Stem cell research

Just read about Christopher Reeve's "ad from the grave":
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/3947029.stm

And I know some of us were discussing this recently, but I'd like to know what people here think about it- are you for or against it, and why.

In principle I'm not against stem cell research at all, I think the
help that it offers to medical science far outweighs the nagging voices
of "Christian extremists" :razz:

Being almost aborted (as my mother loves to tell me every time shes
drunk and pissed off at me) I feel I have a right to speak about most
fields involving life (though some sort of phd would be handy too!).
Stem Cell research definately needs to be monitored, as it is an
extremely new and pretty scary field in general. It should never, EVER
be allowed into the hands of corporations, since generally their
'research' is paid for by them and around four times more likely to be
positive than negative.

I don't think its a 'sin', as the "religious right" would have you
believe. While everyone is entitled to their own faith, and personally
I believe a good moral character requireds some sort of religion, in
general the religious/conservative types like to pick and choose the
bits of the bible that applies to their agenda. I won't go into the
Devil quoting scripture, but I'm sure there are a hell of a lot of sins
capitalism commits (all of us obviously included) which religious
headcases (mostly american) seem to omit.

I digress, and flame, but the point I'm trying to make is that stem
cell research is needed today. Think about how many people have died of
or inflicted by ailments which could be cured through this powerful,
but terrifying research while sitting on your ass reading this!
Following the bible is all well and good, but it takes balls to choose
the lesser of two evils in this case, something the 'Holy Joes' neglect
to do.

• looks for someone he HASNT alienated *

:razz:

Plenty of todays medicine and medical practices are directly due to methods that were, and would still be, considered immoral and inhumane. And not only from a religious viewpoint.

But how many of us question how any particular piece of knowlege came about when we need it?

It's not like stem cell research involves chopping up babies and torturing them. If people leave their bits to science when they die, and the only raw materials needed for the research are some doods testicles that got saved when he fell in a big mincing machine, and a set of ovaries that got recovered from a particularly nasty railway accident, then I can't really be the one to say it's bad.

But I suppose there are some people who believe that any form of medicine is interfering with nature and god.

fishy said:
But I suppose there are some people who believe that any form of medicine is interfering with nature and god.

And then you get those people who claim artificial insemination practices are a sign from God that they should have children, although they were sterile for some reason or another.

I've always found that highly amusing.

Monqui said:
<DIV class=quote>
<DIV class=quotetitle> </DIV></DIV>

And then you get those people who claim artificial insemination practices are a sign from God that they should have children, although they were sterile for some reason or another.

I'm religious and even I believe in natural selection.

Anways I say we go with stem cell research, but that is all. I have been through this same topic argument before and it gets tiresome after a while.

the only thing i have for or against this conversation is, the idea that you must be religious to be against it, and non-religious to be for it.. why does it always seem to come down to these two groups.. can't one be able to distinguish right from wrong without being devout in some pagan belief?

i believe, at the moment of conception, it is a person.. i do not believe that person has to be inside a womans uterus to be considered human.. i believe killing this person is wrong.

i have heard that the placenta of new borns is almost or is as good a source of stem cells as killing unborn children.. all the basic materials are still present in the placental fluids and mass.. the placenta goes into the waste dump anyways.. use it.

whether my belief is correct or not, please try to stick to leps original question, which is how do you feel about the research.. this thread is not how you feel about my belief system..

Sorry, Orpheus, but if religion was kept out of medical research there would be little or no arguement!

I think a better way to put that would be:

Most people do come to their moral beliefs based on some form of religious system. Thus, if religion were excepted from medical debate, those opposing on moral grounds would become virtually insignificant in number, therefore creating virtually no controversy,

Mephs said:
Sorry, Orpheus, but if religion was kept out of medical research there would be little or no arguement!

i was not commenting on this board .. i was commenting in general.. i am clarifying this before someone thinks i am accusing a person/member of being something..

i had no one in mind when i replied.

Mephs said:
Sorry, Orpheus, but if religion was kept out of medical research there would be little or no arguement!

Not really, because some people don't have a religoin it doesn't mean they won't think the same thing on this topic as someone who was religious.

KungFuSquirrel said:
Most people do come to their moral beliefs based on some form of religious system.

here's a thought, what if religion got its moral beliefs from people who knew them?

i don't believe morals come from religion, i think maybe its the other way around, especially when you consider, good is older than god.. :rolleyes:

Argh, this is an issue where I'm hogtied up and thrown to the... hogs. That basically stems (no pun intended) from the fact that I also believe that life begins at conception, so taking a babeh and extracting its stem cells = bad. However, leaving the embryos frozen in whatever vat their in also = bad.

But I suppose according to my philosophical wise guru hero person, "Without pain, without sacrifice, we would have nothing!"

How do you define when a human being is dead? By lack of brain and organ functions. Does a foetus have any of these? No. Ergo, it is technically not alive. However, you cannot say it is dead, for there is some cellular activity going on, but this on its own does not define being alive- it is merely as "alive" as my fingernail or a nostril hair. It's what the overall collection of cells is doing that defines it.

I'd like to argue that life does not begin at conception. What you have got at that moment is still simply an egg and a sperm- exactly what you had a second before, but now with some chemical reactions underway. All you have at this point is the potential to become a human being, but there is nothing special, wonderful or unique about it- sperm are created in their trillions, and eggs in their thousands, and there is a "window" for them to turn into a zygote a few days every month (which works out into thousands of opportunities in a lifetime for someone to create one). Anything you do with this zygote is merely denying its potential, but in doing so you are not causing it or anyone else any kind of pain or hindrance. In fact, you are helping to save other people's lives!

I do not deny there is anything special about having a baby, though. For me, life starts at the stage where a foetus can survive outside the mother, i.e. when its critical functions work independently. This fits in with a few observations- for example, I watched a program a few months ago about a condition known as fetus in fetu. This is a very rare condition where a developing baby will "envelop" its twin, which will continue to grow inside the other, for as long as the "host" is still alive. These things are living human beings according to some people here; first of all, it really does make me disbelieve in a god to see this sort of thing (along with other horrific genetic diseases- which we're trying to cure with stem cell research!- such as harlequin babies (warning, don't look this up if you are faint of heart!)), and secondly seeing something like this which is technically a living human being but not properly formed into one does make you think that being "alive" is nothing clear cut or defined by anyone's standards.

/end my own personal opinion. Please feel free to point out any flaws there, I posted this topic in an attempt to understand the topic a bit better.

it is a perfectly acceptable belief lep.. one shared by many.

i however think, fingernail cells will remain fingernail cells till they die. these cells are a tad higher on the charts.

plus, alive? i would not consider most diseases alive, but they do a fair job of reproducing.. however, it would not be fair to say they killing a disease in its embryonic stages is considered a bad thing :smile:

i respect your view, but think its flawed only in the sense of the cells you have chosen to compare this to.

i consider a person dead, when the brain dies..

Argh, harlequin babies are indeed very disgusting.

Anyway, I believe most of the controversy arises from the idea that taking an embryo apart to get at its stem cells to possibly cure diseases in the future seems a bit dodgy to most people. And fetuses do have brain/organ function, just not right from the get-go and not as developed as us walking types. So by your definition of life and my understanding of babies, life starts at somewhere around a few months after conception, which I believe is more or less the age of the embryos if they're going to extract a significant amount of stem cells from them.

At least that's how I understand it.

Orpheus said:
here's a thought, what if religion got its moral beliefs from people who knew them?

i don't believe morals come from religion, i think maybe its the other way around, especially when you consider, good is older than god.. :rolleyes:

Well, that I don't doubt, but at the present time, religion is generally a very heavy factor in determining the morals people choose to uphold. :smile: Anywho, I'll back out now, nothing really worthwhile to contribute other than I generally support it, but nothing new to say otherwise :smile:

i was just pokin at'cha andrew.. i know what you meant before i replied, i just couldn't resist.

anyways, as you say, i cannot add much more.. i support the research 100%, what i am iffy on, is the acquisition of these cells.. thats the part i want clarified.. if its from live embryo's i have qualms , if its from placental go for it :smile:

How would that be any different then abortion? I mean honestly. When a woman gets an abortions she's developed the child longer then when they take cells from embryos to do that portion of stem cell research.

And you can't say abortion is wrong either. Because, it's that persons choice, just as it is those people's choices to donate cells. But it seems most people have too thick of a head to get it through that you can't tell people what to do when it pertains to their own body, especially in this country.

1st off, whom are you talking to crono? and..

Crono said:
And you can't say abortion is wrong either.

of course i can, i do it every day..

also, i would like to point out, abortion is not the topic today, stem cell research is :biggrin:

Crono said:
And you can't say abortion is wrong either. Because, it's that persons choice, just as it is those people's choices to donate cells. But it seems most people have too thick of a head to get it through that you can't tell people what to do when it pertains to their own body, especially in this country.

It's the person having the baby's choice, not the father, not the baby, thus it's controversial. Just because the baby's inside their body doesn't necessitate that it's theirs if other people were instrumental in its creation, so I don't think they should have all the choice on whether or not to get it aborted/donated to science.

hugh, thats a whole new can of worms, are you certain you're willing to go into it?

stem cell research can be less controversial, after all, i have heard of benign ways of acquiring the cells, but abortion has no benign ways of happening, its always controversial..

when it comes right down to it, the only person who truly has a choice, or THE choice, is the fetus.. i think each case should be handled on an individual basis, and each fetus should be consulted.. at a time when the fetus is capable of communicating its wishes of course.

Orpheus said:
hugh, thats a whole new can of worms, are you certain you're willing to go into it?

I just like arguing. :dorky:

cool, then the floor is yours.. i however am not ready to debate the topic, so, it looks like you and crono..

keep it civil you two. :wink:

Abortion and stem cell research are linked together, actually; they are both matters regarding what you can do with foetus's.

Orph, seeing as the foetus cannot actually make that choice, then whose choice is it? Do you think it's ever acceptable to have an abortion, e.g. in the case of someone who has been raped?

Leperous said:
Abortion and stem cell research are linked together, actually; they are both matters regarding what you can do with foetus's.

Orph, seeing as the foetus cannot actually make that choice, then whose choice is it? Do you think it's ever acceptable to have an abortion, e.g. in the case of someone who has been raped?

rape? no, incest? no.. but if its 100% certain the mother dies directly due to a pregnancy, then i think its the mothers choice, only because its her life, or the child's.. then, and only then are you assured the sacrifice is note worthy..

remember, you asked.

lep, i come within a hairs breath of losing my grandson, i am really not comfortable with this topic..

stem cell research can have noble outcomes, abortions.. well, one would have to really stretch the definition of "positive" to come up with very many reasons to have one..

i must bow out..

What you are all assuming is that we are talking about embryonic stem cells. There are in point of fact many other sources, they just aren't as promising and versatile. The only true debate in embryonic stem cell research is because of it's link to abortion. My Mother is dead set against it because she believes that stem cell research will create a market for fetuses, so that people might actually be paid by corporations to have abortions. I believe this is a widely held fear but it only serves to underscore the scientific ignorance of the general public. Once a cell line has been established it is self-sustaining. What this means is that there will be no sustained demand for new cells.

I am fully in favor of embryonic stem cell research. Like Lep, I simply cannot bring myself to believe that a collection of a few hundred cells that happen to contain human DNA is a human being deserving my respect. I just can't stretch my definition of Human that far.

I don't really know anything more about stem cell research than I have already presented, and despite it's promise I don't really find the subject interesting. I'm a nanotech man myself :smile:

I'll have to read up on how cell lines become established, then, since how you're presenting it, it seems like once they are established, the cells can be recreated synthetically, which would be very neat-o.

Edit: Apparently the cells will reproduce themselves, don't know why I didn't think of that. So why then do they (I'm assuming) want multiple embryos? Faster reproduction?

Actually ... I said that I was talking about embryonic stem cells.

"...when they take cells from embryos to do that portion of stem cell research. "

From my original post.

They need to set up more cell lines than they already have because each line is different and a larger verity of cell lines will presumably lead to results more quickly. Also, apparently currently existing lines are contaminated.

Leperous said:
foetus

BRITISH

Abortion is all good and well so long as the system acknowledges the fact that killing something that could have been alive is never a good thing, no matter how necessary. A woman who has the capacity to give birth to a child and put it up for adoption should not end the potential life of the child. A woman should not be able to buy a shirt that says, "I had an abortion."

But it seems most people have too thick of a head to get it
through that you can't tell people what to do when it pertains to their
own body, especially in this country.

It's not just the woman's body we're talking about here, what about the
child inside of her? I've heard about women getting abortions, and when
they pull the fetus out of her, it's a nearly fully developed child.
When you let the fetus develop THAT LONG, I consider it murder. These
late-term abortions are done by grabbing the fetus inside of the woman,
and pulling it out, one body part at a time. Granted, 90% of abortions
are done early in the fetus' devlopment, but I think the other 10%
should be illegal.

And I do fully support stem cell research, so long as the fetus has not
yet developed a brain or other organs as Lep described. Just because
certain cells have the potential to become a fetus, doesn't make it a
living fetus. Every egg that a woman produces has the same potential,
but noone thinks it's wrong or against their religious beliefs when a
woman has her period.

Leperous said:
How do you define when a human being is dead?

The persons heart stops beating.

By that definition, $loth, I've been dead, considering I was frozen during heart surgery as a youngster. Oh well, being a zombie's a nifty excuse for the ladies bein' scared of me.

$loth said:

Leperous said:
How do you define when a human being is dead?

The persons heart stops beating.

Yeah, that's no definition of death. It happens to people all the time and they can survive. When they use a defibrillator on someone what it does is stop their heart so that the body can then restart it in a more efficient manner than it was beating in before. I think Leps definition is a good one.

Tracer Bullet said:
I think Leps definition is a good one.

his definition of dead, may or may not be good, i am not sure yet, but i think he is confusing alive, with awareness of one self.. cells may not be a baby, but are alive, by not being aware, you could argue that coma victims are dead.. or children so mentally handicapped, they are unaware..

i guess i am not entirely sure how i want to express myself.. but alive to me is alive, what you may be at any given moment in your life, is irrelevant, you are human from conception to death.

i have never been good at philosophy subjects such as "at what point does..."

Dead = irreversible loss of all brain function and respiration. How's that?

Hugh said:
Dead = irreversible loss of all brain function and respiration. How's that?

the brain, is the only organ we cannot bypass to sustain life.. i am not talking about doing so long enough to harvest organs sure we can sustain people a short time to keep the organs viable, but more so i am talking about long term substitution, the brain cannot be replaced.. so if you lose it, you are dead..

respiration, can be bypassed either with more lungs, or an iron lung..

Hence the and, Orph. I might be an idiot for saying this but couldn't you live (at least for a short time) with only one of them? 'cause then you wouldn't technically be dead, though you would be in... probably a few minutes.

Every living cell in a persons body is a potential new person. Cloning has shown us this. So the next time you cut yourself shaving, think of all the poor innocents you've just murdered.

fishy said:
Every living cell in a persons body is a potential new person. Cloning has shown us this. So the next time you cut yourself shaving, think of all the poor innocents you've just murdered.

I'm thinking maybe that should be in lightblue?

Orpheus said:
his definition of dead, may or may not be good, i am not sure yet, but i think he is confusing alive, with awareness of one self.. cells may not be a baby, but are alive, by not being aware, you could argue that coma victims are dead.. or children so mentally handicapped, they are unaware..

I never said anything about being "aware" and I'm certainly not confusing it; I said that you need to have your brain working (in the sense that it can maintain your body and keep the cells constituting it alive) to be classed as a living human being. And yes, I will argue that people in a coma who die if not hooked to a life support machine are technically dead; for all intents and purpose you could chop off their heads and keep their bodies alive, which would be no different- are they still alive without their heads?!

There are none of these brain functions in a small ball of embryonic cells that can mean it can be classed as a living human being at all. The only way you can call it a human being is by saying that it is made out of human cells and that left alone it would develop these brain functions (among other things), so basically the only thing that sets it apart from my fingernail or a piece of bone marrow is the potential that it has. Personally, this potential is irrelevant to me, but if not then fair enough, I'm a cold hearted bastard :smile: And yes, what Fishy said; when we can turn cells into our body into embryonic stem cells then what then, are these artificially created babies still human? Even if we can change them again from embryonic stem cells into different types of stem cells?!

But I refer you again to the case of fetus in fetu- emrbyos which are growing inside another (fully grown) person. Are these alive human beings, with the right to live and to vote? By some definitions here they are, except they don't have a heart, so maybe not by $loths... Reading about these things certainly changed my opinion of things!

fishy said:
Every living cell in a persons body is a potential new person. Cloning has shown us this. So the next time you cut yourself shaving, think of all the poor innocents you've just murdered.

the difference is, if i cut my finger, and placed it in a womans womb, it won't mature into another person..

we have already strayed from stem cells to abortion, you wanna round it off with cloning now?

cloning, and embryonic cell clusters are not the same, at least i don't think they are

lep, i am so confused now, i am not truly able to reply.. everyone here, with the exception of a couple have posted logical replies.. it gives one much to think about..

i still feel you are alive at conception, but.. am wondering just how important that cluster is in the grand scheme..

remember, my knowledge about biology is pre-1980.. stem cells and cloning were either unheard of, or science fiction.

i do know that women spontaneously abort cell clusters all the time.. i do not grieve for these clusters, in spite of the fact that most prolly end up in the toilet, literally as well as figuratively.. now i may believe cell clusters are humans, but i don't grieve for them all..

on the other hand, once the organs are present, you are murdering if you have an abortion.

i can tell you this much, my head hurts trying to absorb this thread.. it has a lot to read.

in the end, i believe what i believe, and expect no one to follow suit..

Indeed. Much of the abortion controversy focuses on partial-birth abortion because of the developed stage of the fetus, notably that it has a brain which is promptly sucked out (literally, if I'm not mistaken).

It's basically at that developed stage that I'm opposed to abortion, it's hard to feel empathy for a cell mass that has no feelings in and of itself.

Cloning, I believe, typicaly involves taking an egg, extracting it's nucleus, and inserting one with the genetic material form the organism you wish to clone. You then need to implant it into a host mother, and coax it to begin deviding. All this is of course much more complicated and diffacult than it sounds... In the end it becomes hard to seperate abortion/ESR/cloning, because they all deal with the cells that have the potential to become a human life.

Despite being a christian, I don't believe in the sanctity of human life. We as a culture value it because if we didn't, an organized society would be impossible. I think it must be an evolved trait of our species. Think how chaotic the world would be if the majority of us believed that it was all fine and dandy to kill people!

In view of this, what needs to be considered is what is good for society as a whole. We are repulsed by murder because it is distinctly bad for society. We cannot kill any individuals that are recognizeably human for the "greater good", but is destroying a zygote equaly harmfull? I think not.

Orpheus said:
we have already strayed from stem cells to abortion, you wanna round it off with cloning now?

cloning, and embryonic cell clusters are not the same, at least i don't think they are

Abortion and cloning are both subject the same moral questions that stem cell research is, so I'm surprised to find anyone thinking the topic has gone astray by their inclusion.

And I guess even clones need to be embryonic cell clusters at some stage in their development.

fishy said:
Abortion and cloning are both subject the same moral questions that stem cell research is, so I'm surprised to find anyone thinking the topic has gone astray by their inclusion.

And I guess even clones need to be embryonic cell clusters at some stage in their development.

i see them as 3 different facets of the same topic, but not necessarily the same topic..

it would be like talking about engines in a car, a jet and a rocket, all have the same goal, which is to provide thrust, but none of them are similar in design.

stem cell research can be achieved without embryonic cell clusters
abortions involve them always
cloning, involves both, but the end result would be a viable copy of the original

i do not think all 3 topic must be in the same thread.

My personal opinion: Killing sentient humans is wrong nomatter
how you slice it. The point at which a fetus stops being a collection
of cells and gains rudimentary thinking ability is a question for
scientific debate, but once that threshold is passed abortion becomes
murder.

The counter argument: There is a pragmatic "ends justify the
means" argument that basically goes like this: Women who want an
abortion will get one whether it is legal or not. However if abortion
is illegal, the women wanting one will try to perform unsafe
do-it-yourself abortions rather than having it done by professionals.

EDIT: If you believe, like Tracer Bullet, that the law against murder exists only for the purpose of the "greater good", then it might make sense to agree with pro-abortion "ends jusfity the means" argument.

However, I believe that the law against murder exists for a more fundamental reason: because murder is morally wrong. In fact, "murder is wrong" is one of the few morals that I am OK with the government imposing on people.

I think the current war situation completely violates what you're trying to say Maze.

If murder is so wrong and immoral in the eyes of our government, why do they have no qualms killing innocent people? American or not.

Murder is not profitable. That's it. Period. The moral ideal is a facade to get you to not do it. Wars in general are a blantant example of when murder and killing is very profitable to the nation (usually).

I know that's over simplifications, but, until this nation admits it's socialist and not capitalist, that's how I'll state it.