Stem Cell Research Breakthrough

[Foil]

I'd venture to guess that my own definitions for a reasonable compromise that still protects against exploitation wouldn't necessarily match others.

Foil, no offense and with all due respect, you have shown in the abortion thread that you had no middle ground and were incapable of supporting a reasonable compromise. I would be surprised if your views in this thread would be any different.

That's my point exactly. What you consider a 'reasonable' compromise may not be 'reasonable'
from my sense of ethics, or vice versa. Thus the chasm between our viewpoints.

For example, as I said before, I would consider a reasonable compromise in this issue to be allowing the use of embryonic cells, as long as that embyro wasn't created with the sole intent of being destroyed/used as a material source. That's a perfectly reasonable compromise to me.

For me, it's not inherently a religious thing (in fact, as I said before, I'm not sure if scripture says much about the technicalities of this issue). It has to do with my view about apathy toward life.

----------

Bet, I know we don't see eye-to-eye on these issues. You seem to think I'm a cold hateful person because of our discussion in the abortion thread... (you want badly to protect young pregant girls, and I want just as badly to also protect the unborn lives)... which put us at a complete impasse. Tough subjects tend to do that, they tend to bring the focus sharply to differences rather than any common ground.

Honestly, I believe am a reasonable guy, within the bounds of my belief system. I know you're reasonable as well, and I understand your stance on things. It's just that we come at it from different base ethics on this issue.

And that's okay. That's why we have this wonderful place called "the DBB E&C".

[Herculosis]

Thankfully, the entire world isn't as religiously wrapped as president Bush so stem-cell research will continue in other countries. Then, some day, Americans can go overseas to get the treatment that will save them. I can only hope the next elected president won't be as backward thinking, in almost every area, as this one.

How can you jump from the story I linked to this kind of response? All I hear is bitterness and hate. Let me guess, liberal arts college?

The whole point of the thread was to share what I thought was pretty incredible news. Regardless of one's view on the acceptability of using embryonic stem cells, fetal tissue, or cutting up anyone that's already been born, reprogramming gets us all past that, and has the potential of not only opening up federal funding, but generating an even higher level of energy into the research. Add to that the fact that the genetics would match the person the cells would be used on/for.

When I brought it up to my wife, her first response was a prediction that it wouldn't even make a dent in the arguments. Smart girl, my wife.

[Foil]

Herc, I think everyone here recognizes the potential, and hopes that reprogramming actually works! (See the first responses in the thread.) I would personally love to have it work, because it would not only make the ethical issues fairly moot, it would be a huge advancement!

However, the ethical discussion here is still valid, because we don't know yet if this new process will be workable. I'm hopeful, but a bit skeptical at this point, because the primary sources I've heard this from have been religious ones, which are better at commentary than real science.

So if it works, you're right, we should just celebrate and drop the ethical dialogue. But as long as reprogramming is an 'unknown' this is still an issue worth discussing, and that's why the E&C is here.

[Testiculese]

Well, we KNOW that embryonic cells can do what we need. I don't think we're all that sure that skin cells reprogrammed can do what we need. Hence the debate continues. I'm for whatever works the best. A clump of 50 cells is life, not a human, and humans could care less about life unless it advances them politically. Now if these clumps of cells were stolen from pregnant women, well then there would be a problem because it's affecting an actual person.

I look at the thousands and thousands of rats, rabbits, dogs, cats and monkeys that are killed every day for experiments, and a clump of cells from yet another species of animal matters how?

However we get them is fine by me (again, unless we are stealing them from people or something similar)

All this bickering about a non-issue is killing people.

[Bet51987]

Bet, I know we don't see eye-to-eye on these issues. You seem to think I'm a cold hateful person because of our discussion in the abortion thread... (you want badly to protect young pregant girls, and I want just as badly to also protect the unborn lives)... which put us at a complete impasse.

We will never see eye to eye and I still don't think you were remotely reasonable.(my point of view ) but I do understand where your coming from.

How can you jump from the story I linked to this kind of response? All I hear is bitterness and hate. Let me guess, liberal arts college?

I didn't mean my remarks to be bitter and full of hate and I'm sorry you took it that way. I like the new ideas you posted but I'm just not willing to chance all the time, money, and effort into that one idea only to have it fail down the road. I want our government to invest in all the ideas that we presently have instead of listening to the people who oppose those methods because they claim human life begins the moment the female is fertilized and to interfere with that would be murder. This is not a big issue with me locally, because I know other countries are going to take the lead so it will get done.

Oh, you got college right but I'm not taking a liberal arts course. I’m studying special education focusing on elementary and middle school students who have some type of physical or mental disability.

Bettina

[Behemoth]

What difference does it make which country has more advanced research when we'll all benefit in any case?

Only reasons i can think of is grants, Nobel prizes or just to say we were first (Which would be vain and immature considering the subject matter)

I would love to see how foreign stem cells assimilate into living tissue and become new tissues.

[roid]

Ok, back to the OP.

Some defining: A Blastocyst is what we use for embyonic stem cells, they should really be called Blastocyst stem cells as most ppl confuse Embyro with Fetus (when i think Embyro, i think of a little thingy with hands and feet like a fetus... not a Ball).

A Blastocyst has an inner embryoblast which turns into the fetus, and an outer trophoblast that turns into the placenta. Note in the diagram the blastocyst is made up completely of \"pluripotent\" cells.



What the NEW technique seems to do is create just the embryoblast, without the surrounding trophoblast. All this means is that it cannot implant into the uterus. THIS IS THE ONLY DIFFERENCE. Humans are really really really simple at this stage - perhaps even less sophisticated than bacteria? maybe that's a jump.

so really. i don't see why anyone would see a difference between this and creating Blastocysts in the lab that will never be implanted into a Uterus: In both cases you are creating something arguably human that will never have the opportunity to become a human.
The only difference is that one of them is damaged so that it can't become a human.
Another difference is that it's a clone of you, it's not a unique genetic profile. You don't even need to have sexual organs to make these pluripotent cells, and if that's what you're missing then you could arguably make yourself some BRAND NEW sexual organs from them. lulz


So Herculosis this is why i don't think this new-technique really skirts around the ethical questions.

It's awesome though. SCIENCE YEAH!
But we all saw this comming. I mean, how simple. Havn't we known howto clone mammals ever since we cloned Dolly the Sheep? But still, we needed an egg for Dolly. With Dolly we just got rid of the sperm (and the egg's original DNA obviously wasn't used anyway, but we still needed AN EGG regardless - since Dolly was female, that Egg could have been Dolly's own egg). This way we don't even need an egg.

I wonder how long the research progresses further, and we can further turn back the clock on these cells and get to Totipotent cells (ie: they can turn into complete embryos including a placenta), then we can effectively clone someone without even one egg. So, no sperm AND no egg.

As things stand now since Dolly the sheep, a woman could theoretically donate one of her eggs and \"fertilise\" it with DNA from another of her cells (this is how Dolly was made) then give birth to her own clone.
This new research hasn't changed that, it has only created pluripotent cells. But in time we may be able to create Totipotent cells, and then she won't even need an egg - therefore she wouldn't even need ovaries. (hmm... do you need ovaries for a successful IVF pregnacy to carry to term? or can you get by with just hormone replacements?)

Perhaps in time we won't even need a uterus?

[roid]

actually... don't we currently get embryonic stem cells from discarded IVF blastocysts?

That means that ethically... this new technique could be said to be worse. As it is creating new pluripotent stem cell lines not even for the purpose of creating new life with IVF - but SOLELY for the purpose of harvesting the cells.

abiet, as cloned cells it's questionable whether they are a NEW stem cell line since they HAVE already previously existed before - when you were a baby.

Maybe, ethically it's like growing a new 3rd arm on you body (somehow) - then amputating it and using it as a skin graft for some other injury.

[Foil]

Wow, thanks for the info, roid. Definitely a different perspective than what I've seen it portrayed as in the media.

[Lothar]

don't you think there will be resistance to this even if reprogramming has no human embryos involved? With all due respect, I think a case could be made that those against the research aren't always the most rational bunch.

I think there will also be those who downplay this discovery precisely because no human embryos are involved*. A case could be made that some of those who were so vocally "pro" stem-cell research before actually don't care about stem-cell research at all, they just considered it a convenient issue to use to bash Bush, Christians, etc. so they're hoping less objectionable methods fail just so they can keep bashing. If a completely unobjectionable and viable method of stem cell research arises, and Bush and 99% of Christians are on board with it, we'll still have those who use the remaining 1% as an excuse to toss around insults and accusations of "unreasonableness".

Yet again, politicians use the issue as a proxy for their ongoing power struggles, and the masses play along.




* of course, as roid points out, there are still valid ethical and philosophical questions to ask. Is it ethical to create a blastocyst for harvesting if it's made from one person's skin cells instead of from one person's sperm and another person's egg? What about creating whole cloned adult humans to be used as spare parts, so long as they're cloned from one person's skin cells?

[Jeff250]

It's treading on some dangerous ground to say that human rights are partly derived from properties like rationality. It would imply that the mentally handicapped or those with Alzheimer's aren't due the same human rights as the rest of us.
(I know this isn't what you're saying, but I just wanted to point out that that particular piece of the argument by itself can be easily taken to very questionable territory.)

And this is my point--no matter which option we choose, we get conclusions that are unintuitive. Do humans have rights because of their human DNA? What if Vulcans existed--then Vulcans wouldn't have rights. Do humans have rights because they have immaterial souls? What if God created a human without a soul--we would be able to murder him without it being evil. Do humans have rights because God said so? What if God changed his mind--then we would be able to do whatever we wanted to each other without it being evil. It's all "treading on dangerous ground," so to say.

[Foil]

And this is my point--no matter which option we choose, we get conclusions that are unintuitive. ... It's all "treading on dangerous ground," so to say.

So which "unintuitive" / "dangerous-ground" option do you personally hold to be best?

[roid]

actually... don't we currently get embryonic stem cells from discarded IVF blastocysts?

That means that ethically... this new technique could be said to be worse. As it is creating new pluripotent stem cell lines not even for the purpose of creating new life with IVF - but SOLELY for the purpose of harvesting the cells.

abiet, as cloned cells it's questionable whether they are a NEW stem cell line since they HAVE already previously existed before - when you were a baby.

Maybe, ethically it's like growing a new 3rd arm on you body (somehow) - then amputating it and using it as a skin graft for some other injury.

(continued)
Hmm... how is it really different to growing (and then harvesting) a 3rd arm on your body?

What we have here is pluripotent Stem Cells - outside of your body. These same pluripotent Stem Cells existed in your body while you were a fetus, they have your same DNA, they are identical to the Stem Cells YOU had in your body as a fetus. It's like someone extracted some stem cells from you when you were a fetus, froze them, then now that you're an adult they defrost them and do things with them.

When our bodies repair ourselves, we don't complain that it's immoral. IIRC animals that are capable of regrowing limbs and organs contain Pluripotent stem cells or the ability for cells to regress back into Pluripotent Cells (crabs, salamanders, Claire Bennet and Dr Who )


You know what... i think i'm ok with this. These cloned pluripotent stem cells are not NEW stem cell lines - they are OLD stem cell lines - remember the exact same cells with the exact same DNA used to exist in our own bodies when we were young.

So what we're doing is turning some of our own cells back into those original cells, if this were an automatic process then we wouldn't have any problem with it. This is exactly what many animal species do - when they loose an arm the cells around the scar regress back into a Pluripotent state and recreate the limb again.

So what we're doing is recreating this in humans - we're reverting our own cells into a pluripotent state, the only difference is that we can't do it inside the human body - we have to do it in the lab.

So it's ethically the same as a salamander regrowing a leg, and they've been doing that for millions of years.

[Palzon]

...A case could be made that some of those who were so vocally "pro" stem-cell research before actually don't care about stem-cell research at all, they just considered it a convenient issue to use to bash Bush, Christians, etc.

Actually, I doubt this very much. Or let me say it this way: I doubt very much that anyone who acted thusly would be taken seriously by those who support stem cell research in earnest. And on the other hand, relious views have (seriously) influenced the scientific enquiry in this country. The influence is quite disproportionate.

Reading what you've quoted me as saying now, I realize I did not quite convey what I had hoped. To be more precise: the notion that the pro life believer is irrational is self evident since, at heart, his convictions are based on scripture and not reason. This is a trivial point really. It's not a putdown of the faithful. On the contrary, the putdown would be to argue God's existence can be explained by our reason. Science should not be used to manipulate religion in that manner. Nor should religion be used to manipulate science.

We can make moral choices without a book of scripture. We can lead ethical lives without belief in a supreme being. But we cannot proceed with rational scientific advancement if our Science (sic) is controlled by people who claim to know the mind of God.

I agree there are moral choices to be made. And they should not be taken lightly. Yet as a nation, a culture, a species - we should accept that we require no middle men to tell us what crosses the line. Further, science is never more abused than when backed by ideology instead of the genuine effort to increase knowledge through solving problems both crucial and genuine. Even if we turn out to be alone in the universe, we can be moral and scientific at the same time.

[Lothar]

...A case could be made that some of those who were so vocally "pro" stem-cell research before actually don't care about stem-cell research at all, they just considered it a convenient issue to use to bash Bush, Christians, etc.

I doubt very much that anyone who acted thusly would be taken seriously by those who support stem cell research in earnest.

Of course not -- not any more than the total nutjobs you cited would be taken seriously by those who were opposed to specific forms of stem cell research or by those who were opposed to government funding for economic reasons.

This demonstrates how foolish it would be to base scientific policy on popular opinion. Certain religious people would cut off all scientific research for fear of breaking their fragile little worldviews. Certain anti-religious people would throw trillions of (other people's) dollars at unpromising research just to tick off the religious. And it's all harmful to science.

There are valid ethical questions to ask, and difficult decisions to make in terms of funding viable avenues of research. IMO we should focus on those questions, rather than on the nutjobs on either side who want to hijack the debate for their "cause".

the notion that the pro life believer is irrational is self evident since, at heart, his convictions are based on scripture and not reason.

There certainly are those whose beliefs are not based on reason, and who would use their claims regarding the "mind of God" to restrict rational inquiry. But there are also valid, not-based-on-any-scripture reasons for people to hold pro-life positions. We can make moral choices and lead ethical lives without a book or belief in a supreme being, and that means we can sometimes have ethical problems with certain types of research that are not "religious" objections. We need to take that seriously, as you said, to be moral and scientific at the same time.

[Foil]

...there are also valid, not-based-on-any-scripture reasons for people to hold pro-life positions.

Exactly. Holding a pro-life position doesn't necessarily imply a religious view.

In my case, as I've said above a couple of times, it's not inherently a religious thing for me - it has to do with my view about the danger of apathy toward life.

Hopefully we can steer the debate away from accusations of irrationality, and back toward some more objective and rational discussion of how we balance ethics and science.

[Jeff250]

So which "unintuitive" / "dangerous-ground" option do you personally hold to be best?

Why would I hold such a viewpoint? In all seriousness, they're all wrong insofar as they are not always right. The truth (used ironically of course ) is that the enlightenment project ultimately failed to explain morality. There is no neat and tidy rational principle that we can universally use to explain all of morality. Here's my best advice. Think about the things in life that are good. Engage in conversation with as many people as you can about what they are. Then surround yourself in them and do them.

In my case, as I've said above a couple of times, it's not inherently a religious thing for me - it has to do with my view about the danger of apathy toward life.

I don't think that this is a slippery slope. If it is, we can have this discussion again when we are talking about something that more seriously threatens life.

With respect to the process of using embryos itself, I don't think that there's anything wrong with using embryos to save lives. You're concerned about respect for life. I am too. But we need to think about why life is neat and valuable to begin with. I don't think that any of these properties exist in embryos. On the other hand, those being saved most definitely possess them.

[Foil]

... we need to think about why life is neat and valuable to begin with.

"What makes life valuable?" Sounds like it would be a good dialogue. Maybe the subject of a future thread?

[roid]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blastema

Blastema
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

A blastema is a mass of undifferentiated cells capable of growth and regeneration into organs or body parts. Blastemata are typically found in the early stages of an organism's development such as in embryos, and in the regeneration of tissues, organs and bone.

\"Primitive\" Organisms such as salamanders can still produce blastema when adult; more developed organisms such as frogs can't. That's the reason why salamanders can regenerate an amputed leg and frogs aren't able to do so.

so cool

this is essentially what these new cloned stem cells are.
Groups of pluripotent stem cells, de-differentiated from your own original cells. A Blastema (note similarity to Blastocyst).

You may have heard of the MRL strain of mice that has regenerative abilitys. In reading about them, i noticed it said that one of their traits that makes this possible is that they do not produce scar tissue as readily as normal mice. This means there is less scar tissue to get in the way of regerneation, but it can leave them more prone to other problems such as infection that scar tissue would quickly protect against. When it is asked why humans don't regenerate - i have heard a reply that it is because we would probabaly bleed to death if we didn't - in the harsh savannah our wounds must heal fast or we die, so scarring was the way things worked out for mammals.

[Palzon]

Hopefully we can steer the debate away from accusations of irrationality, and back toward some more objective and rational discussion of how we balance ethics and science.

Steer it away from truth while you're at it. You certainly don't balance ethics and science by letting science be dictated by the bible to the exclusion of evidence. this is a valid point since it is NOT HYPOTHETICAL. It is actually occurring in this country. So don't act like it's off topic.

[Aggressor Prime]

If you consider life to start at the moment of conception, then you would realize that embryonic stem cell research is wrong. There is no stage in the growing process in which one can identify the soul as coming into the body, for the soul is spiritual and cannot be identified by physical means. Therefore, if you want to be morally correct, stay on the safe side and believe life starts at conception. On the other hand, placenta and adult stem cell treatment (solutions that actually work and don't cause cancer) are morally correct and deserve our attention.

And for those who do not believe in the soul, then maybe we have no right to protect any life and there is no difference in killing an animal for food as killing a human for food, for both are tasty. Then again, that is for those who believe in no soul. And if you are concerned about human intellect as the value behind humanity, computers can be made to calculate far faster than any brain. Humans have no distinguishing value except that given by their spiritual nature.

[Spaceboy]

On the issue of producing tissue or organs or something from stem cells, wouldn't it just create baby organs, or baby tissue, or something? Is that a problem? The cloned sheep died relatively soon compared to a normal sheep life because on the DNA of every cell that divides there's a segment that is cut off every time the cell divides, and when that segment is gone the cell just dies. Because the cloned sheep was not produced from a sperm and an egg (which have that segment on the DNA reattatched) her cells were 'aged' and had died. Could having an organ with aged cells cause a problem? My dad reads on stuff like this all the time and I know what he's told me, but I'm just curious about it.

As with the morals of stem cell research, if I flick my balls 1,000,000 sperm have probably just been killed and no-one cares, and eggs die monthly for girls. These dying cells technicially have the potential for life, if they're inside eachother why does that suddenly make them equal to a human being?

If this new cell has every property of a stem cell, a baby could still be created from it. Regardless if it is one consenting person's DNA, identical twins are separate people, you would still be messing around with a potential human life. Why is this any different? Is it because that person already existed and took this newly created cell's place of being a person, even though it still has the potential of being one? If you take cells from your own body and turn them into cells that behave like stem cells, that segment on part of one's DNA is very shortened and will create an aged organ. If you take a stem cell and over time replace every part of a person's body, would they live twice is long as an average human? Since most brain cells don't divide, mabye they could take the nucleus of those.

[Gooberman]

As with the morals of stem cell research, if I flick my balls 1,000,000 sperm have probably just been killed and no-one cares....

No comment, just wanted to quote that.

[Spaceboy]

Of course something I said is the most awesome quote in this topic.

[TIGERassault]

if they're inside eachother why does that suddenly make them equal to a human being?

Because it's way too inconvenient for pro-lifers to consider otherwise. And if they do consider sperm as life, then only a very, very small number of them are going to do anything about it. So small that I've never actually heard of one.
That's about it, really.

[snoopy]

In an attempt to demonstrate why it makes a difference, I'll turn around and ask you a question:

Give me a thorough, objective, concise scientific definition of an individual human life, and a thorough, objective, concise scientific definition of what one must do to have murdered the newly defined individual human life.

[roid]

On the issue of producing tissue or organs or something from stem cells, wouldn't it just create baby organs, or baby tissue, or something? Is that a problem? The cloned sheep died relatively soon compared to a normal sheep life because on the DNA of every cell that divides there's a segment that is cut off every time the cell divides, and when that segment is gone the cell just dies. Because the cloned sheep was not produced from a sperm and an egg (which have that segment on the DNA reattatched) her cells were 'aged' and had died. Could having an organ with aged cells cause a problem? My dad reads on stuff like this all the time and I know what he's told me, but I'm just curious about it.

RE: Dolly the Sheep's death.
i've heard that too, but it's incorrect. Dolly actually died of a common sheep disease which attacks irrespective of age - with a predisposition for indoor environments. Dolly was indoors almost her entire life, so the odds were high.

On February 15, 2003, it was announced that Dolly had been euthanised because of a progressive lung disease and crippling arthritis. A Finn Dorset such as Dolly would have had a life expectancy of around 12 - 15 years, but Dolly only lived to 6 years of age. Some believe the reason for this is because Dolly was actually born genetically 6 years old, the same age as her donor at the time that her genetic data was taken from her. Surprisingly, Dolly did not die because of being a clone, an autopsy confirmed she had Ovine Pulmonary Adenocarcinoma (Jaagsiekte), a fairly common disease of sheep caused by the retrovirus JSRV. Roslin scientists stated that they did not think there was a connection with Dolly being a clone, and that other sheep on the farm had similar ailments. Such lung diseases are especially a danger for sheep kept indoors, as Dolly had to sleep indoors for security reasons.

[Foil]

Hm, this thread has gotten a bit off the original topic since I last read through it.

if they're inside eachother why does that suddenly make them equal to a human being?

Because it's way too inconvenient for pro-lifers to consider otherwise.

No, not at all!

In fact, think about it: the location only matters to pro-choicers. Pro-life folk believe the unborn life is human no matter where it is; pro-choice folk often won't call it human until it's out of the womb.

[roid]

is it human even when it's still egg and sperm Foil?

[Foil]

\"Sperm and egg\", meaning they're separate?

[TIGERassault]

"Sperm and egg", meaning they're separate?

Wouldn't that mean that they're two life forming into one? Which would mean that reproducing isn't actually making a life, it's killing a life!

[Jeff250]

In an attempt to demonstrate why it makes a difference, I'll turn around and ask you a question:

Give me a thorough, objective, concise scientific definition of an individual human life, and a thorough, objective, concise scientific definition of what one must do to have murdered the newly defined individual human life.

Why expect a scientific answer? "When does human life begin?" isn't a scientific question.

[TIGERassault]

Why expect a scientific answer? "When does human life begin?" isn't a scientific question.

Since when did they stop thinking of human life as part of Biology?

[Foil]

"Sperm and egg", meaning they're separate?

Wouldn't that mean that they're two life forming into one? Which would mean that reproducing isn't actually making a life, it's killing a life!

T, you've gotta stop making assumptions about people's points of view. I didn't say "separate sperm & egg = two human lives", and I don't believe that.

I was asking a question to try to clarify what roid asked me (i.e. did he mean "sperm & egg" as in an embryo, or separate?).

Why expect a scientific answer? "When does human life begin?" isn't a scientific question.

Since when did they stop thinking of human life as part of Biology?

Jeff250 is right, and I think he answered snoopy's question well. The definition of "human life" isn't strictly a biological or scientific one.

Sure, we can state some 'boundary conditions' involving DNA or body structure or brain functions, but those definitions get really fuzzy when you start considering the exceptions. And if you force making stricter and more complex conditions, they begin to exclude groups of people (those with DNA mutations, or variations in body structure, or mentally handicapped).

Effectively, especially when it comes to questions like these, the definition boils down to a social and ethical one. Of course, that means it's even harder to "pin down"... thus we get the debates in threads like this.

[roid]

oh, well TIGERassault was prettymuch on track. You replied to TIGERassault's addition to Spaceboy's post.

you said \"pro-life people believe the unborn life is human no matter where it is\"

But Spaceboy's post you were by association replying to raised the question of whether sperm and egg are human.
Thus why i brought up Spaceboy's point again.

You can't wiggle your way into a \"unborn life no matter where it is - the elegance and simplicity of our stance is ideologically attractive\" bracket. You still have to deal with the issue of defining human life etcetc, there's a lot of assumed definitions that this statement is based on:
\"pro-life people believe the unborn life is human no matter where it is\"

one could even say that induced abortions fit into this definition just as easily as a failure-to-implant natural abortion. It's life - being born! just too early (neither will survive outside of the womb)

i could go on, but it's not like i'm attacking any real official statement here.

[Foil]

You're right, I didn't really answer your question, so here goes:

If it's \"sperm & egg\" (I'm now assuming you mean separate, not an embryo), I don't consider them individually human, as neither one has the capacity to become a developed human by itself. I know, it's not a perfect definition, but it's the most sensible one I can see.

The reason I \"draw the line\" at conception is that it makes infinitely more sense to me than at any other point:

- Defining individual sperm and eggs as human before conception: \"Trillions dead, no one to blame!
- Making the distinction at some arbitrary number of weeks: \"It was just a bunch of cells yesterday, but today it's a baby boy!\"
- Using birth: \"It can't be human if it's inside!\"

Those definitions are just nonsensical.

So, yes, \"unborn life (beginning at conception) no matter where it is - the elegance and simplicity... is ideologically attractive\" fits pretty well, at least compared to the rest.

Does that answer your question?

[Jeff250]

- Making the distinction at some arbitrary number of weeks: "It was just a bunch of cells yesterday, but today it's a baby boy!"

I don't like the clump of cells vs. baby boy dichotomy. I maintain that there is middle ground here in between clump of cells and baby boy that requires some ethical consideration.

But here's something that your argument reminded me of too:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradox_of_the_heap

Perhaps "X is a human life" uses a vague predicate in the same way that "X is a heap of sand" uses a vague predicate. Are all heaps of sand conceived at the first spec of sand?

[roid]

Does that answer your question?

it doesn't really answer my question, because all it ever does is raise consistency questions:

if life is precious at the moment of sperm/egg merging, that zygote can still fail to implant into the uterus. Therefore that "life" would die. Why arn't you putting just as much effort into getting women to only convieve when their uterine wall is perfect? Why arn't you campaigning to stop women from having sex who have fertility problems relating to the uterine wall - but can still release eggs and they can still be fertilised. These women must be "creating" and then "killing" a bunch of lives all throughout their lives - simply because they arn't fertile enough.
Do you also campaign against certain common birth control means that stimulate the uterus to never accept an implantation? That means that countless "lives" clulessly float past without implanting.

Why arn't you stopping damaged eggs from being fertilised and dying before they are even a few weeks old? This is also a common reason for natural abortion. So why don't you demand that we screen our eggs and sperm for damage that may cause them to die before birth? (Or even after birth? how far after birth? isn't a heart defect merely a genetic problem that ABORTS you from life after say 20 years?)
Afterall - the natural means of birth is very hit and miss. All of those misses are deaths that you should be horrified about considering that if we paid enough attention we could reduce the amount of unforseen issues such as failure to implant. But no, it seems more people are concerned with NATURAL conception than EFFICIENT conception - we don't care if a zogote fails to implant, since whoopdedoo it's natural.



Why arn't YOU that devout member of the crazy Bhuddist sect that sweeps the path infront of you so you don't stand on any insects, wearing a face mask so insects don't accidentlly fly into your mouth. These ppl must be ignorant of the millions of microscopic creatures that live on their body - everytime they bathe they kill thousands.

If we paid enough medical attention we could avoid all these natural abortions, these failed implantations, we could remove the ovaries or block the falopian tubes (so sperm/egg can't meet) of women with fertility problems. So no zygote could be created that could possibly die. We must protect these people from their sins!

[Foil]

You made my point, roid.

As snoopy implied and Jeff250 said (and I echoed) above, none of the attempts at drawing a biological/scientific definition for human life work when looked at closely... they all get \"fuzzy\" on the edges.

So, in the absence of a really thorough, consistent answer... where does one \"draw the line\"? For me, that line is at conception. No, it's not perfect, but it makes infinitely more sense than some arbitrary number of weeks, or birth.

[BTW, don't put words in my mouth. I would have to be an idiot to think of non-implantations and miscarriages in the same ethical sense as an abortion. It's a loss of life, but my concern is with intent. My statements here are about intentional apathy toward life, like abortion or the use of embryos solely as a material source.]

[TIGERassault]

[BTW, don't put words in my mouth. I would have to be an idiot to think of non-implantations and miscarriages in the same ethical sense as an abortion. It's a loss of life, but my concern is with intent. My statements here are about intentional apathy toward life, like abortion or the use of embryos solely as a material source.]

But what about people that don't believe foetuses are considered life? They're not intending to kill off a life at all, because they don't believe there's one there in the first place.