Breakthrough by NUS scientists: safe stem cells

Strait Times ^ | August 5, 2002 | Salma Khalik

[The Energizer]

It does not sound "safe" for the embryo.

[gcruse]

Stem cell research, like cloning, is going forward whether we are involved or not. This is another version of "Left Behind." ;)

[Mark Bahner]

"It does not sound "safe" for the embryo."

Since the embryo at that point has no nerve cells at all, it will never know.

[carenot]

Since the embryo at that point has no nerve cells at all, it will never know.

You are right. It don't know. If I am murdered in my sleep I won't know, either.

[Mark Bahner]

"You are right. It don't know. If I am murdered in my sleep I won't know, either."

Never having been murdered in your sleep, or spoken to anyone who has been murdered in their sleep, how do you know?

These cells have absolutely no nerve cells, let alone brain cells, or a functioning brain. To equate them with a person who is asleep seems pretty inappropriate.

To even equate them with a dead person seems inappropriate. At least a dead person HAS a brain...even if it isn't functioning.

[carenot]

To even equate them with a dead person seems inappropriate. At least a dead person HAS a brain...even if it isn't functioning.

I cannot argue with that.

Anyway, it is just tissue.

It's a tadpole, it ain't no frog---YET!

[Mark Bahner]

"It's a tadpole, it ain't no frog---YET!"

It's not even a tadpole. A tadpole is equivalent to a live baby. A tadpole has a nervous system and functioning brain.

This is a collection of 40 embryonic stem cells.

[spunkets]

"To equate them with a person who is asleep seems pretty inappropriate."

You justified the use of body parts from an individual that was killed by claiming the equivalent of they wouldn't know what happened to them. A person who is alsleep wouldn't know whether they were killed, or stripped, shaved, painted up and transported to the center of a suburban mall. The idea that it's OK to use the remains of dead people, when they were never given the opportunity to have a say in the matter is bogus. Their right to life was violated, even if they never knew what hit them.

[jwalsh07]

A person is defined as ahuman being. A human being is identified by DNA. There are no "mind measuring machines" nor do the absence or presence of certain brain waves make it open season on human beings, except to hypocritical libertarians who have no conception of what the right to life means.

[gcruse]

 The idea that it's OK to use the remains of dead people, when they were never
given the opportunity to have a say in the matter is bogus.

           Even if it were to save a life?

Their right to life was violated, even if they never knew what hit them.

           They had their right to life, and now it is gone..
           How does using their remains violate their right to life?

[jwalsh07]

How does using their remains violate their right to life?

said Dr Mengele to Dr Frankenstein.

[gcruse]

Does a corpse have a right to life?

[jwalsh07]

A corpse is dead. That happens when you kill it to harvest parts for another living being. You with me here?

Before the corpse was a corpse, it had an unalienable right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Most of you feloows understand the last two but for some reason the first one confounds you.

But, nonetheless, none of the three can, perhaps I mean "should", be taken absent due process or informed consent.

[spunkets]

"Even if it were to save a life?" Yes. It so happens that an embryonic stem cell is a person. If you keep halving your age, when is the limit reached where you are no longer a person. It's at the point of conception. Otherwise a mother would never have said to her husband, "feel the baby kick". They would have said, "feel the non-viable tissue mass squirm".

"They had their right to life, and now it is gone.. How does using their remains violate their right to life?"

Their right to life was violated before they had a say in the matter. Using their remains is both a continuation of the disrepect afforded the deceased in the first place and a reward to the bozos that originally condoned, promoted and perpetrated the practice. This practice is equivalent to collecting and scraping stuff off a battlefeild, crash site, or from the World Trade Center site and using what's collected to play with.

[gcruse]

Nevertheless, a corpse has no right to life. If some part of it can be used to save someone's life, it would be criminal not to use it.

[gcruse]

Okay. By " the remains of dead people, " I mean someone who has lived and then died. I see that to you, a blastocyst is a person. We don't agree there, but that's where the misunderstanding comes from.

[RJCogburn]

An achievement. That is why one does the research.

[gcruse]

Yes. People need to realize that restricting research to their personal agenda can mean passing up wonderful things beyond their ability to imagine.

[spunkets]

All the successful research and healing done with stem cells I've seen was done with adult stem cells, not embryonic.