Should Humans Play God?
Statement
Cloning is wrong — humans shouldn’t play God.
Q1 Analysis
This may be a Q1 violation if you cannot define what constitutes "playing God."
Q2 Analysis
This may be a Q2 violation if you would not consider immoral actions that other people might consider exclusively the domain of God.
Discussion
If there are certain actions that are solely the domain of God, then a human performing one of those actions would be "playing God." For example, some people hold that creating life (other than engaging in normal sexual reproduction) is something that only God should do. If that is the case, then which (if any) of the following would you consider to be playing God?
- In vitro fertilization.
- Genetically modifying a naturally conceived child.
- Using a sperm donor.
- Cloning a human.
- Cloning an animal.
- Selectively breeding plants or animals.
- Modifying your body to make it more attractive (e.g., tattooing, ear piercing).
- Surgically modifying your body to make it more attractive (e.g., breast implants, hair plugs, face lift).
- Surgically modifying your body to repair damage done in an accident (e.g., repairing a severely burned face).
At the other end of the spectrum, would interfering with God’s ability to create life also be immoral? For example:
- Using contraception.
- Not using contraception but using the rhythm method to try to avoid pregnancy.
- Having sex for entertainment purposes only.
- Using a certain position that you heard makes it more likely that you’ll conceive a boy.
- Taking a "morning after" pill.
- Masturbating.
- Getting a vasectomy.
- Not seeking treatment for infertility.
- Abortion.
If creating life is solely in God’s domain, would any of these items also be solely in His domain?
- Taking life.
- Curing disease.
- Saving people from natural disasters.
- Saving animals from extinction.
- Creating light.
- Judging right and wrong.
You are encouraged to leave your answers to the questions posed in this post in the comments section. This post is based on an excerpt from Ask Yourself to be Moral, by D. Cancilla, available at LuLu.com and Amazon.com. See the 2Q system page for details of the philosophical system mentioned in this post.
on November 28, 2010 at 1:18 pm
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Being able to define what constitutes “playing God” is so crucial here. As I understand it, many religious people think that God controls everything and is responsible for everything in existence and every occurrence. If that’s the case, then isn’t it more like God is playing humans than humans are playing God? Everything “we do” would in a very real sense be something that “God did.” If that is your understanding of how God works, how could you ever accuse a person of “playing God”?
on February 23, 2011 at 9:15 am
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I have debated in my mind on why God made sin possible by declaring a certain fruit to be forbiden. The main thing I took was this.:Before the Fall, only one act-the eating of one fruit-was considered wrong. Of all the fruits in Eden, why did Man let himself get drawn to the taboo one?