Yahoo Tuning Groups Ultimate Backup metatuning Re: bioethics

> I must admit that I am in favor of research on stem cells
> and into the possibility of human cloning.

Jeff: I mentioned my views because you mentioned something about
persecuting scientists, something I feel very strongly about no matter
what country or culture they live under.

>Hm. Did I mention anything about that? Well I _was_
>wondering about those things and I will admit openly
>that I now view you as a psychotic and deranged madman
>because of it.

Needless to say, I find this remark extremely offensive.

>Perhaps you are simply misguided seeing cloning as some sort of weird
>fertility treatment for narcissists.

I think this should be a legal application. I view this as fundamentally
no different from parents wanting to "live through their children" born
by copulation. Wanting children and hoping they have advantages and
successes denied the parents for whatever circumstances is a very basic
human desire. Would you prosecute single mothers who want to raise their
children or people who adopt children if they can't have them
themselves? I see
very little if any difference between this hypothetical case and the behavior
of most parents, single or traditionally married.

What about middle-aged parents who have lost their only child
and are now infertile?

>or perhaps you are the embodiment of evil, envisioning the cloning of a
>twin for the purpose of murdering it and harvesting its body parts.

I fail to see why this is evil, anymore than a burn victim using his/her
own skin for an autograft
or the use of other parts of ones own body (leg veins, fat, etc.) to
surgically correct
injuries. One could use the clone to generate stem cells or organ
primordia and use them
before a central nervous system develops and starts functioning. You
don't have to raise fetuses
full term or clones to adulthood and them recycle them. The technology
for growing replacement
organs from stem cells or tissue isn't ready yet except for skin and I
believe possibly for arteries,
bone and cartilage. If the recipient organ has some function and
structure, cell transplant might work.
It's a very exciting field at the moment.

>Would you see the clone as a human being
>with the same rights as everyone else or not.

Absolutely, he or she would have the same rights as any identical twin has.
They are natural clones (separation can place upto about 2 weeks after
conception), BTW.
However, as I believe in abortion rights, such a clone is a person only
after it has fully
functional nervous system and can live independently of its birth mother
or artificial culture apparatus.

>If not, would you allow for clones of famous personalities to
>be sold as sex slaves, or clones of one's boss to be
>kept and tortured for entertainment/stress-release?

No one should be sold as a sex slave, in this or in more traditional societies.
I must admit that I hadn't thought of the 2nd suggestion, but I can
imagine the appeal <g>. However, since a clone would have a different environmental
and social history from the donor, his/her personality would be
different from the
original. One might as well try to clone a psychopath and raise it to be
a saint. This might
even work as we know little about the genetic and environmental bases
of personality
differences.

The cloned person might have only a general physical resemblance to the
original; "identical" (monozygotic) twins often look quite different
and may be
morphological dissimilar as well. The suggestions are really quite
pointless and
intellectually dishonest "straw men" based on ignorance of what a clone
would be
like.

>Or would you simply sidestep the issue and leave it
>to 'trained bioethicists', saying you are a 'pure
>scientist' who leaves issues of morality for others
>to decide?

It would not a moral issue for me once the technology were perfected and
I would leave the
decision whether or not to clone a human to the donor or genetic
original, just as I think most
other reproductive decisions in a free society are best left up to the
individuals concerned.
I would no more trust a so-called "trained bioethicist" than I would a
politician or judge
to make the decision for me or anyone else, though I might seek the
advice of such a person
before doing so.

Would you prosecute a normal couple known to be carrying genes which
might result in a child
with a painful, life-threatening, or physically or mentally debilitating
disease to have an afflicted
child when cloning, gene repair (not available yet) or prenatal embryo
testing could eliminate
the possibility? This a real moral (or at least a legal) question? A
well-known case happened in
Houston while I was there -- the Bubble Boy's parents had already lost 2
children to SCID, but their
priest told them to keep having more children because more souls get
incarnated that way.
Unfortunately, the doctors agreed with them because they mistakenly
thought they could correct the
defects after David was born and they couldn't.

As a practical matter, I think cloning humans is premature as the
process is very inefficient
and unpredictable even in mice and other mammals. Until more research
is done and the quality
control problems are solved, it shouldn't be attempted. However,
conception by copulation isn't
very efficient either -- somewhere between half and two-thirds of all
zygotes abort spontaneously
and about 15% of couples are infertile for various reasons. The most
probable outcome for all
conceptions is early death.

--John

> Jeff: I mentioned my views because you mentioned something
> about persecuting scientists, something I feel very strongly
> about no matter what country or culture they live under.

John,

Please reference the exact email or post to which you
are referring so I may address your concerns more
specifically.

> Needless to say, I find this remark extremely offensive.

Don't be such a silly boy, John.
It's what you were fishing for, was it not?

I didn't bring up your fanatical and bizarre BIO
Nazi-like cult beliefs -- you brought them out and
addressed them to me specifically. So now you are
'extremely offended'. Yeah right. Making a clone
of oneself and killing it for spare parts is
what's really offensive, John. Murdering human
beings for medical research is really offensive,
John. Both these practices are also sadistic and
thoroughly EVIL, John. Any human being would know
that. As a global society, we already addressed
the issue of torturing, mutilating and killing
human beings in order to facilitate what your kind
calls 'scientific research', John.

So either you are 'just kidding' or you are a clearly a
profoundly evil presence *if* you really support these
abominations.

> Would you prosecute single mothers who want to
> raise their children or people who adopt children
> if they can't have them themselves?

What do you think John?

> I see very little if any difference between this hypothetical
> case [of cloning oneself] and the behavior of most parents,
> single or traditionally married.

Perhaps there is something dysfunctional in the part of
your brain that should be able to discriminate between
completely different things? You may want to have an
MMPI done at the least; though there are probably
better tests for this specific problems. Even so, I
would strongly recommend you get an MMPI and discuss
the results with the doctor.

> What about middle-aged parents who have lost their only child
> and are now infertile?

What about them?

>> or perhaps you are the embodiment of evil, envisioning the
>> cloning of a twin for the purpose of murdering it and
>> harvesting its body parts.

> I fail to see why this is evil, anymore than a burn victim
> using his/her own skin for an autograft or the use of other
> parts of ones own body (leg veins, fat, etc.) to surgically
> correct injuries. One could use the clone to generate stem
> cells or organ primordia and use them before a central
> nervous system develops and starts functioning.

Thanks for the chilling honesty, Dr. Chalmers.
You aren't of German descent by any chance are you?
Or do statements like you just made come naturally to
you as a result of your involvement witnh BIO?

> It's a very exciting field at the moment.

I understand the Nazis were quite excited about
what they did too.

>>Would you see the clone as a human being
>>with the same rights as everyone else or not.
>
> Absolutely, he or she would have the same rights as any
> identical twin has.

Well that's a relief. At least we agree on something.

> However, since a clone would have a different environmental
> and social history from the donor, his/her personality would
> be different from the original. One might as well try to
> clone a psychopath and raise it to be a saint. This might
> even work as we know little about the genetic and
> environmental bases of personality differences.

Would you support the cloning of Hitler or Dahlmer as
an interesting experiment into the effect of nature
vs nurture? If not, which personalities would you
prefer? Perhaps it would be interesting to take a
sample of the blood on the shroud of Turin and make
a clone of whoever that person was? Would it make
sense to do the opposite experiment and raise that
person in an abusive family instead of a loving one,
just to see what would happen? Should there be legal
limits placed on any of these kinds of experiments,
or should scientists do as they please without
restriction?

> The suggestions are really quite pointless and intellectually
> dishonest "straw men" based on ignorance of what a clone
> would be like.

Are they? Am I any more ignorant of what a clone would
be like than you are?

Am I simply a poor ignorant goat raising hillbilly
country bumpkin? Should I be deprived of the privledge
to vote because of what you see as my vast
scientific ignorance?

Or perhaps you support the system H.G. Wells proposed,
where the genetically superior intellectual elites such
as yourself will make all decisions for society and
ignoramouses like myself will just do as we are told
since we're not bright enough to understand the lofty
dictates of wisdom emitted by the mouths of the glass
bead game players in their ivory towers.

> It would not a moral issue for me once the technology were
> perfected

Ah.

> I think most other reproductive decisions in a free society
> are best left up to the individuals concerned.

So you believe that a woman should not be able to get
an abortion unless she has the fathers permission?

> Would you prosecute a normal couple known to be carrying
> genes which might result in a child with a painful,
> life-threatening, or physically or mentally debilitating
> disease to have an afflicted child when cloning, gene repair
> (not available yet) or prenatal embryo testing could
> eliminate the possibility?

Did you mean persecute instead of prosecute?
Please clarify; I am having difficulty understanding
what you are saying in this paragraph.

> However, conception by copulation isn't very efficient either
> -- somewhere between half and two-thirds of all zygotes abort
> spontaneously and about 15% of couples are infertile for
> various reasons. The most probable outcome for all
> conceptions is early death.

Yes, this is basically true.

Thanks John!

- Jeff

Re: bioethics

🔗John Chalmers <JHCHALMERS@...>

🔗X. J. Scott <xjscott@...>

🔗Paul Erlich <PERLICH@...>