A "Slippery Slope" Only If We're Stupid

And when petri-dish "intercourse" becomes an exact "science" and there are no extra lives formed for experimentation then what??

Testing 123 testing 123

CCNL said:

"Potential parents of petri-dish human embryos should consider the consequences of creating life they cannot sustain i.e. making adoption the better option."

These parents are not bad or malevolent people; they are simply seeking medical assistance in having children. They are not "creating life thay cannot sustain." That is your ugly spin on it. Any good thing can have an ugly spin put on it.

Their goal is to have an embryo grow inside of a woman's womb, to birth, so that they will have a baby that is their own.

In this process, there may be additional embryos that will not be implanted in a woman's womb, and will therefore never be a baby. These embryos are in fact, stem cells, the first cells, the beginning cells. Embryonic stem cell research involves studying these cells to try and learn how they work.

The goal is to make copies of a person's own cells in the form of these stem cells, which may then be varied to any tissue. You might call this cloning. I would call it cellular cloning, but that is not the same as cloning a fully formed human being.

There is no way around it that in order to grow restorative tissues in a sick or injured person it would be necessary to use some sort of stem cell variant, which are indistinguishable from embryos, even though they are not formed from a sperm and an egg, and even though they will never grow inside of a woman's womb, and even though they would not exist and never appear, but for the application of science.

In all of this, it is just plain incorrect to suppose that scientists will ever seek to clone human beings to be dismembered for their body parts. Why do I say this? Because human clones would be humans; you would no more chop up a cloned human than one twin would chop up the other twin for body parts.

All these arguments are beside the point, however. These ideas about stem cell restorative therapy have crept into the mind of man; these ideas cannot be stamped out or erased. They are here to stay. And these ideas are based on the way in which we are put together, they way our body's work; everything is there, to be worked out.

I cannot imagine this not being exciting to EVERYONE. I cannot imagine how this is scary or threatening. I have heard alot of irrational, paranoid arguments, but I have not heard anything to dissuade me from my enthusiasm.

Bottom line: Potential parents of petri-dish human embryos should consider the consequences of creating life they cannot sustain i.e. making adoption the better option. Considering that we all descend from one mother who lived ~60,000 years ago in Africa, even adopted children have some genes in them common to the adopting parents.

And if there were no excess human embryos from fertilization clinics?? Maybe Dan in the Den and/or Arminius can fertilize some women and then we can harvest the results but when do we start the procedure?? Or are the embryos from women who use the morning after pill or RU496 viable candidates for dismemberment?

As caring humans, we do what we can to save all. If we fail to save all, we at least did what we could. But first we dial 911.

Dilemma scenarios can go on and on and are a bit strange as it can result in who to save type tough questions that normally never arise, Mom or Dad, Brother or Sister, Old or Young, Muslim or Atheist, Catholic or Jew and on and on.

CCNL,

Thanks for implicitly conceding my point!

You're right, Arminius.

CCNL can say over and over that embryos are "pristine" (???), but that doesn't make it so. It doesn't even make any sense.

Earthly life began some 3.5 billion years ago, and continues to this day. There is no point at which one can coherently say that life "begins." Legally, we chose birth - the moment when an individual is indeed an individual - as the beginning for a single life. It works just fine.

Haven't you people figured out CCNL yet? He will never give you a straight answer to a question, he will never discuss, he just keeps posting variations of his same garbage - over and over and over again. It has been said that insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. Seems to me CCNL fits that very well.

CCNL

Each of your comments, in succession, is more and more ridiculous. Your arguments are not persuasive.

You say that the embryo is a pristine state of life. That is just a nonsense statement.

The fact is, life never begins. It is your foolish quest to mark some arbitrary point along its continuum to say when it begins. But anyone else could pick some other arbitrary point.

I would say that stem cells to not have any potential to form a human being if they do not exist inside of woman's womb. And that is not a technicality; it is not a small point. It's YOOGE! (I mean, it's huge).

They whole "baby-making" system depends upon the existience of the mother's womb where the embryo must live, or else, it can never be a baby. NEVER. It just can't.

How do you answer that? You prefer to keep the embryos frozen as you say, forever, perpetually waiting for a mother's womb, that is never going to appear?

You have not thought through the implications of your statements.

CCNL

You mean that embryos don't live in little tiny houses, with little tiny furniture?

Billy Graham's daughter, an evangelist herself, once appeared on the Larry Kind show, and she tried to describe what embryos were; she said embryos are "little tiny people..." in her excessively harsh nasal southern drawl. And she held up her index finger and thumb in a pinching motion, as though to mime "tiny little.." people. It was one of the most pitiful things I have ever seen.

The only thing that I learned from her explanation was that she seemed very confused, just like CCNL.

Up, down, right, left or from this side or the far side of the waxing or waning Moon:

The human embryo is the most pristine state of life, the genesis of us all thereby he or she should be protected and respected like any new born.

Scroll down for added details.

"You will not find a human embryo in a burning house because they are kept in cryonic facilities with all kinds of safeguards against fire and theft."

-----------------------------------

CCNL,

OK. Let's make it a burning fertility clinic with embryos and a newborn? You can only save one, which one do you save and why?

Dodging the question only proves you don't really believe your own claim.

And the old "burning house and who to save delimma" is trotted out yet one more time!!!

The basics once again:

You will not find a human embryo in a burning house because they are kept in cryonic facilities with all kinds of safeguards against fire and theft.

CCNL

You keep referring to the embryo as a "pristine state of life."

An embryo is not the same as a baby; nor is it the same as a child, an adult, or on old person. Such beliefs indicate prodound misunderstanding, and consequent misplaced values, regarding the so-called unborn versus the already born.

All of the cells of an embryo are stem cells. Such cells that exist outide of a woman's body do not have the potential to grow into a person.

Yet, you could say that such cells have the potential if they could be inserted into a woman's womb.

Would'a Could'a Should'a!

There is alot of life that falls under wishful thinking. But that is not the same thing as what really is.

Of course we are one day going to want to induce stem cells to grow in a sick or injured person, so that they might undergo restorative therapy. Would you then call these stem cells an embryo? even though these cells were skin cells, and even though these cells will never grow in a woman's womb?

Someone on another thread made the comment that "live never begins."

I think that this idea is correct, that life never begins. It is only and merely a phoney human contsruct to draw a line, to say, just exactly where, in the continuum of life, does it begin.

It surely goes against the grain of common sense and the way most people feel that life begins at conception. No matter what people say, it is the overwhelming custom and feeling of people all over the world that we measure our beginnings on the day of our births.

I do not see any real mass movement to transition from birthday celebrations to "conception day" celebrations. And I do not see any age qualifying benefits such as drivers licenses or social security defaulting to "conception day" instead of birthday.

CNNL

I think you are wrong.

"The human embryo is the most pristine state of life, the genesis of us all thereby he or she should be protected and respected like any newly born."

---------------------------------

CCNL,

If there were an embryo and a new born baby in a burning house and you could only save one before the house collapsed, which one would you save? And why?

Once again for those that have the ability to read:

The human embryo is the most pristine state of life, the genesis of us all thereby he or she should be protected and respected like any newly born.

"embryo: In humans, the prefetal product of conception from implantation through the eighth week of development." answers.com

"The Visible Embryo is a visual guide through fetal development from fertilization through pregnancy to birth. As the most profound physiologic changes occur in the "first trimester" of pregnancy, these Carnegie stages are given prominence on the birth spiral.

The shape and location of embryonic interal structures and how they relate and are connected to each other is essential to understanding human development. Medical professionals create a mental picture of this process in order to determine how well the fetus is progressing. It is also the basis of knowing how and when errors in development occur and if a possibility exists for a corrective intervention."

"It is equally important for expectant parents to understand the relationship of these internal structures and how their infant develops through pregnancy."
http://www.visembryo.com/baby/
http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic-art/185610/2919/Development-of-the-human-embryo

"The term embryo applies to the earliest form of life, produced when an egg (female reproductive cell) is fertilized by a sperm (male reproductive cell; semen). The fertilized egg is called a zygote. Shortly after fertilization, the zygote begins to grow and develop. It divides to form two cells, then four, then eight, and so on. As the zygote and its daughter cells divide, they start to become specialized, meaning they begin to take on characteristic structures and functions that will be needed in the adult plant or animal.

An embryo is a living organism, like a full-grown rose bush, frog, or human. It has the same needs—food, oxygen, warmth, and protection—that the adult organism has. These needs are provided for in a variety of ways by different kinds of organisms."

Embryonic development
434 x 254 - 14k - jpg
www.scienceclarified.com

Day 6: Embryo implants in the uterus ...

409 x 306 - 26k - jpg
www.solutionsphc.com

CCNL

I do not know where people such as you get the idea that embryonic stem cell research will lead to cloning people for their body parts. That is made up, and invented; that is your paranoia working again.

A cloned person would still be a person, as human as you or I. A cloned person would be born as a baby, not fished out of some Frankenstein-esque test-tube, a ready-made adult.

A cloned human would be born a baby, would learn to talk, and walk, and go to kindergarten and then to school, and then to college, and then get married, and live out a fully normal life. It would be completely impossible to chop up a cloned person for his body parts.

Identical twins are clones of each other. We do not regard one as spare parts for the other. Cloning for this purpose is not feasible.

All of these bogus arguments against embryonic stem research have nothing to do with reality. I suspect that there is some other, perhaps, subconscious reason for being afraid of this type of research; it is a sort of fear-of-blood squeamishness at this tinkering around with the fundamentals of life and living things.

Yet, science will progress and move onward; there is nothing that can stop it; it is all based on ideas in the minds of men, which cannot be stamped out, and the nature of existence, in which we all dwell, which persists, as it is, whose nature cannot be changed or denied, simply because it does not conform to the policital correctness or dogma of the day.

Sorry, CCNL, you and Krauthammer are wrong, DITLD is right (whether or not he has medical credentials - the only one necessary being the ability to read).

But don't take my word for it, either - do some research.

And Dan in the Den has a degree in what field???

CCNL
I don't think you understand embryonic stem cell research very well. The goal is to be able to manipulate cells from a person's own body to regenerate damaged, diseased, or destroyed tissue. THAT IS WHAT IT IS. It is has nothing to do with growing embryos or clones to use their body part. It takes a lot of thinking to get it, and I don't blame people for getting it so confused in their minds. But if you are going to comment so prolifically on this, I wish you would try to understand it better.

Hmmm, and Paganplace remembers what the leader of the Immoral Majority said spefically about the geneses of human lifes aka human embryos but somehow cannot remember on what TV show it was on and what date??

And I don't believe Charles Krauthammer got his story wrong but if Paganplace disagrees, his e-mail address is letters@charleskrauthammer.com. Growing limbs etc. via human embryos is hardly "nit picking".

"Hmmm, Paganplace "heard" Obama? And where might that have been? Recordings?"

Well, we have this newfangled device called 'Television,' and an old-fashioned device called, 'Actually speaking.'

Wow.

"The issue is cloning embryos to make parts not cloning humans to make more humans."

If you wanna come here to exercise your OCD, you're gonna have to accept you don't get to make such broad statements, CCNL, cause what you said was not true, no matter how many nits you pick.

Hmmm, Paganplace "heard" Obama? And where might that have been? Recordings?

The issue is cloning embryos to make parts not cloning humans to make more humans.

As per CK:

"He pointedly left open the creation of cloned - and noncloned sperm-and-egg-derived - human embryos solely for the purpose of dismemberment and use for parts.

"I suggested the bright line prohibiting the deliberate creation of human embryos solely for the instrumental purpose of research - a clear violation of the categorical imperative not to make a human life (even if only a potential human life) a means rather than an end.

"On this, Obama has nothing to say. He leaves it entirely to the scientists. This is more than moral abdication."

Actually, that's entirely untrue. I heard him discuss this in his own words. Lifting the Bush *ban* on otherwise-acceptable research, (for which grants must still be written) *doesn't* mean the government has written a blank check or permission.

Cloning for human reproduction is still banned, as always. The only difference is that Bush's blanket claim that IVF surplus cell clumps are sacrosanct human lives (unless you have corporate funding) ...is no longer in effect.

It

From Charles Krauthammer who writes for the Washington Post:

"President George W. Bush had restricted federal funding for embryonic stem cell research to cells derived from embryos that had already been destroyed (as of his speech of Aug. 9, 2001). While I favor moving that moral line to additionally permit the use of spare fertility-clinic embryos, President Obama replaced it with no line at all. He pointedly left open the creation of cloned - and noncloned sperm-and-egg-derived - human embryos solely for the purpose of dismemberment and use for parts.

I am not religious. I do not believe that personhood is conferred upon conception. But I also do not believe that a human embryo is the moral equivalent of a hangnail and deserves no more respect than an appendix. Moreover, given the protean power of embryonic manipulation, the temptation it presents to science, and the well-recorded human propensity for evil even in the pursuit of good, lines must be drawn.

I suggested the bright line prohibiting the deliberate creation of human embryos solely for the instrumental purpose of research - a clear violation of the categorical imperative not to make a human life (even if only a potential human life) a means rather than an end.

On this, Obama has nothing to say. He leaves it entirely to the scientists. This is more than moral abdication. It is acquiescence to the mystique of "science" and its inherent moral benevolence. How anyone as sophisticated as Obama can believe this within living memory of Mengele and Tuskegee and the fake (and coercive) South Korean stem cell research is hard to fathom."

Thanks Colin for book recommendation. I've read some of Sagan--essays, I forget the title of book,--it was years ago--but I thought he was good.

Daniel12.

Will check out the book you mention - from my local library.

Recommend one in return.

"Varieties of Scientific Experience"
a Personal View of The Search for God.
by Carl Sagan.Penguin press. 2006

So much to read...so little time.

CCNL,

"Expanding the new format with the expansion set at 125% or 150% fills in the page quite nicely and makes for easy reading of the new format."

Intriguing. I never thought of you as an optimist, CCNL, so I admit being taken aback by your buoyant assessment of the new format. But I did always think of you as conventionally disposed, and as preferential toward conditioned norms, so it does all fall into place, and no great upheaval is passed in the world. Alles gut.

With 67+ comments already posted to Susan's comments, what more can be said?

Susan, I will simply add my thanks for your well written, well reasoned essay on this subject, as well as on almost every other topic brought forth on ON FAITH.

Obama's decision presents an opportunity for the scientific community and this nation to move forward. Would it be a wast of time to PRAY that such progress actually occurs?

Oh, I forgot to mention something. Might as well be nice and let all secular humanists here know about the book I happen to be reading now. Actually I am reading two books as I always do (one at work the other at home) but I have no reason to mention I am reading the best of Ray Bradbury's stories so I will go on and say enjoy reading "A preface to morals" by Walter Lippmann. I guarantee all secular humanists will salivate reading this book. It really is that good. I discovered it because it happens to be on the list of the best hundred non-fiction by Modern library (Jeez! On other posts on other sites I kept saying the book is one of the Library of America best! The hell with it!). Trust me--a really good book.

A miracle! I managed to make a post on Susan Jacoby's site! I thought I was banned from this site!

Was my inability to post previously a technical error? If it was not a technical error and you, Susan Jacoby, meant to ban me, you might want to ban me again because I managed to post here in this new format.

I wish I could tell you Susan Jacoby that I will now behave so please allow me back on site, but I am now 45 years old and I know I will be pretty much what I really have always been to the end of the line.

I guess best to be honest about it.

To everyone: I post mostly on the main site now if you want to criticize my posts.

Testing 123 testing 123

Expanding the new format with the expansion set at 125% or 150% fills in the page quite nicely and makes for easy reading of the new format.

My format here has changed, and it is more difficult to read - big, boldface type, narrow column, entire essay to scroll thru. Am I the only one? The reasons to hang on here are getting fewer and fewer.

Lately, I have had trouble posint comments with the following error; am I the only one?

"Comment Submission Error
Your comment submission failed for the following reasons:

Publish failed: An error occurred publishing entry 'The (Im)Morality of Stem Cell Research': Publish error in template 'Individual Question Archive': Error in tag: Error in tag: Can't find included template module 'Author Bio Full'
Return to the original entry."

"One doesn't need a PHD to realize we are not God."

--------------------------------------------

Volkmare,

Neither does one need a PhD to recognize the logical fallacy of begging the question!

Exactly which god are you referring to anyway?

Freedom,

"Every life is sacred" -- until your born, then you're on your own, Jack!"

Unless, of course, you are one of the "fortunate" one's to be born to a mother and father who are in a committed relationship.

As an aside, there is currently a waiting list in the United States for parents that would like to adopt an infant. So, if there is a waiting list, why not accept some responsibility and accountability for your life, deliver the baby, and let a loving couple adopt?

(Note, however, that there are still over 100K children waiting to be adopted)

It seems to me that we should be asking if IVF itself is moral or not. The procedure itself when not being grossly abused (and when being grossly abused for that matter), is a product of a hyper-individualistic and consumerist society that seeks and demands more than what the environment can provide reasonably. These procedures cost exorbitant sums and are available only to a select few within the population. But perhaps the most selfish and egregious part of this procedure is that it is a slap in the face to all of the children who exist already without a home. Apparently they are not worth enough to have a place, that people are willing to spend tens of thousands of dollars to create a child. Maybe we should elect not to exercise this apparent right to reproduce, and bolster the adoption process.

Nonsense. If anyone here wanted to play "god" we'd be mandating the forced termination of 40-50% of pregnancies, which is the rate of spontaneous miscarriage.

We're advocating the usage of the 0.0001% that ends up in IVF clinics, that are going to be discarded anyway.

And as for embryos not having individual human rights, take it up with the Constitution.

One doesn't need a PHD to realize we are not God.

I agree with CCNL in that even the basic single cell embryo needs protection to survive.

Any debate over when it gains human rights is moot.

Stop pretending to be God by trying to determine when to respect the embryo as a human. You are just being selfish to do so. Find another way to research medicine.

Mark
Always seek the turth.

"Every life is sacred" -- until your born, then you're on your own, Jack!

The human embryo is the most pristine state of life, the genesis of us all thereby he or she should be protected and respected like any newly born.

"embryo: In humans, the prefetal product of conception from implantation through the eighth week of development." answers.com

"The Visible Embryo is a visual guide through fetal development from fertilization through pregnancy to birth. As the most profound physiologic changes occur in the "first trimester" of pregnancy, these Carnegie stages are given prominence on the birth spiral.

The shape and location of embryonic interal structures and how they relate and are connected to each other is essential to understanding human development. Medical professionals create a mental picture of this process in order to determine how well the fetus is progressing. It is also the basis of knowing how and when errors in development occur and if a possibility exists for a corrective intervention."

It is equally important for expectant parents to understand the relationship of these internal structures and how their infant develops through pregnancy."

http://www.visembryo.com/baby/

http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic-art/185610/2919/Development-of-the-human-embryo

"The term embryo applies to the earliest form of life, produced when an egg (female reproductive cell) is fertilized by a sperm (male reproductive cell; semen). The fertilized egg is called a zygote. Shortly after fertilization, the zygote begins to grow and develop. It divides to form two cells, then four, then eight, and so on. As the zygote and its daughter cells divide, they start to become specialized, meaning they begin to take on characteristic structures and functions that will be needed in the adult plant or animal.

An embryo is a living organism, like a full-grown rose bush, frog, or human. It has the same needs—food, oxygen, warmth, and protection—that the adult organism has. These needs are provided for in a variety of ways by different kinds of organisms."

Embryonic development
434 x 254 - 14k - jpg
www.scienceclarified.com

Day 6: Embryo implants in the uterus ...
409 x 306 - 26k - jpg
www.solutionsphc.com

Onofrio:

"Every sperm is sacred,"

Actually, the lyric originates in the divinely inspired Scripture of CCNL's temple: Church of Clancy, Nussbaum, and Luigi (CCNL). I would have thought you knew that. :

Spidermean,

You, way back at the thread-genesis:
"These guys are dreaming. Just as they were dreaming when they say that their great great granpa is a baboon. NOT TRUE."

Wrong, Spider! My g-g-granddad WAS a baboon, a great white one the size of a coal truck. He was a brilliant writer, though always accused of gibberish when he spoke.

It was glossolalia.

They say the earth shook when he eulogised the rising sun. He was delighted that nature did not stop at his own on-heat a-s when devising bright red things.

I know this because he wrote it down, in klarschrift on a potsherd.

CCNL,

You:
"The human embryo is the most pristine state of life, the genesis of us all"

Eureka!

Let us then set up a Pristine Chapel filled with sybils, apocalypse, and beefcake ignudi, just like the good ol' days.

And you, CCNL, can be Pope Prixtus I, and insinuate your insignia into every cranny of the decor.

Visions splendid!

CCNL,

Why not take your genesis back further to the individual ova and spermatozoa? After all, without them, there would be no "genesis of us all", at all. They're LIFE too. "Every sperm is sacred," as some heavily accented Pythonic folk once sang, and myriads since have tiresomely - yet aptly - quoted...

I propose a naming ceremony and state funeral for every nocturnal emission, and a day of public mourning for every period, and an extension of Arlington especially for placentas. Will you second me?

Perhaps you would like to get the ball rolling with a substantial financial endowment. I can give you the account details - still in my name at this stage. We can change the world, "Concerned-the-Christian"!

In the meantime, back to your valley of sackcloth! Given the kazillions of dead cells on whom you lavish full-personly devotion, you must be in a permanent funk of lamentation.

I sympathise, truly I do...

CCNL,

You:
"The human embryo is the most pristine state of life, the genesis of us all thereby he or she should be protected and respected like any newly born."

What are your qualifications for saying this, CCNL? You mentioned "state of life", so where are your PhDs in microbiology and philosophy to back that up, like the ones you demand from others who venture a thoughtful opinion?

The human embryo is the most pristine state of life, the genesis of us all thereby he or she should be protected and respected like any newly born.

Here's the whole quote: "As a person of faith, I believe we are called to care for each other and work to ease human suffering."

He goes on to say, "I believe we have been given the capacity and will to pursue this research — and the humanity and conscience to do so responsibly."

Both of these thoughts are humanist as much, if not more so, as they are Christian.

Perhaps the faith Obama was referring to was faith in people to do the right thing. It sure sounds like it.

"George Daley admitted that the use of iPS cells for therapeutic treatment is not possible because of the left over viral DNA."

This is old news. It's now possible. There are new ways to go around that.

"That means some embryonic stem cells had to be destroyed:"

They were the old lines of embryos permitted by the Bush Law. What's wrong about those old lines by the way?

Spidermean,
What you missed in the story from the Whitehead Institute's results was that they knew there level of success by comparing the DNA of their transformed iPS cells to the DNA of embryonic stem cells. That means some embryonic stem cells had to be destroyed:

From sciencecodex.com, March 5, 2009:
"When the researchers compared the gene expressions of human embryonic stem cells to iPS cells with and without the reprogramming factors, iPS cells without the reprogramming genes had a gene expression closer to human embryonic stem cells than to the same iPS cells that still contained the reprogramming genes."

So as many have been saying, ES cells are need in the basic scientific studies, including those of iPS. You cheer the Whitehead study, yet it destroyed embryonic stem cells. The successful results could not have been know without those ES cells being destroyed. This is why lifting the restriction is so important.

rubytues63 stated:
Fifteen months ago, scientists Shinya Yamanaka and James Thompson discovered a way to reprogram adult human skin cells so that they behave just like embryonic stem cells.

Yes, but read the scientific literature from the team members who coaxed these cells. (Nature, November 2007). They admit that the process of coaxing adult stem cells into iPS cells carries over the viruses used to get them to change, thus contaminating them. George Daley admitted that the use of iPS cells for therapeutic treatment is not possible because of the left over viral DNA.

onofrio stated:
I wonder whether today's Christmongering naysayers will abstain from treatment, as conscientious objectors.

This is a very good question and one in which we have already glimpsed an answer. Before former President Reagan got Alzheimer's disease, was there anything from Reagan himself about supporting embryonic stem cell research?

But, after the diagnosis, Nancy became a strong advocate. It think as long as they and their loved ones are unaffected by these kinds of diseases, religious conservatives will continue to fight it.

But, as soon as a loved one becomes "taken" by Alzheimer's or Parkinson's or a spinal injury, you'll see them jump faster than they did when they became born again fiscal conservatives as soon as Barack Obama was sworn into office.

CCNL says:

One assumes human embryos cannot last forever in the cryogenic state. As with all life, they should be given proper burial and allowed to decompose (or be cremated) with dignity as all human life is.

So you're equating a 2-day old fertilized egg with all the rights and privileges of a full human being? That means whenever a woman has a miscarriage, we need to call the coroner and have a cause of death determined and a death certificate issued?

You do realize, right, that we declare someone dead when there is a lack of detectable brain activity. So, legally speaking, without a nervous system or a brain, every fertilized egg less than 10 weeks ago, is clinically dead.

It seems misguided to conclude a 2-3 day old fertilized egg, without the ability to do all those things we equate to being human (feeling happiness, sadness, pain and pleasure), to be afforded all of the rights of a human.

The analogy is this : Every person has it's own "OS" or his DNA. Embryonic stem cells come from a different person therefore a different OS.

If the one being cured is the owner of that stem cell, then fine. BUT it's not. IT won't work on me nor it can work in you coz it has a different OS with ours.

The same DNA means the same OS. NO conflict, therefore iPS cells coming from ADULT (OUR) stem cell is the future.

I have no qualms about studying embryonic stem cell. The point of my contention is when they are looking for cures DERIVED FROM IT.

To Jim39 speaking about adult stem cell research.
I think your missing some of the facts related to embryonic versus adult stem cell research and creating iPS (those cells that can be coaxed into forming other types of cells). Yes, iPS can be coaxed to form other types of cells but under today's technology, those cells cannot be used for therapeutic treatment. And that's the key.

From the November, 2007 Nature magazine; although an incredible step forward in stem-cell research, iPS cells are in fact at the beginning of a long road. "iPS cells as we make them today are riddled with viruses," says George Daley, of Harvard Medical School in Boston. Mr. Daley represented one of the two teams that successfully coaxed skin cells to form other cells.

He says that these viruses can be mutagenic and have the potential to activate oncogenes, so at the moment iPS cells remain a research tool and not a potential therapeutic agent.

This means that at some point we will be able to coax them (iPS cells), without carrying along unwanted viruses, into other types of cells. But, while that research takes place, we can coax embryonic stem cells NOW into forming any type of cell, allowing us to concentrate on attacking various diseases. Embryonic stem cell research offers an immediate ability to work on repairing cells destroyed by disease or injury. iPS does not and we would have to solve the mutagenic cell problem first before we can start working on curing specific diseases.

I haven't read your other comments spidermean2 because the first one you posted is full of crapola.

If you want to use an analogy regarding operating systems (software is my field of expertise) why not make an accurate one?

The analogy you should have made if you understood computers is as follows:

Coaxing embryonic stems cells into a different kind of cell while still maintaining the basic DNA is like building a new driver for a single device in an operating system. Embryonic stem cell research does not attempt to replace the entire cell structure of an organism -- unlike you implied. It attempts to coax a cell into forming a specific type of cell -- maybe a spinal cell or a specific neuron.

Using the OS analogy, that's like taking an operating system and trying to patch into a running operating system the driver which controls the video or the sound or the keyboard or the mouse.

I'd be happy to teach you as much as you want about computers :-)

THe science behind embryonic stem cell if very simple. It cannot be used for cures becuase the REJECTION possibility is VERY HIGH.

This is the future : iPS cells which is derived from ADULT stem cells.

Virus-free Embryonic-like Stem Cells Made From Skin Of Parkinson's Disease Patients

ScienceDaily (Mar. 8, 2009) — Whitehead Institute researchers have developed a novel method to remove potential cancer-causing genes during the reprogramming of skin cells from Parkinson's disease patients into an embryonic-stem-cell-like state. Scientists then used the resulting induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells to derive dopamine-producing neurons, the cell type that degenerates
in Parkinson's disease patients

Rubytues63:

You may be interested to know that the induced stem cells created by Yamanaka cause tumors as well. ( http://www.cell.com/abstract/S0092-8674(06)00976-7 ).

And that James Thomson (not Thompson) is an advocate for relaxing the restrictions on embryonic stem-cell research because he recognizes the need to keep all avenues of research open.

Whatever site you got your secondhand (or thirdhand, or fourthhand, etc.) information from is being deliberately misleading, as usually happens from the extreme right wing.

At any rate, I do not see why the right-wingers claim that the field has not been set back, when it took seven years to make "acceptable" embryonic stem cells... whereas we could have gotten to work on the real thing seven years earlier.

Well written article. Thank you.

And Paganplace and Spidermean2 have PhD's/MD's in Biochemistry, Microbiology, Obstetrics and/or Gynecology?

References please to support your statements !!!!

rubytues63 wrote: "Does lifting this ban matter? Perhaps, but probably not."

No, it matters.

rubytues63 wrote: "Scientists like the idea of using embryonic stem cells because one of these biological marvels can (in theory) become any type of cell in the body. But in practice, these marvels form tumors instead of the desired tissue type in more than 50% of all trials. Because of the undesirable and often unpredictable results, many scientists have given up completely on embryonic stem cell research, believing it to be a dead end."

The "study" of ESCs is just that, a study. The potential is huge, being able to regenerate organs and limbs like slamaders do. No one is trying to come up with a cure using them. Their behavior and potential needs to be studied. Its called basic science, the study of just what ESCs can do. The therapies that they might provide are down the road. I'd liken it to when antibiotics were first discovered. The potential was enormous but it needed to be studied as far as how to create the antibiotics, how to deliver them, for what diseases, etc.

rubytues63 wrote: "But let’s assume for a moment that these nay-sayers are wrong; that embryonic stem cell research is not a dead end. Fifteen months ago, scientists Shinya Yamanaka and James Thompson discovered a way to reprogram adult human skin cells so that they behave just like embryonic stem cells."

No, not just like. They are pluripotent like ESC but they are not the same. It was a big advance but ESC still need to be studied from a basic science viewpoint.

rubytues63 wrote: "Embryonic Stem Cell Research no longer needs embryos!"

Embryonic stem cells are by definition from embryos. What a silly statement.

Who are we to determine when life begins and when a soul arrives? We are not god.

By the title of her article it then is definitely a "slippery slope".
Just look at the group that now runs the government.
We elected them all...

Mark
Always seek the truth.

"Adult stem cells works. That is where the future of stem cell is. In fact there is now a technology which makes adult stem cells behave exactly like embryonic stem cells.

"What doesn't work is EMBRYONIC stem cells per se. The main problem why it doesn't work is because its DNA is not the exact copy of the recipient patient."

Half-truth, there, Spidey. (Actually, sometimes, like in biological science, fifty percent's actually pretty good.)

Embryonic stem cells are more flexible and more straightforward to use, particularly for reseach. Adult ones are more likely to have some damage, as well. Which complicates research greatly... Eventually being able to use adult stem cells for perfectly-matched tissue is of course, promising, but it'll be harder or in some venues impossible to get there without using the 'embryonic' medical waste from fertility clinic donors who've had all the kids they're going to.

Immunosuppressants are *already* in common use for transplant patients, as well as many other purposes. No one calls *that* bad science, apparently apart from people who try to see reality in black or white terms.

They do certain things.

There are costs to it. But ask a transplant patient whether it's worth it.

"Is there any justification, other than the greed of the doctor who implanted the embryos, for providing a woman who already has six children with the opportunity to have eight more? I've been stunned by the focus on whether the mother is mentally unbalanced: we ought to be asking about the ethics and sanity of the doctor who made this possible."

Well, yes, that's pretty crazy. I've been really trying to *not* follow this story, cause it's so ridiculous, but the reason fertility clinics create all these surlus blastocysts is because often womens' fertility problems in fact are related to embryoes not implanting. So they make a bunch, and usually implant a bunch, (those that seem to have the best chance) in the hopes one will result in a pregnancy.

As it is, these fertility treatments use a great surplus of in-vitro fertilized eggs. Even when a pregnancy does result. Those 'human lives' as some call them, usually are 'killed' in the process.

Dan, Dan, Dan,

As with gay sexual activity, you are also "biologically challenged" in the area of human creation.

Does lifting this ban matter?

Perhaps, but probably not.

Scientists like the idea of using embryonic stem cells because one of these biological marvels can (in theory) become any type of cell in the body. But in practice, these marvels form tumors instead of the desired tissue type in more than 50% of all trials. Because of the undesirable and often unpredictable results, many scientists have given up completely on embryonic stem cell research, believing it to be a dead end.

But let’s assume for a moment that these nay-sayers are wrong; that embryonic stem cell research is not a dead end. Fifteen months ago, scientists Shinya Yamanaka and James Thompson discovered a way to reprogram adult human skin cells so that they behave just like embryonic stem cells.

Embryonic Stem Cell Research no longer needs embryos!

If Yamanaka and Thompson had not made their discovery, Obama’s policy reversal would have been significant, regardless of whether you agreed with it or not. But they did and so I’m not sure how Obama’s policy change matters. The time when such a move would have made a profound difference (or any other kind of difference for that matter) is long gone.

Is the Administration’s announcement more about making headlines or producing results?

CCNL

Everything that you stated in your reply to me has been stated over and over on previous occaisions. But none of it is relevant to anything that I said. I said that it is bunk to suppose that cells in a laboratory dish have the same status as a fully formed human being.

You have not answered because you cannot answer. You are a good example of the flawed thinking in the opposition to embryonic stem cell research. Keep it up; it only helps promote the ultimate success of good sense and reason on this matter.

Dan, Dan, Dan in the Den,

Trying to impress Jesus?? No, just being fair to all of our brothers and sisters!!!!

With respect to Jesus and his current followers: (for those eyes that have not seen)

Jesus was an illiterate Jewish peasant/carpenter/simple preacher man who suffered from hallucinations and who has been characterized anywhere from the Messiah from Nazareth to a mythical character from mythical Nazareth to a mamzer from Nazareth (Professor Bruce Chilton, in his book Rabbi Jesus). Analyses of Jesus’ life by many contemporary NT scholars (e.g. Professors Crossan, Borg and Fredriksen, On Faith panelists) via the NT and related documents have concluded that only about 30% of Jesus' sayings and ways noted in the NT were authentic. The rest being embellishments (e.g. miracles)/hallucinations made/had by the NT authors to impress various Christian, Jewish and Pagan sects.

The 30% of the NT that is "authentic Jesus" like everything in life was borrowed/plagiarized and/or improved from those who came before. In Jesus' case, it was the ways and sayings of the Babylonians, Greeks, Persians, Egyptians, Hittites, Canaanites, OT, John the Baptizer and possibly the ways and sayings of traveling Greek Cynics.
http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/theories.html

For added "pizzazz", Catholic/Christian theologians divided god the singularity into three persons and invented atonement as an added guilt trip for the "pew people" to go along with this trinity of overseers. By doing so, they made god the padre into god the "filicider".

Current crises:

Pedophiliac priests, atonement theology and original sin!!!!

Luther, Calvin, Smith, Henry VIII, Wesley, Roger Williams et al, founders of Christian-based religions, also suffered from the belief in/hallucinations of "pretty wingie thingie" visits and "prophecies" for profits analogous to the myths of Catholicism (resurrections, apparitions, ascensions and immaculate conceptions).

Current crises:

Adulterous preachers, "propheteering/ profiteering" evangelicals and atonement theology.

I also like how CCNL's comment utilizes the slippery-slope fallacy... in response to an article in which Susan Jacoby so ably demolishes the slippery slope. Way to advance the conversation, holmes: knee = jerked.

CCNL

Thank you for making this suggestion, because it demonstrates perfectly the attitude of peopele who oppose embryonic stem cell research. The assumption of these people is that stem cells in a lab dish are equivalent fully fomred human beings. You dont' need to study the Bible and analyze verse after verse, and weight the arguments carefully, this way and then that, to know that such an argument is pure BUNK!

The facdt is, that it is easy to feel empathy for a blob of protoplasm; it is difficult to care for real people and to become invested in the emotional lives of real people. When a person whom you truely love gets sick, or injured, or dies, you suffer the true and deep psychic injury of grief, from which some people never recover.

When a cell in a dish die, you get to prance around in pretentious grief, all for the benefit of Jesus and God, so that Jesus and God can see what a deep and sincere person you are, that you are actually more sensitive than most people, that your Christian concern for cells in a dish make you better than everyone else.

But that is all fake emotion and fake grief, fake and contrived to impress Jesus.

Hmmm, and why don't we just harvest the organs/cells/blood from Alzheimers patients??? Why waste all these valuable resources??

Daniel ITLD,

Damn right. If I had a spinal injury, Parkinson's, Alzheimer's, or whatever, I would not hesitate a second to volunteer for any treatment whatsoever. Hell, I would scream for it.

Dear Spiderman

You have not lived much; I have.

Anyone who has suffered enough, or knows they will soon die of a sickness, disease, or an injury would gladly be a guinea pig for some hopeful yet unperfected treatment that might help them with their suffereing, or that might help them get well. In fact, people already do that everyday.

Don't you want sick people to get well? Don't you want to comfort people's suffereing? You act like this is just a theoretical argument in which the difficulites of real people do not count.

Whenever there is any good movement towards progess in the world, there are always people who want to drag their feet and hold things back, for any number of contrived reasons. But then when the world moves ahead, so do they.

For crying out loud! We have a black President. Think of all the people who would have given anything to prevent that from happening; but it happened anyway.

Can't you accept the promise that embryonic stem cell research might lead to, and not be so negative about everything? Do you really hope God will destroy everything, as you so often say?

Well, I do not hope that. If you believe in God, then do you think he created the stem cells? And did he give us access to them with our brains, and with the ability to figure out how they work? If we are not meant to know of such things, then why wouldn't God keep these things hidden from out probling minds?

There are the embryonic stem cells; someone has got in their head what they are and what they do; and that we might learn how they work and use the "power" that is in them. Now that these ideas have come into people's heads, there is nothing that can make these ideas ever go away.

Those who support embryonic stem cell should fall in line to be their next guinea pigs. That's fine with me.

Let's see how their kind of science works. As I've said, observe those 10 patients how "well" they will recover.

Daniel ITLD,

Excellent, even beautiful, and true reply to Spidey re stem cell research. More, it is a great reply to all who so mindlessly oppose it. As a Christian, it always amazes me how so many who loudly proclaim to be Christian don't ask this simple and worn-out question: What would Jesus do? Obviously, He would support healing - He did quite a lot of it, as I recall from the Gospels.

Spiderman

Perhaps I am mistaken, but I was under the impression that embryonic stem cells have an unknown mechanism that enables them to differentiate into any tissue of the body. I was under the impression that the goal of embryonic stem cell research was to identify this mechanism, and try to mimic it.

Currently, as far as I know, there are no therapies in which embryonic stem cells are used to cure any medical conditions. It is all at a preliminary stage, and would remain so forever with the restrictions that President Bush had put on embryonic stem cell research.

Thank God for my President Barak Obama, who has some sense. Embryonic stem cell research is not creepy or weird; it is not Frankenstein; it is not baby-killing; it does not involve cloning.

It is instead, an attempt to understand, control, and exploit a process of cellular differntiation, which we know happens in nature, in the original formation of all our bodies; why should we not also use these exact same processes to renew or sick, diseased, and injured bodies?

Embryonic stem cells in a laboratory dish are not human beings anymore than a skin cell is a human being, anymore than a heart cell is a human being; anymore than a blood cell is a human being.

Adult stem cells works. That is where the future of stem cell is. In fact there is now a technology which makes adult stem cells behave exactly like embryonic stem cells.

What doesn't work is EMBRYONIC stem cells per se. The main problem why it doesn't work is because its DNA is not the exact copy of the recipient patient.

******

10 Paralyzed Patients to Get Stem Cells in Spine
By Daniel J. DeNoon
WebMD Health News
Reviewed by Louise Chang, MD

Jan. 23, 2009 -- Geron Corp. will test its OPC1 cells in 10 patients completely paralyzed by recent spinal cord injuries. It's the first FDA-approved study of an embryonic stem cell product in human patients.

******

Research is good but I think what they plan to do with those 10 paralized patients just to "prove" that ES cells have a future is unconsciounable.

They are sacrificing those people for the sake of FUNDING.

As I've said, ES cells has NO promising cure. Those 10 patients, if they will truly be injected with ES cells are in for a very BAD ride.

I hope they will have a monthly report on those patients to show the stupidity of these doctors.

The concept of immunization is to strengthen our immune system by introducing weak bacteria. Immuno suppression reverses this idea. It is BAD SCIENCE.

What these people are actually testing with Embryonic stem cell is how their IMMMUNO-SUPRESSION DRUGS work.

Business as usual. It's all for the money.

I have a hypothetical question for entrenched opponents of embryonic stem-cell research.

Let's suppose that embryonic stem-cell research has proceded, and has enabled super-effective medical procedures that can repair tissue injured by deep burns. And let's suppose that you - a principled opponent of embryonic stem-cell research - are involved in a domestic accident that results in disfiguring and enduringly agonising 2nd and 3rd degree burns to your face and upper body.

Would you refuse treatment because embryos have been spawned and used up to make it possible?

If stem cell science does spawn all manner of miracles in its labs - new skin for the burned, new organs for the diseased, new hope for the chronically afflicted - I wonder whether today's Christmongering naysayers will abstain from treatment, as conscientious objectors. Given the choice, would a 3rd-degree-burned anti-stem-cell-research type prefer new skin over eternal principles? Will we see cancerous cardinals opting for death over life from stem-cell-grown neo-organs?

On another tack, assuming all these medical miracles do eventually transpire, will there be anyone in a position to pay for the treatments?

Seems not just laboratorial breakthroughs are needed...

DITLD wrote: "It is easier to shed an empathetic tear for a blob of protoplasm than it is to feel empathey and compassion for the suffering of fully formed human beings"

My wife and I shed many tears for the embryos that didn't survive our two failed IVF attempts. I firmly believe that the vast majority of women who choose abortion, do so tearfully.

I have the utmost respect for those couples who have the courage to release their embryos to save the lives of others.

Robert Beaver -- FYI - Researchers make scientific discoveries that lead to treatments. Researchers do not treat patients and therefore do not charge for treatments. That is the realm of doctors, drug companies, medical equipment and supply companies and health insurance providers.

Embryonic stem cells have the capicity to transform themselves into any kind of tissue.

The hope is that by studying this process, scientist will be able to mimic it, and will be able to grow new healthy tissue to replace diseased, damaged, or injured tissue.

If a person suffers heart damage from a heat attack, perhaps the heart could be restored to normal.

Any tissue that is damaged by cancer and its subsequent surgery and radiaion could possibly be restored. That would enable more radical treatment of cancer, with a greater hope of recovery in one piece.

If a person has a spinal chord injury and paralysis, perhaps the spinal chord could be restored, and the paralysis cured.

People mutilated in accidents and fires would have a greated hope of being restored to their former selves.

These are just a few jumping off points for what might be accomplished with embryonic stem cell research. It is beyond my comprehension that people would block advances in this kind of research. It is a sign of a mean spirit and a hard heart; and there is NO argument that a religious person can put forward that will ever change my opinion on this.

Embryonic stem cells have the capacity to transform themselves into any kind of cell, and consequently, into any kind of tissue. Embryonic stem cells therefore have the capcity to transform themselves into brain tissue, heart tissue, stomach tissue, muscle, skin, and, in fact any tissue. Adult stem cells do not have this capacity.

It is not an uncertain hope that embryonic stem cell research will lead to medical advances; quite the contrary, there is a high degree of certainty that many medical problems can be improved or cured by the techniques discovered in stem cell research.

I am stunned at the utter absurdity of the Catholic debate. It is intuitive and obvious that a fetus in a lab dish is not the same as a fully formed human being. It is the mere-est of common sense.

The Catholic debate is based on nothing, but pure invention. It is easier to shed an empathetic tear for a blob of protoplasm than it is to feel empathey and compassion for the suffering of fully formed human beings.

I believe that this is partly what this is all about, a need to show Jesus a degree of empathy, that seems to comply with Christian instructions, but which is, pretty easy and painless, tears for blobs of mindless, soul-less, unsuffering protoplasm versus a cold shoulder for people in need.

The work of the Catholic Church in obstructing the scientific advances of embryonic stem cell research is a tragedy. It is one more example of the relgious people of the world over-thinking problems that are not problems, and assigning the undefinable quality of sin, where there is no sin.

CCNL writes:
"As with all life, they should be given proper burial and allowed to decompose (or be cremated) with dignity as all human life is."

That reminds me of a very funny Doonsbury cartoon, featuring Shrub 43, asking one of his handlers to check and see if "all those poor little stem cells got proper funerals".

Bun-Bun, you have reached a new lower level of stupidity.

CCNL writes:
"As with all life, they should be given proper burial and allowed to decompose (or be cremated) with dignity as all human life is."

Why?

That seems like a criminal waste when they can be used to further research that may save lives, or at least substantially improve them - for real, living people. It's not like the 5-day old clump of cells knows, or cares.

And the coffin would have to be awfully tiny.

Susan Jacoby

Why is it that nearly all opponents of embryonic stem cell research can't spell the word "embryonic?"

All researchers are indeed dreamers. It is entirely possible that there will be no effective treatments for fatal diseases--whether based on adult or embryonic stem cells--for generations. All the more reason to begin exploring all avenues of research now.

I doubt that anyone born in 1909 could have imagined antibiotics, much less organ transplants and open heart surgery, at the beginning of their adult lives. We simply don't know where any research will lead in its initial stages.

As for the octuplets Mom being more responsible than her doctor, this is typical right-wing thinking. She is, of course responsible--but society cannot control the individual desires of unstable and selfish people. It can, however, set
legal standards for the practice of medicine (as we know from the fierce attempts of the anti-choice movement to restrict the practice of abortion). A doctor who would implant eight embryos in any woman, given the danger to both mother and children of higher order multiple births, ought to lose his or her medical license. Anti-abortion psychology is quite fascinating,in that it would deny a rape victim the right to choose abortion but allow a woman with six children (two of them with disabilities) to choose to have eight more children.

One assumes human embryos cannot last forever in the cryogenic state. As with all life, they should be given proper burial and allowed to decompose (or be cremated) with dignity as all human life is. Creating/breeding these embryos for research or use as life-saving drugs is akin to cloning humans simply to harvest their parts for life-saving transplants.

And the fastest growing voting demographic and possibly the largest voting bloc in the USA is ? ::

The Immoral Majority i.e The 70 million "mothers and fathers of aborted children" whose ranks grow by two million per year. They easily put BO in the White/Blood Red House!!!! The math: ~one million abortions/yr since 1973(Roe vs Wade) X 35 yrs x 2 parents/aborted child = ~ 70 million.

The popular vote: 69,456,897 votes for BO, 59,934,814 votes for JM.

And as BO promised the members of the Immoral Majority, he is now the leading advocate of abortion-on-demand to include the destruction of human embryos.

whoops, I'm not sure why I introduced an O into the abbreviation of iPS there.

Jim39:

"I think the pro embriotic stem cell folks should be more honest in their debate tactics."

That takes gall, considering your post is full of the dishonest tactics used by the anti-ESC zealots on this issue.

First off, the use of "50 adult stem cell therapies" is from a fraudulent list derived from some right-wing group. I had a look at that list when they started circulating it years ago: most of the entries were newspaper articles about *potential* treatments, or scienitfic articles on preliminary animal-model work.

Second, adult stem cells have been in use for decades longer than embryonic -- bone marrow transplants, for instance, as one crude form of the therapy.

Third, adult stem cells have limited application because they have already been partially differentiated. The hematopoietic stem cells in bone marrow, for instance, can become any type of blood cell. That's great for disorders involving the blood or immune system, but useless for neurological disorders. And right now, the only way to get adult neural stem cells is to chop up an embryonic brain.

Embryonic stem cells have the potential to be induced to become any variety of adult stem cell, and then in turn any terminally-differentiated cell.

There has been some progress in trying to get adult stem cells to revert to an embryonic state, but there are huge pitfalls here too that need to be addressed. These "induced plutipotent" cells (iPOS) have been experimentally manipulated (the only human iPOS cells so far have multiple nuclei), and potentially carry the nasty retroviral DNA elements used to induce that state. In vivo, they have a high propensity to cause tumors. And, of course, you can never be entirely certain whether these iPOS cells act like "real" hESC unless you have actual hESC to compare them to.

"Most scientist have changed their focus from embriotic to adult stem cells"

This is also a lie (and reminiscent of the old creationist canard that "more and more scientists are abandoning evolution for intelligent design"). You can't name any or cite any studies showing this to be the case. I guarantee that.

To the extent that the USA is losing ESC researchers, it is because they were going overseas to study in countries that did not impose the restrictions we had here.

Just about every expert in the field advocates research into all areas, both embryonic and adult. This is the only way science progresses, by looking at things from multiple angles, sorting through the various approaches and seeing what works.

Dear Spiderman,

I am curious: on what do you base your expertise? Not on science, nor on any knowledge of the field. To cure a disease you need to understand it, and to understand it you need to study it. Diseases like Parkinsons are hard to study because they are far advanced before they are even diagnosed (at diagnosis, most Parkinsons patients have already lost 80% of cells in the substantia nigra). Stem cells allow researchers a unique way to manipulate cells to test their hypotheses about how diseases like Parkinsons start and progress BEFORE they can be diagnosed. Uncontaminated embryonic stem cells offer by far the best chance, but such research takes time.
But you won't believe that, because if science claims something you don't want to hear - like evolution - you simply claim it's NOT TRUE (your caps, not mine). I am one of those Christians who happens to think that the bible is a spiritual guide, not a science handbook. If the people writing the bible died of diseases like appendicitis (which was deadly then) it does not mean that we should too. But it's science, not religion, that brought, brings, and will bring the cures to our physical ailments. Scientists may be dreamers, but an awful lot of their dreams have come true over the past centuries, in the teeth of naysayers like you.

Jim39,

Only a few Episcopalians have spoken out against embryonic stem cell research. Most of us are in favor of it.

As of two years ago over 50 different types of surgeries to regenerate cells using ADULT stem cells have been successful. To the best of my knowledge as of today there has been no success with embrionic stem cells. Most scientist have changed their focus from embriotic to adult stem cells for the practicle reason of what works. Contrary to your assertion the Bush limited restriction did not limit research. The availability of IVF stem cell lines has never been a problem. If the wonderful therapies are around the corner as you say why does the government have to pay at all? Private pharmicuticals should be falling over themselves to make the first breakthrough and score a patent!Your opponents are not just "right wing Evangelicals" and Roman Catholics; Anglicans, Episcopalians and Lutherans have spoken out against embriotic stem cell research.I think the pro embriotic stem cell folks should be more honest in their debate tactics.

Reading a Spidermean2 post is like being caught in a hurricane of pure stupid. Nothing worth wasting any time on, except,

"Every person has a unique DNA. It is his "operating system". You add a different OS over an existing one and it will go haywire. Biologists don't undertand this. Their usual solution is immuno-suprression. BAD SCIENCE."

Yes, which is why organ transplants never work and nobody does them anymore.

"Simply because it is NOT NOT NOT science."

Did you hold your breath and stamp your feet as you typed that?

Globalone:

I'm stunned - and intrigued. I actually agree with your entire post without reservation.

Regards,

DZ

Robert Beaver -- FYI - Researchers make scientific discoveries that lead to treatments. Researchers do not treat patients and therefore do not charge for treatments.

Treatment and payment is the realm of doctors, drug companies, medical equipment and supply companies and health insurance providers.

if the taxpayer is going to fund this then I believe that the taxpayers ought to benefit from any discoveries free of charge or let them (researchers) pay for this themselves because you know they will charge out the wazoo for any treatments

Susan,

As an aside to your comment, "I've been stunned by the focus on whether the mother is mentally unbalanced: we ought to be asking about the ethics and sanity of the doctor who made this possible."

I would suspect that is partly based on the lack of clear accountability for the doctor. Outside of physical harm, there is no bright line test at which a doctor can make decisions for the patient. I certainly don't want a doctor to determine what procedures, within reason, I should or should not be allowed to pursue.

The responsibility of the mom however, at least in this case, is not so blury. She clearly acted in her own self interests with a certain disregard for the welfare of herself, her children, and her unborn.

Jacoby wrote "Leave the slippery slope to victims of Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, and paralysis by spinal cord injuries."

What's wrong here is oftentimes, we believe what biologists say are "facts".

Note this : Embryonic stem cell implants is NOT feasible, therefore it cannot cure anything that you've mentioned.

The proof of the pudding is always in the eating. Embryonic stem cell has been with us for years already and it's not even banned in any country including America.

So far it has not demonstrated a single cure. Not in South Korea, Japan, Europe, etc . NOWHERE.

Why? Because it's NOT science.

To patients who will be subjected to ES cell implants, just beware guys. Look for good lawyers. You will need it to collect some BIG money.

These guys are dreaming. Just as they were dreaming when they say that their great great granpa is a baboon. NOT TRUE.

All sciences follow the same basic principles and at a glance embryonic stem cell implants are scientific "law breakers".

Every person has a unique DNA. It is his "operating system". You add a different OS over an existing one and it will go haywire. Biologists don't undertand this. Their usual solution is immuno-suprression. BAD SCIENCE.

Believe me, it's NOT going to work.

I repeat. It's been with us for years and NO single cure was demonstrated. Simply because it is NOT NOT NOT science.