[jtfanclub]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070905/ap_on_...sgzm1oelMKs0NUE

It's cases like these that make me rethink my pro-choice philosophy.

So what happens when some of these 99.9% human embryos get implanted in a donor? You know it's going to happen, even if only as a protest (or to make on heck of an athlete).

[pbleighton]

People looking back 300 years from now won't see what the fuss was about, just a we (or at least most of us) can't understand Galileo's imprisonment.

Biological science is going to change our lives even more profoudly than have the physical sciences. We've only just begun. Crick/Watson were biology's Newton.

Some of the consequences make even me uneasy. It won't be stopped, however, and it shouldn't.

Peter

[helene_t]

As I understand it, animal eggs are used instead of human eggs for experimental purposes because they are cheaper. They may eventually be used as donor material as well. Compared to all the fuss about xenotransplants this seems like a minor issue. I don't have a problem with the technology per se. As usual it depends how it is used and for what purpose.

As for making a heck of an athlete .... maybe stem cells could be used to enlarge the heart. But a larger heart may not be a good thing. And enlarging skeletal muscles is probably better done through training.

As for the title .... I don't see what this has to do with religion, except of course to some, religion embraces politics and politics embraces everything. Then again, what do I know about religion.

[jtfanclub]

helene_t, on Sep 5 2007, 04:37 PM, said:

As for the title .... I don't see what this has to do with religion, except of course to some, religion embraces politics and politics embraces everything. Then again, what do I know about religion.

Most religions state a fertilized egg is a human being. Therefore, this would be modifying a human being for the purposes of science, eventually killing him/her.

Quote

As for making a heck of an athlete ....  maybe stem cells could be used to enlarge the heart. But a larger heart may not be a good thing. And enlarging skeletal muscles is probably better done through training.

You're thinking too big. Changing the blood so that it would hold just a little bit more oxygen would probably be a huge advantage. And think of people who take lots of steroids...most of those are natural and can already be found in the human body...a slight genetic change could modify your natural production. There are a hundred other tiny, tiny tricks.

[mike777]

Besides all of this, it will be interesting as stem cells get pumped into us from all kinds of sources, implants and chips of all sorts are put into our bodies.

We have all of this in a very limited form now, but I think it will really explode the next 40 years.

We all read about direct brain to computer interfaces in the lab.

It will be interesting as more machine parts go into humans and more human parts go into machines.

[Winstonm]

Helene:

I would be interested on your comments of chaos theory and DNA.

[BebopKid]

jtfanclub, on Sep 5 2007, 04:59 PM, said:

Most religions state a fertilized egg is a human being. Therefore, this would be modifying a human being for the purposes of science, eventually killing him/her.

I'm pretty sure that no religious texts talk about fertilized eggs.

Religious people however have their own beliefs that may be based on those texts, which possibly could be interpreted differently.

[Gerben42]

Quote

  http://news.yahoo.co...sgzm1oelMKs0NUE

It's cases like these that make me rethink my pro-choice philosophy.

That's just what the opponents of this research want you to do. How would you feel to be excluded from future Parkinson & Alzheimer treatment because you actively opposed this research?

Quote

Most religions state a fertilized egg is a human being.

No religion states this. Some people who are seen as important in these religion state this which makes these people dangerous. They are abusing people's beliefs to get what they want.

[helene_t]

jtfanclub, on Sep 5 2007, 11:59 PM, said:

Changing the blood so that it would hold just a little bit more oxygen would probably be a huge advantage.  And think of people who take lots of steroids...most of those are natural and can already be found in the human body...a slight genetic change could modify your natural production.  There are a hundred other tiny, tiny tricks.

Sure, but what does this have to do with the use of animal eggs to produce human stem cell? Stem cell technology is about overcoming cell differentiation. As such they can be used to repair tissue that differentiated to the point of losing its ability to regenerate, iow brain and heart. To make a human produce "natural" steroids, you should infect him with a viral vector or such, containing a gene for that steroid. That's a different issue.

As for improving the blood's oxygen carying capacity I see no alternative to blood transfusions. But maybe it's my lack of fantasy.

Quote

Most religions state a fertilized egg is a human being. Therefore, this would be modifying a human being for the purposes of science, eventually killing him/her.

In what sense would a lump of animal cells equiped with human DNA count as "fertilized eggs"? Of course the human DNA is derived from an organism that grew out of a fertilized egg, but so are all the dead skin cells of which house dust consists.

The animal cell used may be a fertilized egg, so if your religion does not allow you to kill animals, ok. (And even if it's an animal body cell, the animal was probably killed for the harvest of the cell)

[Al_U_Card]

Man has been condemned to a sentence of continuing evolution. Despite efforts to cast his current state in stone, we are hardly at the apex of our development. The physical, cultural, emotional and spiritual changes that man has evinced during his somewhat tumultuous tenure on this shiny orb will continue whether we like it or not. Were we not given the ability to conceive of and accomplish what we are able? Of course. You may not desire or appreciate change but you will observe and endure it. Get with the program. Welcome to the ®evolution.

[hotShot]

helene_t, on Sep 6 2007, 11:17 AM, said:

As for improving the blood's oxygen carying capacity I see no alternative to blood transfusions. But maybe it's my lack of fantasy.

You don't need fantasy, just copy nature. Further reading: Eero Mäntyranta

Quote

Mäntyranta has naturally aberrant high blood hemoglobin due to a mutation in the erythropoietin receptor (EPOR) gene, which was identified following a DNA study done on over 200 members of his family, as reported in 1993[1].

[barmar]

jtfanclub, on Sep 5 2007, 04:59 PM, said:

Therefore, this would be modifying a human being for the purposes of science, eventually killing him/her.

That's the argument used against cloning human stem cells in general. How is this case, where animal eggs are used rather than human eggs, particularly different?

Good luck finding a line in the Bible that discusses recombinant DNA techniques.

[Al_U_Card]

[quote name='barmar' date='Sep 7 2007, 11:38 AM'] [quote name='jtfanclub' date='Sep 5 2007, 04:59 PM']

Good luck finding a line in the Bible that discusses recombinant DNA techniques. [/quote]
And Jacob begat Lot and Lot begat...

[jtfanclub]

helene_t, on Sep 6 2007, 04:17 AM, said:

Sure, but what does this have to do with the use of animal eggs to produce human stem cell?

well, this may be my confusion here, but if you take an animal egg, remove the animal DNA, and put in human DNA, why can this not be implanted and carried to term as a (mostly) human being?

[helene_t]

jtfanclub, on Sep 7 2007, 09:45 PM, said:

helene_t, on Sep 6 2007, 04:17 AM, said:

Sure, but what does this have to do with the use of animal eggs to produce human stem cell?

well, this may be my confusion here, but if you take an animal egg, remove the animal DNA, and put in human DNA, why can this not be implanted and carried to term as a (mostly) human being?

Maybe it can. But this cost issue in mainly of concern for experiments were one needs say hundred cell cultures to make the statistics significant. If they grow stem-cell derived brain implant for me to cure some of my psychiatric disorders, I think my insurance will be willing to pay for all-human material. Part of te problem with implanting animal stuff in humans is that it may transfer transmiddable animal diseases to humans. Otherwise I dont have much issues wit this.