Posted on 06/04/2010 2:30:34 PM PDT by nickcarraway
In the new movie "Splice," a human-animal hybrid terrorizes people. In real life, scientists argue mixing human and animal cells could save lives.
Dren, the half-human, half-animal hybrid set to terrorize Adrien Brody and Sarah Polley in the new movie "Splice," is pure science fiction, but politicians across the country aren't taking any chances.
In the last month Ohio and Arizona have both passed laws forbidding research of animal human hybrids.
Proponents of the laws fear Dren-like creations and object morally to the combining human and animal cells. But scientists say the research could lead to cure for AIDS, immunize people against cancer, or grow replacement organs.
The potential for medical cures or advances is huge, said Esmail Zanjani, a scientist at the University of Nevada Reno who has created sheep that produce livers that are up to 20 percent human.
"But just because we can do something doesn't mean we should," said Zanjani. "We need to have a full discussion with the public," about this kind of research.
In a recent interview, "Splice" director Vincenzo Natali said that his inspiration for "Splice" was the earmouse, a 1995 experiment where scientists grew a large, human-shaped ear from cow cells grown on the back of a hairless mouse.
Despite the fact that no human cells were used in the ear mouse (the scientists placed cow cells on a polymer shaped like the human ear), the research sparked controversy and raised hopes that replacement organs would soon be available.
Since then research into animal human hybrids, or chimeras (after the lion, goat, and snake creature from Greek mythology) has exploded. Over the last 15 years scientists have created sheep with human livers and pancreas cells, mice with human immune systems, and many other combinations of human and animal cells.
None of the modern chimeras look like something out of Dr. Moreau's menagerie. They look like normal animals. The difference is on the inside.
The blood flowing through their veins could be human. The liver or kidneys could contain discrete human liver or kidney cells. These are not transgenic animals, said Zanjani. They are discrete cells, either animal or human. The DNA is not mixed.
If a human had, say, hepatitis, and their liver was dying, scientists could extract liver cells from that person, insert them into a developing sheep, and then harvest a human liver, made from a person's own cells (to reduce the chance of organ rejection), and replace the old liver.
Infected cells can't fight off an infection, whether it is HIV or some other disease. But if uninfected human stem cells were placed in an animal's body, scientists could train those cells to recognize and fight off the infection.
Once they are ready, the cells would be harvested from the animal and introduced back into the original human's body. There the retrained immune cells would fight off the infection.
The same technique could work for cancer, said Jeffery Platt, a scientist at the University of Michigan exploring this very scenario.
Millions of lives could be saved using human-animal hybrids, say scientists, but some people have strong moral objections to mixing human and animal cells. Earlier this week the Ohio Senate passed Senate Bill 243, which prohibits "the creation, transportation, or receipt of a human-animal hybrid, the transfer of a nonhuman embryo into a human womb, and the transfer of a human embryo into a nonhuman womb."
Anyone who violates the new law could spend five years in prison and face up to a quarter million dollars in fines. Other states, including Louisiana, Oklahoma, and Arizona have also banned research into chimeras.
National governments have also stepped in. The United Kingdom approved chimera research in 2008, when it granted a Newcastle University stem cell scientist Lyle Armstrong a permit to use cow eggs filled with human DNA to develop therapies for Parkinson's disease and stroke victims. (All cow DNA would be removed before the human DNA would be inserted.)
Canada bans all chimera research, but the Human-Animal Hybrid Prohibition Act of 2009 failed to pass the U.S. Congress.
Fears about new technology are nothing new, said Platt; the advent of railroads sparked controversy about how fast the human body was meant to travel. Nor are they unnatural; people fear what they don't know. But the potential of chimera research to save millions of lives should also be added to the equation.
"Where it becomes a problem is if government responses with undue constraints that are not justified," said Platt.
They really try to make it sound all innocent and harmless.
*We just want to help people.* *Imagine what good we could do for mankind if.....*
People can say all they want about Bible prophecy and what’s been fulfilled and what’s not, etc.
But if there’s anything that convinces me that the end is really near, it’s the technology that is going to allow these kind of abominations to exist. God intervenes when the purity of the human race is at stake, just like in Genesis before the Flood.
Our current level of technology is going to allow us to destroy ourselves and our planet on a scope that was inconceivable 100 years ago.
God help us. The end has got to be nearer than we ever imagined.
Are you sure you’re on the right forum?
You don’t see any moral concerns about hybridizing humans and animals?
Ends justifies the means?
What part of the Bible forbids this tech? Indeed I thought that was the whole point of the, “Everything in this garden is for YOU”-part.
When we mate a horse and donkey, the offspring is a mule —is the mule *evil*..? Isn’t each of those 2 species inviolate? Or is that OK, while this other stuff is not...?
Turning to DNA (per AT GC), let’s say by way of example that we extract the “L” from the word, love, and we insert it into the separate word, hemLock —does that make the poison 1/7 “love-like”..?
Have we violated the L-ness of the L by turning around and using it as an interchangeable part of a new whole word..?
Or instead is it simply that you’re USED to that, you’ve done it a million times, and so now it’s not scary to you? And that this other stuff does seem to you as new, and therefore scary?
Note: when they invented telephones, folks said it would provoke TB epidemics. Why? Because, silly, the speaker is talking DIRECTLY into the ear of the listener..!
They also said trains would make it impossible for riders to breathe (excessive wind), and the NYT’s front page after the Wright Brothers flew was that flight was IMPOSSIBLE according to the laws of physics.
Anything - from science to industry to technology - which is not guided by morality inevitably creates horrible inventions which degrade and ruin human lives. It’s that simple. The human mind and intellect when not guided by the morals and guidelines given by God sooner or later becomes a tool or instrument for evil.
Add pride, lust for power and money - and it’s a recipe for disaster.
Horses and donkeys can mate without human interference and techonology.
If you can’t see that this is wrong, I certainly can’t help you. Just because the human mind thinks up something doesn’t automatically make it good.
What Bible are you reading that it says that?
Nice strawman, but FAIL. I never said anything about the Bible forbidding the technology, but this kind of DNA manipulation is not the same as getting a mule or other sterile hybrid plant of animal from natural reproduction.
It's the combining animals with humans part that's looking for trouble.
As far as the rest of your incoherent post, what are you smoking?
Without fail.
If I don’t think like you already, then you can’t “help” me?
If I did think that same way, then presumably I would not NEED help, so I’m not sure how much of a positive externality your enlightenment entails.
Did you know 80% of the US food supply is already genetically modified? Do you feel sick? In 20 years you will eat your morning bacon specifically to help your heart, cuz the porcine tissue development will be recoded so that lipidocytes express those components of fish oil that are cardiotherapeutic (actually it will be more than 20 years cuz the FDA is really crazy about approvals for new food products).
Your real message is that you don’t like embryonic stem cells research, and I agree. Even though it doesn’t work and clearly there’s not even any need for it (cuz we can manipulate non-germ-line cells), it IS evil, because it kills innocent, living stuff, and that’s realllllly dark and bad.
But that’s not the message here, in this movie —that all biotech is somehow scary and evil.
The Garden is FULL of amazing stuff —it’s just now that we’re able to overturn some of the heavier rocks.
You..you are saying that God did not say that everything in the Garden of Eden is for mankind?
You are not saying that?
Umm...I am not smoking anything, no. I do not smoke.
I disagree that genetically modified foods are great and harmless.
There is much evidence that they are indeed harmful. I do not agree that huge agribusinesses are the best way to produce food; using so many tons of harmful chemicals that people are sickened. Ever read about farm workers’ rate of cancer and other diseases?
Just because technology can do something doesn’t mean it’s good. I don’t worship God’s energy, I worship Him. And He’s given rules - that are essentially the same in every religion (leaving Islam out of it as I always do) that if not followed, lead to disaster.
Greed, pride, arrogance and lust for power and money are what is ruining our world. All based on rebellion against God. His creation needs to be respected and natures’ laws respected. Mad scientists trying to think of how to improve on nature and break the laws of nature are creating a hell on earth.
You won’t see it; nothing I say will change your mind. So be it.
So you’re saying that anything in the world including anything the human mind can think up is good.
That’s pure insanity.
Which parts of my post are incoherent?
What components of farm worker cancer rates can we attribute to cultivation of GM crops as opposed to standard crops?
I thought that was owing to the use of pesticides?
I believe evil can come from this kind of technology just like evil can come from all sorts of technologies. That doesn’t mean technology itself is evil.
The Bible is our guide for resolving these issues:
2 Timothy 3:16-17, “All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, 17so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.”
gaijin is correct, IMO, that we are required to back up and test any belief with scripture. That is our standard by which to measure ideas. If we rely on emotions or beliefs that are not founded in scripture, we can go wrong.
Genesis 1:26 “And God saith, ‘Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness, and let them rule over fish of the sea, and over fowl of the heavens, and over cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that is creeping on the earth.’”
gaijin is correct, based on scripture, that God gave man dominion over animals. I don’t know of any scripture that would ban this technology, depending on how it’s implemented of course. However, I could be wrong. I’m open to correction by scripture as noted in 2 Timothy.
There are many, many Christians who would be dead today without medical intervention, including myself. Is it wrong for a scientist or doctor to want to help their fellow man? Should the sick avoid all medical technologies beyond naturopathic medicine?
Maybe the scientists involved aren’t driven by greed, power, and arrogance but simply want to help others. The desire to help others wouldn’t justify everything under the sun, such as abortion, harvesting organs from unwilling donors, etc., but it’s not fair to attribute evil motives to all scientists in this regard.
test
I believe evil can come from this kind of technology just like evil can come from all sorts of technologies. That doesn’t mean technology itself is evil.
The Bible is our guide for resolving these issues:
2 Timothy 3:16-17, “All Scripture is God-breathed and is useful for teaching, rebuking, correcting and training in righteousness, 17so that the man of God may be thoroughly equipped for every good work.”
gaijin is correct, IMO, that we are required to back up and test any belief with scripture. That is our standard by which to measure ideas. If we rely on emotions or beliefs that are not founded in scripture, we can go wrong.
Genesis 1:26 “And God saith, ‘Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness, and let them rule over fish of the sea, and over fowl of the heavens, and over cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that is creeping on the earth.’”
gaijin is correct, based on scripture, that God gave man dominion over animals. I don’t know of any scripture that would ban this technology, depending on how it’s implemented of course. However, I could be wrong. I’m open to correction by scripture as noted in 2 Timothy.
There are many, many Christians who would be dead today without medical intervention, including myself. Is it wrong for a scientist or doctor to want to help their fellow man? Should the sick avoid all medical technologies beyond naturopathic medicine?
Maybe the scientists involved aren’t driven by greed, power, and arrogance but simply want to help others. The desire to help others wouldn’t justify everything under the sun, such as abortion, harvesting organs from unwilling donors, etc., but it’s not fair to attribute evil motives to all scientists in this regard.
Show me where in Genesis it DOES say that "everything in the Garden of Eden is for mankind"
Turning to DNA (per AT GC), let’s say by way of example that we extract the “L” from the word, love, and we insert it into the separate word, hemLock —does that make the poison 1/7 “love-like”..?
Have we violated the L-ness of the L by turning around and using it as an interchangeable part of a new whole word..?
Or instead is it simply that you’re USED to that, you’ve done it a million times, and so now it’s not scary to you? And that this other stuff does seem to you as new, and therefore scary?
It's only a presumption that genetically modified food stuffs are harmless.
And considering the companies that are pushing it and the amount of money they stand to make from it, I trust them about as much as I trust big pharma and the FDA.
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