June 24, 2004
FAIRY TALES, SCIENCE, WHAT DIFFERENCE?:
I’m With My Dad on Stem Cell Research (Michael Reagan, 6/22/04, Chronically Biased)
Listen to what Ronald D.G. McKay, a stem cell researcher at the National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke told the Washington Post: “People need a fairy tale,” he said, explaining why scientists have allowed society to believe wrongly that stem cells are likely to effectively treat Alzheimer's disease. He added “Maybe that's unfair, but they need a story line that's relatively simple to understand.”A story line that is a flat out lie.
Writing in the Weekly Standard, lawyer, ethicist and human life advocate Wesley J. Smith reported that “Researchers have apparently known for some time that embryonic stem cells will not be an effective treatment for Alzheimer's, because as two researchers told a Senate subcommittee in May, it is a ‘whole brain disease,’ rather than a cellular disorder (such as Parkinson's). This has generally been kept out of the news. But now, Washington Post correspondent Rick Weiss, has blown the lid off of the scam, reporting that while useful abstract information might be gleaned about Alzheimer's through embryonic stem cell research, ‘stem cell experts confess . . . that of all the diseases that may be someday cured by embryonic stem cell treatments, Alzheimer's is among the least likely to benefit.’”
People such as Nancy, however, have been allowed to believe otherwise - “a distortion,” Weiss writes that “is not being aggressively corrected by scientists.” Why? The false story line helps generate public support for the biotech political agenda. As Weiss noted, “It [Nancy Reagan's statement in support of ESCR] is the kind of advocacy that researchers have craved for years, and none wants to slow its momentum.”
Unlike the hyped embryonic stem cell research, adult stem cell research is already paying dividends. According to Michael Fumento, one of the nation’s most skilled debunkers of junk science, “Over the horizon are so-called adult stem cells (ASCs), extracted from people of any age and from umbilical cords and placentas. Not only don't they carry the moral baggage of embryonic stem cells (ESCs), but research with them is much further along.
Fumento adds, ”Unfortunately, embryonic stem cell researchers have so powerful a PR machine that many influential people don't even know there's an alternative.“
It's not about medicine. It's about the dehumanization of the unborn. People want to destroy embryos just to show that they're disposable. Posted by Orrin Judd at June 24, 2004 7:11 AM
True enough, oj, but it is also about money, speciffically government money. There is no ban on ESCR, just no federal money for it.
Private money needs a good reason for it to be spent, usually. Federal money is available for piss in the punch bowl.
In adition, there are 'researchers' who will work on government grant money but not on private funds. They prefer that the money 'given' to them be stolen rather than earned.
Posted by: Uncle Bill at June 24, 2004 8:24 AMIf this article is at all correct--and it sure seems to be--embryonic stem cells aren't much good for much of anything, except as a handy excuse for propping up the abortion industry.
Posted by: Mike Morley at June 24, 2004 9:02 AMAgree with Uncle Bill. This is about biotech lobbying, and the money that flows from their efforts. Think about the dollar signs dancing in the heads of the leaders of the biotech firms who want to patent the stem cell lines. Like I posted here, when is it ever not about money?
Posted by: Jeff Brokaw at June 24, 2004 10:46 AM"It's not about medicine. It's about the dehumanization of the unborn. People want to destroy embryos just to show that they're disposable."
OJ, how does this square with what you posted below?
"God made Man with the potential to be human--few are."
You argue for the humanity of all human life on one hand, and you deny it to all but the philosophically blessed on the other. You are closer to those you decry than you will admit.
Posted by: Robert Duquette at June 24, 2004 11:12 AMBoth are human potential and therefore both are valuable.
There are different implied definitions of 'human' in the two statements -- one being descriptive and the other being prescriptive.
Posted by: Gideon at June 24, 2004 4:04 PMFor practicing scientists, t's all about the grant money.
We all understand how separation of church and state protects both church and state from corruption.
Now that the unusual circumstanceds of the cold war are over, I'd like to see science & the state separated too, for similar reasons.
Posted by: ralph phelan at June 24, 2004 6:11 PMIsn't it obvious OJ? If you can declare that the majority of living people are not human, how can you quibble with people who say that fetuses are not human?
Posted by: Robert Duquette at June 24, 2004 11:47 PMThey're biological human beings. There just aren't a whole lot of spiritual humans. We're only very dim reflections of God.
Posted by: oj at June 25, 2004 12:00 AMOJ: the stem cells come from dead things, not living.
Posted by: Robert Schwartz at June 25, 2004 12:11 AMAre you one of these "spiritual humans"?
Posted by: Robert Duquette at June 25, 2004 12:37 AMNot by a long shot--that's why I think all biological human life is precious and should be equally protected.
Posted by: oj at June 25, 2004 12:44 AMI agree with you on that.
Posted by: Robert Duquette at June 25, 2004 1:02 AM