Sam Harris - The Dehumanizer

Whenever Prof. Richard Dawkins, Dan Barker or, apparently, any of the New-Atheist Sect speaks on the issue of abortion and related topics they are sure to demonstrate both poor logic as well as virtual misanthropy (read Prof. Richard Dawkins' views here and his fallacious correlation between abortion and terrorism here. For Dan Barker see here).

Sam Harris wrote:

"A 3-day-old human embryo is a collection of 150 cells called a blastocyst. There are, for the sake of comparison, more than 100,000 cells in the brain of a fly. The embryos that are destroyed in stem-cell research do not have brains, or even neurons. Consequently, there is no reason to believe they can suffer their destruction in any way at all."1

Just as Sam Harris compares human embryos to flies Prof. Richard Dawkins compares them to tadpoles, cow and sheep embryos. These correlations between one species and another particularly on the issue of butchery clearly demonstrates the savagery to which some are driven by their views on evolution.

We ought to note that in this particular instance Sam Harris restricts his comment to 3-day-old human embryos because he is commenting on stem cell research (which he quite erroneously claims is the most promising). It is however interesting to note that according to atheistic interpretation of Darwinian evolution, full grown human beings such as Sam Harris are no more than a larger collection of cells.

If a human adult can cease the life process of a human embryo because it consists of less cells than a person of Sam Harris' age, could an elderly human being cease the life process of an adolescent because the adolescent consists of less cells?

What does suffering have to do with purposefully ceasing the growth process of a human being? Are we really to set lack of suffering as the criteria for bringing a human life to cessation? Can we cease human lives from proceeding if we anesthetize their bodies first? If we ensure that the person will feel no pain, are we free to cease their life at any time and for any reason?2

If a 3-day-old human embryo is a collection of 150 cells give it another day and it will have more. Another week and it will have more still. Another month and yet more. Nine months and all of a sudden: in sight and in mind you cannot legally murder a human baby any longer. A couple of decades and the baby has grown up enough to argue in favor of baby murder-an argument from dehumanization.

The way that they handle the topic of abortion and experimentation upon humans in the womb demonstrates the New-Atheist dismal view of human life, worth and dignity. Human, fly, tadpole, cow and sheep are all the same-nothing more than a particular combination of DNA.

1. 1. "A Dissent: The Case Against Faith - Religion does untold damage to our politics. An atheist's lament" (Newsweek, Nov. 13, 2006)
   
2. 2. The issue of capital punishment is irrelevant to this question since we are discussing an innocent human baby and not an adult who made conscious adult decisions to commit brutal crimes.