Cat & Dog Meat?

[Lotus Eater]

Cross over cool. No problems with artificially cloned bits and pieces. Although that photo of the mouse growing a human ear sort of puts me off a bit whenever I see it.

There is a strong argument for retrospective abortion - Pol Pot, Hitler, the guy that jumped in front of you in the queue.

[solongtinik]

LOTUS,MR. NOBODY

chiz! did i hit a nerve there <...like us...assholes>? ewww...that was meant to be a joke.

whew! i've been havin lots of slips here lately...

IM REALLY SORRYYYYYYYY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Mr Nobody]

I took the "like us - assholes" as a joke, no worries. No anger or annoyance was intended i was running with the joke. Don't panic. I was serious about the hope for mankind with the stem cells though, and the options. My degree is in this approximate area, and my post grad was going to be even closer, on genetic engineering sort of stuff. (actually in the exact area of how genes express themselves and how this can be controlled/changed/monitored - an area we are no closer to understanding now, even after more than 20 years. Glad I didn't take it - I would still be working on it, and would probably have got the Nobel Prize before my PhD if I had. It looks HARD.)

[solongtinik]

but whether the fetal tissue is advantageous or not, im sticking to my belief that it's still inhumane...

i love kids so much that's why...

[Lotus Eater]

I wasn't worried about the like us ... assholes (we speak a slightly more correct language in Oz! ) so that bit didn't make it into any sort of offence filter. I just went to the next process in the post

INHUMANE!!!!!!!! whether the fetal tissue is clinically proven to be medicinal or whatever,they still aborted

which is a likely controversial topic - but we have had them here before - check the capital punishment threads - and had really good discussions without any problems.

No problem.

[Mr Nobody]

Did you read my post, Solong? Fetus doesn't = kids. stem cells don't = kids.

Inhumane defn. from cambridge online:
adjective
cruel and not caring about the suffering of people or animals

no suffering is done by anything.

Studies show that a fetus can feel no pain at all, is in fact in what in an adult would be called a coma. (New Scientist last year)

So not inhumane either.

[Lotus Eater]

Using parts of living or dead tissue is been around for donkeys years. My drivers license has me down as an organ donor if I am ever in an accident that I am clinically dead from. I used to donate blood regularly (plasma because they don't actually want my blood).

In abortions/miscarriages the fetus is already dead once it is expelled from the body - why is it inhumane to make the best use of it possible for other people's lives?

Slightly off the topic: Last year I went to a sky burial. This is a Tibetan practice where the naked body of the deceased is offered to the vultures. Tibetans believe that this is the last 'good deed' they can do - offer their now useless shell for the sustenance of others. It is seen as a one of the best levels of burial by Tibetans and you need to be worthy of it.

[Escaped Lunatic]

Yep - we saved a TON of RMB on Granpa's funeral because we managed to get him declared "worthy" to be left outside so that his naked corpse could be plucked to bits by vultures.


Something about this doesn't quite process correctly through that pile of jello I'm using for a brain.

Personally, I hope I'm found worthy to be cryogenically preserved in something along the lines of the great pyramid.





"There are worse things in life than death. Have you ever spent an evening with an insurance salesman?"
- Woody Allen

[solongtinik]

mr nobody,

i rest my case...

[Lotus Eater]

Going to the sky burial was a very moving experience that made me question many of the assumptions we make about death and the dead in the west. It has taken me a long time to work through the feelings this engendered in me - from both a cultural and a personal aspect.

But - in the end I feel that it is pragmatically and spiritually a GOOD thing! Pragmatically - Tibet is so damn cold that bodies can't be buried! So what the hell do you do with them? They can't be left in peoples tents for 6 months waiting for enough of a thaw for them to be buried. There isn't enough wood for them to be cremated. So.... a sky burial is a sensible, ecologically, psychogically sound process.

Couple that into the Buddhist view of giving to the world - and vultures make up part of our world, and the part that is happy to see all creatures as ourselves, then it is a help in a barren and desolate section of the world. It works - for me and for them.

I rest my case - we are all here to be of use in some way or form. If as an unfeeling, unthinking, unknowing, fetus - or a live/dead human being who can no longer make a contribution any other way - lets take that opportunity to be of use.

[Escaped Lunatic]

I'm sure the whole sky burial made far more sense in context, but I think I'd rather have my corpse be fed to homeless dogs and cats than to be picked over by vultures. (Am I the only one here who finds vultures a bit on the creepy side?)

So, how do they dispose of people who aren't worthy of this honor?




Do you believe in immortality? "No, and one life is enough for me."
- Albert Einstein

[George61]

So, how do they dispose of people who aren't worthy of this honor?

Feed 'em to the homeless cats and dogs, of course!

[Mr Nobody]

Which brings us back to soylent green. Ah, Harry Harrison, the room you have made.

[Lotus Eater]

There are a couple of different ways Tibetans manage burial. If you are a lama you can be mummified and placed into a stupa (highest form of burial); a monk you have the stupa for your remains after incineration (next highest class of burial); if you are a child, diseased or poor you are wrapped and placed in a small barrel and sent down a river, or dismembered and tossed into the water. Sky burial or Celestial burial is seen as the thrid best form of burial. In areas with few vultures water burial is seen as similar in level of burial as sky burial and used widely - offering to the fish - which is why these Tibetans don't eat fish. If you are seen as 'impure' then you are buried underground. In areas with plenty of wood cremation is used and your ashes scattered over the mountains.

[Escaped Lunatic]

Makes me wonder what the people down-river must think when they keep getting these barrels with such interesting contents.

OK, if I drop dead in Tibet, someone tell them I'm not worthy of vultures and to please feed me to the fish.




"I have offended God and mankind because my work didn't reach the quality it should have."
- Last words Leonardo da Vinci

[Mr Nobody]

Solong, You didn't have a case, you stated an unsupported opinion. The word used in that opinion (inhumane) doesn't apply to this situation, as shown by my reference. You needed to support that opinion, reword it, or something. Resting a case after someone shows the words in it don't mean what you want them to is pretty, well.......

But forget about it. It is hard to have a rational discussion on an emotive topic.

[joe]

I think the deal with using fetal tissue and maybe stem cells is potential: if the biological process were left to run its course, then in the end barring other accident you'd get a person. Deliberately harvesting tissue ends that potential. It's not killing so much as never allowing the person to be in the first place.

Potential is killed off every day by all of us in one form or another, but usually people do it to themselves or to other people who have had at least some of their chance to succeed. Making tissue farming an industry of the kind needed to support ongoing research projects seems a bit more complex.

I suspect this idea of "potential" is related in some way to "responsibility." Their potential, your responsibility, perhaps.

[Mr Nobody]

Easily can use cell lines that do not have this potential. No worries. See previous post. I have done it myself with mouse and chicken cells, although we were using cell fusion which isn't useful for human stem cell research. We were doing something else. They develop so far then stop, then die.

For that matter ALL cells have this potential, we just can't trigger it yet, although cancer can. I suspect that the problem with this can be solved, and before too long, using adult cells of a tissue type and then using it for that tissue, getting around the need for sending the cell back all the way to primordial, thus getting around the 'ethical' issue. BUT and this is important, this will not be acheived unless people continue with the research.

It is just a matter of drawing the line. I am cool with the idea that people don't like it. People haven't liked medicine for centuries. Looks at body snatching for the Vivisectionist movement - the dissecting of newly dead bodies. Without it, we would be nowhere. 'Ethics' sometimes caused these researchers to be hanged (not hung). I know people will argue that this is not the same, but then, nothing ever is. Doesn't matter as long as somewhere some people are working on it. Here in China they are. If our countries choose not to, fine. China's technology will surpass ours in this area of medicine. Our citizens then shouldn't complain that their life expectancy is shorter and that they are dying of diseases that are easily cured, and just die. Eg antibiotics and 3rd world. But wanna bet that the citizens of these countries will want modern medicine then? Ethics, and hypocracy. Hmm.

But I like it. Legally, biologically, etc, the cells are just cells until they attain the capability of conciousness. I like the 3 month limit, it is nice and handy and has evidence to support it - and very conservative. Arguments can be given for much later (China's abortion arguments) or earlier. The ones used for research are MUCH earlier.

I also like the idea of in vitro fertilization of lines that cannot make it to maturity and do not have that potential - many if not most of the normal invitro embryos are like this anyway and are not implanted. That is why so many are made. And as lotus said, lets use them not flush them. THAT is disrespectful of life.

[joe]

daoding said:

But I like it. Legally, biologically, etc, the cells are just cells until they attain the capability of conciousness. I like the 3 month limit, it is nice and handy and has evidence to support it - and very conservative.

See, but that's the kicker, init? They could have attained consciousness. Harvesting cut them off.

But if there are lines that weren't viable (and they were still useful for real research), then okay.

These lines can be identified?

[Mr Nobody]

Apparently yes.

One of the girls I did my degree with researches in this area, in Singapore at the time, in a fertility clinic. Obviously working in the other end of the business, in vitro and implantation, not harvesting stem cells. But the ones that need discarding, yes, they are identified before implantation, so yes, they can be identified. I assume that they are useful for stem cells if harvested immediately, I can think of no reason why not, although stem cells weren't the issue. We were catching up on about 10 years of history over beer, so I didn't ask how. And that would have been about 10 years or more ago, so the science would be better now.

And anyway, what do they do with the viable ones that are superfluous to needs? They only need one baby after all (not sure how many it takes to make a baby, on average.) . They flush them, too. No one else wants them.

The problem seems to be to get the two sides of the coin working together.

[Lotus Eater]

"Could have attained consciousness" is way too dodgy a concept to work on. How far back do you extrapolate this potential "potential"? To the morning after pill, to using contraception, to not masturbating for guys? All of this is wasted "potential that COULD have attained consciousness".

But why would there be objections to using tissue material that regenerates (like blood or kidneys), is already used but no longer needed (other organ transplants from the clinically dead) or is already NOT going to attain consciousness for other reasons - abortions, miscarriages, 'end-line' development, or too many fertilised cells?

My biggest objection - and by ruling it out, also the biggest safeguard - is payment for the original 'owners' of these tissues. For me - it should be a donation, pure and simple - no material gain at all. This prevents the 'harvesting' of people for their organs, the illegal processes that could be involved and solves a couple of the other ethical issues.

From memory Mr. N they usually do an invitro fertilzation of about 5 or 6 - then hope to pick the best for implantation.

For me this honours the potential, merely in a different way.

[Mr Nobody]

That matches my memory from another source. I think back then they did more - a LOT more, like 20 or so.

[Lotus Eater]

IN the early days it was an accelerated 'ripening' process followed by insemination and then wait and watch for the best ones. Today I think it is down to about 5 or 6. Sometimes they implanted 5 or 6 and so early IVF people had the potential of having multiple births - highly dangerous especially when you are talking quins or more.

[Mr Nobody]

IN the News today: A snippet:

Aussie of the Year makes stem cell plea
Tuesday Aug 22 10:35 AEST
Australian of the Year Professor Ian Frazer has written to federal politicians urging them to make the "right decisions" on therapeutic cloning.

As MPs prepare for a conscience vote on whether to overturn a 2002 ban on therapeutic cloning, Professor Frazer assured them scientists can create stem-cells that have no potential for growing into humans.


The Link: news.ninemsn.com.au/article.aspx?id=74235

I think that closes the case.

[Newbs]

One of the few bits of good news coming out of Hoganland of late is that little Johnnie has allowed a conscience vote on stem cell research. This means enough Liberals (read arch conservatives) will actually side with Labour to bring about some legal stem cell research.