Stem Cell Bill Passes in Australia

nickd writes "Having recently being passed in the Senate by only 2 votes, an Australian bill to overturn the ban on 'theraputic cloning' has now been passed in the House of Representatives by 82-62. The amendment that was seeking to prevent stem cells being extracted from the eggs of aborted late term female fetuses has also been voted down. The changes will allow scientists to create and use embryos up to 14 days old for research."

Pssshhhaw

[PeeAitchPee]

Everyone knows that 6,000 years ago Australia was created by God as a place where the Hebrews could send "uncooperative" members of the tribe. The fact that this stratergy wasn't follow through with until much later (by a different tribe) doesn't make it any less true. ;-)

Re:

[emor8t]

England was a tribe? Or even better yet, Australia is only 6,000 years old? This facts are so new and strange to me. I blame their backwards flushing toilets.

No..

[The Creator]

the *whoosh* sound was not the toilet.. :)

Visit to Australia

[onkelonkel]

My friend went to visit Australia, but he got into a big hassle with Customs. When he arrived the asked him if he had a criminal record. He said " I didn't realize it was still required"

After that...

[le0p]

"The changes will allow scientists to create and use embryos up to 14 days old for research."

The article failed to mention that after 14 days they will be used to create a Shaky's Pizza for each scientist!

Is there bias showing the article itself?

[BirdDoggy]

Using the term embryo conveys a level of development not present at up to 14 days of development. At 14 days, we're talking about a blastocyst. Technically, it needs to be 3 weeks old before it can be considered an embryo.

Re:

[mordors9]

If they wanted to show some real bias, they would have called them dead babies.

Re:Is there bias showing the article itself?

[ScentCone]

If they wanted to show some real bias, they would have called them dead babies.

No, they would have called them "possible future Einsteins and Ghandis." Although I always get a laugh out of that one since they avoid the "possible future Idi Amins and Stalins," too. Look, mah, no Godwin!

Re:

[caudron]

Never attribute to intent what can be attributed to incompetence.

Tom Caudron
http://tom.digitalelite.com/ [digitalelite.com]

Repurcusions for the U.S.?

[Salvance]

If we begin seeing stem cell harvesting/research being allowed in other industrial countries, what are the repurcussions for the U.S.? I don't think we can hold out forever, at some point I'd expect some researches to start moving to more hospitable countries, and pharmaceutical companies in those countries (such as Australia) taking a definitive lead in stem cell therapy and research. As a nation, can we afford to just let the world pass us, even if there are "moral" concerns regarding the technology by our government?

Re:

[Thunderstruck]

What, exactly, prohibits stem cell research in the United States? Is there a federal law that says "stem cell research impacts interstate commerce, and is hereby prohibited." Or is it more like "We're not going to provide any funding for groups that do stem cell research?"

Re:

[ArcherB]

The only kind of stem cell research that is illegal in the US is embryonic stem cell research (stem cells harvested from aborted fetus's). Adult stem cell research has never been illegal and is the only form of stem cell research that has shown progress and led to huge advances in medical science. Embryonic stem cells simply tend to be rejected by the host body.

Not necessarily true. Embryonic stem cell research is allowed in the US, from unwanted, lab fertilized eggs. It is even federally funded, but only

Re:

[gatzke]

But as your brother post points out, private embryonic stem cell research is legal.

You cannot get federal funding for stem cell research on new cell lines. Everything else is fine.

It's a ban by any other name.

[Kadin2048]

Everything else is not fine; nobody is going to spend that much money producing new cell lines, if most scientists and research institutes in the U.S. won't be able to use them for risk of losing their Federal funding. Nobody is going to hire you, if your research is ineligible for Federal money. And nobody is going to look hard at your research in terms of publication, if it can't be duplicated by anyone who gets Federal money. The research science world in the U.S. orbits around the Federal government. Ba

Re:

[gatzke]

I stand corrected. Everything else is legal.

You cannot claim the executive order stopped all research in that direction. California has put tons of money into new stem cell lines, without federal money. This is totally legal. Other countries have done so as well.

You are not being honest by calling this a ban on stem cell research, or even a ban on embryonic stem cell research. This is just a ban on federal funding using new embryonic stem cell lines.

Just because you don't like the result does not mean

Lack of funding effectively a ban

[Kadin2048]

It's a funding ban, as you suspect; however, its effects are so wide-ranging as to be effectively a ban on it in practice. So much scientific research in the U.S. is funded (one way or the other) by the Federal government, or by organizations that receive some level of Federal grants or funding, that nobody is willing to do pure research if it knocks them out of the running for Federal money. Plus, if you did somehow get the money and do stem-cell research, it wouldn't be duplicable by anyone seeking govern

Re:

[AliasTheRoot]

It's allowed in most of the developed world already. The prolife / prochoice debate is almost uniquely a catholic / american thing. Its not an issue throughout most of Northern Europe or Asia.

(In NW Europe, the only country blocking this is Ireland)

Re:

[gatzke]

It is allowed in the US. Privately funded embryonic stem cell research is allowed.

Federally funded is allowed, if you use existing stem cell lines.

So technically, W was the first president to fund stem cell research... He actually came up with a compromise on the issue (that satisfies neither side, thus the compromise).

Re:

[mutterc]

can we afford to just let the world pass us

Don't worry about that; it's pretty much inevitable in every area.

Big business runs the country, and they do everything to maximize short-term profit. Usually this involves "tragedy of the commons" results - like "eating your seed corn".

Babykillers!! ..?

[SantaClaws04]

I do love it when people compare taking an embryo to killing a baby. Like saying its the same as putting a bullet to little baby Annie's head. Or something straight out of the bible, egypt first borns etc. Something like that.
I, for one, do see a slight difference between a cell and a full life-size baby, though. And if that makes me a "terrorist, who disregards human life", so be it. I just see it as a baby-could-be, if anything other than a cell. But hey.. I women "kill" a "baby" about once a month too,

Re:

[jbarr]

So where do you draw the line? Let's assume just for conversation sake that life begins at conception. At what point do you consider it a "life" such that it should not be ethically terminated? Conception? Embryo? Fetus? Partially-delivered? Delivered? 18 months after delivery? 10 years after delivery? 65 years after delivery?

And what happens when we get to the point in science where we could develop a baby start-to-finish completely outside the mother's womb? You would fertalize the egg in a petri dish (yo

Re:

[cdrguru]

Personhood should only be granted to an individual after they can prove that they are sentient. Failure to prove this, such as watching endless Wheel of Fortune reruns, means they are immediately eligible as an organ doner.

Re:

[JanneM]

Sentience seems to be a pretty good line to draw. Before here's a developed, active central nervous system it is not and can not be a person.

Re:

[scheming daemons]

So where do you draw the line? Let's assume just for conversation sake that life begins at conception. At what point do you consider it a "life" such that it should not be ethically terminated? Conception? Embryo? Fetus? Partially-delivered? Delivered? 18 months after delivery? 10 years after delivery? 65 years after delivery? Ooooh, I'd love to see answers to this. Not just from the original poster but from everyone. We know that the religious faithful are making their decision not based on logic and reas

Re:

[Citizen of Earth]

I'd like to hear people take on this.

My take is that a baby isn't a "person" until it shows mental capabilities which exceed that of an animal. This doesn't happen for several months. It is legal to kill an animal. (I had two distinctly different types of animal for lunch.)

Re:

[jbarr]

What animals? All animals? I know you said "capabilities" but are you talking "potential" or "actual" abilities? Is a newborn infant more or less mentally capable than an adult chimp or dolphin? OK, I'm playing devil's advocate, but what if it could be proven that the mental capabilities didn't exceed an animal's until it is, say, 3 months old. Would it then be OK to kill newborns prior to 3 months old?

Re:

[Citizen of Earth]

Would it then be OK to kill newborns prior to 3 months old?

In my opinion, yes. Of course, I am stricken with a mental disease called "rationality". There is no known cure.

OTOH, a baby represents one of few chances for a pair of humans to reproduce, so killing one without BOTH parents' permission would be a rather severe crime.

Re:

[Citizen of Earth]

Rationality? I think not. It's people like this who truly demonstrate why society is degenerating to the point of self-destruction.

A fertilized egg and an 7-month-old baby have two things in common: neither of them is a sentient being (in the Star Trek sense of the word) but both have the potential to become one. I don't see how a rational person can defend the killing of a fertilized egg and the eating of an animal but not the killing of a pre-sentient baby or especially a blob of undifferentiated human c

Re:

[LordLucless]

Scripture's out but Star Trek is in? Hail the bastion of rationality.

Please correct me if I'm wrong

[Aqua_boy17]

This may stray off topic a bit, but aren't the existing restrictions against federally fundedstem cell research in the US? Under current policy I don't believe private corporations are under any restrictions except those against cloning. One may disagree with the official government policy, but is any privately funded stem cell research going on in the US, and if so is it legal?

Once again, people are asking the wrong question.

[Baba Ram Dass]

Don't ban cloning, but don't pay for it with my taxes.

Everyone wins. The fundamentalists don't have to finance something they don't agree with, yet modern science is allowed to continue promising research.

Re:Once again, people are asking the wrong questio

[Guuge]

Amen to that. Let the fundamentalists pay for their wars in the Middle East. The rest of us will fund medical research. It'd be amusing to see how long they keep "supporting the troops" when it's coming out of their own pockets.

Nobody jumped on this?

[Sogol]

I, for one, welcome our new Embryonic Masters.

Flaming bush

[supermegadope]

This will surely anger God. I fully expect it to begin raining frogs very soon. Well, im off to build an ark....word to yo momma

Silly discussion

[cdrguru]

This is not a Christians against, rational people for type argument.

This is 99% of the people don't understand the argument.

Embryonic stem cell treatment needs to be genotype specific. This means that your DNA has to be used to create some stem cells so they can be used to treat you. This implies there is a way to take your DNA and make a new human even if you never let it develop.

Therefore, the foundation of this is human cloning on a fairly reliable scale. Not one or two "experiemnts" a year but every

Re:

[LordLucless]

Therefore, the foundation of this is human cloning on a fairly reliable scale.

No. You can use adult stem cells to apply the treatment that you discovered using experiments with embryonic stem cells.

Re:

[jimstapleton]

Actually, I think it limbo for blastula at that point...

Re:

[dr_dank]

Well, they'd better make room so we can see how low they can go.

Re:We Do It Because We Can

[jimstapleton]

believe it or not, some people find *not* doing this more unethical/immoral than doing this.

This can take something that is rather upleasant in the first place, that would not be avoided, and turn it into something that can save millions of lives.

That being said, I hope the bill has a rider in it that says a person cannot recieve compensation for donating the genetic material.

Re:

[balsy2001]

I used to be one of those hard core christian types until my mother got multiple myeloma cancer. Fortunate for her they were able do a self stem cell transplant by harvesting them from her bone marrow. This stuff WILL SAVES LIVES and when it their mom people will start to understand.

Re:

[frederec]

I think the problem most Christians have with stem cells is not using them, but where they came from. So using stem cells from someone's bone marrow is okay, but using them from an aborted child is not. The big problem is the same that people have with organ donation. Not that what can be done with them is bad, but people become afraid that if someone's life is on the line, a doctor may not be as inclined to save them if their organs can be harvested. It's similar with stem cells, why not just encourage

Re:

[ArcherB]

Thank God we are spending so much on *adult" stem cell research. Without it, there is a very high possibility that the same treatment from embryonic stem cells would have given her cancer (irony not meant to be humorous).

I'm glad things worked out for your family.

Re:

[ArcherB]

believe it or not, some people find *not* doing this more unethical/immoral than doing this.

And some people believe that *not* killing infidels is more unethical/immoral than letting them live. Does that make them right?

That being said, I hope the bill has a rider in it that says a person cannot recieve compensation for donating the genetic material.

Excellent point. Granted, these are aborted babies that will be tossed anyway, but I'd hate to see a market for this "material" spring up.

Re:

[jimstapleton]

believe it or not, some people find *not* doing this more unethical/immoral than doing this.

And some people believe that *not* killing infidels is more unethical/immoral than letting them live. Does that make them right?

No, but the OP said something suggesting that this was basically a voteout against morals or something like that, which I will argue it wasn't, because there are certain camps of morality that believe there is nothing wrong with this.

I think there is nothing wrong with stem cells b

Ethics?

[The Creator]

Why whould it be unethical to experiment on an unconsious lump of cells?

Re:

[ObsessiveMathsFreak]

Why whould it be unethical to experiment on an unconsious lump of cells?

It wouldn't be unethical at all. Now if you could just give an accepted definition of unconsciousness, that would be really great.

Re:

[The Creator]

accepted by whom?

Re:Good

[ArcherB]

Glad some country isn't taking Christian fundamentalist BS.

WOW! I smoke, drink, do drugs and download porn. I had no idea I was a fundamentalist!

What happens when they pass a law that allows for experimentation on people your age?

Re:Good

[geekoid]

People can volunteer for experimentation right now.

Too abd this isn't about people, it's about a ball of about 128 cells.

Or do yo cry for all the 'people' that your body sheds every day?

No, I like where this is going.

[Grendel Drago]

The standard response to your assertion is that embryos are genetically unique, and that's when they become people, endowed with immortal souls and whatnot.

So, are identical twins one person? Which one gets the soul? Does it alternate? Do they each get half a soul? What about chimeras [wikipedia.org]--do they have two souls? Do they get to vote twice?

Now, you might be thinking, that's ridiculous! But if you're going to start accepting criteria like sapience or a fully-formed nervous system, then you're back onto the slippe

Re:

[shudde]

I find your argument specious but your rhetoric beguiling. I wish to subscribe to your newsletter and learn more of your wonderful organisation and its baby smoothies.

Re:

[ArcherB]

You're partially correct, my example sucked. Read my response to someone else who said the same thing you did, but in politer terms.

Re:

[ArcherB]

Did I see a different article or are we talking about aborted fetuses, not pre-embryonic tissue in a petri dish. Now tell me again how I'm the one that's trolling by invoking incorrect imagery?

And the imagery I had in mind was the trailer-trash Jerry Springer fan who will do anything for a quick buck, and even save on her birth control pills at the same time. Not the downtrodden women renting out their uteri. Still, I think you would have done better by asking "why aren't they doing it now?"

Your *persona

Re:

[dr_dank]

What's wrong with the stem cell lines we already have?
Those limited stem cell lines are contaminated with mouse genes.

Why the push to create endless stem cell lines when a stem cell will reproduce to more and more stem cells forever?
No cell can reproduce forever. Telomeres inside each cell dictate how many times it can reproduce.

Why are we wasting money, time and energy creating more stem cell lines when those resources could be spent on the actual research?
You can't properly carry out the research if you

Re:

[NiteShaed]

Good point. However, saying that this will not create a market for aborted children (yes, I called them children), is equally silly. Maybe Betty won't see the benefits, but the clinics, the scientist, or whoever does the collection/harvesting will.

See what benefits? There are thousands of blastocysts destroyed every year as "leftovers" from fertility clinics. Why would it benefit researchers to pay someone to have an abortion when there are plenty of viable alternatives sitting in freezers waiting to

Re:

[Citizen of Earth]

Third, if you "hardly call her sentient", I feel bad for your daughter. Mine did things that I found fascinating every day (even at two months), which I doubt a cluster of cells could have managed.

I imagine the parent poster was using the Star Trek definition of the term "sentient". Was your daughter solving differential equations at two months old? Did she do anything "fascinating" that would distinguish her mental functioning from that of an animal?

Re:

[NiteShaed]

Was your daughter solving differential equations at two months old?

If that's your test for sentience [wikipedia.org], most of the population of the planet would fail.

Did she do anything "fascinating" that would distinguish her mental functioning from that of an animal?

Well that's a matter of opinion, isn't it. For that matter, who's to say all animals (other than humans) are non-sentient?

Re:

[shudde]

WOW! I smoke, drink, do drugs and download porn. I had no idea I was a fundamentalist!

You're obviously not taking the right drugs. I'd recommend a quiet environment and some strong acid, should fix those religious beliefs right up.

What happens when they pass a law that allows for experimentation on people your age?

Yes, that's a reasonable comparison to make. Apart from the fact these 'unborn children' (as you asked us to refer to them) aren't sentient, self-aware or capable of experiencing pain. I

Re:

[ArcherB]

If a two-week-old pre-embryonic blastocyst ever beomes comparable to someone my age, I want to play chess with it. Until then, I want it to be available to any and all researchers who can get some use out of it before it gets trashed with all the other biohazard waste.

There are many Alzheimer's patients around the world that have the mental capacity as two-week-old pre-embryonic blastocyst and would probably do about as well against you in a game of chess. Do these people (I can't think of a term as cold a

Re:

[shudde]

There are many Alzheimer's patients around the world that have the mental capacity as two-week-old pre-embryonic blastocyst and would probably do about as well against you in a game of chess.

Your first comparison was genetic material versus an adult, now you're comparing them to alzheimer's patients?

With logic like that you should be defending creationism.

Re:

[LordLucless]

Actually, the US is pretty much the only country with any Christian Fundamentalism. It's an entirely US-based movement. Foreigners might consider themselves Christians who believe in the fundamental tenets of the Bible, and mistakenly identify themselves with US Christian Fundamentalism, but if they read the list of "Fundamentals" the US-based group subscribes to, they probably wouldn't.

Re:

[heinousjay]

I'm generally surprised by the need people feel to insult the religious, but on Slashdot, I expect it in droves.

Re:

[minus_273]

the key is to create a good foes/friends list. Make sure you have the trolls and brats on your foes list then suppress foes. It really filters out the riffraff. For example, i never saw the parent to your post. I suspect the slashdot I see is completely different.

Re:

[morgan_greywolf]

So only fundamentalist Christians are made a bit uncomfortable with some of these new concepts of cloning, use of aborted embryos for research.

No, they aren't the only ones but almost all fundamentalists Christians are made at least a bit uncomfortable, and they are the group against the use of both stem cells and cloning technology that carries the most political clout, at least in the U.S., where the Conservative movement and, in particular, the Republican Party have set back important and potentially lif

Re:

[vertinox]

I'm no fundamentalist, but creating embryos for research purposes strikes me as a bit creepy.

As opposed to dying of Parkinson's or various other diseases that cloning research may cure?

I would suppose putting dead viruses into my body is a bit creepy too, but I'd rather do that than die from a disease that could have been prevented with a vaccination.

Rather than looking at just the creepiness factor, you should consider how much human suffering you can cause or alleviate by the choice.

If the choice will sav

Re:

[ArcherB]

This stem cell debate being pushed by those "pro-choice" people who are looking for benefits to abortion. It serves their agenda to dehumanize unborn children. They call them "blastocysts, fetuses, genetic material, but never unborn children. All that aside, when it comes to stem cells, they have yet to give me an decent, honest answer to these questions:
What's wrong with the stem cell lines we already have?
Why the push to create endless stem cell lines when a stem cell will reproduce to more and more stem

Mistaken premises

[Kadin2048]

First of all, I don't think it's the "pro-choice people" who are pushing the stem cell agenda. If anything, I think it's the pro-life crowd who made it an issue when they went after it a few years ago. It wasn't even on the radar screen before then. There's no giant pro-choice conspiracy here, trying to show the benefits of abortion; that's ridiculous. The benefits of abortion are obvious -- not being pregnant. There's no huge conspiracy afoot there.

On the contrary, I think the arguments against stem cell r

Re:

[Simon Garlick]

This stem cell debate being pushed by those "pro-choice" people who are looking for benefits to abortion. It serves their agenda to dehumanize unborn children.

Do you have any idea how many human embryos get flushed down the toilet at a fertility clinic EVERY DAY? Enough to make abortions statistically insignificant.

Re:

[ArcherB]

They're tainted with animal (mouse) enzymes that would make any research with them difficult, as a human body would immediately attack the mouse proteins. That's your answer to the next two questions too.

I was not aware of that when I asked the question. However, after a bit of research, it seems that new stem cells will suffer the same fate. Also, I think you are confusing research with application.

Re:

[LurkerXXX]

Actually I was very surprised to see 'creating embryos' listed as part of that legislation. I would think that Australia, like the U.S. would have so many unused embryos from in-vitro fertilization clinics that there would be absolutely no need to worry about creating new ones just for science.

Re:

[vertinox]

So only fundamentalist Christians are made a bit uncomfortable with some of these new concepts of cloning, use of aborted embryos for research.

Well there are the Luddites, but we don't bother insulting them because they don't use the internets and would never know that we are making fun of them.

Re:Good

[mcrbids]

Genetic research is not and never has been about "aborted embryos". This is one of the most common misconceptions of genetic research.

By the time an abortion has happened, it's WAY TOO LATE to use for genetic research.

What is used are frozen results from fertility clinics. When a couple has trouble reproducing, they'll sample some eggs and sperm from the couple, and put them together. They usually end up with a number of results, perhaps a dozen or more. They then try them, one by one.

When the woman gets pregnant, they're done - and there's usually a few left over.

So, once again: Genetic researchers do not use aborted fetuses.

Re:

[saforrest]

What is used are frozen results from fertility clinics. When a couple has trouble reproducing, they'll sample some eggs and sperm from the couple, and put them together. They usually end up with a number of results, perhaps a dozen or more. They then try them, one by one.

When the woman gets pregnant, they're done - and there's usually a few left over.


What's most amazing is that, as understand it, when these leftover fertilized eggs are not used for scientific research, then they are simply destroyed. I'm n

Re:

[LordLucless]

The reason people have qualms about it, is that once it is established as acceptable, you'll have people start creating embryoes solely for the purpose of harvesting stem cells. For example, an IVF doctor needs to make twenty embryoes in order to have a good chance of producing a viable offspring for his clients. Instead he makes two hundred, and sells (or even gives) the excess to a stem cell research lab. Then you're not dealing with embryoes that would have been destroyed anyway, you're basically conduct

Re:

[_KiTA_]

So only fundamentalist Christians are made a bit uncomfortable with some of these new concepts of cloning, use of aborted embryos for research. I would find that a bit surprising. Perhaps this just looks like a good opportunity to insult some group of people that you disagree with, while adding nothing to the debate. Big surprise there.

Actually, as far as I can tell, Fundamentalist Christians have objections to the concept of Women's Lib.

Observe.

Originally, the argument was that Women should be subservient

Problem at the very core.

[Kadin2048]

There's only a few common themes here. If you take the most recent arguments, you get a trend that the real argument is "Women -- or people in general -- shouldn't be allowed to enjoy sex". If you take the arguments a bit further, you get a trend that says "Women do not have the right to make their own decisions" -- be it reproductive decisions, legal decisions, what have you.

I think the common theme all drives back to the ridiculous assertion that one should intentionally pass over opportunities for happin

Re:

[aussie_a]

So only fundamentalist Christians are made a bit uncomfortable with some of these new concepts of cloning, use of aborted embryos for research.

Of course not. But who do you think the US government is pandering to with the bans? The "fundamentalist" (if we're defining anti-stem cell as fundamentalist) christians who make up quite a large portion of the population? Or the small minority of atheists who are somewhat concerned about stem cell research (with atheists of any stripe making up a minority in America)?

Re:

[Quiet_Desperation]

Be careful what you ask for. A lot of Republicans played football and a lot of Democrats were in the marching band. ;-)

Re:

[ArcherB]

Be careful what you ask for. A lot of Republicans played football and a lot of Democrats were in the marching band. ;-)

And George Bush was a cheerleader! Cheney is armed, however.

Re:

[Jartan]

Be careful what you ask for. A lot of Republicans played football

I thought the labor unions were big democratic supporters?

Re:

[ColaMan]

I figured they just sorta split into two teams with rival pieces of legislation on opposite goal posts and played some sort of mad max rugby with no pads to determine what passes.

Yeah, that's pretty much what they do - it's called parliament.
Oh, don't act all shocked! It works most of the time.

Ethical Science.

[jellomizer]

All this stuff about Stem Cell Research, Abortion... Is really about one thing really which no one want to define.
Where is the line between Ethical Science and Unethical Science. This is the issue which needs to be debated not every single thing that falls in the gray area.

We know there are some things that are defenatly beyond the range of ethical science. Like Killing healthy and productive people to examin how a perfectly working body and mind works, or taking identical twins away from their parents at birth and giving one a loving family and putting an other one in a box with no human interaction to see where the limit of Nature vs. Nuture lays. Even though these things if widly experemented could help out greater humanity but it beyond the range of Ethical Science, and should be avoided.

Now things like Stem Cell resheach is falling in a Gray areas. Where people feel both ways about it. For Sciencetist there is no real line for this gray area so it is up to them to realize how far to go. This could be good or bad. But that is where the problem lays.

For those people who are against this type of science, it is not because they are religios extreamest or sciencetificly enept. It is just that when they look into the gray area it seems to dark for them to say yes this is right. As well the people who are for it are not always Unreligious, imoral, who only listen to science as the only source of wisdom. They look at the spot in the gray area and they see it is more light then dark.

We can't allow Scienctist to do whatever they want just because they want to see the results, just as much we can't prevent sciencetist from learning more just because interpration of books written over a thousand years ago say it is not right.

So Stem Cell research is actually a very difficult topic and not something that is compleatly sensible at all. It is a difficult decision.

Re:

[DoofusOfDeath]

We know there are some things that are defenatly beyond the range of ethical science.

Yes, but the question is, what is the basis for caring about doing things ethically? If it's just aesthetic, i.e. unethical = that which makes us feel bad, and there's nothing deeper about it than that, then you may as well do an aesthetic cost/benefit analysis for even those actions that at first strike you as unethical. Besides, what one generation finds unethical, the next generation might be more willing to acce

Re:Societal Degeneration From The Non-Christian Le

[RsG]

If Christians are correct, then you, as a non-Christian, have lost everything. Are you willing to make that gamble?

s/Christian/Muslim, and that's still just as accurate. How do you know that your god is real and theirs is not? I don't see you wearing a turban though (or a burqua, though I somehow doubt you're a woman).

Since you can't join every religion (many of them won't allow it), and since you cannot know for a certainty in advance which of them is right (out of several thousand), plus you cannot rule

Re:

[mrpeebles]

No, Muslims and Christians are both right. Muslims go to Christian Hell, and Christians go to Islamic hell. :-)

Apply logic and reasoning

[maddogsparky]

Just as with any branch of science, discard the religions that are riddled with inconsistancies. This will remove a large number of religions, as long as the searcher is willing to dig deep.

I'm Catholic for two reasons: 1), I was brought up Catholic and 2), I didn't find any apparent inconsistancies that could be resolved through effort on my part (e.g. bible study, church history, etc.).

One can argue that this still leaves a number of equally valid religions. That is where personal experience steps in, a

Re:

[saforrest]

Just as with any branch of science, discard the religions that are riddled with inconsistancies. This will remove a large number of religions, as long as the searcher is willing to dig deep.

I'm Catholic for two reasons: 1), I was brought up Catholic and 2), I didn't find any apparent inconsistancies that could be resolved through effort on my part (e.g. bible study, church history, etc.).

I appreciate your desire to combine faith and reason, but I don't think internal consistency is any sort of useful guide

Re:

[Citizen of Earth]

I think that God's real test is whether you are able to hold absolute beliefs with zero positive evidence and mountains of negative evidence. If you can, then you are labelled a dangerously gullible fool and sent to Hell.

Re:

[Rakishi]

And that's a problem with faith in that there is no empirical evidence. Faith requires belief in something you cannot see. Unfortunately, this will never satisfy the self-centered, the science-minded, and the empirical-minded.

In other words once your crude attempt at logic fails you need to resort to veiled insults? Now that's some good old Christian love, eh?

Also, it's amusing that someone who claim "I'm right because I say so, do what I say" to society calls other people self-centered.

All I can say is tha

Re:

[Rakishi]

Christianity is simply the belief that God created everything and created man with free will. After warning us not to commit a specific sin, man chose to sin with that free will, and with that sin came consequense: death. Across history, man has tried to appease God with sacrifices, but man was never able to gain God's grace because left to his own devices, man continues to sin. (And yes, believe it or not, even born-again Christians sin.) So God came to Earth in the form of a man as Jesus, and died a final

Re:

[Citizen of Earth]

Is it possible that it is all some psychologically oriented event? Is it possible that when I die, I'll simply rot? Yes, absolutely! But I have a hope and a faith in something that, if it is true, will provide an eternal joy and peace. And if it is not true, then what have I really lost?

It is interesting that your faith is not absolute, that you accept the possibility that there is no God. I would argue that this makes you a Theistic Agnostic rather than a Christian. Personally, I am an Atheistic Agnosti

Re:Societal Degeneration From The Non-Christian Le

[ObsessiveMathsFreak]

If Christians are correct, then you, as a non-Christian, have lost everything. Are you willing to make that gamble?

See Pascal's Wager [wikipedia.org].

Re:

[EmTeedee]

Totipotent stem cells can differentiate into any other cell type. Polypotent (I guess you refer to pluripotent) are a later type of cells. The point is, totipotent stem cells are as good (or better) than pluripotent cells. But I agree, that it should never be an excuse for abortion. There should be no benefit (be it monetary or whatever) for donating stem cells.

Re:

[freeweed]

George, they let you use the internets now?

Re:U.S. the new "down under"?

[LithiumX]

True. Throughout the 30's, european scientists often had moral issues with the medical research they were performing, but their work expanded the field of medicine greatly. True, many complained that the test subjects were not being given a choice, or that the experiments were a bit cruel and often resulted in maiming or killing the patient. However, science won out over ethics at that time, and it was science and the extent of human knowledge that benefited. Of course, it also left psychological scars on the world that won't go away for a very long time.

I do not have a significant qualm regarding stem cell research. I have limited issues with cloning ONLY for the purpose of producing more research material. I also do not consider an embryo to be on the same moral level as a fetus, or a fetus to be the same thing as a viable baby. But I do think every major advance in science presents us with a new slippery slope, and that concepts of morality change drastically over time, based primarily on the decisions made by previous generations.

You can rest assured that whatever you consider slightly dubious but warranted or necessary today with either be absolutely shunned by your children's children, or embraced in ways that would horrify you.

Without a clear line being drawn, I guarantee you that some parts of the world will do whatever is possible. Once you loosen the boundries in one area (creating biologically human lives, even if of highly dubious status), the rest can quickly fall like dominoes. Then you end up with debate over how far a test subject should be allowed to gestate before it's consumed, or debate over the legal status of a human created by humans specifically for study. Genetic manipulation only makes the lines blur further.

Progress is the core of modern society. But err on the side of caution, because the last century has shown what happens when you let morality take a back seat to that progress.

It's the new "FOR THE CHILDREN!' catch phrase!

[maillemaker]

>potential cure for a disease like Parkinson's

Look, I'm as pro-stem cell research as you can be. I think it's great, and I think someone is going to do it no matter what so we might as be the ones who do it.

But I'm tired of the arguement that says, "We must do X, because it could possibly do Y".

It might NOT do Y, also. We do scientific research to gain knowlege. Sometimes there's even a goal in mind behind the search for that knowlege. But this constant shrieking that "We must do stem cell research because it could cure disease (fill in the blank) smacks to much of the the old saw "We must do it FOR THE CHILLLLLLDREEEENNNNN!".

Steve

Re:

[ArcherB]

It's incredible how countries around the world are prepared to take bold steps to further science, while we are still mired in our ridiculous issues. (I'm sorry, but squashing a potential cure for a disease like Parkinson's, to protect an embryo that was going to be destroyed anyway, does not fall under my definition of "ethics") Leave it to the fundamentalists, and our country is going "down under"

You, who speaks so highly of ethics, have just told a boldfaced lie. You know as well as I do that the US gov

Ewwwww

[Aqua_boy17]

and the toilets flush in the opposite manner

You mean in Australia when you flush the loo, it shoots back out at you? I for one don't think I'll be visiting there anytime soon. :P

Somatic research legal and gov. funded

[maddogsparky]

"Isn't somatic stem cell research ok in the U.S.?"

Yes. Somatic (adult) stem cell research is even endorsed by many religious groups (e.g. mainstream protestant and Catholicsm both support adult stem cell research). The main conflict is over the use of embryonic stem cells due to unresolved conflict about when human life begins.

However, the mainstream media distorts the issue and tries to make the conflict appear to be either for or against stem cell research in general. It almost always reports on how s

Re:

[LordLucless]

Wow, you managed to ignore the text of the article and invoke the ire of slashdot's logic-nazis by mis-using "beg the question" all in one post. I know who the first recipient of the replicated braincells should be.