the embryo is indeed a human being, and what makes it so is that it has an immortal soul, a soul implanted by God into the physical organism from the moment of conception. In doing this, God not only renders the developing life form a human being, but also simultaneously renders it deserving of moral protection. In ensouling the conceptus, God not only makes it a creature with a certain ontological status (human being), but also instantly establishes its moral status, as a being with dignity, etc.10 The following passage from the Instruction on Respect for Human Life in its Origin and on the Dignity of Procreation: Replies to Certain Ques tions of the Day, authored by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith in 1987, makes this view explicit: From the moment of conception, the life of every human being is to be respected in an absolute way because man is the only creature on earth that God has "wished for himself' and the spiritual soul of each man is "immediately created" by God; his whole being bears the image of the Creator. Human life is sacred because from its beginning it in volves "the creative action of God" and it remains forever in a special relationship with 9Ibid., p. 16. 10Once again, this distinction is important. The soul, according to most theological views, serves two functions. First, because it is thought to be immortal, it serves to mark a fundamental ontological distinction between human beings and non-human creatures: only humans are immortal, and the soul is the vehicle for preserving identity between flesh-and-blood humans and their heavenly (or hellishly!) successors. In virtue of this function, it confers a special ontological status. But the soul also serves to confer moral status: it constitutes the source of dignity in a human being. So while one allegedly gets both ontological and moral status simultaneously, neither status is received in virtue of the other, i.e., one does not get moral status because one has a certain ontological status, or vice versa. In either case, one gets the particular status one has in virtue of one's soul. In what follows, however, I will focus solely on the function of conferring ontological status served by the soul. This content downloaded from 128.205.114.91 on Sun, 02 Feb 2020 13:29:38 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms 56 David W. Shoemaker the Creator, who is its sole end. God alone is the end: no one can, in any circumstance, claim for innocent human being." What, though, is meant by "soul"? One what Descartes meant, viz., a thinking view that embryos have souls also holds to have a soul, on this view, requires no ties. Nevertheless, given the host of r must eventually have both to God and and given the (dogma-based) need to d non-human animals via reference to sou rationality must somehow play a role in And so it does. Current Catholic theolo dividual substance of a rational nature."1 There are four aspects worth noting in part first, souls have a rational nature, so w think, that aspect may not be active, or ye of their existence. To take a rough anal clock to tell time—clocks have a time-te installed in it, say, that part of the clo Similarly, it is a functioning brain that pacities on earth; nevertheless, even w tional nature. Second, the soul is a subs it is an enduring entity, a continuant t and change. Third, the soul is an immat thing. It is thus something for which t pirical evidence. Fourth, the soul is an in one thing. Given that it is unextended, stance, then,14 having neither extension supports the theological view that the ruptible.15 It is the possession of this i "introduction, Section 5, published by the Cat on the web at http://www.vatican.va/roman_curi _cfaith_doc_19870222_respect-for-human-life_ ment of The Third Plenary Assembly of the Pon City, 14-16 February 1997, at http://www.vatica acdlife/documents/rc_pa_acdlife_doc_16021997_ l2Michael J. Coughlan, The Vatican, the Law University of Iowa Press, 1990), p. 59. 13Thomas Shannon and Allan B. Woltor, "Reflec Embryo," Theological Studies 51 (1990): 603-26, 14See, e.g., Roderick M. Chisholm, "On the Si Perspectives, vol. 5, Philosophy of Religion (199 l5Coughlan, The Vatican, the Law and the Huma This content downloaded from 128.205.114.91 on Sun, 02 Feb 2020 13:29:38 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms Embryos, Souls, and the Fourth Dimension 57 physical) thing, therefore, that renders an organism a human being, and if God creates it immediately to be possessed by a newly created concep tas, then that developing organism is a human being at every stage from there on out. There are many questions we might ask here. For instance, how could we possibly know if an embryo were to have a soul? If souls were truly immaterial, then determining this would be impossible. Given this prob lem, what possible non-arbitrary reason could there be for marking con ception as the spot where ensoulment occurs, as opposed to any other stage of the developmental timetable? Indeed, throughout history various theologians and religious philosophers have pointed to different stages as the points of ensoulment. Aquinas, for instance, following Aristotle, claimed that male fetuses received souls about forty days after concep tion, while female fetuses received souls about eighty days after concep tion, presumably because these were the days when fetal movement was typically first detected (although one might harbor some suspicions about the statistical methodology at work here). And other candidates for the stage of ensoulment have included viability, brain activity, and the point at which the primitive streak has developed.16 But each chosen stage is just as suitable a candidate as all the others, insofar as we could have no evidence whatsoever to believe that one is more likely than the others. Because of our complete lack of evidence in these matters, it might be thought, we have no reason to accept the claim that embryos have souls. This is an epistemological argument, however, that may simply have no bearing on the actual metaphysical facts of the matter. For it still seems logically possible, at any rate, that embryos do have souls, regard less of the fact that we could never know that. If so, then if the having of a soul renders its bearer a human being, embryos might, for all we know, be human beings, in which case a "better safe than sorry" argument 17 could be offered to extend some moral protection to them. To avoid this line of attack, therefore, many people in favor of stem cell research have offered a general and purely political argument against 16There have also been divisions into types of souls received at various stages. Aqui nas, for instance, following Aristotle, distinguished between vegetative, animal, and ra tional souls, and this division also represented the ordered sequence in which these souls were "received" by developing humans. For a fascinating brief history of the Catholic Church's evolving position on embryos, fetuses, and souls, see H. Tristram Engelhardt, Jr., "The Ontology of Abortion," Ethics 84 (1974): 217-34, esp. pp. 226-27. l?From the Los Angeles Times, 24 March 2002, a letter to the editor (by James Bjor seth): "Even the wisest among us must acknowledge that they are not qualified to answer the question of when life begins ... If we can't be sure then we must err on the side of caution and not terminate any existence." I have no doubts whatsoever that this writer means to include only human life under this principle, though. Cockroaches should still beware. See also Coughlan, The Vatican, the Law and the Human Embryo, chap. 6. This content downloaded from 128.205.114.91 on Sun, 02 Feb 2020 13:29:38 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms 58 David W. Shoemaker the use of the soul argument in matters of public policy. It is a familiar one, and it goes as follows. If one's support for the claim that embryos are human beings is that they have souls, then this sort of argument is simply illegitimate in a secular democracy, even if it turns out ultimately to be true. When offering a public justification for some policy or other, one's arguments must appeal to reasons that respect the equality of all citizens. Arguments having their sole source in a specific and quite con troversial religious view fail to do so, however, insofar as they appeal to premises utterly unacceptable to citizens of other religions, or to citizens who reject religion altogether. A public policy adopted on the basis of such religious justifications, then, would involve state promotion of one religious view over other religious and non-religious views, rendering the citizens who advocate these alternatives without a voice, unequal with respect to this policy. This is not to say that a viable public justification for religious folks who want to protect embryos cannot be found; it is rather to say that any premises on which they build such a public argu ment would have to be ones that respect the equality of all citizens. What would need to be found, then, is some basis for the conclusion that is 18 shared by all reasonable citizens.19 While I believe this to be a knockdown argument against the religion based justification with respect to public policy, it will be, as already noted, terribly unsatisfactory for practical reasons to an advocate of the view, and it also does nothing to undermine the moral argument itself. The soul argument is repeatedly and cursorily dismissed in the philoso phical literature,20 but I nevertheless believe it to be worthwhile to take the argument quite seriously, in part for the practical and moral reasons already cited, but also because of its extremely interesting implications for other important issues in the philosophy of religion and metaphysics 18See, for one example, Parens, "On the Ethics and Politics of Embryonic Stem Cell Research," pp. 40-41. For an alternative perspective, see Françoise Baylis, "Human Em bryonic Stem Cell Research: Comments on the NBAC Report," in Holland et al. (eds.), The Human Embryonic Stem Cell Debate, pp. 51-60. I9I am obviously drawing here from the sorts of arguments with respect to the grounds of public reason in a liberal democracy put forward by John Rawls, in Political Liberalism (New York: Columbia University Press, 1993), esp. Lecture VI: "The Idea of Public Reason." 20See, e.g., Engelhardt, "The Ontology of Abortion," p. 227; Lawrence C. Becker, "Human Being: The Boundaries of the Concept," Philosophy & Public Affairs 4 (1975): 334-59, p. 340 fn. 2; and Paul Bassen, "Present Sakes and Future Prospects: The Status of Early Abortion," Philosophy & Public Affairs 11 (1982): 314-37, pp. 326-27. Two excep tions, however, are Coughlan, The Vatican, the Law and the Human Embryo, chap. 5, and Ronald M. Green, The Human Embryo Research Debates: Bioethics in the Vortex of Controversy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001), pp. 31-32. While my approach in the early stages of my argument will be similar to these two, I eventually go far beyond them to discuss a number of other troublesome implications for the theological view. This content downloaded from 128.205.114.91 on Sun, 02 Feb 2020 13:29:38 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms Embryos, Souls, and the Fourth Dimension 59 generally. I believe we will find that the view ultimately is either absurd or commits its advocates to some very troubling implications.21 Was I an Embryo? I doubt I will cause any theological controversy by suggesting first that souls are intended to provide fairly significant unity relations. Specifi cally, an ensouled entity is unified both synchronically and diachroni cally by its soul. At any given time, for instance, what unifies the various physical parts of a material ensouled entity is its immaterial soul. What makes its collection of parts one unified thing is that there is an indivisi ble individual soul attached to it. In addition, this single soul is what pro vides unity across time (given its status as a substance). Insofar as it would be the essence of a human being, X at time tl would be identical to Y at time t2 (assuming X and Y were both ensouled human beings) if, and only if, Y's soul were numerically identical to X's soul. This latter feature is crucial to the eschatological requirements of the theological view: the unity of my soul across time enables me to survive the death of my body in heaven (or hell). Someone in heaven will be me just in case that person is—or has—the same soul I was—or had—on earth.22 On this overall view, then, a human being is an entity deeply unified both at a time and over time by his or her soul. So if a pre-implantation embryo were a human being in virtue of having a soul, this fact would have two implications. First, the various cells of the embryo would be 21I should point out before beginning that some of the arguments I will advance are formally similar to those from familiar philosophical literature on abortion and embry onic research. Helga Kuhse and Peter Singer, for example, have offered arguments for the absurdity of claiming that a conceptus is a human being by drawing on the identity con siderations involved in fission that I marshal below (see, e.g., 'The Moral Status of the Embryo," and "Individuals, Humans, and Persons: The Issue of Moral Status," in Peter Singer, Unsanctifying Human Life, ed. Helga Kuhse (Oxford: Blackwell Publishers, 2002), chaps. 12 and 13). Nevertheless, Kuhse and Singer (and others) typically start with materialist assumptions, and so their arguments are easily sidestepped by someone start ing with immaterialist assumptions about souls, so I will be adapting the argumentative methodology they have employed specifically to this religion-based position, which will require several additional sorts of arguments from those seen before (with some excep tions; see n. 20). In addition, the conclusions I will draw are very different from those Kuhse and Singer draw. 22It remains a wide-open question, though, just how these unity relations are pro vided, i.e., how an immaterial substance could possibly unify a material particular. I can not begin to articulate a theological response to this version of the mind/body problem, so let us simply allow that it somehow does so and, to paraphrase Samuel Johnson, "there's an end on't" (James Boswell, The Life of Samuel Johnson (1791), quoted in Gary Wat son, "Introduction," in Gary Watson (ed.), Free Will (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003), p. 1). This content downloaded from 128.205.114.91 on Sun, 02 Feb 2020 13:29:38 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms 60 David W. Shoemaker unified as one individual entity—a human that synchronically unified individual ent tical to all the later stages of the fully dev ther standard assumption that a spatio- houses the same soul throughout its lifetim souls do not "jump" from one body to anot fore, I now am identical to—I am the same ized egg from which I developed many yea same essential substance underlies and unif seems, an embryo.24 To evaluate this view, we may begin w identity. Ordinarily, when applied to talk question of synchronic identity is about th ous mental states; that is, what unifies var perceptions at time t as being those of one embryo has no mental states. The issue of only be a question, then, about its various cate of the soul view answers that some co human being at t in virtue of its having a s the matter implies that there is another (an play here, however. After all, to identify cannot point to a soul; instead, we must po cal cells that together are inferred to consti then what is it about those cells that privi part of the unified, ensouled entity? The an what makes them a distinct ontological obj souled. Instead, they must already constitut or becomes ensouled. What the soul alleged cells into one human being, but the cells tog a distinct ontological object in order then distinct ontological object in virtue of thei were not the case, we would have no means ject under discussion. Thus, the relevant, id the cells constitute is that of a human embr according to the theological advocate, that i not just an embryo but also a human being. 23I will distinguish and discuss two importantly dif the nature of this relationship below. 24And of course that embryo would also have confe ensoulment the appropriate moral status. 25At the end of the paper I will actually entertain human beings (independent from their collection of m save the soul view, but I will nevertheless reject that v This content downloaded from 128.205.114.91 on Sun, 02 Feb 2020 13:29:38 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms Embryos, Souls, and the Fourth Dimension 61 But if this is the case, then what precisely is the metaphysical relation between embryos and human beings? More specifically, with respect to the question of synchronic identity, what is the relation between what unifies the cells at t qua embryo and what unifies them at t qua human being? Consider, for example, what happens at around five days after fertilization, when certain cells separate off from the ICM to form the trophectoderm. The entire collection, including the outer layer, still falls under the rubric of "embryo" (or, more precisely, the stage of the embryo called a blastocyst). But it is only the cells of the ICM whose descen dants will form a fetus and then an infant. Are the cells of the trophecto derm, which are synchronically unified with the cells of the ICM at this time as an embryo, also unified as part of a single human being via the soul? If so, then the shedding of the placenta as afterbirth (and its even tual casual destraction) would seem to have heretofore unrecognized moral implications, insofar as it would involve the destruction of at least part of a human being. Surely this cannot be right, though, and as far as I know, no one holds that the placenta is part of a human being. If not, then the ontological object to be ensouled is not the embryo but the ICM. But the ICM does not come into existence until around five days post conception, which might introduce a wedge against the soul theorist who wants to maintain that human beings (via souls) come into existence at conception. And this could be all the wedge the stem cell theorist needs: if stem cells could be derived from the cell mass prior to the formation of the trophectoderm, then no human beings would be destroyed in the process, and thus there would be no such soul-based objections to doing so. One response on the soul theorist's behalf, though, might be that the identity of the human being does not necessarily track any specific, uni fied, material ontological objects across time. So while the ensouled ob ject at any given time (synchronic identity) will correspond to some iden tifiable material ontological object, the object to which it corresponds at some other time may be different. Thus while the ensouled human being is a zygote on the first day, it may be merely an ICM on the fifth day (and not the entire embryo). Clearly the ICM is a direct descendant of the zygote, though, and while our typical conceptual categorization includes the trophectoderm as part of the embryo, it is only part of that embryo that is significant for fixing the referent of "human beings."26 This response shifts the focus from synchronic identity to diachronic identity, rendering the former derivative from the latter, at least with re spect to identification. In other words, identification of the relevant mate 26I will discuss a powerful objection to this move at the very end of the paper, but for now I will allow it to explore its many important implications. This content downloaded from 128.205.114.91 on Sun, 02 Feb 2020 13:29:38 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms 62 David W. Shoemaker rial ontological object at a time will dep the relevant material ontological object ings may not correspond precisely to em we fix the appropriate unity relation acr vant material ontological object being able to fix what material ontological ob particular time, for it will be whatever s object that is appropriately related to its Let us turn, then, to considerations o first the familiar problem of twinning. ICM cells are still undifferentiated, s sionally does) divide into two or mor then develops into its own individual fe from the two-cell stage to approximatel What is the status of the soul in this case? The possibility of twinning has been much discussed in the literature (albeit rarely with respect to souls), and it poses a genuine threat to the coherence of the theological view on which we are focusing.27 The rea son I am going to discuss it yet again is actually twofold. First, to be as sympathetic to the soul view as possible, I need to spell out all the crucial details of this objection to it so I can explore in equal detail possible re buttals from the theological camp. There are a variety of ways the soul theorist might handle this possibility, yet these ways are simply not dis cussed by writers who advance the twinning scenario.28 Second, the problem of twinning raises a very important issue regarding the general ontological picture of the soul theorist. Specifically, I believe this theorist (under one specific conception of souls) cannot maintain a coherent view of the persistence conditions for his ensouled human beings—that is, to the question, "Do human beings endure or perdure?" this theorist has no coherent answer. Consequently, I beg indulgence from some readers for whom this initial discussion may seem like a reheated rehashing. There are larger issues afoot, but it will take a bit of time to set them up. Onward to the possibility of twinning, then. If, as already noted, the soul is a simple substance, then it cannot divide along with the dividing 27For just two examples in which souls and twinning have explicitly been discussed, see Coughlan, The Vatican, the Law and the Human Embryo, pp. 71-74, and Green, The Human Embryo Research Debates, pp. 31-32. For discussions of twinning used to un dermine the materialist (non-soul-based) view that human beings come into existence at conception, see Kuhse and Singer, "Individuals, Humans, and Persons," esp. pp. 189-92. 28See, for example, Coughlan (The Vatican, the Law and the Human Embryo), whose otherwise careful and balanced discussion of the Church and its position on the human embryo is too abrupt and one-sided when it comes to his discussion of souls and em bryos. On pp. 72-73, he asks a number of seemingly devastating questions to the soul theorist that he makes no effort to answer on their behalf. I attempt to do so below. This content downloaded from 128.205.114.91 on Sun, 02 Feb 2020 13:29:38 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms Embryos, Souls, and the Fourth Dimension 63 cells. If the pre-fission cells are ensouled, therefore, what happens to that human being—call it Adam—during fission? There are four possibilities: (1) Adam survives as both fission products—that is, Adam's soul is em bodied in both of the survivors; (2) Adam ceases to exist altogether (here on earth, anyway), and the two fission products are two new human be ings, each with their own new souls; (3) Adam survives as one of the fission products, while the other at that point becomes a newly ensouled human being; (4) Adam is actually two human beings, with two souls, until fission, at which point one soul serves to unify one clump of cells, and the other soul serves to unify the other clump of cells. Nevertheless, there are problems with all four possibilities. We can rule out (1) right away. If developed to term, the fission prod ucts would eventuate in two spatio-temporally distinct entities, capable of living on opposite sides of the earth, undergoing radically different experiences, and perhaps even fighting each other. Nevertheless, on this possibility, they would together still constitute only one human being (because only one soul). But this would wreak havoc with our ordinary conception of human beings. If one kills another, would it then be a sui cide? If, through a bizarrely incestuous turn of events, they have sex with one another, is it merely masturbation? And so on. Clearly, the two fis sion products would eventually have to be two human beings, and thus, if the formula is one soul per human being, two souls. What of (2)? On this possibility, Adam is destroyed (put out of com mission on earth) by fission, making way for two new souls to pop into existence, each corresponding to one fission product. At the very least, this possibility raises a new angle on the problem of evil: since God regularly allows such divisions to take place, he is regularly allowing the pointless (earthly) deaths of numerous human beings. Indeed, this possi bility raises an even worse scenario: not only is God allowing these pointless deaths, but because he would be responsible for ensouling the doomed-to-fission cells in the first place, he would also be responsible for causing them to die as human beings. Surely, if he were omniscient, he would have known that the cells would divide. Why ensoul them pre fission, then, if failing to do so would prevent the needless deaths of such human beings? Indeed, why should the creation of two new human be ings come only at the expense of the life of one human being? On its face, there seems to be no available theodicy that could plausibly account for this possibility's particular brand of senseless evil. To avoid such worries altogether, though, it might be the case that God waits to ensoul potential splitters until after fission occurs, given that he would know when this would take place. But this alternative would leave some embryos, namely those "predestined" for fission, soul less, and thus not human beings, which once again would violate the This content downloaded from 128.205.114.91 on Sun, 02 Feb 2020 13:29:38 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms 64 David W. Shoemaker theological assumption we are working w beings begins at conception. If we allow (qua human beings) would only begin pos possibility would presumably make harv for-fission embryos (assuming we could destined) perfectly permissible, if the o such procedures were the ontological sta the embryo here would be more akin Nevertheless, because the destruction of lives of two human beings would be prev as opposed to only one in the case of a n cause many Catholic theologians also fin precisely this sort of reason), there may Nevertheless, because this possibility wou position on the ontological status of the man being, it should be set aside. Next consider (3), according to whic fission product, while a new soul pops in the other fission product. Once again, th not all human beings come into existen human beings come into existence only since the presumption is that one soul (h moment of conception, we have a puzzle be Adam, and which would have the new no non-arbitrary reason God could have given that each would be exactly similar not too brittle a bullet for the theologian able that God occasionally acts entirely o coin-flip. More on this point in a moment Finally, consider alternative (4), accor souls present all along from conception, soul now becomes attached to the separa allows the theological advocate what he s the lives of all human beings begin at con cost. For one thing, it implies that tw "body" (prior to the fission), but this po one soul assumption. Perhaps, though, be only be temporary (and God would know would ensue.29 Not so fast, though, for explored idea of fusion. As mentioned ea could be pushed back together to form a 29I will explore precisely this issue in detail in th This content downloaded from 128.205.114.91 on Sun, 02 Feb 2020 13:29:38 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms Embryos, Souls, and the Fourth Dimension 65 will, if implanted, develop normally into a single infant. What would happen to the two fissioned souls if we were to do so in this case? If souls are simple, individuated substances, then presumably they could not fuse together to form a single individual. So the only possibilities are that (a) both souls would remain housed in the fused embryo; (b) both would be replaced in the fused embryo by a new soul; or (c) only one of the two souls would live on in the fused embryo. Possibility (a) cannot be true, for it would again imply that two (or more!) human beings could exist simultaneously in one body, and the "temporariness" escape clause above would no longer be met, given that the infant would continue to develop its individual body into adulthood and beyond. A view implying that one adult body contained two wholly distinct and individual human beings would be absurd. Possibility (b) is problematic for two reasons. First, it seems an incredible waste: why would God remove both souls (allowing two human beings to die on earth) when one could (easily?) be transferred to the fused embryo? Second, this possibility would again mean that the new embryo would be a new human being, a human being coming into existence sometime post-conception, an implication that vio lates the general theological assumption under which we are working.30 So (c) would have to be the safest theological bet: one soul would be re moved, while the other would remain and be attached to the new fused product. But there are a few problems with this proposal as well, depending on one's conception of the soul. There are, in fact, two importantly different conceptions of the soul that the Church has worked with over the years, conceptions that remain (in some quarters) competitors to this day. On the one hand, there is the Thomistic version of the soul, a conception de rived in part from Aristotle. On the other hand, there is the Augustinian version of the soul, a conception derived in part from Plato. According to the Thomistic view, the soul is by nature embodied-, it is a formal design that has no real existence unless it is instantiated in a particular body, much like a coin, whose essence consists in both its formal design (shared by all such coins) and its particular physical construction." This is a hylomorphic view of souls, and Aquinas argued that it is only this conception of the soul that can make sense of the Christian doctrine of the resurrection of the body in the afterlife, for without a body there could be no particularized person.32 According to the Augustinian view, which is a dualistic conception of the soul, the soul can exist independ ently of the body, and it is only temporarily (on earth) housed—some 31 30Thcre is also a third problem, having to do with what kind of deaths would have taken place here, a problem I discuss below. 31 See Coughlan, The Vatican, the Law and the Human Embryo, p. 18. 32Ibid„ p. 19. This content downloaded from 128.205.114.91 on Sun, 02 Feb 2020 13:29:38 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms 66 David W. Shoemaker might say trapped—in a body. Salvati the boundaries of the body, which prod overcome.33 On this view, the immort terial—exists without a body in the afte The Thomistic view is presented as Ch the Augustinian view remains popular as much of the public (perhaps due to cartes). Up to this point, it has not bee but what I wish to argue now is that n soul is maintained, there will be seri metaphysical implications in light of th Return, then, to possibilities (b) and (c maintains the hylomorphic conception o one's theology belief in the resurrection ensouled human beings that existed prio disappears; in possibility (b), two disapp human tissue died (or disappeared) at al where are their bodies? This certainly rection of the body, if there are no ex The "life begins at conception" theolog sion of the soul seems to be committed sitions: (l)each "body" prior to fusio fuse together; (3) there can only be a bodies and souls; and (4) there is a re person's bodies) in the afterlife. But tions in the fusion case, then this theo contradiction: option (a) contradicts pr (c) contradict proposition (4). Which vates the claim that (a)-(c) are the only theologian gives this up (which seems t must also give up the claim that the lif conception, however, and this would pr theorist with a significant wedge agains On the other hand, perhaps this th Thomism altogether, specifically propo the Augustinian conception of the soul and (c) may not seem so problematic. A of bodies, they can certainly survive wi remove a soul from certain groupings o that that soul (and any rational being it "ibid., p. 17. 34Cf. ibid., p. 72. This content downloaded from 128.205.114.91 on Sun, 02 Feb 2020 13:29:38 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms Embryos, Souls, and the Fourth Dimension 67 in the afterlife. Now again, option (b) seems quite strange (God would be removing both souls when he could have just transferred one of them to the fused embryo), and it again denies that the life of all human beings begins at conception. So consider again the best option for the Augustin ian, option (c), according to which God does indeed remove one soul and transfer the other to the fused embryo. The first question to ask is which would be which? Each of the origi nal embryos would have the same full-fledged human status, and each would seem an equally legitimate candidate for having its soul trans ferred to the fused entity. Once more we have a situation similar to the third alternative in the fission case: here too there simply would be no non-arbitrary reason for saying the survivor is identical to one of the pre fusion humans rather than the other. Keep in mind that the thing God would have "attached" to it—the soul—would at this point itself have to be utterly featureless. No one who holds that embryos are ensouled hu man beings maintains that there is any thinking going on at that early stage; the rational capacities of the soul would not yet have been acti vated. But if the soul is immaterial, and it does not yet have a psychol ogy, then there would seem to be nothing in virtue of which it would—at this point, anyway—be distinguishable from other such souls. It would be a completely featureless "nugget," somehow constituting the essence of particular human beings, without itself yet being particularized in any way. Thus, there could in principle be no reason for God to assign the fused organism one soul over the other, based on their present properties. They would at this point be entirely interchangeable, entirely indistin guishable, and so there could be no basis at all on which to assign one of the pre-fusion souls into the fused organism. Indeed, this is precisely why Aristotle (and Aquinas) objected to the Platonic conception of souls in the first place.35 There are two seriously problematic implications of the view, then. For one thing, if embryonic souls are featureless nuggets, then it is ex tremely difficult to believe that they could have any moral status whatso ever. What possible reason could there be to assign moral protection to an entity devoid at that time of any particularized features, with neither individuated material form nor any psychological characteristics? The 350ne might maintain, however, that, perhaps in virtue of having been attached to an embryo with a particular complement of DNA for a bit, these souls might not be entirely indistinguishable after all. (I am grateful to an anonymous reviewer for providing this possibility.) What matters for my purposes, however, are the intrinsic properties of the souls in question, and while the history of the soul's attachments may constitute certain distinguishing extrinsic properties, there remains nothing about the souls in and of them selves at this stage that could render them distinguishable from one another. Furthermore, purely extrinsic properties like these could not possibly help establish the kind of moral status that I go on to discuss next. This content downloaded from 128.205.114.91 on Sun, 02 Feb 2020 13:29:38 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms 68 David W. Shoemaker least problematic alternatives in the fis God assigning souls to various collection whim, but this would actually be comple determining moral status. An updated v should incline us towards accepting in because they already have moral status bryos have moral status because God en case, then we would need to look som provides embryos with that independent Second, we should also not forget t bryos—numbering millions (or even bil taneously aborted post-implantation, of aware of her pregnancy. On the version sion, we would have to maintain that mostly undetected and/or ignored, const tion of human beings of massive propor "tiniest of human beings" were immorta exactly would be the point? They again tinguishable, neither missed nor mourne them simply "floating" around, capab tantly, entirely without a personal ident too pointlessly crowded to contemplate.3 The soul theorist should thus abandon puzzles of fission and fusion by allowin stall souls in an arbitrary way. If the em are thus two options: either there we along, or there were none until the twinni can be no objection to stem cell (and o based on the objection that it destroys tion is the otily way to go. I have discus but now it is time to explore it in depth ing ontological picture required by the s ultimate downfall. 36Cf. L. Nathan Oaklander, "Personal Identity (2001): 185-94. 370ne might object to this characterization by are united to a body in an afterlife (and in that tity), or (b) perhaps they acquire some sort of ps ently of embodiment. Option (a) would be a Thom gustinian reply. In either case, though, the worr point be simply creating souls intended to exist a again, what could the point possibly be? Of cours be a point at all, but without one, we are once m presume that the Church certainly wants to avoid This content downloaded from 128.205.114.91 on Sun, 02 Feb 2020 13:29:38 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms Embryos, Souls, and the Fourth Dimension 69 Dimensions and the Future Consider a "snapshot" of the five-day-old embryo. We don't yet know whether or not it will split into two (or more) distinct embryos. Neverthe less, the soul theorist wants to maintain that this entity is ensouled, that it is, at this time, a human being. Now while souls don't exist in any spatial dimensions, human beings (as distinctly earthly entities) do. The ques tion we need to consider, then, is how many dimensions do human be ings take up? There are two rival theories. According to three-dimen sionalism, human beings are three-dimensional objects, having spatial, but no temporal, parts, and they are wholly present from moment to mo ment. Across time, then, human beings are enduring objects. On the other hand, according to four-dimensionalism, human beings are four dimensional objects, having not only spatial but also temporal parts, such that what exists from moment to moment are temporal stages of a space time worm. Across time, then, human beings are perduring objects.3 If souls are substances (as they clearly are on the Augustinian view still under discussion), then what is their role in these rival ontologies? They of course could not have any spatial parts, being immaterial. But if they are also simple substances, they could not have any temporal parts either.39 At any particular moment that a soul exists, it must be wholly 38For a lucid discussion of the rival ontologies, along with a compelling set of argu ments in favor of four-dimensionalism, see Theodore Sider, Four-Dimensionalism: An Ontology of Persistence and Time (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001). 39While it is obvious why a soul could not have any spatial parts, it may be less obvi ous why a soul could not have any temporal parts. Normally, of course, temporal parts are thought to exist, if they do at all, in spnrio-temporal objects, which, if true, would immediately rule out souls (non-spatial objects) as having any temporal parts. Neverthe less, it seems in principle possible for there to be objects having no spatial location that still have temporal parts (see, e.g., ibid., p. 59). What exactly would this mean, though? The soul would have to have parts that exist only instantaneously (or perhaps over a more extended interval of instants) and be such that each one of those parts nevertheless wholly overlaps with everything that is a part of the soul at that instant (or interval). Now insofar as the soul is supposed to be a simple substance, it is also not supposed to be divisible at all, either into spatial parts or temporal parts like this. But why not? The restriction against spatial parts is obviously required by the soul's immaterial nature. The restriction against temporal parts would have to follow, I believe, from two aspects of the temporal parts view that are problematic for immaterial substances. First, the notion of what it means for a temporal part to "overlap" at t with everything that is part of the soul at t is an idea of which it is exceedingly difficult to make sense with respect to immaterial sub stances. This is no problem, of course, with respect to material objects: for a temporal part of my mug to overlap at t with every part of the spacetime worm of my mug that exists at t, it just has to be the case that every particle of physical stuff making up the temporal part of the mug at t takes up the same space as everything that is part of the spacetime worm-mug at t. But if an object, like the soul, takes up no space to begin with, it is difficult to see how to specify what it would mean for its temporal part to overlap with anything. Second, if a soul were to have temporal parts, there would need to be a This content downloaded from 128.205.114.91 on Sun, 02 Feb 2020 13:29:38 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms 70 David W. Shoemaker present (in whatever sense we can m souls). Souls must, then, endure acros location). And if souls are what make being, human beings must also, then dimensional objects. The problem, though, is that the only ings-on in the fission and fusion dimensional ontology of human being again, this time talking only about hum intuitive sense. Recall the options: (1) products; (2) Adam ceases to exist, and human beings; (3) Adam survives as on the other is a brand new human being); human beings who branched off with se just in terms of our ordinary concept of simply because one does not equal two believe, for a variety of reasons; for ceased to exist when no tissue whats should the double success of there now b to Adam count somehow as a failure, as (3) raises the arbitrariness issue: since b similar in every respect to Adam, what be to mark one product as Adam and the What of Option (4), though? It origina souls in one body, but removing talk of ders this option no longer problematic, view of human beings. If human beings worms, then they have temporal parts, involved would be akin to roads that sh they would coincide for a brief tempor tinct) before twinning, at which point t off. For the four-dimensionalist, there ing, distinct objects at a time. The coin ject are identical, but that does not ren cal. Think here of the famous lump/stat lump of clay on a Monday and creates a unifying principle connecting the various parts a again difficult to imagine what that unifying pr selves—might consist in, if there were no materi tuting them. For these reasons (and there may w the "indivisibility" constraint on souls as meaning parts. This content downloaded from 128.205.114.91 on Sun, 02 Feb 2020 13:29:38 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms Embryos, Souls, and the Fourth Dimension 71 day (without, of course, destroying the lump in the process).40 If the statue and the lump are distinct objects, what is involved in the identity conditions of each? They certainly share all their physical properties in common, but they don't share the same historical properties: the lump has the property "exists on Monday," while the statue does not. Accord ing to Leibniz's Law, they cannot be identical to one another. But how can two exactly similar things, located in the same portion of spacetime, both exist? The four-dimensionalist answers that on Tuesday it is only a temporary part of each object that exists, that is wholly present. These temporary parts are indeed identical—that's how they can both "fit" into this single location—but that does not at all mean that the two objects— the lump and the statue—are identical with one another, for the lump's spacetime worm contains parts (on Monday, e.g.) not contained in the statue's spacetime worm. For the three-dimensionalist, though, there is a huge problem in ex plaining such events. How can two ontological objects completely over lap with one another, both being wholly present in the exact same spatial location at the exact same time, while nevertheless remaining distinct? There simply doesn't seem room enough for both objects to "fit." So if the statue and the lump on Tuesday are wholly present in the exact same region of spacetime, in virtue of what could they be distinct objects? And the same problem extends to the question of the human beings in Option (4) of the twinning case: if there are two human beings wholly present but occupying the exact same region of spacetime, in virtue of what could they possibly be two distinct human beings? There doesn't seem room enough for both human beings to fit. It is here that the soul theorist might try to come to the rescue, mark ing the distinction between the two human beings not in virtue of any physical properties, but in virtue of their non-physical properties, viz., their souls. Now keep in mind that talk of souls rendering some X a hu man being presupposes the existence, in some identifiable, material sub stance category, of an X to which the soul is attached. The "X" in this case is the embryo—or, more technically, the ICM—so for the soul theo rist's case to be made (in Option (4)), the ICM must contain two wholly present human beings. And because souls have no spatial location, there should be no more worries about how two human beings could "fit" into the same spatial region at the exact same time. One embryo could house two distinct souls, rendering it two distinct human beings, both wholly present at that time. Now this answer is not a possibility for the Thomis tic conception of souls, given that on that view souls are formal designs '"'See, e.g., Sider, Four-Dimensionalism, pp. 5-6. For his detailed treatment of at tempted three-dimensionalist accounts of this case, see pp. 154-61. This content downloaded from 128.205.114.91 on Sun, 02 Feb 2020 13:29:38 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms 72 David W. Shoemaker particularized in specific human bodies, s soul per body. Imprinting two coin desig yields only one actual coin. But we have conception as incoherent with respect to conception, on the other hand, might ve sibility to avoid the worry under consid formal designs but are independently cording to this view, then, human beings pairs of bodies and souls, so that the ord is distinct from the ordered pair/human that both human beings occupy precisely But while this explanation might accoun of pre-fission human beings, if it nev dimensionalist account of the bodies inv cannot explain the diachronic identity in After all, what is the relation of B1 to th time just prior to fission, and t2 the time one body, Bl. But at t2, there are two "brand new," to be labeled B2 and B3, or that they should be labeled B1 and B2? If ing ordered pair of bodies and souls ({B identical to either of the tl ordered pairs. the resulting ordered pairs ({B2, S2}, sa identical to neither of the original ordere of introducing the possibility of two sou solve the fission case by maintaining that existence at the moment of conception, (b and be wholly present in one body pre-f human beings would be the survivors of what (b) would have to involve (on a co count of bodies) contradicts both (a) and A more promising option might then b view of the bodies involved, such that so bodies. What is wholly present at tl, then a wholly present temporal part of two s dered pairs involved would thus be funct tinct bodies to distinct souls, that is, {Bl and B2 are spacetime worm-bodies who overlap with one another. Articulating th the most plausible account of what happ case (both spacetime worm-bodies shar while also allowing that (a) both bodyconception, and (b) the two post-fission This content downloaded from 128.205.114.91 on Sun, 02 Feb 2020 13:29:38 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms Embryos, Souls, and the Fourth Dimension 73 fied with the pre-fission body-stage as part of the same body (while not being unified with each other). Nevertheless, while making this move renders the identity of the bod ies involved utterly unproblematic, it raises a host of questions about the identity of the human beings involved. For example, do human beings (ensouled bodies) endure or perdure? On this account, the bodies in volved perdure, while the souls involved endure, but how are we to make sense of what happens to the combination of the two? If human beings are truly ordered pairs of bodies and souls, then what precisely is wholly present at til There are only (temporal) parts of two bodies wholly pre sent, but there are two wholly present souls. Set aside for now the prob lem of fission and consider an embryo at tl that will not twin, though. Combining bodies and souls under these competing ontologies in this simple case yields a straightforward dilemma resting on a logically ex haustive disjunction: human beings either endure or perdure. On the one hand, if human beings endure, then all of their parts must be wholly pre sent at any given time. But on this view only the tl temporal part of our human's body is present at tl\ its remaining parts have yet to occur. Thus not all of the human being's parts are wholly present at tl, so it cannot endure. On the other hand, if human beings perdure, then what is wholly present at any given time must be only temporal parts of human beings. But on this view the soul renders the embryo housing it a human being, and because the soul is a simple substance it can have no parts whatso ever, including temporal parts, so at tl what is wholly present is not just the temporal part of the embryo/body but the entire soul. Since the entire soul, and not merely a temporal part of it, is wholly present at tl, the hu man being involved cannot perdure. Ultimately, then, the view implies that human beings neither endure nor perdure. But if these are logically exhaustive possibilities, then the soul view (in this version) is incoherent. Perhaps, then, as a last resort, the Augustinian soul theorist could simply abandon the ordered pair approach altogether and press the more radical view that the souls involved constitute the entirety of the human beings involved—that is, the identity of human beings has nothing what soever to do with the identity of any of the bodies involved. This move would allow the soul theorist to avoid the incoherence associated with having competing ontologies for material and immaterial objects, while still allowing her to take the most plausible option in the twinning case: she can place two souls in the pre-fission embryo, have them be two wholly present human beings who endure across time, and then locate each soul in a different body post-fission. Thus if human beings are wholly spiritual, immaterial objects, then they are not bound by certain ontological constraints and identity conditions of the material objects in which they are housed. This content downloaded from 128.205.114.91 on Sun, 02 Feb 2020 13:29:38 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms 74 David W. Shoemaker Unfortunately, this move would under theorist's project altogether. If the iden are wholly divorced from the identit straints of the bodies that house them— tion of bodies to souls—then human be objects in any way. But if that is the c killed, and it would be pointless to obje search on the grounds that it involves mantling a house does not kill its occupa Conclusion I need to make explicit both what I have and have not shown here. I have tried to show that there is no way for either Thomistic or Augustinian soul theorists to maintain, in the light of fission and fusion cases, that embryos of the sort used in stem cell research are human beings without rather crippling implications. Thomistic advocates maintain a logically impossible position in light of the possibility of fusion, wherein humans die with no physical remains to be resurrected. On the other hand, Au gustinian advocates, in offering the least theologically problematic re sponse to fission, cannot put together a coherent ontological picture ex plaining the relation between bodies and souls unless they divorce souls from bodies altogether, which renders their overall moral conclusions groundless. Now there may be some views on the nature of the soul that I have not considered and that could somehow avoid these difficulties. I readily concede this point. As I have noted elsewhere, the soul is a "slippery lit tle sucker," and its allegedly immaterial nature allows for any number of possibilities, each equally as plausible (or implausible) as the next.41 All I 4'See my "The Irrelevance/Incoherence of Non-Reductivism About Personal Iden tity," Philo 5 (2002): 143-60, p. 147. Or, as my former colleague Ron Mclntyre puts it, one can always just "make up" some quality of the soul that can do the trick. True enough. On a brilliant episode of The Simpsons, Bart sells his soul to his friend Milhouse in exchange for five dollars. Prior to this exchange, Milhouse articulates his own theory of the nature of the soul by saying that it resides "kind of' in the chest area, and when you sneeze that's your soul trying to escape. "Saying 'God bless you!' crams it back in." And when you die, it squirms out and flies away. To Bart's probing questions about what happens if you die at the bottom of the ocean, or what happens if you die in the middle of the desert, Milhouse glibly replies that the soul can swim, and it also has wheels so it can drive to the cemetery. After showing this hilarious episode to my students, I then ask, "And what makes Milhouse's theory wrong?" Answer: nothing. It's just as good a theory about the soul as anything else, precisely because of the soul's allegedly immaterial na ture (so perhaps Milhouse's claims about its having wheels may need to be jettisoned, unless they're special, immaterial wheels, of course). This content downloaded from 128.205.114.91 on Sun, 02 Feb 2020 13:29:38 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms Embryos, Souls, and the Fourth Dimension 75 have tried to do is examine what I take to be the best, most worked-out conceptions and applications of the soul view, derived from Catholic scholarship. Is this then a straw man? If it is, then the outer layer of straw must mask concrete inside, for this view has been longstanding and very difficult to destroy. And while I certainly have not destroyed it myself, I believe I have revealed enough serious problems attached to it that its advocates should be very reluctant to present it as a freestanding objec tion to stem cell (and other early embryonic) research again. Of course, the problems associated with the soul view with respect to fission and fusion are what have led many of the more reflective theo logical advocates to mark the point of ensoulment as occurring after the potential for twinning and such has ended, generally around the four teenth day after conception when the "primitive streak" that will become the spinal cord is formed.42 But this move implies that stem cell research, where the stem cells are derived from pre-implantation embryos between one and five days after fertilization, would be perfectly permissible. If the soul somehow determines/marks moral status, and an embryo is not ensouled until fourteen days after conception, then prior to that point there would be no soul, no entity with moral status, that would be de stroyed via stem cell (and other embryonic) research, and therefore, once more, no good reason to object to it.43'44 David W. Shoemaker Department or Philosophy Bowling Green State University dshoema@bgnet.bgsu.edu 42See Ernie W.D. Young, "Ethical Issues: A Secular Perspective," in Holland et al. (eds.), The Human Embryonic Stem Cell Debate, p. 171. 43Actually, though, this view also falls prey to the objections relating to the feature less nature of the souls implanted even at this point, for embryos with newly formed primitive streaks would still have no psychological capacities, which means any souls attached to them would be absent psychologies, and if they were to be spontaneously aborted at this point, they would still have no particularized, distinguishing, personal features. 44For extremely helpful comments and insights on earlier drafts of this paper, I am grateful to Eric Cave, Sean Foran, Josh Glasgow, Doug Portmore, and two anonymous referees for Social Theory and Practice. I am also grateful to audience members at the 2002 Mountain Plains Conference and colloquia at California State Universities Bakers field and Northridge, where I tried out many of these ideas. Finally, I would like to thank the Office of Research and Sponsored Projects, at California State University, North ridge, for providing me with reassigned time that reduced my teaching load in 2003 while I worked on this project. This content downloaded from 128.205.114.91 on Sun, 02 Feb 2020 13:29:38 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms 
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