stem cell research

What are your views on stem cell research? should it have been granted funding? is it morally right?

I would like to hear some christian and non-christian views on this please.

 

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I'm all for it....

As long as the ethics get ironed out its a real leap forward. I don't believe harvesting embrio's (sp?) is ethical but I believe down here in AUS' some success has been made in stimulating the body to produce and utilise its own dormant stem sells.

 

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your for the death of unborn children to further your own knowledge of science? you would be willing to kill a child to save your life from an illness that you may contract in the future?

 

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A_Believer

Which part of my post didn't you read/understand?? the part about harvesting embrio's being unethical, or the part about stimulating the already existing stem sells in a human adult??

 

A Believer,

Your phrase ”you are for the death of unborn children” Is deliberately emotive but has no real meaning. An embryo is not a child, so the reference to children is very misleading. It might be possible to talk of a potential child in the same way that one can talk about a chicken egg being a potential chicken. But until either develop into something more than a small cluster of cells then each entity has no identity and no rights.

Or in other words to vastly extend the knowledge of mankind in order to help relieve real pain and suffering that currently exists throughout the world.

There you go again – an embryo is not a child – it has no identity – it is not a person.

Cris

 

Cris

I completely agree, an embryo is not a human being...however lets not forget this is coming from a christain perspective.

 

We need that research. I would gladly see a few embryo die to heal millions and prevent their pain or death. It is not just the immediate implications as well that you have to look at but all the unexpected knowledge and its applications as well. As stated before an embryo is not a child.

 

Natural Evolution

Hiya,

As Christianity purports - mankind was made in the image of God. How ironic that mankind is capable of continiung the process all on his own.

Secondly, is this advancement not a natural step in human evolution?

Take care

 

A few points

1) Re: Harvesting embryos--The only need for this would come from the commercial aspect; that is, the need to economize the process in order to increase profits. Deliberate fertilization and abortion for the purposes of comemrcial science is only unethical and immoral because we, as people, place a certain value on human life. For the record, the idea sickens me. But given twenty years of lessening the tragedy of abortion by putting the otherwise-discarded tissue to use for human benefit, we should be able to find ways to work around it. What about being able to clone the damn things? This, however, requires much work with source stem-cells. If one still has a problem with it, we can compare it to theories of warfare: we reap a greater benefit from this tragedy.

2) Re: A_Believer--Stop inventing demons merely to have a shadow over which you might feel a sense of triumph. Until religious objectors stop holding back education and allow the rest of society to educate children on a number of issues--sex, drugs, crime, &c--the tragedy of abortion will continue to haunt us. Ne'er will we eliminate it totally--among the mass of Christian lore is one Kasdaye (Kesdeya or Kasdeja), a fallen angel who taught the practice of abortion to mankind. Certes, the angel fell, but it would appear that abortion is heavenly knowledge at least. According to Gustav Davidson's A Dictionary of Angels, Kasdaye is among seven angels who led the apostate angels in Enoch 1. The intervening centuries have done nothing to settle the issue of abortion, and in the meantime, the Christian echelon continues to call for the maintenance of conditions which seem demonstrably conducive to abortion. What's more important, then: keeping children ignorant of vice, or saving the unborn from abortion? In a fit of what I consider rare perspicacity, a supermodel (I believe Nikki Taylor) appearing on Maher's Politically Incorrect several years ago related that, while people may think of her own morals however they choose, at least she did not fall into the trap that her religiously-educated friends fell into, ceasing their educations after high school and pumping out hungry mouths with little or no idea of how to support and educate them.

3) Re: ...willing to kill a child...--On the one hand, I won't deny the sense of relief felt when the burden of whether or not to abort was lifted from my girlfriend and I--no fetal heartbeat. To the other, let's take a good, cold look at the situation: I am only adopted because I was conceived too early for the Roe v. Wade decision. At the time of my birth, abortion was a whole different matter, and had my mother chosen that route, it might have been by the coat-hanger. If we want to approach the idea of fetal viability, then I'll concede that my personal principle is that abortion ceases to be an option at that point. But otherwise, to invest in the potential of an embryonic mass of cells leads us back to Monty Python: Every sperm is good, every sperm is great. If a sperm is wasted, God gets irate ... or something like that. Every sperm cell and every ovum has human potential, and you're not about to tell me a woman who menstruates is immoral.

4) Re: ...willing to kill a child to save your life from an illness...--See, this is what I talk about when I criticize redemptive religions when I say it makes people selfish. Who says this is about one life? Alzheimer's, cancer, and a host of human mortalities may be averted. This bodes well for the human race in general. So it's not just about one person. Why do I aim at redemptive religion with this? Well, as long as you're worried about your own salvation, you're focusing on yourself. Those evil, world-minded infidels understand a little more about their place in the living scheme, and tend to look at what such a thing as stem cell research can offer the whole of humanity, as opposed to the redemptive concern for one's own self.

5) Re: ...willing to kill a child to save your life from an illness... (part 2)--Does anyone remember the "Bart's Comet" episode of The Simpsons? Even if you haven't seen it, worry not, for the concept still works. But there's a great line in there from Moe Syszlak after the comet crisis ends happily: Let's go burn down the observatory so this can never happen again! Of course, as they storm the museum of natural sciences, a dinosaur skeleton crashes down on Moe, who laments, "Oh, my back! I only hope medical science can cure me." To translate across to the present: Given the longstanding ethical quandaries facing scientists, I would propose to the anti-animal research people that they refuse any cancer treatment that was developed by animal testing; I would also propose that A_Believer should, in the future, refuse any medical treatment that was developed by stem-cell research. If the cure is born of evil sin, then why would a person wish to reap its benefits?

thanx,
tiassa

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Well said tiassa....

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well maybe its just me but a child is a child from the moment it is concived. We are all created in gods image, by saying it's allright to kill a person, and embryo in this case, you deface God and all those that believe and follow him. Murder is Murder. weither it be of an undeveloped child or a fully-grown adult. you cant justify the ends by the means.

 

A_Believer

I will not deny you your opinion. The course of your moral decisions, then, seems clear.

thanx,
Tiassa

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This question relies on what a child really is. At what point do you consider the beginnings of life an actual human life. A_Believer: What is the difference between a child and a sperm then. Is masturbation a case of mass murdering children. There is not a large leap from sperm to conception. What is the defining thing that a conceived child has that a sperm does not?

 

From a wider, human race perspective: There should be unlimited research on stem cells and there should be no limits to how the material can be collected. The human race is still in its evolutionary developmental infancy and we should not place any artificial restrictions on being able to rapidly improve our dire fragile existence and ensure our continued survival. It is unfortunate that there are some people who are squeamish about using and collecting fundamentally very useful human cells and who are unable to see and benefit from this fundamental research. Again we see religions favoring human suffering rather than healthy long lives.

In terms of preventing the development of potential new human life there is no practical difference between using an embryo for research, to the use of contraception, to the stress of a bad day that prevents a couple from having sex that night. We could also extend this to include the restriction of pornographic material that, if made more available, would almost certainly help stimulate many couples to have sex more often and create more human life.

Cris

 

notes on conception

Not too long ago, a young man ticketed for Minor In Possession of Alcohol in the state of Missouri, where life begins at conception, put a wrinkle into the legal system. Aged twenty years and five months at the time of his citation, he contested that if life begins at conception, then he was, officially, 21 years old and qualified for the purchase, possession, and consumption of alcohol. Because the statute read "aged 21 years", and said nothing about conception or birth, the courts found on his behalf and threw out the citation.

So this poses all sorts of questions about voting (a sudden addition of young voters could tip the scales to the liberal parties), driving, military service, &c.

But what I wonder is what will be the psychological effect--and therefore the practical effect--of causing couples to come down and register with the state the morning after good sex; doctors should not worry about a "birth certificate", but rather a "conception certificate". What a bureaucratic nightmare: My husband did me really well last night so I need to apply for a Possible-Conception Certificate, form number 666-13d.

Not to mention that miscarriages would be subject to homicide investigations ....

There's a lot of work to do, A_Believer. I suggest you start now, for the entire society would have to be overhauled.

That being said, I would like to see a detail of your views, A_Believer, pertaining to stem-cell research, cloning (it's human potential, is it a life?), and the other aspects of the subject you've introduced.

thanx,
Tiassa

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tiassa,

LOL

Cris

 

What are you saying here? Do public schools need to teach about sex, drugs, and crime? I think kids learn that easily enough on their own. Basic reading, writing, and math skills are a lot more appropriate (which U.S. schools do pretty miserably). What do kids need to know--other than that it is dangerous, and generally to stay away from experimenting with any of them so that they don't get a disease/addicted/arrested?

I would say it's not much of the government's concern anyway. It would be far better to make more producers in society to raise the standard of living than try and put patches on problems.

Why do we need a birth certificate anyway? It seems fairly dumb to me--as does state-imposed marriage licenses. Why does the government need to stick its nose into my marriage? Or how much money I make? Or what kind of things I buy? The whole thing seems rigged so that they can employ a few more bureaucrats and suck more money away from people who actually produce.

As far as the embryonic stem cell stuff goes, I keep hearing false arguments that we "can't stop science" or similar statements. We stop science all the time. We could just completely remove the FDA if we wanted to <i>really</i> unencumber science. Then we could get drugs to the market fast and cheap. However, people tend to want to balance the thrust of science with an eye to their own safety. In extension, it is reasonable for some to extend this desire for safety to even an embryonic human.

What really seems to be under the surface here is the abortion debate all over again. If it can be shown that dead embryos help cure other people, then there is <i>more</i> reason to abort all the embryos we can to get whatever product. However, I cannot see how anyone could weigh the convenience of one person over the life of another. Life is more important than convenience, we should know that.

 

Fair enough Dan

So what's your stance on the issue, yes do stem cell research or no???

What about all the aborted embryo's that come from IVF programs??? wouldn't they need to be taken to full term (I mean ALL of them) if they are considered as living human beings??

Still everyone is ignoring the fact that major steps have been taken (with initial success) that will do away with embryo harvesting for stem cells...I believe the dormant stem cells in adults will eventually be able to be stimulated back into action...its been done in mice so far.

 

My take on stem cell research is that it should be done on adult stem cells. Bush's compromise, however, is understandable (given the circumstances) and admirable, since it does not fund further baby-murders. Its kinda like heart transplants -- use a dead person's heart, but don't go out and have a person killed just so you can take their heart (and other organs) and use it in a transplant.

As for in vitro techniques, I knew nothing about it until the issue came up, and I now think its wrong, to the extent that there are many more being killed by the process than are being given a full life. from what I have heard, in vitro sounds basically like mass-murder. Its enough enough to abort one fetus at a time -- lets do several.

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~Caleb

 

Well, Dan ....

Well, Dan, they already do teach children about these things, and poorly. Like sex: basic sex education is a necessary piece of knowledge in modern society. As are tidbits about prevention of disease and pregnancy, and other safety habits. But Christians, in pursuit of a goal they find appropriate, wish to turn loose as many uneducated kids as possible to reproduce like rabbits. It's observable in my lifetime. Why should a young girl get herself knocked up straight out of high school because it's all she knows to do, and she doesn't know how to prevent it? Yet in order to respect Christians, we apparently should stop educating all children in knowledge they're going to need before they're done with school. It sounds nice to let them wait until college to learn what a vagina and a penis are supposed to do together, but the fact is that they'll more than likely need to know before then.

Drugs? Hey, it's proven in the US that the lies told schoolchildren in order to keep them off drugs backfired. Maybe a little bit of truth would have helped? Hmmm?

Crime? Heck, if it's not a school's job to teach children to be upright and to avoid crime, why don't we just issue 9mm's on day one and teach them the skills of the black market by fifth grade? I remember a host of propaganda films about sex, drugs, and crime during my younger schooldays. At that time, if the parents had objections to those parts of the curriculum, their children were exempted from the session. Since then, we've struggled with the idea that if a parent doesn't want their kids learning about STD transmission rates, then nobody in the school district should learn it. These moronic moralists need to sit down, shut up, and just pray for the best for their kids, since the kids are going to hit the world unprepared.

I tend to agree with you, as well as toss some history in there. But even those are subject to Christian objections: library books, curriculum books ... certes, there are the social-cause idiots who think Twain is racist, but they're their own problem for another day. Should we just go back to Guffey's Reader and teaching kids Bible passages in school? But as I noted, some of the things we are teaching kids we do because despite what the parents wish to believe, their kids might need this knowledge before they go to the college of their parents' favor and fail to learn it there. A bit of reality is definitely needed here; we've done about as well with the reading, writing, and arithmetic as we have reducing teen pregnancy in this country. Considering that we have a history in this country of young girls being pregnant before they know how ... we might want to consider the merits of sex ed.

Y'ever get a tax break because you're married? Y'ever have to get a passport, driver's license, or other document that requires proof of age?

Taxes, taxes, taxes ... what is so damned offensive about taxes? Or is it like our more wealthy citizens who believe that the only appropriate thing to do is to take more from the people who don't have more to give? Hello? It's part of your responsibility to your country. As to what you buy ... yeah, I agree with you there, unless you're going to claim a deduction on your taxes, in which case you have to demonstrate the cause. In that case, yeah, they need to know what you're buying. We could simplify the tax code, but it seems the people don't want that.

What, we should have had a funeral when the doctor extracted the dead, rotting tissue from my girlfriend that never achieved a heartbeat before it died? Something about fetal viability ....? It's an issue far more complex than Christians would like to paint it.

thanx,
Tiassa

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