I've been following the stem cell debate and it seems to me there is a clash of two moral principles. The one is a belief that all possible cures to human diseases should be looked into and the second is a belief that life begins at conception and that embryos should be protected as human beings. My question though is if stem cells can be shown to cure fatal diseases and conditions like parkinson, alzheimers and spinal cord injuries would you feel then that it is right to use stem cells even though that will mean the destruction of the embryo to save the person? In other words is the the unborn as or more important than the born? I'm posting this as a poll but I would like to hear some more discussion on the issue than just the poll vote so please feel free to explain and elaborate on why you think this way.
WARNING - THE FOLLOWING DOES NOT REFLECT MY BELIEFS I think there are people who would take issue with the way your question is framed. These people say that they are in favor of stem sell research in some instance, provided specific conditions relating to the source are met. END WARNING Personally I think after we've used them to cure disease, we should then use them to learn how to augment the human brain. Specifically mine. I want to be like the guy on Star Trek with the silver eyes. Seriously, though, if you were able to convince to me that the embryos were full fledged human beings I would be against it. I really do understand that position. Framed in that light imagine if we found we could only cure diseases by sucking the brains out of 5 year old children. If that were the case then I would think that the people involved were sick human beings who were trying to rationalise their own murders for personal profit. That would be a horribly distressing world to live in. The problem is that I disagree with the initial classification of the embryos as the same as an adult human being. In fact I think the evidence pretty clearly shows that they are not.
Sishir, by tossing the bolded question in this poll, which a very large number of people will say distorts the issue, you are going to have a real nasty thread, IMO. I'm getting in early, so I can relax and watch the mayhem. First off, your bolded question does start off with a fallacy. You speak of "the unborn." Not in my opinion. And I'm not going to get into a big debate about it. Others can do that. I will say that the research is vital, has the potential to save millions of lives, and I am all for it. I also think the politicalization of the issue, by both sides, has been extremely unhelpful to scientific research. The current leadership of the GOP has constantly politicized issues like this for narrow political gain. Time to move on to a more enlightened era of politics in America. The so-called "uniter," Mister Decider, has been anything but. The so-called "compassionate conservative," has been neither a conservative, nor compassionate. This issue is yet another example of that. It's dividing the country for percieved political gain. Let science do it's work. Leave the BS to the politicians. They're so good at it. Keep D&D Civil.
i'm not so sure it's going to be as nasty as you think. i think only the extreme right are against this.
I voted yes, but as long as Roe v. Wade is settled law, right-to-lifers and evangelicals will spend their time and energy on "winnable" wars like this one. The science, once documented by successful research findings abroad for any particular disease, will be accepted stateside, at least, for similar illnesses. I don't think abortion rights have the same trump-card for eventual mainstream acceptance, so as a cynical liberal, assuming there's some connection between theChristian Right's reaction to the two issues, I can do without federal funding of stem-cell research, or whatever the specific debate is now.
You and Otto raise a good point regarding framing the question in that way but that is the specific point of why I framed it that way. The moral conundrum in regard to pro-lifers is that they say that life begins at conception yet the problem is that if stem cells can cure life threatening diseases then you are condemning someone who could be saved to dying from a preventable condition. In other words a qualitative decision has to be made that the life of an embryo is as important or even more important than the life of someone with parkinson or some other condition. While you may not feel that human life starts at conception which is fine but I was framing this question most particularly to pro-lifers to spur some thought on the moral quandry and what makes stem cell research such a difficult issue where in one side is mainly concerned with those suffering diseases while the other side is mainly concerned with the unborn. What about thinking about both?
I answered no, but there is a little problem with the framing of the debate. The big problem is not that the discarded embryos are having stem cells harvested from them, it is that there are discarded embryos in the first place. Moving right past that though, if we accept your premises, it comes down to choosing to sacrifice the embryos or the people who would be cured by stem cell research. The embryos have a couple of advantages in this comparison: The embryos have more time left to them, on average, starting from zero then the people being cured who have already lived some portion of their lives. There are more embryos being destroyed than there are people with Parkinson's, Spinal injuries, etc.
I answered "YES" but have to qualify it. First off, yes the unborn are as important as the born... but not more important. The poll got muddled right there. I answered "YES" because might there be some way in the future to harvest stem cells without destroying the embryo. What would happen if you harvested a few stem cells from an embryo? Would the cells re-generate? There may be no way to find out but to frankenstein it. Maybe it's just wishful thinking. I don't think embryos should be harvested for experimentation... Soylent Green. My father died five years ago after a 15-year battle with Parkinson's disease. He rejected the notion of stem cell therapy even though he rarely darkened the door of a church... in favor of the First Tee, God bless him.
Question to the right-to-lifers: What do you think fertility clinics do with the "embryos" that are not used?
Really? I know that diabetes numbers are huge these days. When combined with Parkinson's and spinal injuries are you sure about that?
Thank you and SM for the thoughtful answers and you're hitting upon the moral quandries surrounding the argument that make it not so cut and dry. Sorry to hear about your dad.
I voted yes, but mainly because of the way that the questions were worded. My Grandfather died of Parkinson's, but I don't know how he would have though about this. He was typically apolitical. My Grandmother used to both volunteer and donate to Parkinson's research causes. Since it has been co-opted by the stem-cell proponents, she only volunteers time, she refuses to give. My opinion: There are a lot of new ethical dilemmas that must be resolved in this debate. Do we call these petri-dish embryos life? I don't know. If they are, what about a clone made off of these petri-dish embryos? This isn't a slippery slope, it's a tangled web. Even so, I'd rather the government not take a stand on this either way. Don't outlaw the research, don't promote it. When the ethics of it are better defined, then revisit.
