"We've Been Waiting With Bated Breath To Get Started"

#2
#2
opening the way for millions of taxpayer dollars to be used
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amazing how this is part of any story about the Obama admin. I'm not against the research but I don't want my tax dollars being used for it
 
#3
#3
Yet, when Bush did exactly that: just eliminate the tax dollar funding of said research he was labeled as Banning it all together.
 
#4
#4
To say that Bush banned it altogether was obviously not true...and an inappropriate label. However, restricting federal funds from being used by researchers who use these lines did restrict all but a few (privately) well-funded labs from carrying out the research. Also, it got kind of crazy. I know a PhD student who had to basically build his own lab beside the rest of his research lab in order to use these private lines because everything from the hoods to the electricity in the normal lab were run using some portion of federally-funded dollars, so he couldn't do the research with the private cell lines there.
 
#5
#5
Last that I heard they had learned to turn lipo-suctioned fat into the needed stem cells. Did it not pan out?
 
#6
#6
Good.

I agree 100%, and if put to a vote, I would gladly support my tax dollars going to this research.

I understand the pro-life stance on this issue and I am certainly against late term abortion in any form. But this idea that the couple haven't even fell asleep yet and there is already a third person in the room is silly.
 
#7
#7
orangeblooded2 said:
Last that I heard they had learned to turn lipo-suctioned fat into the needed stem cells. Did it not pan out?
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I think that there is the possibility of creating stem cells from non-embryonic sources (don't know about fat cells), but the totipotency/pluripotency (ability of the cells to turn into any other kind of cell) of the cells is not completely settled/understood. On the other hand, embryonic stem cells, by definition, are totipotent.
 
#8
#8
"Today there is a great ideological struggle going on in the world. One side upholds what it calls the materialistic dialectic. Denying the existence of spiritual values, it maintains that man responds only to materialistic influences and consequently he is nothing.

He is an educated animal and is useful only as he serves the ambitions--desires--of a ruling clique; though they try to make this finer-sounding than that, because they say their dictatorship is that of the proletariat, meaning that they rule in the people's name--for the people.

Now, on our side, we recognize right away that man is not merely an animal, that his life and his ambitions have at the bottom a foundation of spiritual values."

Dwight Eisenhower 1955
 
#9
#9
Can anyone answer me this - if some form of treatment (e.g. Parkinsons) is developed that uses embryonic stem cells, where will the stem cells come from? It's one issue to research on a few cases but to mass produce embryos as raw material for treatments is clearly ethically troubling.

On the other hand, if the ESCs can be cloned themselves, why not just clone the existing lines and not have to create embryos for stem cell harvesting?
 
#10
#10
rjd970 said:
Good.

I agree 100%, and if put to a vote, I would gladly support my tax dollars going to this research.

I understand the pro-life stance on this issue and I am certainly against late term abortion in any form. But this idea that the couple haven't even fell asleep yet and there is already a third person in the room is silly.
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I am as pro-life as one can get, I am against embyronic stem cell research all together. And I absolutely don't want my tax dollars going anywhere near this crap.
 
#12
#12
volinbham said:
Can anyone answer me this - if some form of treatment (e.g. Parkinsons) is developed that uses embryonic stem cells, where will the stem cells come from? It's one issue to research on a few cases but to mass produce embryos as raw material for treatments is clearly ethically troubling.

On the other hand, if the ESCs can be cloned themselves, why not just clone the existing lines and not have to create embryos for stem cell harvesting?
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I think that the second paragraph is correct. ESCs can be clones themselves. I'm not sure if this can be done in perpetuity, though (though it may be possible...just not sure). I'm not a biologist, so I could be wrong, but I think the reason many different lines of ESC are desired is because a cure that is developed with one line of ESCs may not be the same with another line. I don't fully understand when gene expression comes in with regard to an embryo (that is, why are all ESCs not alike if they are undifferentiated and have the same DNA), but I think that the results can be different.

Obviously mass-producing embryos for cures is not a pleasant picture (unless you are like many of my grad school colleagues who see it as there only chance for lots of action as an embryo-daddy).
 
#13
#13
volinbham said:
Can anyone answer me this - if some form of treatment (e.g. Parkinsons) is developed that uses embryonic stem cells, where will the stem cells come from? It's one issue to research on a few cases but to mass produce embryos as raw material for treatments is clearly ethically troubling.

On the other hand, if the ESCs can be cloned themselves, why not just clone the existing lines and not have to create embryos for stem cell harvesting?
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I don't know the answer to your specific question, but to me, it doesn't matter.

The way I understand it, the stem cells harvested are from 3 day old embryos called blastocysts. This is a collection of 150 cells, indifferent from any other cell in the body with the exception that they can form into any human tissue. I read in an article somewhere that put in perspective, there are 100,000 cells of the same size in the brain of a fly.

Considering these blastocysts as human beings, whether they are technically embryos or not, is not justifiable IMO. Especially considering the potential they have to ease suffering for a number of ailments. I just can't see the ethical benefit of placing the importance of these cells over someone who is right now experiencing real suffering.

This is just my opinion and the way I see the issue.
 
#14
#14
rjd970 said:
I don't know the answer to your specific question, but to me, it doesn't matter.

The way I understand it, the stem cells harvested are from 3 day old embryos called blastocysts. This is a collection of 150 cells, indifferent from any other cell in the body with the exception that they can form into any human tissue. I read in an article somewhere that put in perspective, there are 100,000 cells of the same size in the brain of a fly.

Considering these blastocysts as human beings, whether they are technically embryos or not, is not justifiable IMO. Especially considering the potential they have to ease suffering for a number of ailments. I just can't see the ethical benefit of placing the importance of these cells over someone who is right now experiencing real suffering.

This is just my opinion and the way I see the issue.
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I see your point but the way I see it is that providing a market for these blastocysts is an ethical problem in and of itself. Take away the abortion equation and the ethical problem still stands IMO.
 
#15
#15
i'm still not convinced stem cells will cure anything. I love how people act like it's a proven treatment or something.
 
#16
#16
droski said:
i'm still not convinced stem cells will cure anything. I love how people act like it's a proven treatment or something.
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The science is sound and the potential is there. I think the potential payoff far outweighs the ethical concerns people have over blastocysts.
 
#17
#17
KB5252 said:
I see your point but the way I see it is that providing a market for these blastocysts is an ethical problem in and of itself. Take away the abortion equation and the ethical problem still stands IMO.
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Take away the abortion equation and you still have ethical problems with providing a market for these cells? I don't understand.

To me, it could no different than the organ transplant market in terms of regulation. I don't see a qualitative difference between a human heart, or kidney, etc...and these stem cells. Of course, this is where the real difference is on the issue and you may see it differently.
 
#18
#18
rjd970 said:
Take away the abortion equation and you still have ethical problems with providing a market for these cells? I don't understand.

To me, it could no different than the organ transplant market in terms of regulation. I don't see a qualitative difference between a human heart, or kidney, etc...and these stem cells. Of course, this is where the real difference is on the issue and you may see it differently.
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When giving up an organ for transplant you are giving it freely, of your own will. For obvious reasons there can be no "free will" gift involved. Perhaps I am holding out the grain of possibility that life does (or did) exist in these cells. I simply do not know and I'm not very sure anyone else is either.
 
#19
#19
rjd970 said:
The science is sound and the potential is there. I think the potential payoff far outweighs the ethical concerns people have over blastocysts.
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but that's the point it's all potential. if it is indeed the cure all for all our ills how come in the countries where stem cell research is legal we havent' seen a single tanglible medical benefit?
 
#20
#20
droski said:
but that's the point it's all potential. if it is indeed the cure all for all our ills how come in the countries where stem cell research is legal we havent' seen a single tanglible medical benefit?
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Yeah but all scientific exploits are like that, and sometimes the full power of American research is needed to make the significant breakthroughs. The science was sound and potential was there with things like atomic energy, and other countries were obviously researching that. We should have just given up, because of ethical or any other concern, or because we hadn't seen any tangible results from other research yet? Of course not, you look at the potential, and the soundness of the theory and move on from there.

I'm just saying, being too caught up on the "potential" is shortsighted. IMO, I don't think the ethical concerns outweight the potential and science. When something like this comes along and has the potential to be as world changing as irradicating smallpox, or polio, you don't say it isn't worth the ethical risk that a group of 150 cells are afforded the same rights as a human being. From a qualitative standpoint, there is nothing human about these cells.

I would say even if the potential is half what is stated, and the science was more ambiguous, I would still support it.
 
#21
#21
rjd970 said:
Considering these blastocysts as human beings, whether they are technically embryos or not, is not justifiable IMO.
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Not human beings but human life -- I'm not okay with mass producing human life for the sole purpose of harvesting stem cells.
 
#22
#22
TennTradition said:
I think that the second paragraph is correct. ESCs can be clones themselves. I'm not sure if this can be done in perpetuity, though (though it may be possible...just not sure). I'm not a biologist, so I could be wrong, but I think the reason many different lines of ESC are desired is because a cure that is developed with one line of ESCs may not be the same with another line. I don't fully understand when gene expression comes in with regard to an embryo (that is, why are all ESCs not alike if they are undifferentiated and have the same DNA), but I think that the results can be different.

Obviously mass-producing embryos for cures is not a pleasant picture (unless you are like many of my grad school colleagues who see it as there only chance for lots of action as an embryo-daddy).
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Makes sense. The next question then would be how much variation do you need? Would 1000 lines be sufficient to cover the genetic variation then clone from that point forward?

Embryo-daddy - I like it.
 
#23
#23
volinbham said:
Not human beings but human life -- I'm not okay with mass producing human life for the sole purpose of harvesting stem cells.
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Why?

This whole thing boils down to the issue of suffering for me. The human "life" we are talking about here does have the capacity to feel pain, they have no brain, or even nuerons. There is no reason to believe they suffer their destruction in any way. Meanwhile, we have very real human life suffering everyday. It is a fact these people feel pain, have emotions, and experience what his happening to them.

I think it is a stretch to consider these cells human life, or, at the very least, on the same scale we would consider me or you a human life.
 
#24
#24
I guess I don't agree that there is a distinction between "human life" and "human being". At what point does one stop and the other begin? To me, they are one in the same, and I wouldn't consider these cells "life" in the human sense.
 
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