Bush Pwnt?Follow

That's possible and I can't see the future, but I don't see it as likely. Many cells can be grown and harvested from a single cluster of embryotic cells. That's why the administration was able to say "We have this many lines of embryonic cells you have permission to use". It's actually easier to be able to grow a line of cells and use it continually than to start from scratch every time you need more cells to work with.

Barring a major development in IVF which makes multiple embryos unnecessary, I don't see the supply running out.

The "federally approved" strains are contaminated with some non-human molecules due to their being grown on "feeders" made of murine and/or bovine serum. The concern is that any thereputic treatments for human use designed from these strains will be rejected by the human immune system due to their foreign element.

Edited, Jan 16th 2007 6:11pm by Jophiel

I didn't really see the asthma & Alzheimer's statement as indicating anything other than the fact that the average reader has no basis for comparison when told "We spent $X NIH dollars on this research". Is $X a lot? A little? It is 1% of what we spend on studying head lice or is it 10000x more than we spend studying AIDS? How are you going to know without being given a few other numbers of things from the same basic field?

But, regardless, I don't really give a drowned rat's *** what the USA Today article was trying to imply. I was merely pointing out the fact that your federal funding numbers were way, way off and that human embryonic research constituted a small fraction of the total amount spend on stem cell research which was in direct opposition to your claims.

If going on about perceived bias in USA Today makes you feel better about it, by all means, knock yourself out. When you're done stroking yourself with that though, I'd appreciate those statements from the scientific community saying that embryonic research is now obsolete. Maybe you can rib me about that, instead.

Last year, the government spent ~$1.2bil on cancer research and ~$2.9bil on AIDS research.

USA Today should have raised the bar and used those numbers instead of ******** with asthma. We could have had a billion dollars in embryonic research funding if only they included it in their article!

Edited, Jan 16th 2007 9:04pm by Jophiel

Yea yea whatever.

Did I mention that I <3 Moebiouslord?

I'll say it again. I have made *zero* claims relating to the relative amount of funding for ESC versus other things. Joph did that (and now you are). Not me. I was simply showing that there does exist funding for ESC research. Period. Thus, there is money on the line. I made this point purely in response to Joph (and someone else's) statements that implied that there was no funding and thus no motivation for anyone to make public statements outside of their published research in order to maintain that funding.

Stop reading your own assumptions into my posts. Sheesh!

This would be Gbaji's way of avoiding finding anyone from the cellular/genetic sciences who agrees that this study made embryonic research funding a dead cause.

'Cause all of them scientists lie and stuff.

No. It's my way of pointing out that there's a difference between what scientists say in their papers and what they say when asked about funding for research. You will pretty much *never* find a scientist who'll say that <insert area of research here> should not be funded. No matter what it is, or what it's relation is to what they are researching. Thus, quoting a scientist saying that <some discovery> does not mean we shouldn't still fund <some other research> isn't really saying anything much.

Get it?

Does that mean someone will fund my phrenology research again now? Yay!

I don't have to understand anything at all about the science in question to know that the scientists themselves will almost always support further and increased funding for research.

That's why they don't get to decide these things. The decision is made based on the viability of their research, not on their opinions as to whether more funding should be made available. To parallel Kao's line of thinking, if we listened to those opinions instead of assessing the science itself, we likely *would* still be funding phrenology.

I could make a pretty strong argument that it's the lack of the US trying to "control Iraq" that has led to most of the violence in the region. It's exactly because we're working through a process that gives the Iraqi's themselves control over their own destiny that has caused the faction fighting to erupt as it has.

If the US had simply placed a dictator that we liked in power and provided support for that new regime, odds are there'd be very little violence in Iraq right now. But sometimes, heck most of the time, doing the "right thing" costs more in money and lives then doing the easy thing.

Something that you Europeans could do well to learn.



It's not that you presented facts that I have a problem with. It's that you made no attempt to fill in the middle part between fact and conclusion with... what's that thing called...? an argument. Actually, to be more accurate, you didn't even bother with the conclusion either (but one was implied: We're wasting money on the war that could be spent on stem cell research instead").

That's what I was observing. I've noticed a growing trend in the past decade where actual arguments are stripped out of debate. Instead people simply present facts and leap to a conclusion, all without taking the pesky steps of actually saying *why* those facts support said conclusion. It's certainly pithy. It can certainly be "clever". It may even be "saracastic humor". And if so many people didn't simply swallow such statements and think they represented valid arguments, I'd have no problem with it. But you know, and I know that the purpose of you making a statement like that is precisely to sway people to a point of view.

The fact that you've not actually bothered to argue it doesn't really matter if the tactic you use does succeed in swaying people. Right?

Yes. Except that you are in essense arguing that since a scientist said that his research should not result in a shift or change in funding to some other area that we should take that as a solid reason to continue funding that other area.

I'm stating that we should assess the research data itself instead. I'll certainly admit that I'm using my minimal knowledge of the science to take a position. You'll note, however, that I have not argued once for a reduction in funding for ESC. I've not even argued against increasing that funding. I've simply stated that Congress's attempt to change the law preventing federal funding of the harvesting of new ESC lines is not well supported by those research results.

I've *also* injected my opinion that should amniotic stem cells work out and prove to be everything the research indicates that they are, that this will remove the need to continue funding ESC. That's conditional though. The only thing I've stated as an absolute based on what we know right now is Congress's act doesn't make sense given the new research. I've stated on multiple occasions that should it be discovered that amniotic stem cells wont do what ESC will, that we should re-assess that. But we should do it *then*, not now.


I'll also point out that the quote in question about continuing to fund ESC *also* did not state that we must change the law regarding federally funding the harvesting of new embryonic stem cell lines. He only talked about funding in general. My only point regarding his statement was that it did not support the core of what you were arguing (that Congress was right on this and Bush is wrong to veto). The fact that it's doubly so is just that: Doubly so. Not only should we take the research opinions of a research scientist with a grain of salt, we also can't interpret his statement as a claim that congress was right to attempt to change the law banning federal funds for new ESC harvesting.


We can go around and around arguing semantics until we're blue in the face. My point is and has been that Congress was stupid to push this issue right now. They were vetoed before when there was less solid science supporting a viable alternative method of obtaining pluripotent stem cells. Bush's veto now has much more solid scientific backing and was the right thing to do IMO. Of all the things they (the Dems in this case) could have picked to create an "issue", this one has huge potential to backfire on them. It's not like christian fundamentalists are the only ones with ethical concerns about harvesting embryo's for scientific research. That ethical issue cuts deeply across political lines.

I just think it was a mistake. I also happen to believe they're wrong. I have a firm belief (and I'll admit right off the bat that this is not scientific) that there are other means to obtain the research we need and the cures we desire without crossing that ethical line. I've stated this in past threads we've had on this subject. It just seems bizarre to me that as the science has moved in a direction that backs up my "gut feeling" on this, some people seem to become even more firm in their stance that we must lift that ban. I think that's wrong on many levels. From a purely political perspective, it's contrarian politics at it's worse and only serves to create a void between moderates and the hard core "we oppose anything Bush does" liberals. From an ethical standpoint, it's even less understandable to me.

Well, when politicans are attempting to use hs study as a basis to prevent that funding then, yeah, I'd say the opinion and analysis of the guy who wrote the study is pretty critical. Much moreso than that of a random Congresscritter who probably couldn't pass a Biology 101 test but suddenly declares the study as "solid scientific backing" to promote his cause.Except that, absent any scientific consensus that embryonic research is unnecessary, it doesn't.