In the Philippines, gambling is a multi-billion dollar business. In taxes alone, it generates and remits around 11 billion U.S. dollars to the Government coffers. No wonder then that gambling is sponsored and pampered by the Government at the expense of the windfall of losses from its affluent and moneyed citizens (e.g. high class and middle class).

It (the Government) rationalized that the greater bulk of its income from Government run gambling houses, shall go to charity works for the poor and the needy constituents who direly need of the basic Government services. But be that as it may, it doesn’t make it right, insofar as its moral dimension is concerned. According to the fundamental principle of morality, the end does not justify the means, that is, an inherently evil or bad act (e.g. gambling) could not be set right or purified by good intentions or means like charity works for the poor.

The stark reality of gambling is that in the end everyone (e.g. bettors) end up as losers. It is always the trick of the trade that the game house emerged as the undisputed sure winner, otherwise, there’s no sense of pursuing its business any further, so to speak. While some few bettors got so lucky and enjoy a couple of winning streaks, but almost all other bettors share the burden of the collective losses.

Here’s why? The taste of a few streak of wins gives thrills and excitement that makes you want to keep on betting and keep the stakes high even more. This  reinforces to become a habit. Once ingrained, it then becomes an addiction. This is the part where lives are shattered in the process. Some irreparably destroyed. Other lives have never been the same again living in wretchedness and misery.

Not to mention that even the middle-income working class have also fallen prey to the promise of hitting the jackpot that gambling pompously offers. They, too, have become partakers of the collective losses.

In fact, gambling whether legitimate or illegitimate ones is considered as one of the contemporary social problems facing our country today, insofar as the sociological perspective of gambling is concerned.

That’s why the Roman Catholic church has been constantly locked in the moral fight against all forms of gambling (whether done in high or low places, low stakes or high stakes) to safeguard its flock from the evils of gambling. The Church could have only been right to have done so.

This just goes without saying that the passage of this bill is without the people’s blessing or support. The people through their elected representative in Congress, has clearly manifested their will: They flat out rejected the idea of divorce as this has the potential to ruin or cause irreparable damage to the family. According to the Latin maxim: “Vox populi, vox dei” (the voice of the people is the voice of God). Conversely, this just goes to show how people value the sanctity and legal institution of marriage more than anything else.

By the way, marriage is: “The legal union of a man and a woman as husband and wife.” While divorce is: “The legal dissolution of a marriage.” (The American Heritage Dictionary, Fourth Edition, copyright 2004, Bantam Dell, New York, New York, U.S.A.)

The divorce bill has proven itself to be a thorn in the neck. It has been shot down many times and yet it managed to stage a comeback every once in a while!

Case in point:

Just recently, representatives of GABRIELLA, a party list group in Congress known for its feminist cause-oriented advocacy, has revived the measure to pass the divorce bill into law in order to better serve and protect the rights and interests of women, insofar as the issue of legal dissolution of marriage, is concerned. According to the proponents, the passage of the divorce bill into law should empower the couple especially women who are into a troubled marital relationship to decide for themselves according to their best interest when to break the bond of marriage pursuant to the stipulated legal grounds.

To digress, marriage is not made overnight. To begin with, there is a long period of courtship. Then yet another longer period of going steady and ultimately getting engaged. Even then, it takes years of planning and preparation before it comes to the final part of tying the knot. But with the passage of the divorce bill into law, marriage then can just easily be unmade almost in an instant because of the flexible and liberal legal grounds. Thus, this shall make a dangerous precedent and in the process become the established trend.

Among the purpose of marriage is to raise a family and for posterity. But divorce self-defeats all this for which the institution of marriage is  established. It undermines the very foundation of the family which is considered as the basic unit of society as enshrined in the fundamental law of the land.

According to an intensive long term sociological study, children who come from broken families are most likely to become juvenile delinquents or least likely to succeed in life. This is attributed due to the trauma that etched a psychological scar on the children at a tender young age brought about by the disintegration of the family through the dissolution of marriage or divorce.

Whatever happens to the exchanges of solemn marriage vows: For richer or for poorer, in sickness or in health, for better or for worse, till deaths do us part?

Besides, why need divorce when there is already an existing legal relief for annulment of marriage and legal separation? It is much better this way because the long and winding process of annulment would make us reconsider to exhaust all efforts of reconciliation before the marriage is finally undone by the law.

In the words of the Bible: “What God hath put together, let no man puts asunder.”

To illustrate my point:

Everyday, we see the sun rises in the east and sets in the west. Because of that regularity (almost ad infinitum) people once believed that the sun was actually moving around the Earth. Thus the inception of Geocentric Theory that the Earth is the center of the universe and the sun and all other planets and stars revolved around it. Geocentric Theory was formally formulated by Claudius Ptolemy sometime in the 4^th century A.D. Although, the same belief was echoed many centuries back by the Greeks, notable of which was the ancient Greek astronomer Hipparchus.

Since then, it had taken roots in the stream of scientific thought for the next 1500 years or so. Of course now, we have come to know that it is not actually the sun that revolves around the Earth, but the Earth and so with other planets in the solar system that revolves around the sun.  This just goes to show that perception is not the interpretation. Or, for want of a better term, perception is not the reality.

Here is another example:

“The illusion of solidity: Bang your hand on a table. Although the table feels solid, it is made almost entirely of empty space! Here’s why? “The atom, with a diameter 100,000 times of its nucleus, is almost all empty space (p. 264, Bennet, et. al., 2005).” Nearly, all the mass of the table is contained in the nuclei of its atoms. But the volume of an atom is more than a trillion times the volume of its nucleus, so relatively speaking the nuclei of adjacent atoms are nowhere near touching one another. The solidity of the table comes about from a combination of electrical interactions between the charged particles in its atoms and the strange quantum laws governing the behavior of electrons. If we could somehow pack all the table’s nuclei together, the table’s mass would fit into a microscopic speck. Although we cannot pack matter together in this way, nature can and does-in neutron stars…” (p. 107 Bennet, et. al., 2005)

(Source: The Essential Cosmic Perspective, third edition, Jeffrey Bennet, et. al., copyright 2005 Pearson-Addison Wesley, San Francisco U.S.A.)

On the other hand, on one occasion, the astronomer par excellence, Pierre Simon de la Laplace was discussing to Napoleon Bonaparte about the workings or movement of the heavenly bodies. He explained that the mechanism of which was governed by physical laws of nature. Then, in reaction, Napoleon asked: Where does God fit into the picture? He replied:  “Sire, I have no need of that hypothesis.”

Thus, began the perpetuation of the myth that God is a useless hypothesis, since as far as what can be observed in the events of nature everything has a natural explanation. Hence, atheists and the likes preemptively rule out all kinds of supernatural explanation that is used to explain the workings of the physical world. This, in effect, has put the reality of the existence of God in question.

But reality check we can never tell, whether events in nature can always be reduced in natural explanation. There is always a room for anomaly and even mystery at one point or the other. In fact, all the fundamental questions (the existence of God) still remain a mystery insofar as the scientific quest for truth is concerned. This is so because science can only offer a tentative or provisional view of reality.

Furthermore, the uncertainty principle states that the more we determine the position of a certain particle of matter (e.g. electron), then the less we know about its momentum, or vice versa. This implies then that if we cannot specify the exact condition of the present then neither can we determine the state of the future. So what does this make of reality?  This means that there is no way that we can predict the future.

Conversely, if we cannot make an accurate prediction of the future, then by the same we cannot assume the regularity of the laws of nature The Greek historian, Heraclitus could have never been right: The only permanent thing in this world is change. Since reality itself is in a state of constant flux.

According to Max Plank “We have no right to assume that any physical laws exist, or if they have existed up to now, that they will continue to exist in a similar manner in the future.”

The crux of the matter here is that the belief that God does not exist only holds true in the minds of atheists. Of course, we should know by now that Perception is not the interpretation or the reality.

Erstwhile, Marriage has been an exclusive privilege between a man and a woman. It’s hard to think that one day it becomes a privilege, too, of the same sex. But as it is, it is now a reality to behold.  

Recently, Argentina, a predominantly Catholic country, took the stage of world politics by surprise when it signed a bill into law granting  same sex marriage to homosexuals. For the record, Argentina becomes the tenth country in the world to give legal recognition for same sex marriage.

It granted homosexuals (e.g. gays, lesbians) such marital rights in the light of equal standing before the law. Hence, protect and uphold the rights and interests  of homosexuals from discriminations.

This is a classic realization of the legal dictum that goes: what is legal is not necessarily moral? As it stands now. though, the law takes legal recognition of same sex marriage, but then again, that doesn’t make it right insofar as the state of morality is concerned.

According to the principle of golden mean too little or too much of everything is bad. Same sex marriage is an instance of being in a state of excess or extreme. It overshot the moral bounds when authorities gave credence to homosexuality as a norm of nature. But, God through the laws of nature designs our sexual biology directed towards the opposite sex, and with good reasons because it is geared towards procreation or perpetuation of the specie. 

Fortunately, for now our country is spared from such moral threat. It helps though that our country has a strong catholic heritage and moral foundation.

The line from the song where is the love by the “Black Eyed Peas”: Whatever happens to the values of humanity, is a fitting reflection to all this fuss? But, after all it’s been said and done, what have we become?

82 – St Joseph of Arimathea, dies.

432 – Celestine I, Italian Pope (422-32), dies and ends his reign as Catholic Pope.

916 – Kliment/Clemens van Ohrid, Bulgaria bishop of Ohrid/saint, dies.

1101 – Koenrad, RC-German king (1087-98), dies.

1230 – Treaty of San-Germano between Emperor Frederik II & Pope Gregory IX.

1298 – Roman Catholics German King Albrecht I von Habsburg installed.

1501 – Copernicus formally installed as canon of Frauenberg Cathedral.

1549 – Jesuit priest Francis Xavier’s ship reached Japan.

1833 – Bartolommea Capitanio, Italian monastery founder/saint, dies at 26.

1953 – Vatican disallows priest holiday work in factory.

1993 – Mafia bombs historical buildings in Rome/Milan/Vatican City, 5 killed.

(Source: HistoryOrb.Com, Copyright 2000-2010)

The reality of God existing in three Persons: The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit can be effectively compared with the three states of the substance “water.” Water comes in three states: solid, liquid and gas. But despite of whatever states it’s in, the essence or, for want of a better term, its chemical composition which is a composite of two atoms of hydrogen and one atom of oxygen, remains essentially and chemically the same.

On the other hand, we cannot infer that just because water comes in three states then we conclude that there are “three waters”. In the same way, that the mystery of the trinity of God: The Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit cannot be taken to mean as there are three distinct Gods. Like water in its manifold states: solid, liquid and gas, the trinity of God: the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, may not, after all, be at odds with human reasoning. Since, it has found its validation through the events in nature in the light of natural reason.

Sex education per se is not bad. There is no harm done when the intention is to educate in the right way and at the right time. Like it or not, everybody needs to be educated on something, somehow, someway – even sex education included. The Church takes no issue of sex education by itself. It is only against when it is taught in the wrong way and at the wrong time. Teaching sex education with the kind of graphic representation like showing visually how sexual intercourse is done, in front of curious, innocent and wary eyes of students in the classroom, is out of context and inappropriate insofar as the teaching and learning situation, is concerned. Teaching this kind of education on this particular level is not for the school to teach but rather the job of a sex guru. On the contrary, sex education can be equally and effectively taught without necessarily resorting to graphic and visual representation. After all, the real thing is something that comes out of instinct. No sex guru or teaching manual is required.

In educational psychology, there is such a thing as the right time to learn. According to Edward Lawrence Thorndike in his first psychological laws of learning which is the law of Readiness it states thus: no amount of effort that can force the individual to learn to begin with, if he is not yet mentally prepared and ready to take up such learning task. In this particular case, sex education at a tender young age like in the primary level is not advisable.

Reality check! Look what happen in countries where liberal sex education is the norm? What have they become? It got the worst of them. They become nothing but liberated, licentious, libertine, even promiscuous, pervert and what not? Even Sexually Transmitted Diseases (STDs) like Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS) are most prevalent.

In the end, good always triumphs over evil!

The Reproductive Health Bill is a house bill authored by Rep. Edcel Lagman, et. al. and filed in the 14th congress. Its Full title is: House Bill No. 5043 “An Act Providing for a National Policy on Reproductive Health, Responsible Parenthood and Population Development and for Other Purposes. ” Its shorten title is: the “Reproductive Health And Population Development Act of 2008″ But it is more widely known, so to speak as the Reproductive Health Bill.

By and large,  the human reproductive health bill intends to protect and uphold the rights and interests for the benefit of the greatest welfare for the greatest number insofar as the reproductive health of women is concerned.

In an article “Reproductive Health Bill: Facts, Fallacies “written by Rep. Edcel Lagman for the Inquirer.net in 3rd of September 2008, he underscored the following salient points about the bill:

“The reproductive health (RH) bill promotes information on and access to both natural and modern family planning methods, which are medically safe and legally permissible. It assures an enabling environment where women and couples have the freedom of informed choice on the mode of family planning they want to adopt based on their needs, personal convictions and religious beliefs”.

“The bill does not have any bias for or against either natural or modern family planning. Both modes are contraceptive methods. Their common purpose is to prevent unwanted pregnancies”.

“The bill will promote sustainable human development. The UN stated in 2002 that “family planning and reproductive health are essential to reducing poverty.” The Unicef also asserts that “family planning could bring more benefits to more people at less cost than any other single technology now available to the human race.”

“Coverage of RH. (1) Information and access to natural and modern family planning (2) Maternal, infant and child health and nutrition (3) Promotion of breast feeding (4) Prevention of abortion and management of post-abortion complications (5) Adolescent and youth health (6) Prevention and management of reproductive tract infections, HIV/AIDS and STDs (7) Elimination of violence against women (8) Counseling on sexuality and sexual and reproductive health (9) Treatment of breast and reproductive tract cancers (10) Male involvement and participation in RH; (11) Prevention and treatment of infertility and (12) RH education for the youth.” (Copyright 2001-2010 INQUIRER.net, An INQUIRER Company)

At first sight, it seems there’s nothing wrong with the ”Reproductive Health Bill” at least on the outside. The authors must have done a great job in carefully choosing the right words that tends to evoke a conditioned positive response. On the surface, it seems innocent and harmless-one would not even think that it poses a threat to morality. But underneath lurks a hideous intention to undermine the foundation of morality which has the potential to create havoc and disorder insofar as the state of moral order is concerned. When the bill that has the potential to become a law threatens to infringe or cross the line on the hallowed grounds of morality, then it is deemed warranted to draw the lines, and ascend into the moral high ground.

No amount of euphemism or positive phrasing can change the fact that the reproductive health bill is an affront to the absolute and universal moral ideals of man.

What are the moral issues involved behind the reproductive health bill? The human reproductive health bill, among other things,  is a legislative measure set to  contain population growth with the use of all means necessary to arrest the growth of the population. The underlying premise as alleged by the proponents is that unchecked population growth is the cause of poverty. But it would do well to note, for the record  that this working assumption is highly debatable. Although, it is not within the parameter of this writing that such issues shall be dealt with.

On the one hand, the reproductive health bill presents and teaches the natural method on family planning, but on the other, it also endorses the use of  morally questionable method for preventing pregnancy, (e.g. the artificial method on family planning). This includes the use of: condoms, tubal ligation, vasectomy, pills and among others. Although, in the end, it is the person who decides which method to subscribe.

The use of artificial method on family planning is not only a sin against the law of God: because it transgresses the very commandment to procreate, but, at the same time, it is also a violation against the law of nature itself. Since the perpetuation of the specie is also a biological need. Hence, any artificial means to prevent it is deemed a violation of the natural processes of the law itself.

Man is a stuff of nature, hence, he is at the mercy or under the confines of its laws. The perpetuation of one’s own kind is one such law. Even the morality of the action of man is subject to the natural law. Should an act be not in accord with the natural processes of  the law, then there are  equivalent consequences to be meted out. According to the law of interaction, for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction.

God being the one who sustains nature, maintains the delicate balance of life and death over living things. While God giveth life, He also taketh away. Thus fertility balances itself with mortality. Athough, the trend now is that fertility is much higher than mortality. But, in the end, the rapid rise of fertility is checked and interrupted by mortality from man-made (e.g. wars, accidents, genocides, etc.) and natural dissasters (e.g. calamities, diseases, epidemics, etc.). This effectively restores the balance of things.

Nature has its own way to trim and populate itself. For example, life exploded in the cambrian period bringing about different kinds of species, but then it was punctuated from one massive extictinction to the other. The most recent of which, happened 65 million years ago, when most of the living organisms, including the dinasaur was wiped out in the face of the earth, but then again, life found its way to populate the world, until to date.

To digress, there is a dictum in law that what is legal may not necessarily be moral. While the law is designed and made to protect and uphold the rights and interests for the greatest benefit of the greatest number of people, but the law does not care so much and distinguish or even concern itself between what is right and wrong. The law is founded on utilitarian principles which means that the welfare of the greatest number of people is considered as the greatest good. It does not recognize the moral fact that the goodness of an act is intrinsic and inherent into the thing itself.  Therefore, it does not subscribe to the fundamental principle of morality that the end does not justify the means. Irregardless of the means, whether it is bad or good as long as it brings  about the desired end, then the law could only care less.

But what shall become of the law if it clashes with the ideals of morality? Then such a law is doomed to lose the so called moral high ground. Hence, the spirit of the law ceases to exist, and so does the law itself.

Man is endowed with a universal moral grammar. Even without learning it, he can tell outright, out of instinct, what is right from wrong? It seems, he has an embedded or built-in mechanism to automatically identify and distinguish between right and wrong.

The Church made it certain through the tools of rational inquiry and the agency of philosophy to embrace the in-depth and intensive study of morality under its province. Thus, the Church leads the way in the pursuit of the ultimate goodness of things. The Church then becomes the beacon of morality. It is the measure and the standard in which to judge whether an action is right or wrong.

On the contrary, morality can never be arbitrary that are only based on the whims and caprices of some people. Morality is absolute and universal. Had it been that morality becomes subjective, then there’s no morality to speak of in the first place since morality becomes relative and everyone therefore shall have its own standard measure of right and wrong.

Why the reproductive health bill is an affront to morality? There is no better way to answer it except to cite the fundamental law of morality: The end does not justify the means!

The Church, since its incipient days until now, has been beset from almost all kinds of scandals: imagined or real. Among them are as follows:

In New Testament times, Judas Iscariot betrayed, when he conspired with the people wanting to have Jesus killed. In the end, he led the way for the crucifixion of Jesus on Mount Calvary. Also, but of minor consequence, Peter, when asked if he knew Jesus, denied on three occasions of having had an association with Him.

In the Middle Ages, the Church-sanctioned Holy Crusade where Christian Monarchs in Europe were brought to the task to reconquer the Holy Land, had cost the lost of innocents and unnecessary waste of lives. Alongside, the Church had been accused to have killed and burned in the stakes by way of the establishment of Inquisition Court to purge out heretics from its flock in order to safeguard the integrity of its doctrines and teachings. Sometime also in the middle ages the Church was accused to have elected a female Pope named “Joan.” But now as agreed by scholars and historians we came to know that all this is nothing but stuff of legends.

Moreover, the general inclination of the Church in the past to meddle in the political affairs of the states, had led to a life of corruption and unholy collusion to the powers that be. At its height, this brought about the Investiture Controversy where the Church had challenged the authority of Monarchs over the power of appointment of church officials.

Not to mention that there are also erring Popes, like Pope Alexander the VI born Rodrigo Borgia which was notorious for debasing the papal standards. There was also the so called “Avignon Popes” or otherwise known as the “Babylonian Captivity” where French and Roman contenders alike had contested for the Papal throne. Among others, this led the rebellious Anti-Popes who, after going against the authority of the Church to elect the Pope, ended up electing themselves as the self-proclaimed Pope.

Of course, not to be excluded in the list are: The scientific persecutions, which were systematically undertaken by the Church in order to conform with its accepted position on the knowledge of the natural world: notable of which was the case of Galileo for his position that the Sun is the center of the solar system and the Earth and other planets revolve around it, rather than vice versa.

In the aftermath of World War II, the Church was accused of the seeming inaction and disregard to condemn the German NAZI persecution of the Jew in the holocaust, which costs around six million innocent lives.

Today, the Church has been shaken with a new kind of scandal, one that calls into question and threatens the integrity of its servants: the Priest. Of late, the Church has been hit with sex scandal after the other, one that involved the molestation and abuse of children and illicit relationships with their parishioners. But the way that the Church has handled and dealt with it discreetly, has drawn severe criticisms from almost all sectors of society.

In retrospect, in March 12, 2000, the late Pope John Paul the II had  issued a public apology: “Mea Culpa” asking for forgiveness for all the wrongs and lapses (i.e. the commission and omission of the same) that the Church had inflicted to humanity throughout all history. On the contrary, the Pope clarified that it is not the Church (being the Mystical Body of Christ) per se, that had committed such wrongdoings but rather the sons and daughters of the Church (being all too human, therefore, frail and fallible), who were behind its hierarchy and administration.

In the same way, we should not tend to forget that a Priest, though a servant of God, is also a human being like us who equally share each our weaknesses and tendency to make mistakes. There is no better way to put it, in the words of Alexander Pope: “To err is human, to forgive divine.”

On the other hand, human cloning belongs to reproductive cloning whereby the whole organism is copied from a single cell. A classic example is “Dolly the Sheep” which was cloned by Ian Wilmut at Rosenberg Institute at Edinburgh, Scotland sometime in 1997.

Its Shortcomings And Downsides…

It’s way too dangerous to go over the edge in the quest for human cloning and such other morally sensitive cloning method like embryonic stem cell  owing to human fallibility and frailty.

To illustrate my point:  

“Embryonic cells splendid ability to metamorphose into various type is also their own limitation: not surprisingly, bladders infused with bone from stem cells gone awry aren’t clinically useful, says Jason Hipp, one of some 60 institute researchers working on how to keep the cells from going haywire.”(National Geographic.Com/Magazine July 2005: The Power to Divide (p.p. 6-22) by Rick Weiss)

“One of the greatest challenges  in this work is to harness and direct cell differentiation,” says Harvard cell biologist Douglas Melton. To tell one stem cell to form blood, another skin, and another liver tissue-what’s  nature’s secret? Complex combination of growth factors and chemical and genetic signals drive the process, which researchers are only beginning to pin down. Until they do, embryonic stem cell therapies won’t make the leap from lab mice to humans.” (National Geographic.Com/Magazine July 2005: The Power to Divide (p.p. 6-22) by Rick Weiss)

“Critics point to worrisome animal research. Showing that embryonic stem cells sometimes grow into tumors or morph into unwanted kinds of tissues-possibly forming, for example, dangerous bits of bone in those hearts they are supposedly repairing…Some countries, such as Germany, worried about a slippery slope toward unethical human experimentation, have already prohibited some types of stem cell research. Others, like the U.S., have imposed severe limits on government funding but have left the private sector to do what it wants.” (National Geographic.Com/Magazine July 2005: The Power to Divide (p.p. 6-22) by Rick Weiss)

Seoul National University is the center of operation for Woo Suk Hwang, the South Korean scientist who made headlines in May 2005 when he announced that his team, using Dolly the sheep techniques, had created 11 human stem cell lines perfectly matched to the DNA of human patients, a giant leap beyond anything any other lab has achieved Hwang does not want his work in therapeutic cloning to be confused with reproductive cloning which he deems “unsafe and unethical”. He thinks cloning fully grown humans may be biologically impossible, given the many miscarriage and genetic anomalies that have bedeviled attempts to clone animals.” (Time Almanac 2006: The Revolution in Therapeutic Cloning (p. 569) by Alice Park)

Although, as per verification and peer review in the following year, South Korean Scientist, Woo Suk Hwang work: the first to successfully produce human stem cell lines, had been discredited as hoax.

Cloning is an arduous process that requires great patience and almost ends in failure as cells burst, tears, or suffer damage to their DNA.” (National Geographic.Com/Magazine July 2005: The Power to Divide (p.p. 6-22) by Rick Weiss)

Reality Check

What is there in the real world is that the issue of human cloning and such other morally questionable technique or method of cloning, is a constant source of division and discord. The following excepts mirror such reality:

“But research on embryonic stem cells has been a subject of heated debate, since their extraction destroys the early stage embryo from which they are derived.” (The World Almanac, 2005: Science and Technology (p.332) by William A. Macgeverran, Jr.)

“It will be difficult to do an end run around the ethical quarrels”, says bio-ethicist Tom Murray, president of the Hastings Center in New York. We’re now having to confront subtle distinctions about life’s beginnings that have enormous scientific and religious implications.” (National Geographic.Com/Magazine July 2005: The Power to Divide (p.p. 6-22) by Rick Weiss)

Moral High Ground

There is no better way to put it, George W. Bush’s in an earnest political statement exemplifies what the moralist called the moral high ground:

“I am very concerned about cloning, “President Bush said in response to the news. I worry about a world in which cloning becomes accepted. Critics of the embryonic cloning contend that because it involves the destruction of an embryo it is tantamount to murder. As President Bush put it “he objects to promoting science which destroys life in order to save life.” (The World Almanac, 2005: Science and Technology (p.332) by William A. Macgeverran, Jr.)

Proper Perspective

Without proper perspective, one is at a loss to determine the real issues that lead us to better appreciate the valid and sound arguments in a given discourse.

Going back to the issue. There are those who claim that science itself is amoral, viz., that it is neither moral nor immoral. They say: it is not science that makes such act as either moral or immoral, but the man (scientist) behind it. Well, that may be granted in the interim. But this is a misplaced argument. This point is already moot. The more relevant point is: Should science by itself be able to regulate such action?

Value Judgment Outside From The Province of Science

Science, therefore, has no business telling us what is right from wrong? According to standard and objective sources:

“Without an operational definition (observable and measurable description), the scientific method cannot be employed. Science cannot, for example, tell us whether or not a biblical heaven or hell exists. Such metaphysical concepts are generally not reducible to operational terms. They lie outside the realm of observation and are best left to the areas of religion and philosophy.”

“Besides metaphysical questions, questions of values and ethics also lie outside the domain of science.”

On the other hand…

“The scientific method can be further understood by distinguishing it from other ways of knowing, such as philosophy…Philosophy, on the other hand, often makes its inquiry outside the empirical world, investigating values, meaning, existence, and so on.” (p.p. 196-200 Critical Thinking, 2000 Chapter 10: Scientific Thinking by Gary R. Kirby, Jeffry R. Goodpaster and Marvin Levine)

“Today, philosophy is used to signify the critical evaluation of facts of experience. The key word in this definition is evaluation, rather than critical. This is so since philosophy differs from the positive sciences, especially assigns values to human experience. Scientists, though they must be concerned about truth and validity of their work, nevertheless, do not, as scientists, make value judgments. Philosophy has been reserved the right to render value judgments.” (Logic For Filipinos, 1994 Chapter 2: The Nature of Philosophy (p. 10-11) by Prisciliano T. Bauzon)

Definition of Terms

It is imperative to define the terms involved in order to have a meeting of minds on key points of this discourse. Among the terms in need of operational definitions are:

“Philosophy”(Greek philosophia “love of wisdom”)” the rational and critical inquiry into the basic principles.” One of the main branches of philosopy is ethics, “the study of the nature of morality and judgment”

“Morality is a system of ideas of right and wrong conduct.” (The American Heritage Dictionary, 2004 (p. 551) Margery S. Berube

“Ethics comes from the Greek word ethos which in the plural means character. Ethical actions may be right or obligatory, or disapproved of because they are bad, wrong, undesirable or evil. In philosophy ethics is the study of moral principles . A traditional philosophical question is whether right and wrong are inherent in the nature of things and therefore absolute, or mere conventions, and thus relative to time and place.” (The New Desk Encyclopedia, 1993: Ethics (p. 427) by Robert A. Rosenbaum)

Furthermore: “Ethics is the science of morality, also called moral philosophy and seeks to discover consistent principle by which human actions can be judged. Until about a century ago, ethics aimed to be a guide to human conduct. Now it is more descriptive , attempting to discover how moral decisions are actually made.” (Oxford Concise Encyclopedia, 2004: Ethics (p.313) by Alan Isaacs and Jonathan Law)

Conclusion

Cloning per se is not downright immoral. What makes it so is when it degrades the dignity of man (his unique identity and individuality) in the case of human reproductive cloning, where the whole organism is copied genetically from a single cell. And, when it takes out other life, in the case of embryonic stem cell cloning. Even though, it (embryo) is still in the incipient stage of development. But one  should not lose sight of the fact that the procreation of a human being is a process. Hence, it should be taken from the point of its origin or beginning: from the fertilization stage (when the sperm fertilized the egg cell) to its ultimate end: death (complete cessation of life). On the contrary, there should be no discrimination in between such processes: whether or not when can a human being be called as such. A process is taken from the point of its beginning up to its end, otherwise, it ceases to be a process. It is taken as a whole, not by parts.

Human reproductive cloning, either as byproduct of embryonic or adult stem cell cloning is and always will be considered as inherently evil insofar as ethics is concerned. This also includes embryonic stem cell cloning, however, good is its therapeutic applications. On the other hand, therapeutic cloning which makes use of adult stem cell cloning, may, after all, be free from the so called moral restraint.

Bottom line is: what is scientific may not necessarily be ethical. The fundamental principle of morality still holds true: “the end does not justify the means.” No matter how ennobling and good the intentions of such actions are? But if the the means of achieving it are wrong, then it is downright immoral and inherently evil. No ifs and buts. On the contrary, the principle of double effect (both undesirable acts, but the good act is intended, while the evil one is not intended), may not apply in the case of human reproductive cloning and embryonic stem cell cloning. Since, in the first place, the very act itself precludes the willing of good intention.

In conclusion: “The Pillars of Hercules, (the classical and medieval symbol for what lies at the edge of the known: Ne plus ultra-No further) for modern science may become moral and spiritual. Scientist-and society-will have to decide…whether to tinker with the very genes that make us human.” (p. 2 National Geographic Vol. 196, No. 4 October 1999: Science-Asking Infinite Questions by Joel L. Swerdlow, 1999)