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Politics : PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Thomas A Watson who wrote (171047)	8/13/2001 8:21:04 PM
From: DuckTapeSunroof	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 769667

RE: "Your analysis shows ignorance of the issues involved. I's also suspect that the pro murder the embryo folks are the anti gene engineered food stocks." Response: Quite possibly, to some extent, this is true. Certain weak-reasoning environmentalists come to mind here. But that doesn't mean that ALL 'pro-choice' folks (or environmentalists!) are anti gene engineering... nor that they are anti scientific development in any significant way either. On the 'pro-technology to Luddite scale', I would bet that people of all political persuasions are scattered from one end of the scale to the other. I bet there is also a significant node of "politically conservative" and "anti-technology" beliefs as well... and perhaps in larger numbers than the "pro murder the embryo folks and anti gene engineered food stocks" group that you posit. RE: "The flaw in your analysis is the use of the term fearful and ignorant." Response: fearful of rapid technological change, and ignorant of the intricacies of the new technologies (who among us really are experts?) exactly describes the modern day - and the historical - Luddites. That was my point. RE: "The opposition is based on the fact that all know now that all human life starts and progresses through the embryo stage until it's death. The removal of stem cells from an embryo causes it's death. That is the death of a human life that started as all human life has started. That is not fear or ignorance. The above is true information and those who believe it is wrong to take life oppose using human life for experiments...." Response: You must mean: 'unique human life', because in a sense, we all descend from an unbroken line of life. I am the product of the merging of a live sperm cell and a live egg cell - themselves produced by live individuals down throughout history. If I go out and root clippings from the Oak tree in my backyard, I have 'cloned' new individuals that are genetically identical to the parent. Are they indeed new individuals? From a genetic point of view human life began a long, long time ago... so you must mean 'unique human life'. As to when is that unique individual invested with whatever rights society accords it's adults... (In general parlance: when is it considered to be a 'human life'), well that is a policy decision that has been made in many different ways throughout the history of human societies. In most instances it has been regarded as a religious decision... the ethics of the matter being derived from the prevalent religious view of the period. And, I'd like to point out that those religious views have varied religion-to-religion, and indeed have changed over time within the tenets of individual religions. I believe, for one example, that for some 80% of it's history the Catholic Church's official position was that 'personhood' was conferred when the new individual was invested with a soul... and that that was believed to occur at birth. Obviously, their views have changed. Since I can't prove when a body and a soul are married up (or if they even are), I try to be tolerant of the many possible opinions here. I suppose it could be just as logical to mandate that 'personhood' occurs: 1) at the moment of nuclear transfer, or 2) when a blastocyt is implanted in a womb's lining, or 3) at some intermediate stage of fetal development, or 4) at birth, or 5) at puberty, or 6) never (for certain unfortunate classes) - as various societies and or religions have claimed at different times - as it is to be convinced that your view here ("all know now that all human life starts...") must dominate. RE: "I have never seen any indication that those opposed to killing human life are against any other technology." Response: Well I certainly have. As I said, there are people all over the spectrum of beliefs, and there are people who are anti anything new simply because it is new.... And there certainly are people who are anti new technologies because they threaten their existing economic interests, or their belief systems. The dictionary definition of 'Conservative' does imply a certain resistance to change, a very Luddite-tolerant inclination... :)