60 
Ethical and Policy Developments 
Such work, he contends, should not be seen as inherently and 
always obligatory, and claims to support it may be overridden 
even by a level of respect for nascent human life that does not 
suppose that embryos possess full human moral standing. He 
suggests that it is not at all obvious that individuals or the 
government have a definite responsibility to support such re- 
search or that such a responsibility would override other moral 
duties. 
Others point out that the duty to find cures for disease can- 
not be an unqualified or absolute imperative. Pointing to the 
present rules governing the treatment of human subjects in 
research, they argue that the case for embryonic stem cell re- 
search carmot rest on an alleged and overriding imperative to 
pursue that research. These rules prohibit certain sorts of pro- 
cedures on human subjects of research; and the same, they 
suggest, should be required in stem cell research. Yet those 
who argue that the importance of medical research and treat- 
ment should override the aim of protecting human embryos 
presumably would not propose to override protections for hu- 
man subjects in research on children or adults. Rather, they 
approach the present matter differently because they do not 
consider human embryos the developmental, anthropological, 
or moral equivalent of children or adults, or worthy of the same 
protection. The difference, therefore, has to do not so much 
with a dispute over the imperative importance of research, but 
rather (at least to a significant extent) with the status of nas- 
cent human life, which again turns out to be the fundamental 
point at issue. 
Nevertheless, the moral claims of medical research and 
treatment are extremely powerful in the debate over human 
embryonic stem cell policy, and they are acknowledged as pro- 
foundly important even by those who do not finally take them 
to be decisive. Most arguments in opposition to the present 
funding policy and in support of expanded embryonic-stem cell 
research are groimded in these claims. 
B. Freedom to Conduct Research 
Other opponents of the present policy argue not from the 
value of medical benefits but on the basis of freedom to con- 
PRE-PUBLICATION VERSION 
