[QUOTE=Eureka]
Perhaps I’ve expressed myself poorly. I don’t mean to indicate that researchers are solely motivated by a desire to get rich or famous. I don’t really doubt that most if not all researchers in this field are true believers, convinced that if their research is successful, they will help people.
But I really, truly believe that a lot of the stated potential of stem cells is hype and hope, not fact.
And I really, truly, believe that there is a tremendous, significant difference between using embryos as the starting point for research and using mice or rats or bacteria or plants or even using tissue from adults. I may not be able to explain that difference, but it is there and it is real, to me.
That’s not what I’m saying–what I’m saying is that there is LESS logic than there is hope and hype. I’m not prepared to dismiss your story as an appeal to emotion, you make it sound like embryonic stem cells are much closer to being practical than I would have guessed. Your story is compelling . . . but not quite compelling enough. What would make it compelling enough? I honestly don’t know. I may be in danger of wishing to prevent all embryonic stem cell research in order to prevent frivolous stem cell research–because I don’t trust anyone to figure out how to regulate it so that research can be done only where it is most likely to be effective.
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I don’t do medical research, but I do other types of research, and I can tell you don’t understand what is involved at all. Maybe you’ll feel better with more information.
Any research starts with hope. There is a very high chance that any advanced type of research will not pan out. That doesn’t mean you don’t do it, it means you make sure you’re on the right track all the time, and are prepared to abandon dead ends. I’m sure that not all the diseases will be tractable to this method, but if even some are that’s a lot of people alive who would be dead, or alive with better lives than before.
No researcher is going to spend years of his or her life in the lab for hype. You get the awards and the grants for success, not hype. Look at the cold fusion guys - they had plenty of hype, but no results, and it did not go well for them. I assure you, people working on stem cells are making the best, and most educated, guesses they can.
My understanding is that lot’s of research has been done already on animal stem cells, which is why we’re ready for human ones. No one does human research first - there is a lot more paperwork, for one thing, and you have to be more careful. The reason researchers want to do the work is that they’ve seen enough positive results so that they think there is a good chance of success. Yes, it will take time, but it’s taking a lot more time because of opposition from the religious. If successful therapies are invented, how would you feel telling the families of those who died just before they are available that the reason it took so long was that you just weren’t sure back in 2006, and so helped delay it. (You don’t , directly, but Bush does.)
As for regulating research so that it will be done only if it will be effective - that shows you don’t get it. Research that has a very high chance of being effective gets funded by industry, because the payoff is reasonably certain. No one knows how to be sure if more farout research is effective, which is why it gets funded by the government (or very rich companies) where failures are expected, and we’re happy with a very small hit rate.
Of course no one knows for sure. When I was at Bell Labs, in the good old days, we distinguished between long term research, > 4 years out, short term research , 2 - 4 years, and development, 1 - 2 years. Stem cell research is long term, but it will never become short term without funding.
Now, I live in Silicon Valley, so my property values will no doubt continue to climb thanks to Bush’s actions, as more and more of the work comes here thanks to California’s initiative. But I would gladly give that up to get these cures in time for me to need them.
