The Dawn Treader

I received two recommendations to go rent the movie The Island.  So I did.  And I am glad I did.

The setting is the future.  The premise of the movie is best captured in one of the scenes from the movie.  Some potential clients are ushered into a futuristic, multi-media sales pitch.  The clients are obviously wealthy.  The prospects are watching a presentation on a large screen.

A voice softly says:

"The human organism.  Unique in all the universe in its complexity.  The product of three billion years of evolution.  Perfect in every way except one.

Like all machines, it wears out.

For centuries, the idea of replenishing the human body has been at the forefront of science."

The film stops.  The camera cuts to Dr. Merrick standing in front of the group.  Merrick smiles.

"Ladies and Gentlemen.  Welcome [pause] to the next generation of science."

He motions in the direction of a clear box ... with something organic and fleshy looking inside.  It is hermetically sealed and environmentally controlled.  It looks like a scary science project.

"The agnate.

An organic frame engineered directly into adulthood.  To match the client's age.

You are looking at stage 1 of its development.  Within 12 months it will be harvest ready. Providing a carrier for your baby.  A second pair of lungs.  Fresh skin. All genetically indistinguishable from your own.

And in compliance with eugenics laws of 2050, all our agnates are maintained in a persistent vegetative state.  They never achieve consciousness.  They never think, or suffer, or feel pain, joy, love, or hate.

It is a product, ladies and gentleman, in every way that matters.  Not human."

Merrick's company has found a way to clone you for the purpose of harvesting organs.  A fantastic idea, no?  It is like having an insurance policy.

Would it be morally wrong?  What if using spare parts from your clone could add sixty years to your life?  It would be okay ... just as long as your clone never achieved consciousness ... right?

Many believe that consciousness is what it means to be a person.  Sentience.  The ability to have measurable brain activity.  They have no issue at all with embryonic stem cell research because the human embryo has not reached consciousness and cannot feel anything ... like pain.  Withholding food and water from Terri Schiavo gave them no moral discomfort ... after all, Terri Schiavo was already dead, in their view.

Now, let's take that moral reasoning to its logical conclusion.  If we could create fully developed clones that were kept in a persistent vegetative state, then would it be murder to kill them and take their body parts?  I don't see how.  They never achieved consciousness.  They are not a person.  No rights.  Like Merrick says, a product.

The reasoning holds ... if, and only if, sentience is the key ingredient to being a human person.  Yet the thought repulses us ... and it should.

The thought of growing human bodies for harvesting organs seems terribly wrong ... conscious or not.  It is repugnant.  Yet somehow we don't get that until we see a harvesting facility with rows and rows of adult human bodies being grown in sacs.

Since human embryos don't much look like us, it is a much easier pill to swallow.  But the reasoning is the same.

The truly scary part about the film is that it is within the realm of plausibility to imagine this business idea taking root in our culture.  I realize we are decades (perhaps centuries) away from perfecting cloning technology to this degree.  Unfortunately, the moral skids have been greased to make the case for why it would be a morally acceptable idea ... all in the name of cures and healthier lives.

A utopian fountain of youth?  Or our worst Frankensteinian nightmare?  It all depends ... on what it means to be human.