Re: OT Embryonic stem cell research was Re: OT: McCain's religion was Re: Eliot Spitz

On Tue, 25 Mar 2008 14:58:27 +1300, "Pete Dashwood" <dashwood@removethis.ent
ernet.co.nz>
wrote:

>
>
>"Clark F Morris" <cfmpublic@ns.sympatico.ca> wrote in message
> news:vgtfu3l12uf633nlpo4jm33i5j98kgjrtp@
4ax.com... 
>
>Such an excellent question, I feel moved to respond.
>
>This is a powerful argument and one that people are having great difficulty
>in coming to grips with.
>
>If stem cell research can provide cures to afflictions of the living
>(Parkinsons, Diabetes, Asthma, and maybe eventually obviate the need for
>organ transplants, with the body simply repairing itself...) then it would
>seem to be worth investigating.
>
>But, as you observe, we need embryos to do this investigation and it doesn'
t
>seem "right" to produce embryos purely for experiment.
>
>I've given this considerable thought.
>
>Here's my personal take on it; it might help some people, others may be
>outraged by it...
>
>Few of us think of sperm as potential people (masturbation would have to
>cease immediately if we did... :-)), and an ovum is not a person either. So
,
>we obviously have no problem with gametes; it's when they become a zygote
>that it gets tricky.
>
>If an embryo is "manufactured" in a laboratory by causing the fusion of two
>donated gametes, then I believe we don't need to think of what's in that
>test tube as a person, or even as a potential person, even though that is,
>in fact what the contents are...
>
>It's a bit like eating meat. When a lamb or a rabbit is running round and
>you are stroking it and playing with it, it is an entity and you relate to
>it, and enjoy its company. When it is served on a plate, it is not that
>entity any more, it is simply "food". It tastes no less delicious because
>you knew it personally.

The distinction is over sentience, defined as the ability to suffer. It is a
 mistake to
think the distinction is over life, consciousness, self-awareness or logical
 reasoning.
It's also not about potential to become sentient.

>We require sustenance and are designed to eat other life forms (both plant
>and animal; I don't see people getting choked up and emotional because they
>sliced up a baby tomato...yet the plant life is just as "alive" as the
>animal life in this place.)

That demonstrates the fallacy in using 'alive' as the test. Plants are alive
, but cannot
suffer. Neither can sperm and ova.

>So, for me at least, if it came from a test tube, it can be experimented on
>and we can make as many of them as we need to do that. There is a higher
>purpose here; existing living people, who have families and communities tha
t
>care about them and whom they care about, can be helped by the
>experimentation on a collection of cells that were created in a laboratory,
>specifically for that purpose (just as we specifically breed animals for
>food), from DNA donated by individuals who know what it will be used for.

The intention of the creator doesn't matter, nor the millieu in which the cr
eation occurs.

>I have no moral problem with that. In fact, I believe it is commendable, an
d
>if one person is saved from Parkinsons or Diabetes, it is worth it.

Now you're creating a moral algebra. If X amount of suffering imposed on one
 creature
relieves 10X suffering on another, is it morally justified? That's debatable
. The danger
is a slippery slope that absolves all killing, such as killing animals to re
lieve the
'suffering' of meat deprivation.

>So, what about fetuses removed from mothers because of defects or
>complications or threats to the mother's life?

Less than 2% of abortions are done for medical reasons. The vast majority ar
e done for
convenience.

>Any abortion of a baby is usually traumatic for the parents. They already
>have a mental image of their child coming to fruition and emerging into the
>world. Now they find it isn't to be... Devastating.

>There is a fetus. Why "waste" it?

You seem to be saying that finding a productive use for the fetus relieves p
rospective
parents' suffering. If Vlad the Impaler had turned his corpses into works of
 art, would he
be less guilty?

>If some small shred of good or usefulness can be salvaged from such an awfu
l
>experience, why not do so? Maybe there is some comfort to be had from the
>thought that even such a dreadful experience may do some good for
>somebody...
>
>We gladly donate our organs and corneas etc. in the event of accident, so
>that someone we will probably never know can be helped. Should we do any
>less with a fetus that will never know "life" in the full sense of the word
,
>not just as an energy process within a cell?

Removing organs from a corpse doesn't cause suffering.

>I don't think so. (For myself, I'd gladly donate it to science...)
>
>We should support stem cell research because it will better the human
>condition in the long term.

Humans are not the only sentient species in the world. Removing humans would
 better the
bovine condition in the long term. What conclusion should the cow philosophe
r draw? Oh,
there are none. Does that mean the only species that count are the ones havi
ng
philosophers? What luck, that's us!

>The emotional pain being caused over it is largely self induced and based o
n
>belief systems that were never designed to deal with modern scientific
>possibility.

You're right about that. It's based on a belief system that developed over a
 million years
of human spiritual experience. You can't turn it off by flipping a switch.

>We need to change our minds and perceptions about what is "living" and what
>isn't, what can be useful and what can't, and why we would want to inhibit
>the acquisition and growth of knowledge that can help untold numbers of
>future people.

Forget living, think sentient. Plants and bacteria are living. So what?

>Next time you get emotional about stem cell research, think about children
>struggling to breathe, parents and loved ones who don't even recognise thei
r
>own children, mothers with cancer who are undergoing chemotherapy and
>radiation, devastating their bodies, when, if we had the knowledge, their
>tumours could be attacked at source by cells developed specifically for tha
t
>purpose.

<cue violins, soften lighting and focus>

>That makes more sense to me than bewailing the "sinful" loss of a cell
>collection that was going nowhere anyway.

It's not about their potential; it's about their condition when killed.