Right.
Based on the information contained in the posts, and the quality of the cited sources, who has the surest grasp of the science involved with the issue in this thread?
It might just be someone who disagrees with you.
Well, I’m not sure of the quality of all your citations, Mr. Moto. Your conclusions are a bit suspect as well. Embryonic stem cell work has been active for less than a decade, but you would imply that it has failed to show any progress and should therefore be discarded.
Here’s some of the progress it has yielded: Juvenile Diabetes Foundation Website These include the following: “Embryonic Stem Cells Produce Healing Compounds”; “Treating Blindness”; “Regulating Heart Activity.”
The point is that this is all very new work, and that we cannot know what will lead to cures for diseases. Of course the work is hard - breaking new ground must be. But cutting it off at the knees is not the solution to making it easier, nor to finding cures.
Your position seems to me to be telling someone to negotiate a maze, but also telling them that they cannot explore the left side of the maze. Will they find their way out? Maybe, maybe not. Of course my analogy falls apart a bit, because the effort spent figuring out how all stem cells work will all serve the final purpose, so the effects of limiting research in embryonic stem cells is far more severe.
Here’s some more information, from http://www.stemcellresearchfoundation.org/:
I am by no means an expert in this, merely a very keenly interested observer. My son has Type I Diabetes, as some of you are tired of hearing, no doubt. Please do whatever is within your power to move us closer to the goal of a cure for this disease. Stem cell research holds the promise of treatment for diabetes and for so many other ailments.
Let’s see now (crunch, crunch)… definitely more than a six-pack, isn’t it? Merry Christmas!
Hentor, I’m all for stem cell research. I just believe concentrating on embryonic stem cells invites a moral dilemma without necessarily offering clear benefits in the end.
As an interesting illustration of this, it seems the diabetes research you were so impressed with was conducted using adult stem cells.
Again, I have to stress, absolutely nobody is against using adult stem cells for research or therapy. And the number of uses for adult stem cells, already very important in actual treatment, is growing all of the time.
I wish all of the best for you and your son. Let’s hope a breakthrough is found soon.
How would one know whether it will offer benefits? That’s why it’s called research.
I agree with II Gyan II. It may be dead-end. It may have yeilded all it’s going to. But that is by no means certain. You never know what the benefits are until you do the research.
Uh huh.
You know, the cold-endurance tests run on concentration camp inmates only went so far. Perhaps we should round up another set of prisoners (maybe death row inmates?) and freeze them to death.
I can justify this by the quality of the scientific data returned.
Please don’t accuse me of Godwinizing this thread. I bring this up for a good reason. The experiments were done on a class of people considered less than fully human, yet containing enough human characteristics to return usable data. This is obviously a familiar argument today.
Scientific benefit doesn’t justify everything. We all know this - nobody here would support the tests run by Josef Mengele. Some people here oppose animal experimentation on humane grounds. There are rules that govern ethical experimentation, rules every legitimate scientist follows.
In arguing against embryonic stem cell research, I’m not attacking science in general nor stem cell research in particular. I’m merely attempting to clarify the ethical rules for a certain class of stem cells, mindful that harvesting these cells entails the destruction of a human embryo.
I’m attacking the notion that embryonic stem-cell research should not be conducted because: “without necessarily offering clear benefits in the end.” You don’t know what the end might bring. Maybe zilch. Maybe many cures. Maybe just one. If you’re against ESC research on moral grounds, that’s all you need to argue. This unclear benefits is a fallacious argument and in fact irrelevant. What if someone could demonstrate that certain line of ESC research is highly likely to bring about a cure for some serious ailment(s). Would you then consider the destruction of embryos any more sanctified?
And are these embryos, at the time of their potential harvest, intended for pregnancy?
BTW, your ethical dilemma is actually a (Judeo-Christian) moral dilemma, isn’t it? Based on the belief of ensoulment?
Well, I have a question for you in return.
If, through the course of research, scientists discover a range of adult stem cells that can produce all of the known cells of the body - would you still demand that embryonic stem cell research continue?
If so, why? There would be no scientific need for embryonic stem cells at that point, and the problems embryonic stem cells present (especially in regard to teratoma formation) could be avoided.
Here’s another example - research on stem cells from hair follicles.
To first question, Yes.
To second, because it’s basic research. We don’t know what benefits/knowledge might be missed. Science is about exploration, not just curing diseases.
Can you say for sure it won’t? As others have pointed out, that’s what research is - efforts to find solutions and test hypotheses. Apart from that, it presents no moral dilemma for me, other than the dilemma of restrictions placed on crucially important research by others because of their personal beliefs.
Yes, and? You seem to suggest that I should not be impressed with this, as if I am opposed to everything other than embryonic stem cell research. Foolish. I think it is great. Is there a cure for diabetes yet? Why not? The answer is because more research is needed to bring it to that stage. If we find through embryonic stem cell research a method for bringing a cure about using any stem cells, that’s super, because there will be a greater pool of resources to bring cures to everyone.
Yes, please do. But you treat this as an abstraction - as if the embryonic stem cell supporters are lined up against the adult stem cell supporters, and should be disappointed if a cure is found through the latter. This is not an abstraction to me. Can you not see that there is no cure now? Can you not see that restricting research raises the impediments to finding cures for disease? Why not?
Many Jews and Muslims believe that eating pork is a transgression of God’s law, yet you don’t see them trying to shut down the bacon industry. Why? Just guessing, but I suppose they figure that their moral doctrines apply to them alone and shouldn’t be imposed on those who don’t share their views.
What a silly question, of course they are . . . wait a minute, this is GD, isn’t it? Not CS? So this isn’t a thread on cuisine? Never mind . . .
One more thing: my elder brother has Multiple Sclerosis. Bad. I’m a chemist. As of late, he’s been dropping none-too-veiled questions about the best way to commit suicide. I cannot do a fucking thing to help him. Which makes me feel angry and frustrated to say the least. What can I do? What can I say? The only advice I can give to my older brother (who was always the one I turned to for guidance) is to hang fire; surely, biomedical understanding is growing by leaps and bounds, and surely it’s only a matter of time till the biochemical underpinnings of his disease are revealed. Through research.
So please forgive me if I react with scorn to your hypothetical choice between a blastoma (which was going to be disposed of anyway) and my brother.
I’ll take my big brother, every time.
I’m truly sorry about that, bizzwire. I dearly hope things work out well for your brother and you.
However, I note that above you said that “you only remember those who scream the loudest.” You follow this by screaming pretty loudly.
Should we let policy in this area of medical research be made by people with passionate emotional interest in the issue, on either side? I’d be wary of that position if I were you, given the zeal on the side of those who passionately oppose this research.
I think a consensus can be arrived upon, especially if noncontroversial adult stem cell research continues to produce therapeutic results, far beyond mere promise in a lab.
I can understand you wanting to help your brother in any way possible, but there are lines you won’t cross. You wouldn’t experiment on inmates to find an MS cure. You wouldn’t sanction infanticide to do so.
The dabate here is what can permissably be done in the name of science. If you can’t see that moral values enacted into law through a democratic process have a role to play here, then you’re not enamored with democracy in general.
Exactly right, Mr. Moto.
Saying “It’s research!” is not sufficient justification. Not if it requires crossing ethical boundaries.
Isn’t it? For ethical reasons, I’m highly averse to cruelty to animals. But I have no problem with letting them endure a lot of suffering as laboratory test subjects, if that helps medical science advance. Most Americans feel exactly the same way about the issue if they think about it at all.
Do you have an ethical problem with the cold-water exposure experiments, BrainGlutton?
Or is any scientific endeavor returning good data automatically justified in your eyes?
In which case, I submit that there’s a contradiction in your ethics. In effect, you are saying that you condone a type of behavior that you regard as unethical. This suggests that your ethics need some re-thinking.
Do you think that cruelty to animals is always unethical? If so, that’s rather difficult to reconcile with the notion that you “have no problem with letting them endure a lot of suffering as laboratory test subjects.”
No surprise there.
Not at all. I am saying that actions that otherwise would be unethical can sometimes be justified if they serve a greater good. Relieving the suffering of untold numbers of humans is, in my scale of values, more important than preventing the suffering of a few test animals. (I would not, on the other hand, condone animal testing for less compelling purposes, such as testing cosmetics.)
And it is even more obvious that stem cell research, which might eventually make it possible to repair breaks in the human nervous system, is well worth the sacrifice of a few insensate monocellular embryos, most of which would otherwise wind up in a waste bin.