A month after a pig heart transplant, man works to regain strength with no rejection so far::It’s been a month since a Maryland man became the second person to receive a transplanted heart from a pig — and hospital video released Friday shows he’s working hard to recover.
So what is true of the pig that if it was also true of the human would make it morally okay to kill the human for their organs?
It’s mostly about how cruely we treat food animals normally that I have an issue with. Hunting, for example, I view as a morally acceptable method to get meat. It’s natural and the animal is living a life as a natural animal should. If the pig isn’t raised cruely, I think raising them to help a person live a life is a moral good. That person took a lot of resources to get where they are, and they have the potential to do a lot of good. The pig did not take nearly as many resources to raise and does not have much, if any, capacity to do good besides by dying. Whether they should exist at all is the real question, and I’d say probably yes, again if it isn’t cruel.
Is your answer to my previous question “Potential to do good”?
If a human person was sufficiently mentally disabled to have as much or less potential to do good as the pig, would it then be morally ok to kill that person and harvest their organs?
Yeah, probably, or at least similarly equally moral. For example if they’re born without a brain, which does happen, they don’t meet the definition most people use for personhood. I don’t see what the difference would be other than they have human DNA and look similar to us, but why should that matter?
The hypothetical wasn’t about someone without a brain, just someone with as much or less potential to do good as a pig. They could still lead a happy life, having fun, enjoy being alive, etc. Is it morally ok to kill them and harvest their organs?
Potentially, sure. Somewhere along the line of literally no brain and a fully developed average person there’s a point where you will decide it’s too far. That point is going to be different for everyone.
Do you think a fully developed capable person capable of doing good and helping people is as valuable as every human along that line? Is there no point for you where you think sacrificing one person who can’t do as much to save a doctor who will go on to save thousands?