Journal #2

Yorick (Yongqi)

Biomedical engineering, a combination of engineering and medicine field, is narrower than bioengineering. It’s ethical issues should be studied by engineers and medical practitioners.

Generally, a prosthetic body is used to help physical disabled people, and fulfill the missing function of their bodies. For example, a person without an arm can use an artificial limb to work such as cooking and playing. A prosthetic body is created to give a person a full body, so a person with a prosthetic body part can definitely be considered a fully human. Some people can use a prosthetic body to accomplish their life goals. It was reported that a child without his legs can running and swimming thanks to his artificial legs. It can be seen in the report that the boy had a wonderful life just like a normal child.

I think having a non-human body part do affect the identity of a person, however, the affection can be considered very little. Although some disabled people behave the same as normal people, the fact is that there is still something they cannot achieve. After all, the prosthetic body is not a real body. In this case, they cannot be treated generally, and they deserve a special help. That makes their identity a little bit more special than normal people.

I don’t think there should be a limit to how many prosthetic items a person can own. The child I mentioned before had more than two pairs of artificial legs, and that’s why his life could be as wonderful as other children. He could use one pair for walking and one pair for swimming. Considering the aim of the prosthetic items, there cannot be a rule to prevent someone having a full body.

A prosthetic body does not only help disabled people work in daily life, but also help them gain the faith of life. For normal people a prosthetic body may mean nothing, but for them it means everything.