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Ethics Of Stem Cell Resesarch


belovelife

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stem cells hold a huge promise for repairing tissue damage. Research into this is a great thing.

 

Cells are cells and no more. WTF's wrong with cultivating them for research?

 

You seem to have entirely missed the point. If you feel the cells are cells, then of course you have no objection. Those who object to using embryonic stem cells for research feel the cells are more than just cells, and the research is morally equivalent to experimenting on living beings without their consent. I don't see them beating down the door at fertility clinics to save all the thousands of embryonic lives in the freezer though, so clearly they haven't thought through their position fully. I suspect it's an artifact of unfounded belief in a soul, and believing embryos to possess souls, therefore experimentation on cell lines that have their origin from an embryo is somehow human experimentation. Ideally education could correct the situation, but I'm not going to hold my breath. I do disagree very much though that the federal government should be engaged in funding activities which a significant minority of its population believe to be unethical and are unnecessary for the government to carry out its legal duties, whether those unethical activities include embryonic stem cell research, alternative interrogation techniques, or capital punishment.

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You seem to have entirely missed the point.

And zoo do you, no spelling errors anywhere! B)

 

That reminds me: Are we allowed to joke?

Just asking...BTW "the legal duties of the government" is a heavy thought, what about

"illegal duties"? Say, misleading the general public so they keep their calm...

 

PS Rather cool reply in dark energy!

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what if you could just do it deffenently

 

like if you wanted to grow a orgon for a man, you take his sperm, and find the acact matching x y then grow them in replacement of the genes in that persons orgon's cell

 

similar for a woman, eccept try to get a few moon cycle remnants, and do the same thing

 

Is there some special ethics involved in stem cells research? Or will ordinary ethics do? (whatever that may be)

 

1 "like if you wanted to grow a orgon for a man,"... for his sake or yours?

2 "you take his sperm"... and he agreed to it?

3 "find the acact matching x y then grow them in replacement of the genes in that persons orgon's cell"... Are you adding the genes from one sperm with an x chromosome , to the genes from another containing a Y chromosome and then letting them replace the genes in an "orgon cell" somehow obtained from the male in question? What happens next?

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Those who object to using embryonic stem cells for research feel the cells are more than just cells, and the research is morally equivalent to experimenting on living beings without their consent.

 

I do not believe that is the argument, at least not a rational argument that is worth contending with in any way. So I consider that a mild joke. More than that, I do not recognize a moral argument in this debate.

 

I think morals are about placing value on something at all, which is at the very bottom in a hierarchy of decision making. In other words, first we need to decide whether something has value, and that's where morals kick in. And I do not believe that there is any rational debate about the fact that stem cell have value and saving lives has value. There is also no debate about value of medical advancement then, and lack of value in botched medical results. And that is where the moral discussion ends for me.

 

 

The rest is about risks. Whether the lack of value in medical results outweighs the values in medical results. That's where the real debate is.

 

 

This is unlike cloning, where at the center of the issue is whether a cloned human being has any value at all. That is a moral dilemma.

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I do not believe that there is any rational debate about the fact that stem cell have value
No wait, those contrary attribute just as much value to the life of an embryo as they do to your life or mine. That is where the debate is.

 

This is unlike cloning, where at the center of the issue is whether a cloned human being has any value at all. That is a moral dilemma.
No the ethical doubts about cloning can't be summed up so, they are about whether or not it is evil or in some way wrong to artificially produce what, to all effect, would be somebody's identical twin, only born much later. Nobody would seriously doubt the clone, once born, having as much value as any other person. This is very unlike the stem cell debate, where the question is whether an unborn human organism at a very early stage of development has any value, regardless of whom, if anyone, it shares genome with.
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I do not recognize embryo = baby as rational debate. I do not see how that can be rationalized.

whether rational or not, it becomes a real issue to a mother. I have had a few miscarriages and that will and can affect how someone feels about when the "person" begins. There is a bonding that occurs between mother and unborn that is hard to describe. You can't feel the fetus, yet you know its there. In your mind it has already become the baby. You don't stop to think well this is just a growing mass of cells-it becomes a person to you. You start thinking about him or her, not an it. When you lose that "baby", even in the first trimester, you will grieve. This is a very real thing to alot of women especially those that are overly empathetic and sympathetic. So yeah, I get the debate from that angle.I am all about the research and use of stem cells, yet I find I am double minded on the issue. With my mind,its a go and with my emotions, I am hesitant.

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I do not recognize embryo = baby as rational debate.
Whether or not you see it as rational, whether or not is is so, whether or not it can be made so, it remains that there are all too many people who think it is the Lord's Truth and that an embryo has a soul. In these cases, like many others, there is no end to debate and the only answer is for the people of a nation to decide, all together, through their political system.

 

My vote over here was that there is no reason to ban research that can be very useful and important. Unfortunately it wasn't the result that prevailed.

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let's not forget that not all stem cells are embryonic stem cells. :read:

 

full descriptions of all types at the source link: international society for stem cell research

Types of Stem Cells

1. Adult Stem Cells or Tissue-specific Stem Cells

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2. Fetal Stem Cells

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3. Cord Blood Stem Cells

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4. Embryonic Stem Cells

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5. Induced Pluripotent Stem Cells (iPS cells)

In 2006, scientists discovered how to “reprogram” cells with a specialized function (for example, skin cells) in the laboratory, so that they behave like an embryonic stem cell. These cells, called induced pluripotent cells or iPS cells, are created by inducing the specialized cells to express genes that are normally made in embryonic stem cells and that control how the cell functions. Embryonic stem cells and iPS cells share many characteristics, including the ability become the cells of all organs and tissues, but they are not identical and can sometimes behave slightly differently. IPS cells are a powerful method for creating patient- and disease-specific cell lines for research. However, the techniques used to make them need to be carefully refined before they can be used to generate iPS cells suitable for safe and effective therapies.

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