I can’t say I’m not surprised by this decision.
Rael: No DNA Testing For Cloned Baby Eve
And I love this line…
Thoughts?
Excuse me - the danged double negative caught me.
I meant: “I’m not surprised by this decision.”
I know better than that!
Yeah, these guys are playing the press quite well. I’d like to see the media, across the board, to tell them no more coverage until you’ve got the independent results.
Still, I do believe we’re not far from seeing a real clone from somewhere. Just too much money invovled for everyone to ignore the technology.
Does anyone know what grounds the lawsuit was based on?
http://www.centredaily.com/mld/centredaily/news/4849964.htm
So, what’s a “guardian ad litem”?
Someone other than a parent who represents the child legally, often during cusody cases. Kids I babysat had one while their parents were divorcing, but never got a real sense of what she did other than make recommendations to the court.
If it helps at all Dictionary.com says: a guardian appointed by a court of justice to conduct a particular suit.
What I wonder about the refusal is if they realize that no one is likely to take their claims seriously if a third party is not allowed to do DNA testing on the “clone.” Normally, I’d say “they must” but then these people think we’re aliens, so…
On a side note, I find it interesting that the media never fails to mention the Raelians’ belief that aliens created life on Earth.
Do articles about the Catholic Church refer to it as “the popular worldwide religion, whose members believe a man who could walk on water died two millenia ago and came back to life, and whose rituals involve eating his body and drinking his blood”? Do articles about Scientology refer to it as “the sect, which believes psychological problems are caused by the ghosts of aliens eradicated in a nuclear volcano”?
The media probably assumes that we already know all that, whereas the Raelians are the New Kids.
Ditto what Duck said. And in as much as their beliefs kinda put the whole episode in a different perspective, I would say pointing them out is relevant to the story.
Jeff
—And in as much as their beliefs kinda put the whole episode in a different perspective, I would say pointing them out is relevant to the story.—
Well so would the basis of the religious objections often raised against cloning… but the media rarely if ever mentions what those are: simply stating them as if they were unquestionable moral convictions as opposed to reasoning based on particular theological assumptions.
No, but they should.
No, tracer, they shouldn’t. Space is limited in journalism, and you shouldn’t spend your space explaining things that its safe to assume your audience knows. It’s like the fact that newspapers don’t explain what the term “GOP” means, they use it in the first reference to refer to the Republican Party.
If an article were related to a certain aspect of Christianity, such as Bethlehem, the reputed birth place of Jesus, then that should be mentioned, and usually is. If the article deals with a less-commonly known doctrine of the Catholic faith, then that should be referenced. However, the basic belief of the Catholic Church in Jesus as Messiah is too well known to waste prescious column inches on.
People don’t know what the Raelians believe, and their beliefs are pertinant to the situation with the so-called-clone, both of which make it appropriate to recap those positions in each article. Now, after five or six months of constant press coverage – which I don’t expect to happen here – I wouldn’t expect to see such a mention of their basic beliefs every time the group is mentioned.
The issue is familiarity. People in general, in America, are familiar with the Catholic Church, so such an explanation is not needed. That is not the case with the Raelians.
Mr2001 said:
Which is completely relevant since they believe aliens did it through cloning. The Raelians wouldn’t even be cloning humans (or trying to, or claiming to) if they didn’t believe this.
Well, I’m pretty pissed that this promoter/lawyer seems to be playing the media as well as the Raelians in the supposed interest of the kid.
On top of that, he provided a convenient excuse for them not to test. 
Maybe it’s just my tinfoil hat pinching, but I did wonder, reading the article, whether he was in on it, with them. Everybody wins–he gets exposure, they get off the hook.
I think that seeing Christianity described that way would be pretty funny, at least the first couple of times.
Refering to Scientology that way would be a good way for a newspaper to get sued for revealing cult secrets. 
We must here again remember Tom Wolfe’s definition of a cult: a religion with no political power.
This doesn’t surprise anybody. It’s a silly little game, it doesn’t take much brain power to see through it.
**
SHOW US THE DNA!!!**
http://www.arn.org/ubb/ultimatebb.php?ubb=get_topic;f=14;t=000267;p=1
- posted 01-04-2003 05:27 AM
I heard recently that they were backing out on providing the DNA evidence. Is that correct?
If true, it makes my suspicions extremely strong that they are only in this for all the media attention (and possibly some big money). I think I heard that they had a waiting list of around 2,000 people who are each willing to pay over $100,000.00 each for this procedure. It might have even been $200,000.00 each, now that I think about it.
If so, could this be nothing more than a $400,000,00.00 scam?**
That’s an awful lot of money. Like “they” say: Follow the money…
This really stinks. Some authorities (I’m not exactly sure who) need to stop these people. It seems simple to me: Provide proof, or stop making claims and taking advantage of people who are getting sucked in by all the hype.