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Couples Cull Embryos to Halt Heritage of Cancer
NY Times ^ | 09.03.06 | AMY HARMON

Posted on 09/03/2006 1:55:46 PM PDT by Coleus

As Chad Kingsbury watches his daughter playing in the sandbox behind their suburban Chicago house, the thought that has flashed through his mind a million times in her two years of life comes again: Chloe will never be sick.

Not, at least, with the inherited form of colon cancer that has devastated his family, killing his mother, her father and her two brothers, and that he too may face because of a genetic mutation that makes him unusually susceptible.

By subjecting Chloe to a genetic test when she was an eight-cell embryo in a petri dish, Mr. Kingsbury and his wife, Colby, were able to determine that she did not harbor the defective gene. That was the reason they selected her, from among the other embryos they had conceived through elective in vitro fertilization, to implant in her mother’s uterus.

Prospective parents have been using the procedure, known as preimplantation genetic diagnosis, or P.G.D., for more than a decade to screen for genes certain to cause childhood diseases that are severe and largely untreatable.

Now a growing number of couples like the Kingsburys are crossing a new threshold for parental intervention in the genetic makeup of their offspring: They are using P.G.D. to detect a predisposition to cancers that may or may not develop later in life, and are often treatable if they do.

For most parents who have used preimplantation diagnosis, the burden of playing God has been trumped by the near certainty that diseases like cystic fibrosis and sickle cell anemia will afflict the children who carry the genetic mutation that causes them.


(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...


TOPICS: Constitution/Conservatism; Culture/Society; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: abortion; babies; babyfarms; babykillers; cafeteriacatholic; cancer; dna; embryo; embryos; geneticdefects; genetics; ivf; moralrelativism; murder; nytreasontimes; pickandchoose; playinggod; selectivereduction; selfcentered; selfishness; slipperyslope; treasonmedia
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To: little jeremiah

Your point has always been clear. But my point (again) is that for the purposes of this thread, it is not relevant what madmen think. Let's try to keep the extremist view points of people we both consider to be mad out of the discussion, unless you are trying to generate more heat than light.

jas3


241 posted on 09/04/2006 10:48:48 AM PDT by jas3
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To: syriacus
Pardon me for saying so, but isn't the distinction somewhat arbitrary? One cell has one compliment of DNA, another has two. Therefore the latter is deserving of legal protection?

Yes. Word tricks by pro-aborts don't change reality.

What is a "pro-abort" ?

jas3
242 posted on 09/04/2006 10:50:27 AM PDT by jas3
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To: syriacus
Many people would argue that an unfertilised egg is only potential life. Others would argue that it requires legal protection.

What an intriguing idea. Granting legal protection to an unfertilized egg.

Is it made of gold or something?


No. People who think that unfertilized eggs are deserving of legal protection do not require that those eggs be made of gold. But, YES, they do require that it be made of "something".

jas3
243 posted on 09/04/2006 10:52:56 AM PDT by jas3
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To: syriacus
OK, I'll try to answer. No, the cells were never people. They had the potential to become people but were unfortunately deprived of the proper environment in which to do so. If these cells were aborted (either actively or passively) after just a few hours in the womb, then they were never people.

If you look over my previous posts in this thread, you'll see that I've already said this is a gray area for me. I've seen others in the thread refer to the "soul" of the cells but I am having trouble accepting that this small group of cells has a soul. It's not because I don't believe in the soul.
I will argue that without a brain, there can be no consciousness and that without the possibility of consciousness, there can be no person.
244 posted on 09/04/2006 10:54:19 AM PDT by free_at_jsl.com
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To: syriacus
I can think of no worse authority on science than the Catholic Church.

Do you accept the Catholic Church's authority on infanticide?

Immediately after the Emperor Constantine's conversion he enacted two laws (about A. D. 320) directed against child-murder

No. I don't accept that infanticide is wrong because the Catholic Church has deemed it so. Infanticide is wrong, but for reasons other than the current position of the Catholic Church.

I also have been eating meat on Fridays since well before the Catholic Church decided it was no longer sinful for me to do so.

jas3
245 posted on 09/04/2006 10:58:34 AM PDT by jas3
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To: MichiganConservative
"But whatever, hey, go suck on your bong some more."

Do you really find it necessary to attack people who disagree with you rather than trying to challenge their arguments? If so, that would suggest that your position is either not well reasoned, or that you are not capable of expressing your position.

Either way, attacking one's opponent verbally does nothing to advance the dialog. And if you really have nothing to contribute to the thread any longer, you would do best by simply not posting, rather than by posting personal insults.

jas3
246 posted on 09/04/2006 11:01:57 AM PDT by jas3
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To: metmom
They *won't* be human. They are not being *made* to be human.

Yes, they will and yes, they are. What does the DNA tell you? Human sperm and human eggs were used to create human beings; there's nothing else they could have or would have become if allowed to grow. They weren't allowed to grow but that is not the criteria for determining humanity.

If they had been implanted, there is better than a 90% chance that they would have grown to be nothing at all. Very few IVF implantations are successful.

So the DNA tells you that there is a 10% chance at best that if implanted the embryos would eventually become human, and there is a 90% plus chance that the cells would die.

jas3
247 posted on 09/04/2006 11:06:20 AM PDT by jas3
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To: Wonder Warthog
"I can think of no worse authority on science than the Catholic Church."

Which shows you know nothing about either the history of science or the Catholic Church. The whole "Western" perspective of science is a direct result of the Catholic Church's promotion of an "ordered" universe understandable by human reason.

Actually, I know a great deal about both the history of the Catholic Church specifically and Christianity in general as well as about the history of science. The history of science is one of my favorite topics.

And on balance the Catholic Church has been historically and continues to be TODAY a great impediment to science. I would be happy to debate that point with you on another thread at a later date.

jas3
248 posted on 09/04/2006 11:16:00 AM PDT by jas3
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To: syriacus
How is that deliberately ending a life?

A life would be ended through neglect. I guess you could label it a wrongful death.

I don't see how NOT killing a blastosphere can be construed as wrongful death. If it lived, aged, and died, then how was its death wrongful?

jas3
249 posted on 09/04/2006 11:17:48 AM PDT by jas3
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To: tortoise
Some posters on this thread have imbued fertilization with magical properties that create a moral threshold before which there is no moral consequence to the destruction of an egg or of a sperm, but after which there is moral consquence to destruction of the combined sperm and egg.

The root of the problem is that humanity is a continuum in fact, and any arbitrary binary quantization for the purposes of determining that humanity will be defective as a result yet people are wont to do it. As long as they make this incorrect assumption, all the reasoning that follows will be invalid. It really is that simple, but ignoring that fact makes things so much more tidy if you do not want to think too hard about a complex question.

Interestingly, the English Common Law has always recognized humanity as a gradient and would absolutely reject the idea that there is a clear line between when an object is a human being and when it is not.

I think you've hit the nail on the head. What's more difficult is that asking people who believe in one (or another) specific event as the initiating event for humanity what their logic is for such a decision has, on this thread at least, resulted in name calling and accusations of "moral relativism". It would be far more enlightening to hear an argument as to WHY one specific initiating event creates moral consequence or should create legal consequence as opposed to just stating that it is so, or that it is so because one particular flavor of religion deems it so.

I began contributing to this thread with the hope that others would share their reasoning on this topic, but, alas, there has been very little in the way of reasoning and very much in the way of name calling.

jas3
250 posted on 09/04/2006 11:25:56 AM PDT by jas3
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To: linda_22003

I am also against IVF


251 posted on 09/04/2006 11:52:40 AM PDT by The Cuban
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To: jas3
If it lived, aged, and died, then how was its death wrongful?

It doesn't matter how many stages the neglected person has lived through before dying from neglect. Living a particular number of days doesn't make one more or less human.

When a one-day-old baby dies through neglect, it's a wrongful death. When a child dies through neglect, it's a wrongful death.

When an elderly adult dies through neglect, it's a wrongful death.

252 posted on 09/04/2006 12:11:02 PM PDT by syriacus (Why wasn't each home in New Orleans required to have an inflatable life boat?)
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To: free_at_jsl.com

Thanks for answering.


253 posted on 09/04/2006 12:12:43 PM PDT by syriacus (Why wasn't each home in New Orleans required to have an inflatable life boat?)
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To: jas3
I think you've hit the nail on the head. What's more difficult is that asking people who believe in one (or another) specific event as the initiating event for humanity what their logic is for such a decision has, on this thread at least, resulted in name calling and accusations of "moral relativism".

You were given the reasoning at least 3 times by at least 3 different people and yet you refuse to acknowledge that and continue to assert that no one will answer your questions. jas3, arguing with you is like arguing with the little child that responds to all your arguments with "yeah, but you're fat"; pointless.

Do not talk to me again.

254 posted on 09/04/2006 12:23:00 PM PDT by MichiganConservative (Government IS the problem.)
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To: jas3
"Yes, but the triggering of the growth by the union of egg and sperm results in a live birth less than half the time, even excluding intentional abortion by the mother."

Irrelevant.

"I am pointing out that eggs no longer need to be fertilized to create humans. And in fact you've tipped your hand by stating that the real issue is not fertilization, but when human life should or should not be protected. I think everyone on this thread agrees that human life should be protected, but there are various definitions of what counts as human life.

No, the real issue is whether or not a fetus is human, at whatever stage of development it's in. I say it is.

"Catholics might want to protect sperm, others might want to protect a fertilzed egg, others might want to protect a developed fetus, and others might want to protect a baby only after it has been born. I'm told that Peter Singer thinks a baby deserves protection only well after it is born.

I think you need to study the Catholic position a bit more. You are wrong. The Catholic church's position is exactly mine, and for the same reason. Nothing whatsover in the Catholic position about wanting to "protect sperm".

"I think that murder is defensible in some cases. For example in self-defense, I would argue that murder is morally justified. Quakers would disagree with me. I also think that capital punishment is morally justified in certain cases."

Neither self-defense nor capital punishment qualify as "murder". Abortion does.

255 posted on 09/04/2006 12:31:24 PM PDT by Wonder Warthog (The Hog of Steel-NRA)
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To: jas3
"That is most certainly NOT correct, Warthog. Very few implanted IVF embryos ever result in a baby. I think the current number is less than 10%, which is why doctors tend to implant so many of them in the hopes that just one will result in a live birth. Once the fertilization process is initiated, there is still only the potential (not the inevitable) that the blastosphere will become a human, even if the parents do everything possible to try to bring that blastosphere to full term."

I should have correctly said "if not interfered with". A "natural" failure of the fetus is not the question, it is whether the ARTIFICIAL intervention by humans is immoral.

"I wonder if this is where the misunderstanding arises. Does knowing that very few IVFs work and that in nature, less than half of fertilized eggs result in a live birth change your view that a blastosphere must inevitably become a human?

If it lives it'll be human. It won't be a dog, nor a horse, nor anything else. And no, it doesn't change my position in the slightest.

256 posted on 09/04/2006 12:35:52 PM PDT by Wonder Warthog (The Hog of Steel-NRA)
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To: jas3
Infanticide is wrong, but for reasons other than the current position of the Catholic Church.

Exactly.

We don't need to include churches' opinions in this discussion. Some churches believe killing the smallest human beings is okay, some don't think it is okay. So let's leave churches out of this.

Of course, we have to remember that

Logically speaking,
one side is really incorrect

because the two contradictory positions cannot both be correct at the same time.

As I said, some churches think abortion is a-ok. Would you dismiss a "pro-choice" statement merely because it came from some church?

I'm not against abortion because of what the Catholic Church says, either.

I'm against abortion because it is ridiculous to say a being is a "non-human" being (or non-person) at one point and say that that same being is a "human" being (or person) at another point.

Logically speaking, the being is the same being at every point from after fertilization until death.

I would be against abortion, whether a church told me it was wrong, or not.

I'm finding the Catholic Church more and more attractive, because it defends the weak and because it is against abortion.

The Catholic Church happens to be right about many "life and death" decisions. (And actually led the way in ending infanticide).

257 posted on 09/04/2006 12:36:28 PM PDT by syriacus (Why wasn't each home in New Orleans required to have an inflatable life boat?)
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To: jas3
"Actually, I know a great deal about both the history of the Catholic Church specifically and Christianity in general as well as about the history of science. The history of science is one of my favorite topics."

Then you can't have been studying it very long.

"And on balance the Catholic Church has been historically and continues to be TODAY a great impediment to science. I would be happy to debate that point with you on another thread at a later date."

Malarkey. The ONLY area where the Catholic Church is any impediment AT ALL to any part science is in the area of abortion (in all its flavors).

258 posted on 09/04/2006 12:38:49 PM PDT by Wonder Warthog (The Hog of Steel-NRA)
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To: syriacus
If it lived, aged, and died, then how was its death wrongful?

It doesn't matter how many stages the neglected person has lived through before dying from neglect. Living a particular number of days doesn't make one more or less human.

When a one-day-old baby dies through neglect, it's a wrongful death. When a child dies through neglect, it's a wrongful death.

When an elderly adult dies through neglect, it's a wrongful death.

So would you then agree that if a 7 celled blastosphere lived for 75 years and then died naturally (but without further cell division) that it's death would not be through neglect?

jas3
259 posted on 09/04/2006 1:09:21 PM PDT by jas3
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To: MichiganConservative
I think you've hit the nail on the head. What's more difficult is that asking people who believe in one (or another) specific event as the initiating event for humanity what their logic is for such a decision has, on this thread at least, resulted in name calling and accusations of "moral relativism".

You were given the reasoning at least 3 times by at least 3 different people and yet you refuse to acknowledge that and continue to assert that no one will answer your questions. jas3, arguing with you is like arguing with the little child that responds to all your arguments with "yeah, but you're fat"; pointless.

I could not disagree with you any more strenuously, MichiganConservative. I have never been given any more reasoning than an opinion of one specific arbitrary event that seems "more natural" than another or that the reasoning is that a particular religion says it is so (depspite other religions saying it is not so).

I have tried to inquire specifically into the rationale behind one specific point in time versus another by asking questions which nobody, including yourself, will answer. Some people tell me to go look at other posts.

The child you reference who responds "yeah but you are fat" is resorting to insults rather than trying to gain understanding. On the other hand, I have never tried to insult anyone. Further, I have tried to courteously understand everyone's position to help form my own.

Do not talk to me again

Well I for one think further discussion would be fruitful, but you are certainly free to not respond. Your Constitutionally guaranteed freedom of speech includes the freedom to not speak if you so choose.

Warm Regards,

jas3
260 posted on 09/04/2006 1:18:21 PM PDT by jas3
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