Nebraska Rejects Human Cloning Research
Nebraska has easily passed into law a ban on any state funding of human cloning research and banning any state facility from doing human SCNT. From the story:
The measure prohibits the use of state money or facilities for creating or destroying embryos for stem cell research using a technique commonly referred to as therapeutic cloning. At the same time, the new law allows research using existing lines of stem cells to continue. As part of the compromise brokered by Senator Steve Lathrop of Omaha, groups opposing the destruction or creation of embryos for research agreed not to push for further cloning legislation under three conditions:Of course, any existing stem cell lines would not be from cloned embryos since they have yet to be created successfully.
- if there are no attempts at private-sector research involving cloning;
- if advancements in cloning do not raise new ethical dilemmas;
- and if there are no violations of the new law.
My sources told me that this was going to be a hard sell. The fact that it went through so easily, it seems to me, is an indication of the profound political changes in this field wrought by the IPSC breakthrough.
Congratulations to Nebraska. More of this kind of law, please.
Congratulations to Nebraska. More of this kind of law, please.
Labels: Nebraska. Therapeutic Cloning
posted by Wesley J. Smith @ 8:14 PM
16 Comments
16 Comments:
I had no idea the Philadelphia Phillies were this passionate about the legislation in Nebraska.
Congratultions Nebraska !
You just ensured that no major bioscience industry will ever consider developing facilities in your state.
In fact anyone with the intelligence to do genetic research will likely be leaving your universities for greener pastures.
Now how bout that genetically modified corn you've been growing...
Why, Swan? Nebraska just paved the way for ethical research to continue within its boundaries. You have more time to focus on ethical research (ASCs, iPSCs, chemical therapies), when you're not wasting time on unethical ones (creating new human beings only to kill them).
hmmm, the technology you say is a waste of time, SCNT, is what lead to the discovery of IPSC. You should really pay attention to the chain of current events.
Answer this then
Does a doner cell in an enucleated egg constitute a person if no pluripotent stem cells are induced?
I'd like to see Wesley answer this question as well.
Dark Swan: SCNT has not been done in human beings to the point that the embryo was developed to the point that ES cells could be derived. SCNT is not a synonym for ESCR. If SCNT was involved it was only with animals.
Please get your science right. Otherwise, we can't have a debate because it is based on whisps of steam rather than the factual foundation required to argue from empirical data.
Scientists said that embryonic stem cells were needed. That isn't SCNT. The Bush qualified lines were perfectly appropriate for that work, and remain so.
Dark Swan, ESCR stands for "embryonic stem cell research." SCNT stands for "somatic cell nuclear transfer," also known as cloning.
Actually SCNT is a method of ESCr.
Thomson credits his interest and discovery of IPSc directly to the research and findings of Wilmut's methods of ESCr using SCNT.
You are consistently inaccurate DS: ESCR is one POTENTIAL USE of an embryo created via SCNT. But so is reproductive cloning or fetal farming, which would use the same SCNT method of creating the cloned organism.
ESCR is similarly, one potential use of a fertilized embryo, but that doesn't make fertilization ESCR.
If you are going to make ethical judgments, they should be based on accurate biology.
"Actually SCNT is a method of ESCr."
And here you reveal your ignorance again, DS. SCNT is a method of creating an embryo; ESCR is research on that embryo's stem cells. It's the difference between breeding a lab animal and then experiementing on that animal. They are related actions, but not the same one.
SCNT is a method of ESCr.
ESCr uses SCNT as a method.
In the "Scientific Method" a series of methods are often employed to control and observe experiments in various ways.
Cultivating ES cells via SCNT is one of the methods used in ESCr experiments - is that to hard to understand?
play it forward, play it back ward it still remains true. sorry if you're unable to deduce the logic.
I never stated SCNT couldn't be used for Reproductive cloning, as you falsely assert Wesley. You just choose to misconstrue something I never said by adding to it. is that what you call Strawman?
Wesley J. Smith said...
You are consistently inaccurate DS: ESCR is one POTENTIAL USE of an embryo created via SCNT.
Go back to Logic 101 and assess this statement:
"SCNT is a method of ESCr"
Wesley - where did I say that ESCr is the ONLY use for SCNT. I didnt.
To assert that SCNT is not a method in ESCr is so far out of touch with reality its laughable. I'd like to here that stated in front of a critical peer review.
They are related actions, but not the same one. bmmg
bm you seem to be grasping for an argument again - yet you just reaffirm my statement - I dont think its to difficult to see how extracting ES cells (via SCNT in this case) is part of the process of ESCr. In fact, cultivating these cells is a major part of the research process and takes up large amounts of resources. But if you want to travel down another meaningless tangent- you go on ahead.
You people have a bad habit of losing focus on the topic though.
Back to the point - Drop me the line next the next time private industry makes a major bioscience investment in Nebraska, I'll be the first to admit I was wrong.
Until then expect a long drought of new development in the bioscience industry due to the restrictive shackles imposed on stem cell research in Big Red. People with Bioscience investment capitol will head for Greener pastures.
DS: Sorry, I am in reality and in accurate biology. SCNT isn't stem cell research at all. That is a different and distinct area of biotechnology. That's the biology, pal, if we want to be precise. Of course, people like your pal Neaves conjoin the two into "stem cell research," for political reasons. But that is hardly good science.
Yes, scientists want to do ESCR on cells obtained from SCNT-created embryos. But the two endeavors are very different things.
But I have had enough of going around in circles on this with you.
SCNT isn't stem cell research at all.
I never said that. You keep repeating a false assumption which keeps driving you in circles, Wesley.
If there is ambiguity in terms perhaps the best thing is to ask for a clarification instead of an attack which diverts from the general discussion, as we'v edone here.
Yes we know that SCNT is a way of extracting ESCs. I didn't know we had to belabor this point..but I guess we do here.
Again. I said SCNT is a method of ESCr, I never said it was ESCr. You guys added this and then argued against it.
If you will allow me to clarify the term 'method' as a common courtesy then we could have rational discussion.
By using the term method, I meant its a way, process, system, routine, approach, procedure, function ect....used in ESCr.
Please don't be so arrogant to act as if I dont know that experiments and other functions are part of ESCr. By my definition, there are many methods that encompass ESCr.
Many steps (methods) that must be employed in order to accomplish the entire act of doing stem cell research.
You may not agree that the act of acquiring ESC's is part of ESCr, but to act as if Im nuts for including the procedure of extracting ESCs as part of the process of ESCr is being belligerent.
My definition of medical research is not just observing the experiment, but the entire process of analyzing data and the support structures that contribute to the resulting data. Just as observation is only one of the steps in the Scientific METHOD.
When you talk down to people and dont even offer a basic level of assumption for elementary points then you lead your arguments in circles.
Dark Swan: You are just factually wrong:
"Yes we know that SCNT is a way of extracting ESCs" No it isn't, it is a way of creating an embryo through asexual means.
"I meant its a way, process, system, routine, approach, procedure, function ect....used in ESCr." Sort of. It is, in theory, performed prior to ESCR to create a tailor made, patient specific embryo. Once that embryo reaches the one week develoment stage, it is destroyed to derive ESCs. This hasn't been accomplished yet in humans.
You don't have the right to create definitions that suit you. We need accurate definitions in order to discuss the ethics of the matter.
This post was about NE outlawing state funding for SCNT, that is the asexual creation of a human embryo. It does not prevent state funding for ESCR.
Moreover, I suggested that the creation of IPSCs may have made this an easy sell, since it allows the derivation of patient specific, tailor made pluripotent stem cells without regard to the use of ESCs from cloned embryos you support without cloning human life.
But enough. If you have other matters you wish to discuss about this, we won't belabor these matters. What else would you like to say?
I asked this earlier, but I'll try again.
Would a donor cell inside an enucleated egg constitute a person if no pluripotent stem cells are induced?
Would a donor cell only constitute a person if PSCs are sucessfully induced and able to communicate with external stimulus?
Given through fertilization of the sperm and ovum a zygote undergoes mitosis.
Please describe what physiological processes are occurring that define when you beleive a person has been created via SCNT..
"Cultivating ES cells via SCNT is one of the methods used in ESCr experiments..."
No, it isn't. It is a way to OBTAIN or, more accurately in this case, to CREATE embryonic stem cells -- namely, by creating a new human embryo first. You have to HAVE embryonic stem cells before you can conduct an experiment on them.
Nebraska has made all cloning ("therapeutic" and "reproductive") illegal. That's it. Embryos can still be destroyed for medical research, and both embryonic and adult stem cell research can take place. Only SCNT has been outlawed; ESCR has not.
"Please describe what physiological processes are occurring that define when you beleive a person has been created via SCNT.."
Again, Dolly the Sheep was created via SCNT. She was never the conventional product of sperm and ovum. So...was Dolly really a sheep? I'd say most people would say so. Once we know that a human embryo is a human being (just as an ovine embryo is a sheep), we can then also see that an embryo created via SCNT is similar to one created via fertilization (whether in vivo or in vitro).
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