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Politics : Politics for Pros- moderated

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To: michael97123 who wrote (115145)	5/21/2005 10:23:35 AM
From: kech	Read Replies (2) of 793914

Real issue is not killing the embryos because couples generally make more than are needed as insurance against a miscarriage when the first embryos are implanted. Those that are not needed are thawed anyway. The first part of the ethical dilemma comes about if there is a premium paid by researchers for these embryos and people begin to voluntarily make them for the purpose of harvesting them. This is hard to distinguish from the embryos made by couples seeking to become pregnant because the distinction is really only one of intent. The second part of the ethical dilemma comes about with the arrival of cloning of embryos. (In fact the Koreans announced an easy way to clone yesterday). How long before the cloning process invented for research is used by some individuals to clone themselves? Hard to believe that genie will stay in the bottle. But let's suppose cloning can be restricted to research purposes only, is it an issue that they are being produced for the purpose of killing them? Farming embryos for embryonic stem cells then becomes the norm because it is much better to have the genetic material be used for the person that has the same genetic material. The hope is that this could prevent rejection which is one problem with embryonic stem cell research today. (In addition no one has been able to do anything with embryonic stem cells because the cells are so general that they haven't been able to control them to do what is desired even though the belief is that they could do it if controlled properly). So once one begins farming embryos to kill them, why not farm them to live longer so that other cells and even organs can be harvested? In fact why not whole populations of cloned embryos providing organs to other humans? These are some of the issues that medical ethicists will have to address very soon. In any case, the only ban now is just federal funding so these developments will be happening soon.

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