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As I said in a BreakPoint commentary last month, gene-editing technologies such as CRISPR and what’s being called “Prime Editing” are “existential threats.” We have no idea what our attempts to play god with the human genome will unleash on humanity. Yet, we insist on charging ahead despite our imperfect knowledge with an unbounded confidence in our abilities.Coming from a concerned non-scientist like me, these concerns can be easily dismissed as alarmist, but what if the concern comes from the Director of the National Institutes of Health?It turns out that Francis Collins is also concerned. In a recent article in...

Carly Fiorina’s Passion about Planned Parenthood by WESLEY J. SMITH September 16, 2015 Carly Fiorina laid out the harsh and cold truth about Planned Parenthood in a way no other candidate has to date, amidst the media blackout — and a CNN questioning panel that seemed indifferent, preferring to focus on trivialities. She is worth quoting and heeding: I dare Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama to watch these [Planned Parenthood] tapes! Watch a fully formed fetus on the table, it’s heart beating, it’s legs kicking, while somebody says, “We have to keep it alive to harvest its brain!” This is...

According to a media report out of New Jersey, a third doctor–the others are Shewmon and Calixto–has signed a declaration stating Jahi McMath is not brain dead. The family attorney Chris Dolan says he will petition the California Secretary of State to rescind the death certificate. From the N.J.com story: Dolan provided NJ Advance Media with signed declarations from four doctors, including Charles J. Prestigiacomo, director of Cerebrovascular and Endovascular Neurosurgery at University Hospital in Newark and chair of the neurological surgery department at Rutgers, stating that McMath isn’t brain dead.“The brain structure evidenced in the MRI is not consistent...

The bioethics movement grows ever more radical. In the reproductive field, many activists promote a near-absolute right to have a baby, the kind of baby we want, via any means we desire.  The UK’s John Harris is a major voice in utilitarian bioethics discourse, who believes that killing so-called human non persons is A-OK. He has now written in favor of creating children using a process known as IVG–in vitro gametes–using stem cells to create eggs and sperm, and then fertilizing via IVF. Harris extols the possibilities. For example, a single person could “self breed,” making a baby with only their own cells. Another use would be by same sex...

- I have written about this before. In our growing hedonistic culture, pedophilia is in the process of being normalized, downgraded by some from a severe sexual perversion into a mere ”orientation.” The Atlantic–mainstream media!–has two articles that push us in that direction. First, “I Pedophile,” by David Goldberg–a Canadian journalist convicted for viewing child pornography–argues that his obsession with children is a “sexual orientation:” The main query that I am convinced will always be without an answer is why I am a pedophile. It is the equivalent of trying to determine why someone is heterosexual or gay. We don’t...

Colin Brewer, who disgustingly called for the infanticide of disabled infants some time ago, is apparently under police investigation for those comments. From the Independent story: A councillor who compared disabled children with deformed lambs that are dealt with at birth by “smashing them against a wall” is being investigated by police over his comments, it emerged. Brewer also claimed in an interview there were good arguments for killing some disabled babies with high support needs because of the cost of providing them with services…

The clip below requires a little unpacking: In answering a flip, but it turns out quite good, question about “death panels,” Paul Krugman claims accurately that the cost/benefit board established over private medicine by Obamacare will be able to impose “more or less binding judgments” refusing care, and moreover, that these refusals will save “a lot of money” in the context of treating the elderly (and others, such as people with disabilities and terminal illnesses). He says that the panel will prevent treatment that isn’t “medically” useful. But private insurance companies already do that. So do Medicare and Medicaid. No,...

LANSDOWNE, Virginia, June 3, 2009 (LifeSiteNews.com) - A culture that seeks to escape suffering and inconvenience at all costs will end by eliminating not only pain, but by ending the lives of those suffering or whose condition burden their families, warned bioethicist Wesley J. Smith this weekend.Smith spoke at the Second International Euthanasia Symposium held at the National Conference Center in Lansdowne, Virginia. The symposium was hosted by Canada's Euthanasia Prevention Coalition. Reflecting on the euthanasia agenda amid the modern advances of palliative care, Smith asked, "Why now?" "We live in a time of - even despite the problems we're having...

Salem, OR (LifeNews.com) -- The number of assisted suicides in Oregon has increased 30 percent in the last two years and euthanasia activists themselves may have provided the reasons why. It appears members of Compassion & Choices have infiltrated the hospice system and are urging patients to kill themselves.LifeNews.com reported on the increase earlier this month, but a Compassion & Choice press release last week provided an interesting take on the report.The group said that "nearly 100% of terminally ill individuals using the law in 2008 were enrolled in hospice.""Hospice enrollment among those using the Act increased to 98%,...

The promoters of embryonic stem cell enterprises continue to tout soon to come “breakthroughs” accompanied by supine media coverage and inaccurate statements by “the scientists” who twist and distort scientific definitions to win a political debate. Such spin in the name of science, actually corrupts science. Latest example: Another company is claiming that “next year” it will start human ESC trials. From a column by Orange County Register “biomedical innovation” columnist Colin Stewart, who has apparently drunk the Kool-Aid. First there is his cruelly hyped headline: “ALS patients could get help from stem cells next year:” From his column:...

IT HAS BEEN REPEATED so often that it is now a mantra: "Embryonic stem cells offer the most promise for finding cures" for degenerative diseases and conditions such as Parkinson's disease and spinal cord injury. But saying something ten thousand times doesn't make it true. Indeed, the embryonic stem cell mantra has yet to be demonstrated scientifically. More than that, the actual data published to date in peer-reviewed science journals tell a far different story. While there have certainly been successes in embryonic stem cell experiments in animal studies--many of them hyped to the hilt in mainstream media reports--the numbers...

Lord Patel of Dunkeld, chairman of the UK National Stem Cell Network and chancellor of Dundee University, told the Scotsman earlier this week that research involving stem cells would likely lead to therapies, but that ultimately such treatments could prove too risky for human use. He also said it could be five to ten years before viable stem cell treatments were available. But even then, he observed, "We have to be cautious. It may not deliver therapy for anything. We may find that stem therapy is quite a risky business." In terms of the efficacy of stem cell cures, Lord...

TORONTO, December 6, 2007 (LifeSiteNews.com) - The American author of several highly acclaimed books on the life issues, Wesley J. Smith, spoke to the issue of "Future Concerns" at the Euthanasia Prevention Coalition's international symposium in Toronto, Canada on December 1st, 2007.  Speaking near the conference's conclusion, Smith brought together the themes of the various speakers in his presentation, highlighting several key developments in the strategy of the pro-euthanasia, assisted suicide lobby, and pointing out changes in medical practices touted in some of the leading medical journals and being implemented in a growing number of hospitals.  Smith noted that a...

Wesley J. Smith is a senior fellow at the Discovery Institute and an attorney for the International Task Force on Euthanasia and Assisted Suicide. His latest book is Consumer's Guide to a Brave New World. I think Bobby Schindler is right.There have been a lot of stories of late about how supposedly vegetative patients could understand, or of "miraculous" awakenings by people who doctors were sure would never react consciously again. Bobby, Terri Schiavo's brother, has noticed that whatever the condition of the patient whose story is being told, the reports all have a common sub theme--the awakening, comprehension,...

Throughout his presidency, the Science Intelligentsia has castigated President Bush for placing limits on the federal funding of embryonic-stem-cell research (ESCR). Acting as if he had a banned ESCR, which of course he hadn’t, “the scientists” and their camp followers in the media and on Capital Hill accused the president of withholding cures from the ill in order to impose his religious beliefs on a reluctant public.  Little noted in all of the caterwauling, was that ESCR and human-cloning research (SCNT) have been funded bounteously — to the tune of nearly $2 billion. Not only has the National Institutes of...

As we celebrate the creation and potential of induced Pluripotent Stem Cells, adult stem cell research continues to bear fruit in animal and human studies. The latest is a truly exciting find out of Stanford University: Blood stem cells taken from a donor with a healthy immune system effectively treated multiple sclerosis and arthritis in mice. From the story in the Telegraph: Thousands of patients with arthritis and multiple sclerosis are given new hope today by scientists who have developed a way to alter the immune system.Both conditions are caused when the immune system becomes faulty and attacks the body....

Wesley J. Smith is a senior fellow at the Discovery Institute and an attorney for the International Task Force on Euthanasia and Assisted Suicide. His latest book is Consumer's Guide to a Brave New World. Remember those quaint old days when biotechnologists told us that “all” they wanted to effectuate embryonic stem cell research (ESCR) was merely access to leftover in vitro fertilization (IVF) embryos “that were going to be tossed out anyway?” Actually, I misspeak. Those days might have been quaint but they definitely aren't old. Human embryonic stem cells were only derived in 1998; the great ESCR debate...

LifeNews.com Note: Wesley J. Smith is a senior fellow at the Discovery Institute and a special consultant to the Center for Bioethics and Culture. Visit his web blog at http://www.wesleyjsmith.com.The Swiss Supreme Court recently ruled that people with mental illnesses can be legally assisted in suicide. The case came about when a member of Dignitas, an organization, which, for a fee, provides a safe house for—and assistance with—suicide, brought a lawsuit seeking the right to die.   The man does not have cancer, AIDS or other physical illness, as that term is popularly understood. Rather, he is depressed from bipolar disease....

The pattern in the media reportage about stem cells is growing very wearisome. When a research advance occurs with embryonic stem cells, the media usually give the story the brass-band treatment. However, when researchers announce even greater success using adult stem cells, the media reportage is generally about as intense and excited as a stifled yawn. As a consequence, many people in this country continue to believe that embryonic stem cells offer the greatest promise for developing new medical treatments using the body's cells -- known as regenerative medicine -- while in actuality, adult and alternative sources of stem cells...

http://www.nationalreview.com/script/printpage.p?ref=/comment/smith200405130858.asp May 13, 2004, 8:58 a.m. The Wrong Tree Embryonic stem cells are not all that. By Wesley J. Smith Once again the media are trumpeting the call among many in Congress, pushed by millions in Big Biotech lobbying money, for President Bush to reverse his decision to limit federal funding of embryonic-stem-cell research (ESCR) to those lines already in existence on August 9, 2001. Fronted this time by the grief-stricken Nancy Reagan, and boosted by Hollywood celebrities such as Christopher Reeve, Michael J. Fox, and Mary Tyler Moore, we are warned darkly, as a recent New York Times editorial...