In his July 2 column, “Research on stem cells should be in the open,” Charles Krauthammer refers to the human embryo as a “potential human.”
Since Krauthammer advocates research which destroys these embryos, he clearly uses the term “potential” to make a distinction between the human embryo (which we should not defend) and a “verified human” whom we ought to defend.
He would be hard-pressed to find scientific support for such a differentiation; in 1981, the U.S. Senate summarized eight days of testimony from 57 witnesses with this statement: “Physicians, biologists, and other scientists agree that conception marks the beginning of the life of a human being–a being that is alive and is a member of the human species.” If there is doubt, shouldn’t we give the “potentially human” embryo the benefit of that doubt?
