Yes, I've read that quote before in my research. I think they put the moratorium on the research because of the public's misconceptions of the research, thus making future research in possible jeopardy. They weren't doubting the validity of the research, just the timing.
Yes, I've read that quote before in my research. I think they put the moratorium on the research because of the public's misconceptions of the research, thus making future research in possible jeopardy. They weren't doubting the validity of the research, just the timing.
There's nothing valid about the research yet, as far as medical cures or treatments are concerned. They just realized that they can create some sort of stem cells. Ethics councils don't base decisions based on the public's misconceptions, but rather on the ethical implications.
Cyclowizard:
It is that simple; it is ignorance of the process that drives the ethics debates. And ethics implications are partially (mostly actually, based on mores that vary significantly from culture to culture) a function of public misconceptions. When you look back over history, at monsters like Mengele, the Stanford prison experiment, and the Milgram experiment; valuable lessons were learned by means that were unethical by conventional morality (of the three, Mengele's research is probably the most valuable when it comes to testing the limits of human endurance and the like).
Also the slippery-slope (Bush's words, not mine) connection between stem-cell research and human cloning is just that; a slippery-slope fallacy.
It is that simple; it is ignorance of the process that drives the ethics debates. And ethics implications are partially (mostly actually, based on mores that vary significantly from culture to culture) a function of public misconceptions. When you look back over history, at monsters like Mengele, the Stanford prison experiment, and the Milgram experiment; valuable lessons were learned by means that were unethical by conventional morality (of the three, Mengele's research is probably the most valuable when it comes to testing the limits of human endurance and the like).
Also the slippery-slope (Bush's words, not mine) connection between stem-cell research and human cloning is just that; a slippery-slope fallacy.
Sure they do, if the public isn't properly educated on the matter, any decision rendered could lead to a public outcry. I think they accepted the moratorium to prevent a illconceived public ostrocizing and to give them some time to further the public's awareness of the advancement of the research. Although I'd imagine they did this kicking and screaming. LOL
Also, this self-imposed moratorium also precluded any congressional involvement. They did this because they feared an all-out ban on SCNT. It was, in my opinion, an investment in time so they could garner more public and political favor toward the research. Plus, you have to understand is that the council that proposed the moratorium was appointed by the Bush administration who has to (on the surface at best and religiously against it at the least) be against stem cell research. (*** Please note: This is not a flame at President Bush. Just a statement of fact on this subject. Thank you. ***)
Trust me, I will wholeheartedly agree that we need to proceed very carefully, but we need to proceed and proceed NOW.
You're arguing away ethics by saying that ethical considerations are a matter of public misconception? Can you tell me why I attended, not more than a year ago, a conference on the ethical considerations on human cloning and stem cell research? The committee of this conference was made up entirely of engineers with both PhD and MD degrees who specialize in biomedical engineering, tissue engineering, and cloning/stem cell related research. Are you inferring that THEY have misconceptions about the issues? I would consider them the experts in the field. Even this committee could not come to a consensus on the issues, so I strongly doubt that it is that simple. I'll see if I can track down the minutes for the conference (unfortunately, I didn't have $100 at the time for the CD copy
).Further, your inferrence that unethical behavior is ok, as long as we get useful results in the end (the end justifies the means) is very disturbing.
Cyclowizard,
In order to prevent a congressional ban on stem cell research, they accepted the four year funding moratorium in the hopes that in four years attitudes would be different and public awareness would be greater. The researchers don't feel therapeutic cloning is unethical, just reproductive cloning. The general public and members of Congress, by in-large, don't understand the difference between the two and most people can't get passed the "baby-killing" mentality toward the research.
With the research receiving such angst by the public and members of congress, they accepted the commission's proposal of a funding moratorium. Even the split in the President's commission was pretty close (which to me says something) with this ....
"There is no legislation pending in Congress to impose a moratorium on SCNT research. On July 12, 2002 Dr. Maxine Singer, President of the Carnegie Institution, presented the Council on Bioethics with a petition against a moratorium and a ban on SCNT. Over 2,000 medical schools and university science department faculty members signed the petition.. "The petition signals that a large group of informed medical and scientific opinion in this country does not agree with the Council's call for a moratorium," said Dr. Singer. "The petition amounts to an urgent request to allow this promising research to go forward in the interest of millions who are afflicted with severe childhood and adult illnesses." The Council for the Advancement of Medical Research organized the petition. "
They don't want a Senator Brownback trying to completely banning all of their research, so the council accepted the moratorium. It's the misconceptions like Brownback has that threatens the development of the research permanently. They want to take this time to make people more educated on SCNT.
In order to prevent a congressional ban on stem cell research, they accepted the four year funding moratorium in the hopes that in four years attitudes would be different and public awareness would be greater. The researchers don't feel therapeutic cloning is unethical, just reproductive cloning. The general public and members of Congress, by in-large, don't understand the difference between the two and most people can't get passed the "baby-killing" mentality toward the research.
With the research receiving such angst by the public and members of congress, they accepted the commission's proposal of a funding moratorium. Even the split in the President's commission was pretty close (which to me says something) with this ....
"There is no legislation pending in Congress to impose a moratorium on SCNT research. On July 12, 2002 Dr. Maxine Singer, President of the Carnegie Institution, presented the Council on Bioethics with a petition against a moratorium and a ban on SCNT. Over 2,000 medical schools and university science department faculty members signed the petition.. "The petition signals that a large group of informed medical and scientific opinion in this country does not agree with the Council's call for a moratorium," said Dr. Singer. "The petition amounts to an urgent request to allow this promising research to go forward in the interest of millions who are afflicted with severe childhood and adult illnesses." The Council for the Advancement of Medical Research organized the petition. "
They don't want a Senator Brownback trying to completely banning all of their research, so the council accepted the moratorium. It's the misconceptions like Brownback has that threatens the development of the research permanently. They want to take this time to make people more educated on SCNT.
It's great that they have a large group of informed medical and scientific opinions on their petition, but I guarantee I can get an equal number of just-as-informed to argue against it. I'm not even saying that I disagree with SCNT, but I disagree that it's as straightforward in an ethical sense as you're making it out to be.
Strawman.
I'm not advocating sheer pragmatism; read my post again and look for the word "monster." For someone who supposedly spend a year learning about this stuff, you sure are ignorant.
Maybe, maybe not. I'll agree it's a severe form of cell manipulation that can potentially be dangerous if used improperly (human cloning for instance), but I feel that through public pressure to do the right thing and government intervention and regulation, that this research just offers way too much potential for way too many people to dismiss on any potential misconceptions. It is this improper use that I debated heavily in my own mind for a long while. We must proceed cautiously, but inevitably, we must proceed. It's time for cure-based medicine instead of disease-based medicine.
Edit: Also, please remember that this is only a substitute for the publically known fetal stem cell gathering (as I've said before, I don't like using aborted babies with this). Plus, stem cells can be taken from the placenta and umbilical cords of ladies that have successfully given birth to LIVE babies. The placentas and cords are usually thrown away anyway, so what's the harm? Please be aware that I feel that even in those cases, that they need to have permission from the woman in order to do that. Adult stem cell research should allowed to proceed unimpeded, I feel.
This is exactly what you said, and what I was referring to with the quote you pulled from my post:
You're stating that the results of these admittedly unethical experiments are valuable and attempting to use that to justify further unethical research. Am I misinterpreting this? I hope so.
As I mentioned earlier (maybe in the other thread), there still is no evidence that embryonic (or non-adult, if you would prefer
) stem cells have any curative function. It is perhaps more dangerous to tell the public up front that this is the Holy Grail of medicine when it is still in its infancy and no theories regarding it have yet been proven. I agree with the rest of your post though.From all indications, the potential of embryonic stem cell research is enormous, but as of yet, it hasn't been able to fully be realized how enormous it could be. Right now, we know more about adult stem cells but have learned that they only have a limited usage. Only one way to find out how much potential SCNT has is to do the research and find out for sure. I'm 100% though that it will have some significant usage but not fully sure about it being the be-all end-all of medicine. That I won't say, that's not realistic. But what if it only allowed us to grow organs that use the same molecular structure as the patient and eliminates donor lists and possible transplant rejection? I feel that would be well, well, well more than enough to justify the cost.
By cost, do you mean morally or financially? I would argue that no ends can justify a morally (or ethically) reprehensible means.
Adult stem cells are being researched for the exact type of organ generation that you speak of now. By using the recipient's own stem cells, it's a lock to be a perfect match and avoid immune system rejection (this is the research I'm hoping to do for my PhD
). Sorry, you're right. Switch that example with curing cancer (edit: or fighting heart disease) and I'll elaborate my previous statement as being the financial cost not the moral cost.
Slappy00
Golden Member
- Jun 17, 2002
- 1,820
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That will take many many man hours of research, is anyone really sure that the organ will function properly when grown in vitro as opposed to vivo, or for that matter how will this new organ be sustained when it is growing? Can it be grown in vivo? I think this can be almost immediatly used in skin grafting which would be nice.
See thats why i like working with bacteria, all the fun none of the fuss of multicellular systems, and although gene cloning is sooooooo 20th century, help from the NIH and USDA is always a good thing
Don Vito Corleone
Elite
- Feb 10, 2000
- 30,029
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- 91
Darkhawk28:
:beer: for your clear, concise explanation of SCNT. I had not really had an accurate mental picture of what was involved in it before reading this thread. From my perspective, any "moral" objection to this is silly and counter-productive, and essentially an example of shoehorning the abortion debate into a completely unrelated, scientifically important issue.
:beer: for your clear, concise explanation of SCNT. I had not really had an accurate mental picture of what was involved in it before reading this thread. From my perspective, any "moral" objection to this is silly and counter-productive, and essentially an example of shoehorning the abortion debate into a completely unrelated, scientifically important issue.
yeah I noticed that as well, best read here in a long time, thanks for everyone who took part in the discussion
Cyclo:
You are misreading it. I say that ethics are based on the culture's underlying norms and mores, which vary significantly from culture to culture; morality is relative. You asserted that ethics debates have nothing to do with the public's misconceptions:
I would have quoted you more, but the forums suck now.
You are misreading it. I say that ethics are based on the culture's underlying norms and mores, which vary significantly from culture to culture; morality is relative. You asserted that ethics debates have nothing to do with the public's misconceptions:
And I was pointing out that those ethical implications are mostly a function of public misconceptions. Maybe Mengele was a bad example, but he operated in a culture that didn't necessarily find his "work" (read:torture) unethical. The other 2 examples were believed to be ethical at the time, but later determined to be unethical due to the extreme mental stress placed upon the participants.
I would have quoted you more, but the forums suck now.
All research takes many, many man hours, especially government-funded reseach.
Techinques are currently investigating both in vivo and in vitro, with skin graft (look up 'living skin equivalents') material being one of the furthest advanced at this time.
I would argue that the morality of an issue is based on the culture's underlying norms, whereas ethics are more of a logic-based argument for or against it. Of course, this is really semantics, since obviously the council would have to consider both, so I'll agree with you.
SCNT creates FAKE embryos, not real human ones. But if you further manipulate these fake embryos they can develop into reproductive cloning. That's the only danger that there is with all of this.
Remember, these are unfertilized eggs (not touch by a male's sperm) that have had its nucleus extracted. Then they inject the egg with cells from the donor, incubate them until they're a blastocyst-like state, then extract the stem cells they've produced.
The only real, real moral issue for me, like I said, is keeping people from further manipulating them into creating a real, human embryo. That would not be good, in my opinion.
so in otherwords there is not a point in which if implanted the embryo could become a human, as the unfertilised normal cells have been removed fromt he egg case, and some other ones put in, which obviously arent capable of starting a pregnancy.
It would take a deliberate action to create a viable human embryo. To do so, would require much more manipulation of the cells to do that. What I've described prior is what they call THERAPEUTIC CLONING. What you are worried about is REPRODUCTIVE CLONING. That's what I'm against.
Oh btw, to do reproductive cloning, it must be deliberately done. It can't be done by accident. It would be like you bumping into a lady at the grocery store, your penis falling inside of her and you impregnating her.
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