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

On Tue, 25 Mar 2008 18:44:54 +1300, "Pete Dashwood" <dashwood@removethis.ent
ernet.co.nz>
wrote:

>"Robert" <no@e.mail> wrote in message
> news:aavgu3lbm0r5rik3gnusb5r90td8s1bjtv@
4ax.com... 
>
>Says who?  All living animals exhibit irritability. If you prod an amoeba
>with a pin, it will move away. Who says it suffers?

Most Eastern religions, such as Buddhism, Jainism, Hinduism and Sikhism.
Western philosophers advocating utilitarianism, such as Bentham and Mill.
 
>
>Nor is it about suffering. In fact, it isn't about the fetus at all; it is
>about how WE, as grown people PERCEIVE the fetus. There is no more evidence
>for what a fetus feels than there is for my suffering amoeba, above.

You're right. It's about psychological defenses we employ when we feel GUILT
Y about
unfairly harming others (ethics) or ourselves (morals, addiction). The same 
defenses are
used for both. Guilt is a sure sign of cognitive dissonance -- part of me th
inks it's
right, part of me knows it's wrong. Internal conflict is a form of suffering
, and a poor
survival strategy.

Denial
No wrong has occurred.

"You can't "kill" something that was never born."

Rationalization
OK, maybe it's a little upsetting, but there's a good reason for doing it.

"The intention here is to gain knowledge that can help humans."

Externalization
It wasn't my idea.

"There is an [aborted] fetus. Why "waste" it?"

Minimizing
You're making a big deal over nothing.

"Why is suffering so important? Pain is a natural result from many natural
processes. It is the avoidance of it that helps us survive, and pain is
therefore an essential part of our survival."

Intellectualizing
Deflect their attention from the issue at hand.

"Next time you get emotional about stem cell research, think about children
struggling to breathe,"

Undoing
Positive behaviours in other areas make up for this one.

"We gladly donate our organs and corneas etc. in the event of accident"

Displacement
Take out your frustrations on the nearest target.

" Other, more pragmatic, nations are NOT being stopped by the God Squad."

Projection
Hey look, these guys are worse than me.

" we specifically breed animals for food"

 
>
>Excuse me... experiments have been done and documented, that plants DO
>suffer. Carrots scream as they are pulled out of the ground, plants tremble
>and show differentiated responses to people who treat them well and people
>who don't... The only difference is that WE PERCEIVE plants differently tha
n
>we do animals.

Experiments have 'proven' that plants grow better when you talk to them, or 
play music for
them. It's true. Do you know why?

>At the end of the day, we're all made of the same stuff... vibrating packet
s
>of energy and matter, existing in space through time.

Some vibrate more artfully than others.
 
>
>Nor rocks nor water, as far as we know. It isn't relevant to stem cell
>research.
> 
>
>The intention here is to gain knowledge that can help humans. I think that
>DOES matter.

The road to hell is paved with good intentions.
 
>
>Only if you think it is all about suffering. I don't think it is, so I don'
t
>have the dilemma you outlined.

If you see nothing wrong with suffering, why are you opposed to the war in I
raq or
Somalia? Why not legalize every crime, abolish the police, send random peopl
e to prison?
 
>
>OK, I coulsd include those as well without it affecting my argument. Let's
>say "fetuses removed from their mother for any reason..." The reason has no
>bearing on stem cell research.
> 
>
>No, I'm saying it COULD HELP. Certainly, it would help me to know there was
>SOME useful purpose that could be realised out of a tragedy, if I were ever
>in that situation. I understand that many people won't feel that way, and
>that'sOK, too.

The purpose of stem cell research is relief of suffering. Why is that a good
 thing if
suffering is irrelevant?
 
>
>Of course not, and that isn't what I'm saying.
>
>But if their organs had been harvested so that others might live, what then
?
>He'd still be no less guilty and would deserve whatever punishment was mete
d
>out, BUT, there would have been some positive outcome from a terrible
>situation.
>
>(That doesn't mean we should create terrible situations so there can be som
e
>mitigating circumstances... :-))

Many people create suffering because relief feels good. That's what fear, an
ger and
jealousy are about.
 
>
>Suffering has nothing to do with it. You have no evidence that a fetus
>involved in stem cell research feels suffering. It is your PERCEPTION that
>it might be suffering. Your belief COULD be based solely on antropomorphism
;
>you just can't know.

It's based on a survival skill. Species that neglected or aborted their babi
es are no
longer in existance.

>On the other hand, the suffering endured by families and victims of
>Parkinson's, is very real and easily observable.

Nature is concerned with selecting the fittest for procreation. When an anim
al is finished
procreating, nature doesn't care what happens to it, whether it suffers or n
ot.

You have it backwards. You want to sacrifice enbryos to relieve suffering of
 elders. If
our ancestors had done that, we wouldn't be here.

 
>
>There isn't a single belief system on this planet that is more than 10,000
>years old; before that we can only surmise.

Before recorded history, there was animism, the foundation of all religions.
 It is the
belief that humans, animals, plants and things have souls. It evolved more t
han a million
years ago because it was a useful survival skill. Hominoids who had it out-c
ompeted those
who did not.

>There certainly hasn't been a million years of human "spiritual" experience
.
>The need for humans to create Gods to explain events over which they have n
o
>control, is not a "spiritual" need, it is a pyschological one. That's why
>the Gods they invent mirror themselves.

It was necessary to survive in social groups with duties assigned to individ
uals, as
opposed to solitary creatures. All herd and pack animals have religion. Your
 dog worships
you.

"Felix Warneken and colleagues from the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionar
y Anthropology
present experimental evidence that chimpanzees act altruistically toward gen
etically
unrelated conspecifics.

In addition, in two comparative experiments, they found that both chimpanzee
s and human
infants helped altruistically regardless of any expectation of reward, even 
when some
effort was required, and even when the recipient was an unfamiliar individua
l--all
features previously thought to be unique to humans.

The evolutionary roots of human altruism may thus go deeper than previously 
thought,
reaching as far back as the last common ancestor of humans and chimpanzees. 
In a related
article, Frans de Waal discusses the issues brought out by this discovery. "
http://www.sciencedaily.com/release...70625085134.htm

>As for turning it off by flipping a switch, a couple of hundred years
>against the background of human evolution, could well be considered a switc
h
>flip...

The genetic difference between you and aboriginies living 10,000 years  ago 
is less than
0.1 percent.

>I like to think I can change my mind about things. I don't believe I'm the
>only one.
> 
>
>Sentience, as noted above, is no more valid in this argument than anything
>else.

>Why is suffering so important? Pain is a natural result from many natural
>processes. It is the avoidance of it that helps us survive, and pain is
>therefore an essential part of our survival. It is only our thinking about
>it that makes it bad. Would we stop women giving birth because the process
>is painful?

It's really about respect. Sentience is a simplified way to represent it.

>A natural progression from your argument would be that if the fetus was
>anaesthetized, there would be no objection from you. I'm betting that isn't
>the case, but correct me if I'm wrong...

You're right, that isn't the case. A murderer doesn't get a reduced sentence
 because the
victim was asleep.
 
>
>I meant it literally and was not writing for effect. I know people in these
>conditions, and their best hope may well be stem cell research. It pisses m
e
>off that, in the one nation on earth that has the wherewithal, resources,
>and in-depth knowledge, to actually do something about this, religious
>considerations are more important than living people.
>
>Fortunately, I draw hope from the fact that the USA is not the only country
>where this research is going on. Other, more pragmatic, nations are NOT
>being stopped by the God Squad. All this is doing is ensuring that the USA
>will fall behind in the knowledge derived from this technology and THEIR
>citizens will be last to benefit from it.
>
>Here's an article from the Washington Post which makes the same point. I
>can't find a single point of disagreement with this article and their
>position is very much my own.
>
>http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dy...-2004Aug22.html

There's no US law against stem cell research. The article is complaining abo
ut lack of
federal funding. The very rich pharmaceutical industry and universities are 
free to spend
as much as they want. Big Pharma tells us high drug prices are necessary to 
support
research. Would they lie to us? In 2006, number one Pfizer spent $7.4B on re
search (15% of
sales) while earning $19.4B net profit (14% ROA). Pfizer spent ZERO on embry
onic stem cell
research.

California passed proposition 71, which created a $3B fund to support stem c
ell research.
It is expected that nearly all US research will be done in California, becau
se that's the
only money available.

I support (with money) abortion and stem cell research, but I also understan
d why so many
people are opposed. It's in our genes.