I go rounds with my colleague Donna Martinez on the value of creating a market for organs. She likes presumed consent - opting out of donations instead of opting in - which strikes me as coercive. I favor allowing people to sell their organs instead of donating them, she thinks that devalues life.

We do agree, however, that a new program she described in a recent column and that could start this year at Bellevue Hospital Center in Lower Manhattan is repulsive and raises questions about when a person is really dead.