Obama to End Stem Cell Ban Monday
Researchers applaud his action, which is expected to kick-start efforts to unlock therapeutic potential
Reader Comments
Joe of TN...
"I love the references to 7th grade science textbooks, where Brian's science education ended."
Joe, answer the question: since science textbooks (including those used by students well beyond seventh grade) accurately cite fertilization as the beginning of a new human being's life, on what grounds, exactly, do you argue otherwise?
"Brian, the funding is available, and will most likely continue to available indefinitely. Good for you for fighting the good fight, but victory is soooo so sweet."
I can't wait until a majority of Americans realize what a waste of resources ESCR have proved to be. In California, the CIRM announced that only four of its fourteen stem-cell projects will involve embryonic stem cells.
Ellen Goodman's Stupid "Burning Fertility Clinic" Question
Alan Yavina: "Mr Gillin, if you were a firefighter, and you could save either a five year old girl or twenty frozen embryos from an inferno, who would you save?"
Your "argument," stolen from Ellen Goodman, has been addressed at great length in EMBRYO, by George and Tollefsen. For one thing, one might choose to save the five-year-old girl because there's no guarantee that someone could successfully implant the twenty embryos (which is an indictment, really, of in vitro fertilization). For another thing, arguing that one would choose to save someone other than a human embryo is nowhere near the same thing as saying that the human embryo should be deliberately killed, which is what takes place withing ESCR.
Yaxwzboz
bemCBJ
Funding is finally available
It has been quite amusing to follow Brian Gillin's self quest to "educate" the world on stem cell research. Do a google search for "brian gillin stem cell" and you find the same tired diatribe over and over again. I love the references to 7th grade science textbooks, where Brian's science education ended.
Brian, the funding is available, and will most likely continue to available indefinitely. Good for you for fighting the good fight, but victory is soooo so sweet.
Kazeldzy
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Hello
Helllo
Embryo Morality
Mr Gillin, if you were a firefighter, and you could save either a five year old girl or twenty frozen embryos from an inferno, who would you save? If an embryo is a person, you'd have to save the twenty rather than the one, right?
Embryo Morality
Mr Gillin, if you were a firefighter, and you could save either a five year old girl or twenty frozen embryos from an inferno, who would you save? If an embryo is a person, you'd have to save the twenty rather than the one, right?
An Embryo is NOT a Stem Cell
I see so many people here who accuse President Bush of being anti-science, while they, themselves, don't know the difference between an embryonic stem cell and an embryonic human being. In order to obtain embryonic stem cells, an embryonic human being must be destroyed (killed). So many people on this thread are using the terms "embryo" and "stem cell" interchangeably, which is fallacious.
Someone said something about opening up a biology book. I have, and biology books (and the WORLD BOOK ENCYCLOPEDIA) agree with our side, not yours. An embryo is a human being in an early stage of her development, and fertilization is rightly cited as the beginning of a new human being's life. All arguments in favor of destroying human embryos fail right there.
By the way, an acorn IS, botanically speaking, a young, undeveloped oak tree, and a chicken egg IS a young, undeveloped chicken IF IT IS FERTILIZED, which most eggs sold in a supermarket AREN'T. Not that I'd eat them, anyway.
"Ban"?!
President Bush did not ban stem-cell research.
President Bush did not ban embryonic stem-cell research.
President Bush did not ban federal funding for embryonic stem-cell research.
President Bush merely created a compromise so that science would not be divorced from ethics. He limited his MILLIONS of funds toward ESCR to work on those stem-cell lines already created -- from human embryos who were already destroyed.
A few years after Bush made his compromise, the European Union decided upon the EXACT SAME arrangement: continued funding for ESCR, but only on those lines already created. Most work in Europe is on (DING!) ADULT stem-cell research.
I'm all for the advancement of science. It is science that makes it clear that human embryos are human beings. Anyone who believes that to be a religious view should try entering the seventh grade.
