Re: New Method Makes Embryo-Safe Stem Cells

August 23, 2006

Hi:

That's a pretty interesting article. In a Neo Puritanical world

view, any stem cell, even one taken from peripheral blood, could be

considered capable of developing into a human life. Even though in

this method or in the case of cord blood or peripheral blood, there

is no " womb conception " for the purpose of that particular stem cell

becoming a human.

They will still object. They forget that the cell in question, in

fact does go on to become a human life - the life that it saved or

cured. They forget that every time someone has sex or masturbates,

hundreds of thousands of cells that could have become humans are

destroyed, whether there is conception or not. When I bump or cut

myself, hundreds of cells die, any of which, through cloning, could

become a human life. They forget that in nature, mothers cull

deformed pups, exactly what PDG accomplishes in a humane way to very

early embryos.

If the Puritans want to stick to a literal interpretation of the

Bible, the father has the right to kill his children or sell them

into slavery. There is nothing about embryos or abortion in the Bible at all.

At 10:40 AM 8/23/2006, you wrote:

>*New Method Makes Embryo-Safe Stem Cells*

>

><http://apnews.myway.com/article/20060823/D8JM8JG80.html>http://apnews.myway.co\

m/article/20060823/D8JM8JG80.html

>

>Aug 23, 1:00 PM (ET)

>

>By MATT CRENSON

>

>NEW YORK (AP) - A biotechnology company has developed a new way of

>creating stem cells without destroying human embryos, billing it as a

>potential solution to a contentious political and ethical debate.

>

> " This will make it far more difficult to oppose this research, " said

> Lanza of Advanced Cell Technology, the Alameda, Calif., company

>that reported the new method.

>

>Stem cell researchers were impressed by the new technique's ability to

>produce two robust lines of stem cells without requiring the destruction

>of embryos, and a White House spokeswoman called it encouraging.

>However, few on either side believe the new procedure will end the

>long-running bitter impasse over the science.

>

>Stem cells have become a sort of holy grail for advocates of patients

>with a wide variety of illnesses because of the cells' potential to

>transform into any type of human tissue. But the Vatican, President Bush

>and others have argued that the promise of stem cells should not be

>realized at the expense of human life, even in its most nascent stages.

>

> " The science is interesting and important, " said , a

>professor of bioethics at the University of Manchester in Great Britain,

>commenting on the biotech company's efforts.

>

>But a representative of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops said the

>method " raises more ethical questions than it answers " and criticized

>the experiment itself as " gravely unethical " because it discarded the

>actual embryos it used.

>

>A number of stem cell researchers and bioethicists dismissed it as

>scientifically suboptimal and politically ill-advised.

>

> " This will please no one, " predicted a longtime critic of the company,

>Glenn McGee, director of the Alden March Bioethics Institute in Albany, N.Y.

>

>The new technique takes just a single cell from an early-stage embryo

>and uses it to seed a line of stem cells. The rest of the embryo retains

>the potential to develop into a healthy human.

>

>A paper describing the method is being published online Wednesday by the

>British journal Nature. The journal published a similar paper by

>Advanced Cell Technology researchers last year demonstrating the

>technique's viability in mice.

>

>Stem cell researchers complain that the new approach, though it may hold

>future promise, simply isn't as efficient as their current method of

>creating stem cells. That procedure involves the destruction of embryos

>after about five days of development, when they consist of about 100 cells.

>

>Those who oppose any research that destroys a biological entity with the

>potential for human life argue that the new procedure solves nothing,

>because even the single cell removed in the technique could

>theoretically grow into a full-fledged human.

>

> " It is widely believed that one cell of a very early embryo may separate

>and become a new embryo, an identical twin, " said Doerflinger of

>the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.

>

>U.S. law currently bans federal funding of any research that harms human

>embryos. A White House spokeswoman said the new method's eligibility for

>funding could not yet be determined, " but it is encouraging to see

>scientists at least making serious efforts to move away from research

>that involves the destruction of embryos. "

>

>Scientists at Advanced Cell devised a clever means of piggybacking on

>existing fertility treatments to avoid the creation, manipulation or

>destruction of embryos specifically for the production of stem cells.

>The fertility procedure, known as preimplantation genetic diagnosis, or

>PGD, is used when parents want to avoid having a child with a lethal or

>severely debilitating birth defect. About 1,000 such procedures are

>performed each year in the United States.

>

>PGD begins with in vitro fertilization to produce numerous embryos. At a

>very early stage of development, when the embryos are no more than a

>ball of eight to 10 cells, a technician extracts a single cell from each

>one. The extracted cells are tested for genetic disorders, and those

>free of defect are then implanted in the mother in the hope that will

>develop.

>

>The new stem cell production method takes a cell extracted during PGD

>and allows it to divide. One of the two resulting cells is genetically

>tested as in normal PGD; the other is cultured to encourage the

>development of stem cells.

>

> " It's nothing revolutionary, " said Yury Verlinsky, a Chicago geneticist

>who specializes in PGD.

>

>Advanced Cell Technology was able to produce two viable stem cell lines

>from a total of 16 embryos. The lines appeared to exhibit the full

>potential of embryonic stem cells to develop into any type of human

>tissue, the researchers reported, but additional study is needed to

>verify that.

>

> " I think this will become a standard way of producing stem cell lines, "

>said M. Green, a Dartmouth College professor of religion who is

>an unpaid bioethics adviser to Advanced Cell Technology.

>

>Embryonic stem cells have great medical potential because of their

>ability to transform themselves into virtually any human tissue. With

>further research, they might one day be used to treat patients with

>cancer, Alzheimer's and Parkinson's disease, stroke, diabetes,

>arthritis, spinal cord injuries and other ailments.

>

August 23, 2006

The is a RELIGIOUS question: When is this mass of cells a human being?

That is, at what point does it cease to be a group of human cells with

individual action and become an individual that knows and runs the

show. Jewish scripture has always said that it was at the " breath of

life " which is also mentioned in (but somehow disregard by the

churches). However, the RC Church decided first that preventing or

interfering with conception was a sin. This made perfect sense if your

objective was to perpetuate a religion, which the RC Church has always

had as its objective and has been very successful at. When the abortion

question became an issue in the 60's, it naturally followed that it was

equally a sin (and yes, masturbation is a sin by the bible). The

fundamentalist Christian churches, strangely enough, followed the RC

Church's lead on this one.

I have generally agreed with the Jewish decision. I hold that the

spiritual unit " Soul " , if you will, is a separate entity, since I

have had experiences where I was totally aware and separate from my

body. If this is so, and Soul in fact enters the body at its own

desecration, why would it bother to enter a body prior to birth and be

stuck in a cramped up pool of water? That would be a waste of its time

and we are far more efficient than that in my experience. I sense that

Souls will hang out around perspective parents & get a feel for where

they are headed, but they don't hang out in the womb all cramped up and

black. Further, if Soul has the ability to leave and come back as I

have experienced, what is the big deal? If it has not become encased

in a human body, there can be no death prior to birth. It just moves

on and finds another prospect.

The bottom line is that the world has way more people than it needs

which, of course, flies in the face of the RC Church's objective . We

are certainly messing it up for future generations of successful Souls

that are more or less stuck with bodies. So my conclusion is... kill

the little bastard before it gets a chance to become a person,

especially if there is a problem with its function or it is unwanted.

Brown wrote:

> Hi:

>

> That's a pretty interesting article. In a Neo Puritanical world

> view, any stem cell, even one taken from peripheral blood, could be

> considered capable of developing into a human life. Even though in

> this method or in the case of cord blood or peripheral blood, there

> is no " womb conception " for the purpose of that particular stem cell

> becoming a human.

>

> They will still object. They forget that the cell in question, in

> fact does go on to become a human life - the life that it saved or

> cured. They forget that every time someone has sex or masturbates,

> hundreds of thousands of cells that could have become humans are

> destroyed, whether there is conception or not. When I bump or cut

> myself, hundreds of cells die, any of which, through cloning, could

> become a human life. They forget that in nature, mothers cull

> deformed pups, exactly what PDG accomplishes in a humane way to very

> early embryos.

>

> If the Puritans want to stick to a literal interpretation of the

> Bible, the father has the right to kill his children or sell them

> into slavery. There is nothing about embryos or abortion in the Bible

> at all.

>

> At 10:40 AM 8/23/2006, you wrote:

>

> >*New Method Makes Embryo-Safe Stem Cells*

> >

> ><http://apnews.myway.com/article/20060823/D8JM8JG80.html

>

<http://apnews.myway.com/article/20060823/D8JM8JG80.html>>http://apnews.myway.co\

m/article/20060823/D8JM8JG80.html

> <http://apnews.myway.com/article/20060823/D8JM8JG80.html>

> >

> >Aug 23, 1:00 PM (ET)

> >

> >By MATT CRENSON

> >

> >NEW YORK (AP) - A biotechnology company has developed a new way of

> >creating stem cells without destroying human embryos, billing it as a

> >potential solution to a contentious political and ethical debate.

> >

> > " This will make it far more difficult to oppose this research, " said

> > Lanza of Advanced Cell Technology, the Alameda, Calif., company

> >that reported the new method.

> >

> >Stem cell researchers were impressed by the new technique's ability to

> >produce two robust lines of stem cells without requiring the destruction

> >of embryos, and a White House spokeswoman called it encouraging.

> >However, few on either side believe the new procedure will end the

> >long-running bitter impasse over the science.

> >

> >Stem cells have become a sort of holy grail for advocates of patients

> >with a wide variety of illnesses because of the cells' potential to

> >transform into any type of human tissue. But the Vatican, President Bush

> >and others have argued that the promise of stem cells should not be

> >realized at the expense of human life, even in its most nascent stages.

> >

> > " The science is interesting and important, " said , a

> >professor of bioethics at the University of Manchester in Great Britain,

> >commenting on the biotech company's efforts.

> >

> >But a representative of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops said the

> >method " raises more ethical questions than it answers " and criticized

> >the experiment itself as " gravely unethical " because it discarded the

> >actual embryos it used.

> >

> >A number of stem cell researchers and bioethicists dismissed it as

> >scientifically suboptimal and politically ill-advised.

> >

> > " This will please no one, " predicted a longtime critic of the company,

> >Glenn McGee, director of the Alden March Bioethics Institute in

> Albany, N.Y.

> >

> >The new technique takes just a single cell from an early-stage embryo

> >and uses it to seed a line of stem cells. The rest of the embryo retains

> >the potential to develop into a healthy human.

> >

> >A paper describing the method is being published online Wednesday by the

> >British journal Nature. The journal published a similar paper by

> >Advanced Cell Technology researchers last year demonstrating the

> >technique's viability in mice.

> >

> >Stem cell researchers complain that the new approach, though it may hold

> >future promise, simply isn't as efficient as their current method of

> >creating stem cells. That procedure involves the destruction of embryos

> >after about five days of development, when they consist of about 100

> cells.

> >

> >Those who oppose any research that destroys a biological entity with the

> >potential for human life argue that the new procedure solves nothing,

> >because even the single cell removed in the technique could

> >theoretically grow into a full-fledged human.

> >

> > " It is widely believed that one cell of a very early embryo may separate

> >and become a new embryo, an identical twin, " said Doerflinger of

> >the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops.

> >

> >U.S. law currently bans federal funding of any research that harms human

> >embryos. A White House spokeswoman said the new method's eligibility for

> >funding could not yet be determined, " but it is encouraging to see

> >scientists at least making serious efforts to move away from research

> >that involves the destruction of embryos. "

> >

> >Scientists at Advanced Cell devised a clever means of piggybacking on

> >existing fertility treatments to avoid the creation, manipulation or

> >destruction of embryos specifically for the production of stem cells.

> >The fertility procedure, known as preimplantation genetic diagnosis, or

> >PGD, is used when parents want to avoid having a child with a lethal or

> >severely debilitating birth defect. About 1,000 such procedures are

> >performed each year in the United States.

> >

> >PGD begins with in vitro fertilization to produce numerous embryos. At a

> >very early stage of development, when the embryos are no more than a

> >ball of eight to 10 cells, a technician extracts a single cell from each

> >one. The extracted cells are tested for genetic disorders, and those

> >free of defect are then implanted in the mother in the hope that will

> >develop.

> >

> >The new stem cell production method takes a cell extracted during PGD

> >and allows it to divide. One of the two resulting cells is genetically

> >tested as in normal PGD; the other is cultured to encourage the

> >development of stem cells.

> >

> > " It's nothing revolutionary, " said Yury Verlinsky, a Chicago geneticist

> >who specializes in PGD.

> >

> >Advanced Cell Technology was able to produce two viable stem cell lines

> >from a total of 16 embryos. The lines appeared to exhibit the full

> >potential of embryonic stem cells to develop into any type of human

> >tissue, the researchers reported, but additional study is needed to

> >verify that.

> >

> > " I think this will become a standard way of producing stem cell lines, "

> >said M. Green, a Dartmouth College professor of religion who is

> >an unpaid bioethics adviser to Advanced Cell Technology.

> >

> >Embryonic stem cells have great medical potential because of their

> >ability to transform themselves into virtually any human tissue. With

> >further research, they might one day be used to treat patients with

> >cancer, Alzheimer's and Parkinson's disease, stroke, diabetes,

> >arthritis, spinal cord injuries and other ailments.

> >

August 24, 2006

Jim, Just have to add my two cents, but have you ever been pregnant?!? When my

second son was still in my womb, I liked to sit with my feet up and read. As

soon as I became still, he would dance and jump around like crazy. And, when I

would rest the book on my bulging tummy (perfect book shelf), he would sense its

presence and literally kick it away. Now tell me babies in utero have no

souls!!!!!!!

Becky

Referring to Jim 's comments: I have generally agreed with the Jewish

decision. I hold that the