Adult Stem Cell Research: Stem cells used for 'natural' boob jobs

[Perd Hapley]

The tone of your posts leaves little doubt as to your emotional state.

Let me very calmly and politely say that all of that is in your head.  Perhaps you'd like to substantiate your claim with some examples of my emotionalism.  Am I frustrated by the paper-thin arguments that justify abortion, yet continue to have credibility?  Yes, of course.  I probably should be a little piqued when people are being murdered.   

The anti-abortion side has not shown the fetus has rights

  Again, the burden of proof is on your side.  Your side must show why existing laws against murder, which you believe in, should not apply equally to all. 

 Like it or not, fertilized eggs in in-vitro clinics are substandard biomaterial leftovers.

That's not true.  Some of them are adopted and brought to term. 

Even though you have no excuse not to understand that they are as human as you are. You do have some kind of scientific training, do you not?

I wasn't questioning your training, I was pointing out why you ought to know that embryos are human and treat them as such.  It's interesting to me that you aspire to be so rational and objective, yet you wish to further subjectify law with issues such as personhood or sentience. 

This is the kind of pointless emotional personal attack I am talking about.

Oh, calm down.  You accuse me of rape and brutality, I accuse you of ignoring murder.  That's inherent to the debate, not ad hominem.

Great. So now you want to limit the right of people to have biological children.

They have a right to have biological children, but they cannot claim a right to knowingly, unnecessarily produce multiple children that they plan to abandon or have murdered.  If that means in vitro is not an option, that is very sad.  I hope such people find another, more ethical, option.

Any other rights you would like to attack based on your assumptions concerning fetal rights?

It's not my assumption, it's the logical extension of the concept of human rights we all agree to. 

Btw, I have friends that married very late and had enormous amount of trouble getting pregnant. Eventually, they went through in-vitro and now have a beautiful very smart 14-year-old daughter. You'd have prevented her from being, yet you attack my position on fetuses. How very curious.

I thought you were opposed to personal, emotional attacks?  I don't know what sort of processes these people went through.  I will only question whether they did not themselves prevent some of their own chidren from living out their natural lives once they already existed.  That would be called murder.  Preventing the conception of the smart, beautiful fourteen-year-old, on the other hand, is called birth control.  You're not opposed to that, are you?   

[Strings]

could someone explain how a discussion about the uses of ADULT stem cells turned into an arguement about abortion?

 Y'all hurt your chosen cause (whichever side) when you bring it into ANY discussion, regardless of subject...

[Perd Hapley]

Look at the end of the original post.  Then scroll down to tyme's post.  Once we crossed the line into the embryonic stem cell debate, abortion was already there.  It's the same controversy.

[CAnnoneer]

Again, the burden of proof is on your side.  Your side must show why existing laws against murder, which you believe in, should not apply equally to all. 

Nope. Your side is the one that pushes to extend the power of current laws over new territory. Therefore the burden of proof is on you.

Simple example. Dorothy is convinced her cat is the reincarnation of her grandmother, Wilma, and therefore should be accorded the respective rights Wilma once had. Before society does that, Dorothy must prove her claim. Society is under no obligation to accord the rights automatically and then try to disprove Dorothy's claim if they believe the cat is just a cat.

 
That's not true.  Some of them are adopted and brought to term. 

Certainly not the grades B, C, and D.  Also, when there is no space, even grade A are flushed down the drain and nobody goes to jail over it.

I was pointing out why you ought to know that embryos are human and treat them as such. 

I have never questioned that they are genetically human. My extension of rights is sociologically based as described in a different thread.

It's interesting to me that you aspire to be so rational and objective, yet you wish to further subjectify law with issues such as personhood or sentience. 

Nothing subjective about it. Laws are about duties and rights. Both categories are fundamentally social, contextual, and conditional. Thus the natural way to handle them is sociological, not genetic.

Btw, the insistence on common genetics as a basis of absolute rights is rather curious to me. What if Homo Sapiens splits into multiple species, e.g. as a result of natural mutations or eugenics? What are you going to do then?

It's not my assumption, it's the logical extension of the concept of human rights we all agree to. 

It is a logical extension only if rights are genetics-based. We certainly not all agree to that.

Btw, the skin cells you naturally shed every day are also genetically human. Should we afford them rights as well? I can take any one of them, extract the nucleus, clone it into a fertilized egg, and produce a new fistful in 9 months. Since your skin cell gave life to Fistful MkII, is it entitled to equal rights? If it is, we are all mass-murderers. If it is not, genetics is a poor basis for social rights.

Preventing the conception of the smart, beautiful fourteen-year-old, on the other hand, is called birth control.  You're not opposed to that, are you?   

I have no contradictions because I am both pro-choice and pro-birth-control. The question is where you stand.

And this is not about birth control. Based on your position, you would have prevented her from existence, without being her parent.

[Matthew Carberry]

could someone explain how a discussion about the uses of ADULT stem cells turned into an arguement about abortion?

 Y'all hurt your chosen cause (whichever side) when you bring it into ANY discussion, regardless of subject...

Hunter,

As of yet there is no way to acquire embryonic stem cells without destroying the original embryo.  Deliberately killing an embryo is abortion by definition.

Now the researchers, both here and abroad, have been working on ways to extract a "starter set" of cells without causing the death of the embryo but they haven't pulled it off yet.  Once that happens then a lot of the moral reason to oppose embronic research goes away.

Except (there's always an "except") that it then enters the same level of debate as the generation of multiple embryos for in vitro fertilization.  There is a moral question on whether it is "right" to deliberately generate an embryo just for research or for treatment, knowing it is never going to be allowed the chance to develop and live a life.  The parallel raised is that such an embryo is a "slave", created only to be exploited by someone else.  Even if the cells can be extracted without destruction, it is sophistry to claim a moral difference if the embryo is just put on ice or destroyed later. 

Note that even a non-destructive generation of stem cells does nothing to solve the massive rejection issues of using any cells but someone's own for their treatment.  So we are back to trying to use a person's own cells to heal them, which, unless you planned ahead and extracted, non-lethally, hESC from every infant's embryo in the womb for their future use, means using adult cells, which has generated, so far, a proven series of successful treatments.

[Perd Hapley]

Again, the burden of proof is on your side.  Your side must show why existing laws against murder, which you believe in, should not apply equally to all. 

Nope. Your side is the one that pushes to extend the power of current laws over new territory. Therefore the burden of proof is on you.

Simple example. Dorothy is convinced her cat is the reincarnation of her grandmother, Wilma, and therefore should be afforded the respective rights Wilma once had. Before society does that, Dorothy must prove her claim. Society is under no obligation to afford the rights automatically and then try to disprove Dorothy's claim if they believe the cat is just a cat.

It is not new territory.  Laws protected embryos from abortion until that was changed by Roe v Wade and other court decisions.  Your example is poor, because I am not proposing some new, non-provable idea from thin air.  I am talking about things we all recognize, like the humanity of the embryo.  We could also use Black civil rights as an example.  Is it necessary to prove that Blacks are equal to Whites, or must the racist prove inequality?  I am asking you to prove inequality. 

That's not true.  Some of them are adopted and brought to term. 

Certainly not the grades B, C, and D.  Also, when there is no space, even grade A are flushed down the drain and nobody goes to jail over it.

Of course no one goes to jail.  That proves nothing.  So, you knew that some frozen embryos are viable?  Were you lying earlier? 

Like it or not, fertilized eggs in in-vitro clinics are substandard biomaterial leftovers.

Laws are about duties and rights. Both categories are fundamentally social, contextual, and conditional. Thus the natural way to handle them is sociological, not genetic.

Btw, the insistence on common genetics as a basis of absolute rights is rather curious to me. What if Homo Sapiens splits into multiple species, e.g. as a result of natural mutations or eugenics? What are you going to do then?

I am not proposing a genetic basis.  I am saying that humans are humans regardless how young, and shouldn't be denied their rights based on ephemera like sentience or contrived definitions of personhood. 

Btw, the skin cells you naturally shed every day are also genetically human. Should we afford them rights as well? I can take any one of them, extract the nucleus, clone it into a fertilized egg, and produce a new fistful in 9 months. Since your skin cell gave life to Fistful MkII, is it entitled to equal rights? If it is, we are all mass-murderers. If it is not, genetics is a poor basis for social rights.

Do I really have to help you sort out the difference between a skin cell and a fertilized egg?  I know you're not that dumb.  I love how guys like you think you can trip me up with these kinds of questions.  Or I should say I used to love them?  They're getting monotonously easy to bat out of the park.  The answer is obvious.  At what point is a new human life conceived? 

   Did I ever say that UN-fertilized eggs are human beings? 

I have no contradictions because I am both pro-choice and pro-birth-control. The question is where you stand.

I'm sorry, was I not clear?  Preventing conception, OK.  Killing zygotes, murder.  And can you drop the "pro-choice" nonsense?  Just say you're pro-abortion, and I'll be anti-abortion. 

[CAnnoneer]

Your example is poor, because I am not proposing some new, non-provable idea from thin air. 

If it is not non-provable, then it is provable. Please do so and I will consider. How old or new an idea is is irrelevant to its truthfulness.

We could also use Black civil rights as an example.  Is it necessary to prove that Blacks are equal to Whites,

Strictly speaking, society must recognize equality. It did and it became law. In the same way, society must recognize equality of embryos and then it will be law. The processes are parallel and both purely social and conditional.

  So, you knew that some frozen embryos are viable?  

For grade A, yes, they are expected to develop normally if implanted. The other grades would likely produce miscarriage or varying levels of congenital deformity.

I am not proposing a genetic basis.  I am saying that humans are humans regardless how young, and shouldn't be denied their rights based on ephemera like sentience or contrived definitions of personhood. 

You are contradicting yourself. You spent half the time arguing that embryos are genetically human and therefore deserving human rights. Now you say that is not the basis. What is it? Please define what you mean by "human" then.

I love how guys like you think you can trip me up with these kinds of questions. 

Just answer the question or identify a failure of logic.

  At what point is a new human life conceived? 

You will really hate the next 30 years of biotech. When adult stem cells are reprogrammed to become cloned embryos, what will you do then?

  Preventing conception, OK.  Killing zygotes, murder. 

If you prevent your own pregnancy, it is birth control. When you prevent others from pregnancy, it is something else.

And can you drop the "pro-choice" nonsense?  Just say you're pro-abortion, and I'll be anti-abortion. 

If you will knit-pick about that, I might decide to call you "anti-choice". Hehehe.

[Perd Hapley]

  So, you knew that some frozen embryos are viable?   

For grade A, yes, they are expected to develop normally if implanted. The other grades would likely produce miscarriage or varying levels of congenital deformity.

So, did you mis-speak or did you lie?

You are contradicting yourself. You spent half the time arguing that embryos are genetically human and therefore deserving human rights. Now you say that is not the basis. What is it?

On further thought, you can call it genetic if you like. 

You will really hate the next 30 years of biotech. When adult stem cells are reprogrammed to become cloned embryos, what will you do then?

  My answer should be obvious to you.  I recognize the right of human embryos to live.  Clone or not, it matters not to me.  If a cloned sheep is a sheep, a cloned human is a human.

Wait, do you understand the difference between a skin cell and an embryo or not?

  Preventing conception, OK.  Killing zygotes, murder.

If you prevent your own pregnancy, it is birth control. When you prevent others from pregnancy, it is something else.

  Something else, indeed.  It's called using law to prevent the murder or abandonment of children.

And can you drop the "pro-choice" nonsense?  Just say you're pro-abortion, and I'll be anti-abortion. 

If you will knit-pick about that, I might decide to call you "anti-choice". Hehehe.

And I'll nit-pick that it's "nit" as in lice larvae, not "knit."     If you call me "anti-choice," I'll call you pro-death.  Hehehe. 

[roo_ster]

That is an awfully odd line to hear from someone who espouses libertarian views. "Gov't is the only one professional enough in this room to fund research...BANG!"

There is nothing odd if you look at it more carefully. While I would like a society in which everybody stays out of everybody else's way, the current reality is as is. We have a gov which we can use cleverly or we can use foolishly. Gov funds research that ultimately generates new industries, technological advancement, and prosperity, as well as supports our national security. This has been proven over and over again. Gov recoups the investment by taxation of the respective new industries as well as by the indirect savings from what it would otherwise be forced to pay to unemployment and social costs. Like it or not, the only thing in the gov budget that produces a tangible fiscal return (other than infrastructure, and the military in some sense) is science. The rest of it is pork, bureaucracy ("cost of government"), and illegal entitlements.

Ahh, the usual "They ought to cut gov't spending on all the stuff I don't like, but increase the funding of the stuff I do like."  A buddy of mine calls himself a fiscal conservative, but talk about cutting NASA off from the trough & the squeals will be heard far & wide. ("You see, NASA is cool and provides so many benefits...teflon...other stuff...Besides, we need to plant colonies in the stars!" says my buddy.)

Govt does not recoup the money "invested" in research that the private sector won't fund.  First, there is serious loss in transmission.  All those sticky fingers and bureaucrats to please and forms to fill out.  Second, if there is fruit borne of the research, the return to gov't is usually not in dollars, but in functionality.  New, expensive functionality that is proven is usually beau coup expensive to first-movers/adopters.

Every dollar that gov't takes from an entrepreneur or company that engages in private research is money less efficiently spent that it would have been.  We'd best be darn sure that the added functionality is worth pouring dollars into. 

Usually, it the other way 'round: Gov't is a poor picker of winners, be it chip manufacturing, pharmeceuticals, or what-have-you.

Again wrong, if you look more closely. Gov funds virtually all of fundamental research, which is expensive, long-term, and high-risk yet critical for long-term success. Industry concentrates on applied research, which mostly is a massive but ultimately straightforward short-term optimization. Thus the gov takes the harder but necessary bets, and so it appears it is "a poor picker". Also, the gov ROI is hidden in tax revenue, while XYZbiotech can post record earnings and associate them with a particular drug. Finally, a lot of industrial "research" success was essentially bankrolled by gov through preceding successful fundamental or applied research in academia.

Essentially, in terms of a mining analogy, the gov does virtually all the prospecting, while industry moves to exploit only the already identified deposits. Thus it would be unfair/inaccurate to say that industry has a much better "nose" for it than the gov.

Hogwash.  Professional grant-seeking & trough-feeding second-raters would have us believe that spin.  The research gov't funds is, on the margin, less & less worthwhile the more dollars are poured into more projects.  The last grant-fueled project to sneak its snout in under the wire being the least worthwhile of them all.

The Japanese have tried this gov't-led tech research on a massive scale and failed in a massive way. 

In some cases, it may be worthwhile to spend dollars inefficiently toward some furture goal or functionality.  Most of it is just slop for the grant-seeking hogs.  There are 100 Mohair Utilization Studies for every Manhattan Project.

I've seen it in the ivory sties and in the private sector.  Sooee-Pig!  The private sector is only marginally better, due to more stringent accountability standards required by management, stockholders, SEC, DSS, a very interested customer (in most cases) and the discipline of hte market.  Sometimes.

I see no need for the gov't to fund any sort of stem cell research.  One route (human) is already producing results. The other route has been a dry well.  Our private sector will figure a way to provide a product and make a buck while gooberment and its toadying grant-seekers are still flushing dollars down the toilet.

[CAnnoneer]

Sorry, jfruser, what you are describing is factually incorrect and the few bits that are correct are heavily spun. I do not know why you are so bitter against academic research, but you certainly are unreasonably so. Was it you that mentioned his prof neglected teaching in favor of his research?

Getting research grants is very competitive especially nowadays. Only the best of the best end up securing significant funds. Generally, less than 10% of the submitted grants ever get funded, and even then, it is a custom to grant less than what was requested. Also, whatever is submitted is very serious and well documented, because if it were not, the submitter would no longer be taken seriously by the study sections and would never be funded again.

This stuff about "sticky fingers" is simply boloney. The federal granting agencies have minimal staff and most of the work is done by academics at outside institutions that do not get paid to do it. You might want to educate yourself about the system before slinging mud at it and at the people involved.

If you stop dissing your NASA friend and dig up some data, you would see the sheer volume of technological development coming out of it, as well as its technology transfer to industry.

Finally, please explain to us how it is that the gov does not get the money back through direct and indirect taxation of successful new industries.

[CAnnoneer]

So, did you mis-speak or did you lie?

"CAnnoneer lied, embryos died" Bleh.

Fertilized eggs end up being distributed in grades - A, B, C, D. Usually, you get several grade A's, all of which get implanted in the hopeful mother because even they have a small chance of successful implantation. Thus the A-grade are used up while the others do not get used because of even lower chance of successful outcome and for fear of congenital defects. If you are lucky, you can get more A's than you want to put back, in which case they become leftovers as well. The bottom line is that the crushing majority of leftovers are substandard, although not all of them.

Either way, I do not understand why you keep coming back to this point. From your perspective, all of them are equally deserving of equal rights. What does it matter to you what grade they are? What is your point here?

On further thought, you can call it genetic if you like. 

I can call it many things. The question was what you consider to be the basis of humanity. If it is genetics, we go in one direction. If it is not, what is it? Just answer the question.

  I recognize the right of human embryos to live.  Clone or not, it matters not to me.  If a cloned sheep is a sheep, a cloned human is a human.

Fair enough. Logged for future use.

Something else, indeed.  It's called using law to prevent the murder or abandonment of children.

Unfortunately for you, they seem to come hand in hand under your system of views.

And I'll nit-pick that it's "nit" as in lice larvae, not "knit."     If you call me "anti-choice," I'll call you pro-death.  Hehehe. 

I warned you. Now you are definitely "anti-choice". Hehe. Why do you hate freedom, fistful?

[Headless Thompson Gunner]

Yawn...



Are y'all having fun?

[Strings]

I certainly hope they are, Headless.


Buy you a beer?

[Headless Thompson Gunner]

Make it a scotch and you've got a deal.

 

[Antibubba]

Technically it's only a little off-topic; it started with an argument about boobs, and it's turned into an argument among boobs.

Maybe a Moderator needs to nip this in the bud?   

[Strings]

Antibubba, that was priceless! Thanks... I needed that!

[Matthew Carberry]

Technically it's only a little off-topic; it started with an argument about boobs, and it's turned into an argument among boobs.

Maybe a Moderator needs to nip this in the bud?   

A nip here, a tuck there, pretty soon we'll have this thread looking like it did when it was young. 

[Perd Hapley]

Hey!  Carebear and CAnnoneer are NOT boobs.   

 

[cosine]

Technically it's only a little off-topic; it started with an argument about boobs, and it's turned into an argument among boobs.

Maybe a Moderator needs to nip this in the bud?