S.C. writes:

I’d like to know what the moral difference is between: 1) an embryo used for scientific research, 2 days old 2) an embryo destroyed at a fertility clinic, 2 days old 3) an embryo that fails to attach to the wall of a uterus, 2 days old You seem to be ok with 2 and 3, but not 1. Why? There’s total radio silence at NR on 2. Why? Shouldn’t there be outrage? And if these are all life, and sacred, doesn’t it follow that we should use the force of the state to rescue all of the 3′s? Please explain.

Ok, let me take a shot at it. 1 and 2 strike me as basically morally equivalent. I have said so many, many times, as it happens, but not in the last few days. The fact that nobody is proposing federal subsidies for 2 seems like a perfectly good reason for the difference in attention. As for 3, it is true that the embryos in question ”are. . . life,” or rather, are whole living members of the human species. But the situation is different, even if the embryos are not. Chief among the differences is that nobody is intentionally killing the embryos (let alone demanding federal subsidies for same).