As science fiction-style technology accelerates, Christians must get serious about bioethics and the theology of being human. We won’t know what to do with brainless “bodyoids” if we are theology-less brains and bodies. Even worse, we won’t have any way to resist that which destroys, exploits, or dehumanizes God’s image.  

The recent debates over in vitro fertilization and surrogacy have taught us that most Christians aren’t prepared with answers for what’s ahead. And that means we will be in even more trouble with crazier and more dystopian-sounding technology, which is surely on the way. If we do not embrace a robust theology of what it means to be human that includes the design and inherent goodness of the body, we’ll have no idea whether to reject, redeem, or participate in the innovations. 

Just recently, an article in the MIT Technology Review explored growing human bodies without brains or consciousness in order to harvest their organs for transplant. According to the authors, who are three researchers at Stanford, the ability to create “spare bodies” for parts may be closer than we think. In fact, it’s close enough that, they said, the public and lawmakers must start thinking through the issue now.  

“Recent advances in biotechnology,” the article stated, “now provide a pathway to producing living human bodies without the neural components that allow us to think, be aware, or feel pain.” Such “bodyoids,” as they call them, are possible due to recent medical innovations like pluripotent stem cells that “mimic” embryos, “genetic techniques to inhibit brain development,” and “artificial uterus technology,” which could be used to grow the bodies. Combined, these techniques could result in “a potentially unlimited source of human bodies … that lack sentience or the ability to feel pain.” 

The authors admit that many may find this possibility “disturbing” but, in a familiar refrain, argue that the potential benefits outweigh the risk. After all, bodyoids could enable faster approval of new drugs, shorter wait times for organ replacement, and many lives saved.  

Yes, movies have been made to warn us against this kind of thing. Not least of which, Michael Bay’s The Island with its plot about clones grown in a sealed-off community so customers in the real world can harvest their organs, is chillingly prescient.

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