As a representative from the right to life side of this issue I would like to raise several critical points regarding embryonic stem cells. First, it is important to actually think about what you are doing when you kill an embryo. You are in effect killing a human being that is slowly moving forward in the standard progression we all followed to become who we are today. Would you kill a baby in the third trimester of pregnancy? Probably not. So what makes an embryo any different. Is it consciousness? Most certainly not because we treat a mentally retarded person as an equal human being so why not an embryo? Is it the physical attributes? Of course not because physical deformities in adults do not prevent us from thinking of them as human beings. So I ask...why is an embryo not a human being and how is killing an embryo for its stem cells not murder?
To further drive this point home, I would like to ask you why spend the money to consciously murder embryos when we have new technology at our fingertips that provides the equal potential as embryonic stem cells? Specifically, a recent report published by "Nature biotechnology" cites the extraordinarily promising results with amniotic stem cells. You can find an abstract from this study on PubMed.gov under the name Isolation of amniotic stem cell lines with potential for therapy. This study demonstrated that amniotic stem cells are multi-potent and were able to differentiate into cells types that represented all germ layers. These cells are easy to grow and like embryonic stem cells are non-tumorogenic and resist telomere erosion. If there exist such cells as these that do not require the murder of human beings then why not focus our resources on these. Federal funding should not be focused towards murder but the proactive solution such as amniotic stem cells.
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One thing about the scientific process is that you can not tackle an issue from just one angle. When scientist were researching tumors they tried to approach the issue by analzying the DNA and such. Its like that video we watched in A. Bio about angiogenesis and how a medical doctor (not a researcher) noticed how a tumor somehow could grow even when placed within a animal. Even though the tumor was foreign it still somehow mannaged to attract blood even though it wasn't attached to the blood stream. Somehow it signaled for blood to come to it. At the Fred Hutchinson cancer research institute in seattle I know for a fact that they have their researchers approach cancer from all known angles. What I'm trying to get at is that we need to aproach stem cell research from all angles as to make the dream of regenerative medicine a reality.
Counterpoint to the right to life arguments raised by Dr. Peter Metzger: An embryo is fundamentally different from a human being in many different ways. It's the very first stage in a long process of the growth of a human being. It is much farther from a human than is a fetus, which already has many of its features. An embryo isn't conscious the same way that a mentally retarded person or even a vegetative person isn't conscious; it doesn't even have the ability to be conscious because at this point, it is only a ball of cells. People are so concerned with embryonic stem cell research because embryos have the potential to become a fully grown human being. An embryo isn't a human being; I think the issue is more that it has the potential to be.
Regarding the issue of embryos, I agree with Peter. Whether or not an embryo is just the "very first stage in a long process of the growth of a human being," it's still the very first stage. I believe that embryos should be considered human. I also agree with Peter's point about why kill a human if there are alternative paths to take? For example, according to the "Stem Cells Explained" part of the U of Michigan website, if blood-forming stem cells are needed, instead of embryonic cells, a type of stem cell found in umbilical cord blood after birth. Likewise, another type of stem cell is the adult or tissue-specific stem cell which can be found in all humans, another alternative to embryos. Lots of controversy hovers over the use of embryonic stem cells, why not abandon the idea and use other methods that work just as well?
I too have read about many alternatives to embryonic stem cells and I think that it is very important to keep looking for these new ways to create stem cells without destroying embryos. However, it is important to not let this stop or slow our current progress. Right now, there is already an abundance of unused embryos in IVF clinics that will probably eventually be thrown out. Since this resource is so readily available to us, why not make use of it? I think that in ignoring and not using these embryos, there is the danger of losing critical progress in the fight against diseases and injuries from which many individuals suffer.
Personally, I'm not sure if blastocysts are or aren't "alive", but considering that they are a potential for life, I don't like the theory of handling them like any other cell. Even though it certainly is the very very first stages of life, and not yet "conscious" as we understand awareness, there are several life forms out there that aren't conscious (like trees). Not to liken embryos to plants, but you obviously can't chop up a tree and say "it's not alive!"
I do, however, agree with the point about the IVF clinics. There are about 400,000 frozen embryos in IVF clinics in the US and most of them will likely be destroyed. Considering both the embryos and the patients are likely going to die, I think it's better to try and save one group than let both die.
"Considering both the embryos and the patients are likely going to die, I think it's better to try and save one group than let both die."
This is a very practical position that makes good sense in the individual case. However, the morality of this action involves the implications of it, not just the immediate results. The immediate result would be justified - yes, more people benefit than suffer from this one action. The implications, on the other hand, mean that we can consider sacrificing one life for the benefit of the other to be right, and that independent idea itself is morally controversial. If we go on to accept this idea, we might hit a slippery slope. For example, we might decide that sacrificing a fetus for research to further medical research is justified. Then we might proceed further to believe that using a much later-stage embryo for reserach is justified. Then we might go even further and decide that sacrificing a newlyborn for research is justified. It goes on like that. We might think that obviously a newly born wouldnt be treated like that because it is already born and is a full human we might say. But as beliefs change with society, we might find that we consider anyone who is so young to be deserving of less respect than somebody older, possibly because they lack physical/psychological maturity, which is in fact a true statement, so using him for medical benefit for the older could be considered justifiable (this is purely a hypothetical extreme, but still is worthy of consideration) These are rather extremely pessimistic speculations but they aren't so unlikely when you consider that mass social opinion can change drastically over time, especially if a moral idea such as "killing one to save the other" is accepted and allowed to become engrained in social consciousness. This can be seen throughout human history. (Do you think slavery is right, for example? You sure might think differently if you lived 400 years ago, but enough on that) I myself am not sure if I would seriously consider the "worst of the worst" possibilities in order to play it safe so to speak when obvious immediate benefit can result, but as I said its not an absurd idea if it is at all possible, and should be at least taken into account. Essentially that consideration is an important element of the basis of ethicists's arguments, or that of the Right to Life advocates.
In response to Vassily, I take some issue with the use of the “slippery slope” argument. Other countries in which stem cell research is occurring haven’t experienced any sort of dramatic - or even noticeable - moral decline. It seems rather foolish, on some levels, to sacrifice the opportunity to save real, concrete human lives for the sake of the sorts of hand-wavy, potential consequences you mention.
I do agree, however, that should we proceed with embryonic stem cell research, we ought to be extremely conscious of our stance on whether or not we’re “killing one to save another.” That can most definitely take us down a creepy, Nazi-esque route: the sterilization and euthanasia movement in Nazi Germany was rationalized by the same principle, on a more abstract level. (The disabled, the Jewish, the politically unsound were sacrificed for the good of the German “Volk.)
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