There is that...

I've read a couple of really interesting stories in the last couple of weeks furthering the stem cell issue I wrote about last month.  First, the really interesting news: last week, scientists announced that they had developed a method of collecting an embryonic stem cell from a growing embryo (8 cells large, the size grown for in vitro fertilization procedures) without killing the embryo (indeed, the embryo can be successfully implanted with the same rate of success observed in normal in vitro fertilization procedures).  If the results of this study can be replicated (and it seems likely given the success reported in this paper), I would be very hard-pressed to drum up any opposition to the use of embryonic stem cells in research.  Again, assuming this is true (and removing the reason all these embryos are sitting around in the first place), I have difficulty identifying a moral problem with taking a single cell from a "living" organism if you do not compromise that organism in any real way (we do it all the time to ourselves - think blood tests, throat swabs, etc.)  However, the Catholic church is still not impressed, suggesting that this method amounts to killing two embryos instead of just one.  Scientifically, I don't understand how this argument makes any sense whatsoever.  I can't help but think that we as Christians continually shoot ourselves in the foot in so many ways when commenting on moral issues or scientific issues like this.  Through sheer ignorance or a deep mistrust of science, we have often taken what was a very legitimate moral debate (such as the destruction of embryos for harvesting stem cells) and then blown our credibility by refusing to acknowledge when a good scientific solution to a moral barrier to scientific advancement has been achieved.  Next time we raise the flag on some very important and legitimate issue in this field, maybe people won't take us as seriously as perhaps they should. 

Want an example of such an issue? (cue perfect seguay)  Check out this story about athletes who are essentially farming stem cells (not embryonic as was originally stated - sorry for the editing error) from their kids' umbilical cords just in case they have an injury and the stem cells can be used to reconstruct the tissue they have damaged, enabling them to continue their athletic career.  Essentially, they are wanting to use their kids' cells as a personal "repair kit" to prolong their highly lucrative jobs.  Although it should be noted that we don't know enough about stem cell signaling to actually make this happen yet, this is pretty scary stuff.  The purpose of having kids shouldn't have anything to do with generating "spare parts" for yourself; however, that could very well happen in this case.  On the other hand, just to illustrate how not black-and-white any of this debate is, there is a thought-provoking quote at the end of the article from one of the advocates of the idea: 

"There's a kid who's giving 70 per cent of his liver to his father in the hospital (in Toronto).  What if he could say, `Want some stem cells from my umbilical cord blood, we can grow you a new liver here?' Which is preferable? Is it ethical to give his father his liver surgically but not to have some of his umbilical cord blood?"

A fascinating question - I don't know how to respond really.  Making decisions on rules for using this technology which prevent abuse but also do not defy common sense is not easy. 

As a sidenote, I was talking to one of the stem cell researchers in our lab who is (for some reason) trying to generate oostcytes (egg cells) from stem cells (to me, this seems to be reverse engineering at its most bizarre).  I can assure you that even some of the people doing work in this field have mixed feelings about it, even without the religious perspective.