Observations on a very funny video about doctors meeting bioethicists

Dianne N. Irving
copyright May 24, 2014
Reproduced with Permission

Observations on a very funny video about doctors meeting bioethicists 1

The video, "The Doctor Meets the Bioethicist", with its URL given below, is truly one of the funniest, yet timely and profound, "discussions" on "bioethics" and medical doctors I've seen in a long time. It is amusing, short and sweet, easy to understand, and yet beautifully articulate. Please take a few minutes to watch it! What follows also in this article are simply a few of my own observations I thought would also help people with the range of issues -- just "fill-ins" that might additionally bring home several of the critical points briefly made in the video itself -- and help people better understand historically to some degree how we ever got into such messes these days to begin with (and continue to do so!).

As a member of the first formal bioethics group of graduate students at the then-brand-new Kennedy Institute of Ethics (we were called the First Generationers) at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., and with a doctoral (Ph.D.) degree in that new "bioethics" as well as in the History of Philosophy (which I later taught for 15 years), let me just add a few additions to the points made by this wonderful and very funny video about a conversation between a doctor and a bioethicist.

First, the utilitarian-based "bioethics" was created out of thin air in the 1978 Belmont Report on mandate of the 1974 National Research Act by an 11-member National Commission politically appointed by then-Secretary of DHHS Casper Weinberger. Note that "ethics" is a sub-field of philosophy, yet only one member of that National Commission had a doctoral degree in philosophy (Art Caplan), and another had some academic work as an "ethicist". The other 9 members had various unrelated degrees. Of course, since bioethics didn't exist until the Belmont Report (referred to as the formal "birth of bioethics"), none of the members of that National Commission were bioethicists themselves, and none of them were required to take all those 36 graduate courses in bioethics that we were required to take -- they just taught them. Since 1978 probably 95% of "bioethicists" have no degree in bioethics per se , but might have taken a course or sat in on a seminar on bioethics -- often "taught" by another "bioethicist" who also had no doctoral degree in bioethics. Interestingly, the first formal course in bioethics ( 1979 ) at the Kennedy Institute of Ethics at Georgetown University was taught by "bioethicist" and animal-rights proponent Tom Beauchamp who used the very first textbook in bioethics co-authored by himself and theologian James Childress; the text was published in California in 1975 , long before the Belmont Report . You might challenge any bioethicist you come across for their academic credentials to teach or practice "bioethics". I think you will be shocked at their lack of academic credentials. See my long and fully documented analysis and evaluation of that new "bioethics", " What is 'bioethics'?" (June 3, 2000), UFL Proceedings of the Conference 2000 , in Joseph W. Koterski (ed.), Life and Learning X: Proceedings of the Tenth University Faculty For Life Conference (Washington, D.C.: University Faculty For Life, 2002, pp. 1-84, at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_36whatisbioethics01.html .). (See also other articles by Irving). 2

Second, the degree in utilitarian bioethics at the KIE came through the Department of Philosophy at Georgetown University -- but no real philosophers in the philosophy department had any degrees in bioethics (in fact, they argued with the bioethicists constantly), and only a couple of the more than a dozen bioethics professors had degrees in philosophy. Yet, as professors, all of these bioethics professors from the KIE were required to teach hard core philosophy as well as "bioethics".

The academic field of philosophy itself was changing at that time. It used to be that an undergraduate degree in philosophy (BA) was required before being accepted into the graduate courses for the M.A. and Ph.D. degrees in philosophy -- and most Ivy League universities before that, including my small Catholic college, had required that all undergraduate students take the entire History of Philosophy over four years in chronological order regardless of one's major, a requirement for any "well-educated person". Many colleges and universities also required that students take their Great Books Program. But no longer. With the advent of bioethics, one could get into the graduate program for philosophy at Georgetown with literally no former courses in philosophy. Nor was it necessary to take the full History of Philosophy, as one could now get a doctoral degree (Ph.D.) in philosophy by doing course work in just one of the 4 historical periods of philosophy (including contemporary or modern philosophy only ).

Thus the "philosopher" in the video featured below might be familiar with Peter Singer, but would have no knowledge at all of the entire rest of the History of Philosophy whatsoever, or any intellectual problems with Singer's brand of "philosophy". "Philosophy", instead, became a source of finding a "hero" for whatever political agenda one wished to pursue. This is why I later stated to my students on the first day of my 2-semester required courses in the entire History of Philosophy (covering 28 historical philosophers in chronological order, including their metaphysics, epistemology, natural philosophy, anthropology and ethics) that the purpose of the course was not to find a "hero" that agreed with you, but to help you learn how to think straight and evaluate all philosophical theories . As they fully learned by the end of my 2-semester course, no philosopher is all right, and no philosopher is all wrong. Thus it is very sad that at the KIE the bioethics professors "counseled" that it was a total waste of time -- even "criminal" -- for any bioethics or philosophy graduate students to be forced to study any philosophers that came before Hume and Mill (the modern basis for utilitarian theories, but rather "deconstructed" versions of them for purposes in bioethics courses). Thus these students would be oblivious of the dogmatic intellectual fallacies inherent in Hume, Kant, Mill or therefore bioethics itself. I guess ignorance is bliss.

In short, the field of "bioethics" was concocted by mostly politically -appointed non-philosophers with no degrees in philosophy or ethics (a subfield of philosophy), taught mostly by bioethics professors who had no degrees in bioethics or in philosophy themselves , and the bioethics grad students could get a Ph.D. in philosophy but was not required to study any philosophers who pre-dated Hume or Mill. And that is precisely why many don't have a clue as to the pitfalls and fallacies of "bioethics" -- because the philosophical and intellectual errors in modern and contemporary philosophy were nothing more than the very same errors that surfaced centuries ago and since then, and which had thus been identified and fully rejected . Such historical knowledge would have let these new bioethics students understand precisely what was therefore erroneous in the philosophical "theories" that post-dated Hume, Kant and Mill -- including this new field called "bioethics". Can't think -- or teach -- what you don't know. So how did such "bioethicists" become so influential in public policy-making so fast across the globe since then?

Third, " push the logic ", as I used to insist with my students. Note that the "bioethicist" in this video below often quotes the "personhood" arguments of Oxford educated (with a thesis on civil disobedience supervised by R. M. Hare) Australian bioethicist Peter Singer , promoter of a kind of bioethics called " preference utilitarianism", and of " specism " (erroneously privileging human beings above other species), referred to by the bioethicist in the video below. [For an unusually accurate article, with lists of his books, articles, and "ethical" positions, see "Peter Singer" at Wikipedia , in: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Singer ]. Singer was subsequently brought to Princeton to head up their Center for Human Values [ https://www.coursera.org/instructor/petersinger ]! Go figure! He taught an internet course reaching globally on his "Practical Ethics" from Princeton just this past March 2014 [ https://www.coursera.org/princeton ].

According to Singer (and the other "bioethicists" mentioned in the video below), "personhood" depends on " rational attributes " (the active expression of mental qualities of self-awareness, ability to think and relate to the world around one, etc.) and " sentience " (the active expression of the physical ability to feel pain and pleasure). According to Singer et al, some non-human animals are "persons" because they actively express these "personhood" standards, and some aren't "persons". Indeed, it is this Singer-type of "philosophical" inspiration that is behind much of the "non-human personhood" efforts of today's transhumanists. The actual "human species" is essentially irrelevant, while the legal push is on for a new "posthuman" species with high levels of "rational attributes", e.g., Artificial Intelligences, etc. that can fuse into Cosmic Consciousness; and dolphins, apes and even chickens are more "persons" than many human beings. (In fact, it was Peter Singer, author of Animal Liberation , who as the first president of the International Bioethics Association submitted a "Personhood of the Great Apes" declaration to the United Nations, and who wrote their first bioethics book on Global Ethics !). And for Singer et al, some human beings are thus "persons", and some aren't .

But let's push that logic. IF , as Singer et al claim, even normal human infants don't qualify as "persons" (and whose parents don't want them, and the wishes of their parents who are persons are to kill them), THEN even adult human beings who do not actively express "rational attributes" and "sentience" are also not "persons", as Singer et al admit -- AND THEREFORE , it is "bioethical" to kill those adult human non-persons using euthanasia and physician-assisted suicide, use them to obtain their organs, use them in highly destructive experimental research "for the benefit of other persons" in society, etc. -- and no need for their "informed consent", of course. This would include the following adult human non-persons who can't actively express "rational attributes" : the comatose, those under anesthesia during surgeries, the mentally ill, the mentally retarded, drug addicts, alcoholics, teen-agers (?), transhumanists/futurists (?) -- even anyone who is just SLEEPING (one of the famous arguments by Mersenne against Descartes' absurd philosophy with his "mind/body" splits, after which Descartes was laughed out of the academy, along with his absurd "physics" theories: see, https://www.google.com/#q=%22Descartes%22+%22Mersenne%22 ). This would also include the following adult human non-persons who cannot actively express "sentience" (the ability to feel pain and pleasure): the frail elderly, those with severe nerve damage (e.g., neuropathy, nerve damage from traffic accidents, etc.), the physically handicapped including paraplegics and others who are wheel-chair bound or are using prosthetics (and that would include millions of war veterans). Why not use them in destructive experimental research "for the greater good of society"? It is no wonder, then, that it was the international disabled community who first recognized the dangers involved with Singer's new "bioethics" from the start and protested him globally. [See Irving articles.] 3

Finally, while it is good to remind people about "human exceptionalism" and support it, how one defines that term is just as critically important. Is the term being defined selectively, reductively? If only human beings who are reproduced sexually (fusion of sperm and "egg") are "persons" and asexually reproduced human beings aren't, if only those human beings sexually reproduced and "in the womb" are "persons" and those still in the woman's fallopian tube traveling towards her womb or those in petri dishes in IVF and ART facilities aren't, or if only those human beings who develop after the formation of the "zygote" (Carnegie Stage 1C) are "persons" but those human beings who already exist before (Carnegie Stages 1A and 1B) the formation of the zygote aren't (when most human cloning and human genetic engineering is performed), then the claim of "human exceptionalism" is not much better than the claims of the Belmont "bioethicists". [See Irving articles.] 4

https://twitter.com/bioedge/statuses/470086112468164608
BioEdge
Twitter
May 23, 2014

[also at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4LTq6kBU2-E&feature=youtu.be ]
VIDEO: The Doctor Meets the Bioethicist
(In which people with two very different views get to know each other)
by Wesley Smith

Endnotes:

1  Please note that after 30 years of addressing these related issues in great detail, it is impossible to document everything in the main text here, so please see the following articles for quite extensive historical, scientific, philosophical and bioethical documentation and references that you might be interested in in the references provided in each of these following articles. Most articles have been published in peer review journals, but usually I'm listing only the URLs for them on LifeIssues.net, and the Irving Library, at: http://www.lifeissues.net/section.php?topic=ir . Also, since the URLs for the original website for the Carnegie Stages of Early Human Embryonic Development were conveniently changed a couple of years ago (with no instructions as to how to find the new government website), all such references to the Carnegie Stages used in the following articles before 2013 need to be corrected by using the new URLs for the Carnegie Stages, which can be found in Irving, " The Genuine Carnegie Stages " (September 8, 2013), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_216genuinecarnegiestages.html . Finally, several of the early articles listed here were published, along with several articles by human embryologist Dr. C. Ward Kischer, in a book co-authored by both of us: The Human Development Hoax: Time To Tell The Truth! (Gold Leaf Press, 1995, ISBN 1-886769-01-X; 2nd ed. 1997), at: http://www.amazon.com/Human-Development-Hoax-Time-Truth/dp/0966034406/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1393614544&sr=1-1&keywords=%22Human+Development+Hoax%22 . [ Back ]

2  See, e.g., articles by Irving:

-- Mini-summary of my 400-page doctoral (Ph.D.) dissertation, Philosophical and Scientific Analysis of the Nature of the Early Human Embryo (Washington, D.C.: Georgetown University, Department of Philosophy, 1991), "Philosophical and scientific expertise: An evaluation of the arguments on 'personhood'" , Linacre Quarterly February 1993, 60:1:18-46, at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_04person1.html .

-- "Ex Corde Georgiopolitam: The Many or the One?" , Georgetown University , (Written on request of The Academy , Georgetown University) (March 24, 1997), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_15excorde.html .

-- "Which ethics for the 21st century? A comparison of 'secular bioethics' and Roman Catholic medical ethics" (March 14, 1999), Linacre Quarterly (in press), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_02ethics1.html .

-- "The U.S. Belmont Report Already Requires All Citizens To Take Part in Research 'For the Greater Good'" (April 18, 2005), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_90belmontreport1.html .

-- "Human Embryology and Church Teachings" (September 15, 2008), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/em/em_132embryologychurch1.html ; also published in The New Catholic Encyclopedia , 2nd ed., Supplement 2009 , (Detroit: Gayle), pp. 287-312, as "Embryology, Human"; also at: http://www.personhood.ca/pdfs/embryology_human.pdf .

-- "The impact of international bioethics on the 'sanctity of life ethic', and the ability of Catholic ObGyn's to practice according to conscience" ; presented at the international conference, "The Future of Obstetrics and Gynaecology: The Fundamental Human Right to Practice and Be Trained According to Conscience"; sponsored by the International Federation of Catholic Medical Associations (FIAMC), and MaterCare International, Rome, Italy, June 18, 2001, Proceedings of the Conference , at: http://www.fiamc.org/fiamc/03events/0110gyneco/gyntexts/irving.htm ; also in, Journal: Canadian Chapter, Fellowship of Catholic Scholars (Autumn 2002), pp. 7-32; also at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_40bioandconscience01.html . [ Back ]

3  See, e.g., Irving:

-- "On Singer's, 'The Sanctity of Life: Here Today, Gone Tomorrow'" (Sept. 27, 2005), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_105singerandlife.html

-- "Reading the Singer on 'bestiality'" , (Feb. 8, 2004), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_23singerglobalethics.html

-- Comments: "Hentoff's aim at Singer misses mark" (Sept. 12, 1999), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irvi/irvi_43hentoffsinger.html

-- "Accountability in research with persons with mental illness" , Accountability in Research Nov. 1993, 3(1):1-17, at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_12mentalillness1.html ; also in Adil E. Shamoo (ed.), Ethics in Neurobiological Research with Human Subjects: The Baltimore Conference on Ethics (1996), at: http://books.google.com/books?id=nfGKYOP7yEC&pg=PA27&dq=%22Dianne+N.+Irving%22&hl=en&sa=X&ei=3uPhUvGHM5G_sQSksYKABg&ved=0CDcQ6AEwAw#v=onepage&q=%22Dianne%20N.%20Irving%22&f=false ; also in James F. Childress, BioLaw , Vol. 2 (1998), at: http://books.google.com/books?id=v9hCAQAAIAAJ&q=%22Dianne+N.+Irving%22&dq=%22Dianne+N.+Irving%22&hl=en&sa=X&ei=tefhUqSJOcO-sQSNnIG4CQ&ved=0CC8Q6AEwATgo ; also in George F. Tomossy and David N. Weisstub, Human Experimentation and Research (2003), at: http://books.google.com/books?id=g9tNAQAAIAAJ&q=%22Dianne+N.+Irving%22&dq=%22Dianne+N.+Irving%22&hl=en&sa=X&ei=-OjhUrqpBOexsQTPnYHQDA&ved=0CD0Q6AEwBDgU ; also in Bonnie Steinbock, John Arras, and Alex John London, Ethical Issues in Modern Medicine (2003), at: http://books.google.com/books?id=xh5rAAAAMAAJ&q=%22Dianne+N.+Irving%22&dq=%22Dianne+N.+Irving%22&hl=en&sa=X&ei=-OjhUrqpBOexsQTPnYHQDA&ved=0CEcQ6AEwBjgU .

-- "Biomedical research with 'decisionally incapacitated' human subjects: legalization of a defunct normative bioethics theory" (June 1998), submitted to the Journal of Health Care Law & Policy , Univ. of Maryland, at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_70incapacitated1.html ; also in Sanjyot D. Pai Vernekar, "Human Person in Experimentation: Ethical Issues and Concerns" , in Journal of Dharma , Vol. 33, Issues 1-4 (2008), at: http://books.google.com/books?id=Pr3gAAAAMAAJ&q=%22Dianne+N.+Irving%22&dq=%22Dianne+N.+Irving%22&hl=en&sa=X&ei=BurhUoOYHsnKsQSupIH4DQ&ved=0CEcQ6AEwBTgK .

-- "The PSDA and the depressed elderly: 'Intermittent competency' revisited" , (with Adil Shamoo), Journal of Clinical Ethics Feb. 1993, 4(1):74-80, at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_44depressedelderly.html .

-- "Psychiatric research: Reality check" , The Journal of the California Alliance for the Mentally Ill Spring 1994, 5(1):42-44, at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_35realitycheckmental.html ; also in Patricia Backlar, David L. Cutler (eds.), Ethics in Community Mental Health Care (2002), at: http://books.google.com/books?id=qJ8Rja91sHkC&pg=PT203&dq=%22Dianne+N.+Irving%22&hl=en&sa=X&ei=3uPhUvGHM5G_sQSksYKABg&ved=0CEYQ6AEwBg#v=onepage&q=%22Dianne%20N.%20Irving%22&f=false ; also in McFarland & Co., Journal of Information Ethics , Volumes 4-5 (1995), at: http://books.google.com/books?id=yN5MAQAAIAAJ&q=%22Dianne+N.+Irving%22&dq=%22Dianne+N.+Irving%22&hl=en&sa=X&ei=qubhUvq0JsOisAS1vIGYDA&ved=0CDYQ6AEwAzgy

-- Speech: "Maryland State proposed statute for medical research using 'decisionally impaired' individuals: Beneficence or abuse?" , at Conference on Conducting Medical Research on the 'Decisionally Impaired', The Law and Health Care Program of the University of Maryland Law School, Baltimore, MD, May 28, 1997; at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_29speechmaryland.html .

-- "Academic fraud and conceptual transfer in bioethics: Abortion, human embryo research and psychiatric research" , in Joseph W. Koterski (ed.), Life And Learning IV (Washington, D.C.: University Faculty for Life, 1995), pp. 193-215, at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_10fraud1.html . [ Back ]

4  See, e.g., Irving:

-- "The Genuine Carnegie Stages" (September 8, 2013), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_216genuinecarnegiestages.html .

-- "Personhood 'Language' 2008 - 2011" (October 2, 2011), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_192personhoodlanguage.html .

-- "Irving Re Gardner's Rejection of Herranz's New "Theory" on Human MZ Twinning" (March 14, 2014), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_220rejectionherranztheory.html .

-- "Irving Re Denker's 'Comments on G. Herranz: The timing of monozygotic twinning: a criticism of the common model' in Zygote" (2013) (Feb. 20, 2014), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_219hanswernerdenker.html . See also important recent article by developmental biologist Denker acknowledging with extensive scientific references that some embryonic stem cells and some iPS cells have the capacity to revert to new embryos and develop as such, and thus the need to reexamine the accuracy of the term "pluripotency" , "Time to Reconsider Stem Cell Induction Strategies" , Cells 2012, 1(4), 1293-1312; doi:10.3390/cells1041293 .

-- "Junk Science In, Junk Prolife Out" (October 28, 2013), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_218junksciencejunkprolife1.html .

-- "#1 - Totipotency: Scientific References" (September 23, 2013), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_217totipotencyscientificreferences1.html .

-- "Framing the Debates on Human Cloning and Human Embryonic Stem Cells: Pluripotent vs. TOTIPOTENT" (July 23, 2005), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_100debatecloning1.html .

-- "Conception" is not "The Immaculate Conception" (January 26, 2013), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_209immaculateconception1.html .

-- "Errors in the 'Sanctity of Human Life Act', and the March For Life 'Principles 2013'" (January 15, 2013), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_208errorprolifeprinciples.html .

-- "Irving: Disagreement with this 'Thomistic' definition of 'person'" (December 30, 2012), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_207disagreementperson.html .

-- "'Revival' of St. Thomas' Philosophy - Yes, But Not His Erroneous 'Delayed Personhood' Argument; Concerns for Beginning and End of Life Issues" (April 4, 2011), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_185revival.st.thomas1.html .

-- Irving and Kischer, "Scientific Response to Criticism of the California Human Rights Amendment as 'Protecting Fertilized Eggs'" (December 9, 2009), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_175responsecalifornia.html .

-- Irving and Kischer, "Responses to Dr. Condic's 'Science' in National Catholic Register Interview" (January 6, 2010), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_172responsetocondic.html .

-- "Condic's 'Pre-Zygote' Error in 'When Does Human Life Begin?'" (November 18, 2008), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_134maureencondic1.html .

-- [Fr. Tad] "Why on earth would we want to 'Recapture the soul of bioethics'???" (May 26, 2009), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_143ethicsandbioethics.html

-- "Neither, Nor: Bryne's and Willke's Pseudo-Battle Over Human Embryonic Stem Cells" (June 19, 2008), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_129bryneandwillke.html .

-- "Comments: CRTL Acknowledges Irving's Scientific, Moral and Legal Arguments on 'Personhood'" (July 17, 2008), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_131personhoodandcrtl.html .

-- "Problems with the phrase, 'from conception/fertilization to natural death'" (Aug. 8, 2007), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irvi/irvi_67coloradoinitiative.html .

-- "'Pre-embryos' and 'Pre-embryo substitutes': Safeguarding human life 'from the very beginning'?" (June 8, 2009), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_164safeguardinglife.html .

-- "Heritage Foundation 'Science': 'Pregnancy' Begins at 8-days??" (June 29, 2005), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_98heritagefoundation.html .

-- "FRC's Brochure on Human Cloning at the U.N.: Serious Flaws, Dangerous Consequences" (Oct. 27, 2004), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_84cloningatun1.html

-- "The Kettles calling the Pots fake: 'When is cloning not 'cloning'?; When both sides play politics with human lives" (July 27, 2004), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_63kettle1.html .

-- "'Experts' Teaching Scandals and Catholic 'Confusion'" , November 11, 2003, at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irvi/irvi_17scandalsconfusion.html .

-- "Massive Confusion Re Church Teachings on Euthanasia by Pastors" , November 6, 2003, at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irvi/irvi_16massiveconfusion.html .

-- "FERTILIZATION and IMPLANTATION of the Early Human Embryo: Accurate Scientific Resources" (May 8, 2013), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_212accurateresources1.html .

-- "Plan B's Manufacturer: Pills Can Be Abortifacient" (April 27, 2013), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_211manufacturerandpills.html .

-- "'Contraceptive' and 'Morning After' Pills: Women and Young Girls, You're On Your Own" (April 5, 2013), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_210asecret.html .

-- "Requested Testimony Submitted to FDA Re Change of MAP to OTC Status" (Nov. 19, 2004), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_85newdrug.html .

-- "The woman and the physician facing abortion: The role of correct science in the formation of conscience and the moral decision making process" , ["Is the 'morning after' pill possibly abortifacient?"], presented at "The Scientific Congress, The Guadalupan Appeal: The dignity and status of the human embryo", Mexico City, October 28-29, 1999; published in Un Appello Per La Vita: The Guadalupan Appeal: Dignita E Statuto Dell'embryione Umano (Libreria Editrice Vaticana (2000), pp. 203-223; also in, Linacre Quarterly Nov./Dec. 2000), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_03facing1.html .

-- "Why Accurate Human Embryology Is Needed To Evaluate Current Trends In Research Involving Stem Cells, Genetic Engineering, Synthetic Biology and Nanotechnology" (November 20, 2012), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_206accuratehumanembryology1.html .

-- "Irving Response to, 'Calling People Vegetables: Where Did It Come From?': De-Hominization" (May 18, 2012), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_197vegtable.html .

-- " Any Human Cell - iPS, Direct Programmed, Embryonic, Fetal or Adult - Can Be Genetically Engineered to Asexually Reproduce New Human Embryos for Purposes of Reproduction (implantation for 'Infertility')" (November 2011), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_194cellasexuallyreproduce1.html .

-- "A One-Act Play: 'Crippled Consciences and the Human Embryo'" , presented at Medicine and Human Dignity's " International Bioethics Conference: 'Conceiving the embryo' ", (re human cloning and human embryonic stem cell research), Brussels, Belgium, (and CD-Rom), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_178one-act-play1.html .

-- "Playing God by manipulating man: Facts and frauds of human cloning" (October 4, 2003), presented twice at the Missouri Catholic Conference Annual Assembly Workshop , Jefferson City, MO, at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_22manipulatingman1.html .

-- "Playing God ...; Appendix Church teachings and the 'delayed personhood' ruse" (Oct. 4, 2003), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_74churchteaching1.html .

-- "Ethical and Scientific Concerns About Induced Pluripotent Stem Cell Research -- Yamanaka and Thomson" (June 1, 2008), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_127concerns.html .

-- "Analysis: Stearns' Congressional Human Cloning Fairy Tale 'Ban'; New Age and Transhumanist Legislation for 'Converging Technologies'?" (Sept. 8, 2004), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_77stearncloningtale1.html .

-- "What Human Embryo? Funniest Mental Gymnastics from Medicine and Research" (Oct. 14, 2004), Presented after the White Mass, sponsored by The Guild of Saint Luke, The Catholics Physicians of The Archdiocese of Boston at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_82whathumanembryo1.html .

-- "Analysis of Legislative and Regulatory Chaos in the U.S.: Asexual Human Reproduction and Genetic Engineering" (Oct. 20, 2004), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_81chaosasexgen1.html .

-- "'New age' embryology text books: 'Pre-embryo', 'pregnancy' and abortion counseling: Implications for fetal research" , Linacre Quarterly May 1994, 61(2):42-62, at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_50newagetextbook1.html .

-- "Letters to Embryologist Keith Moore Re Term 'Pre-embryo'" (July 1993), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_56lettersmoore.html .

-- "Iran, abortion - and Islamic embryology?" (July 20, 2004), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_51iranabortionembyro.html .

-- "American Medical Association's "Narrow Definitions", Legal "Re-definitions" ... and Reproductive Cloning" (October 9, 2009), at: http://www.lifeissues.net/writers/irv/irv_170ama1.html . [ Back ]

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