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Embryonic Stem Cell Debate

By Arlon Staywell RICHMOND — The debate here about embryonic stem cell research is going to examine levels of thoughtlessness and shortsightedness many of you have never considered before. At first you might have trouble seeing which side is the more thoughtless and the more shortsighted. Uncomfortable as it will doubtless be you might need to meditate long on the matters to reach your final decisions.
Gruesome Events
In 1972 a plane with 45 aboard crashed high in the frozen Andes Mountains. Twelve died in the crash. As search and rescue attempts apparently failed, a means of survival to which it seemed necessary to turn was to eat the flesh of the people who did not survive.
Without any attempt at all here to pass any judgment on those who did survive by such means, in such mind numbing freezing cold, please consider what you would have done. For certainly there are those who would rather die themselves than eat human flesh. Perhaps you should make a list of things you would rather die than do. There might be several. Some of the better movies show moments in character's lives when they have to make such decisions.
Who Are You?
If you count yourself among those who chose to live at that cost please try to draw a line somewhere. People are starving far and wide. People are dying all over the world. Where do you draw the line that should not be crossed? Or should cannibalism be hailed as science's triumph over it all?
Now I've gone and pushed the button that makes people think about further consequences like the ripples in a pond disturbed by a pebble. And it's time for you to consider which side is the more thoughtful and far reaching. Seeing indeed that our decisions have far reaching consequences what ought we to do? Is it better to make rules by which to live? And not live otherwise? Is there an eternal point of view that such rules can connect us with?
Albert Camus said that by definition, a government has no conscience. Might it also be said that science, by definition, has no morals?
The essential difference between those who see any future in embryonic stem cell research and those who do not is that one side has a longer list of things they will not do to prolong life. It doesn't necessarily mean that they know that embryonic cells are human life. It could mean that in the absence of certainty on the matter they choose to behave as though they are. And beside that most of what little is known about life indicates they are human.
But the dead bodies high atop the Andes were human too.
What Can Science Do?
A bizarre argument against embryonic stem cell research is that adult stem cells seem to be as efficacious making the embryonic ones unnecessary. That misses the point that they were unnecessary anyway.
And please regard any news about the wonders science can achieve with a respectable skepticism. I can make neat looking videos on my notebook computer too. But I'm on God's side as far as I know. And hope anyway.
For more about the bizarre behavior of people blinded by their faith in "science" read the review here of the movie 2012.

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