…and this is a 
More stem cell talk
Category: Politics • Reproduction
Posted on: July 19, 2006 12:32 PM, by PZ Myers
DarkSyde is on the stem cell story, and he uses Neurotopia's summary of the biology.
I just don't understand the other side's argument. Adult stem cells are not a substitute for embryonic stem cells, at least not yet. The anti-stem cell research crowd wants to claim that we don't need ES cells, that AS cells will do everything we need, but they don't think it through. If we want to make AS cells that are functionally equivalent to ES cells, we need to understand ES cells—but they want to deny us the ability to look at ES cells. Furthermore, if we could convert an AS cell line to totipotency what we'd have is…millions of cells we could replicate in the lab, each of which has the potential to become a human being. We'd go from a few "snowflakes" to a blizzard. Then what?
Comments
Of course you can't understand their argument; it's because you live in a different universe.
See, most people on the other side of this one simply don't believe humans come from cells; they believe they come from parents, but conception is somehow a mystical event that embues humanity upon the offspring.
"Belief" may be a strong word here.. it's more likely just an unsettling feeling.
The problem is.. if humans really are just a bunch of genes wrapped up in a yummy stem cell package, why does god talk to them.
---Nathaniel
(Answer: because they haven't taken their meds.)
Posted by: DrNathaniel | July 19, 2006 12:46 PM
This, from an AP article on the issue yesterday:
"The simple answer is [Bush] thinks murder's wrong," said White House spokesman Tony Snow. "The president is not going to get on the slippery slope of taking something living and making it dead for the purposes of scientific research."
I'm not real well-versed in the details of this technology ("Everything I Know About Stem Cell Research I Learned On Pharyngula," now in paperback). But still, there are a couple of things that should be obvious: The point of stem cells is not to make something dead, but to create a LINE. That's far from dead--it's like frigging immortality. Or at least as close to it as we humans can come. Also, if that's really the president's position, should labs that do experiments on animals be worried? Because the way what Snow said is worded, I can't see how those LD50 experiments for toxicity could continue. Has the FDA been told yet that this is its new position?
Of all the ignorant and imperious things this pathetic president has done, having his first (and who knows--perhaps only) veto be of something that has wide democratic and scientific on the basis of a narrow and dubious ideology is the worst. Six years, and the man has done one thing I approve of--created the nature preserve area northwest of Hawaii. And ten to one he finds a way to F that up, too.
Posted by: Greg Peterson | July 19, 2006 12:57 PM
Your argument, dear Dr Myers, isn't entirely logical. Yes, AS-to-ES cell converts could potentially become human beings but only after having their nuclei transfered (nt) into an enucleated oocyte - the ES cell by itself does not have that capacity. By your reasoning one would have to outlaw all work on tissue culture because nuclei from most cell types can probably (and many have) be used for nt - albeit apparently with different degrees of efficiency. The issue, is that making ES cells requires destruction of a blastocyst, which apparently many people find objectionable. The use of AS-to-ES converts does not. Whether AS cells actually need to be converted to ES cells or whether they have an innate pluripotency resembling that of ES cells will have to be demonstrated. My suspicion is that the ability to differentiate into different differentiated cell types will vary among AS cell types.
Posted by: kamensind | July 19, 2006 1:08 PM
Eeeeevery embryonicstemcell is saaaaacred
Eeeevery embryonicstemcell is graaaaaaced
Whenever an embryonicstemcell is waaaaaasted
God gets quite iraaaaate...
C'mon, boys and girls, SING!
Posted by: mjfgates | July 19, 2006 1:17 PM
I wonder if the other side's argument stems from an inability (or an unwillingness) to acknowldge shades of gray. Think about their arguments: a living thing is either a full-fledged human being or it isn't; you're with us, or you're with the terrorists; the Bible is either the inerrant word of God, or it's completely false; you are either one of the Saved or you are hellbound.
It's a very seductive way of looking at the world. It clearly divides people into us (good) and them (bad). So long as you're one of the "us," things will work out in the end.
Posted by: Narc | July 19, 2006 1:40 PM
"We'd go from a few "snowflakes" to a blizzard. Then what?"
Since those would be from adult stem cells, they'd all be clones, so they wouldn't have a soul, and therefore wouldn't be worth worrying about. Duh.
Posted by: Carlie | July 19, 2006 1:46 PM
My suspicion is that the ability to differentiate into different differentiated cell types will vary among AS cell types.
So far, from everything I have so far heard, seen or read on the subject, the amount of differentiation in "all" AS cells so far has been close to 0. Seems that close proximity to other cells may prime them to become those cells, even when they have not "become" one yet, or something. See, its the "or something" that is the problem. We simply don't know. If we can't determine "exactly" what genes are active and inactive and why in an ES, that isn't in an AS, and what causes the transition into AS, or other cells, that question won't be answerable. We will be stuck in the insane stupidity of dark ages medicine or alchemy, trying to stick AS into various places in someone's body and hoping it will produce nerves, instead of bones, for example. Without that answer of "why" they differ, we can't even start the complicated process of figuring out "if" AS cells can be used, how to make them behave if we can, or what causes them to not work in specific cases.
Its like the various projects to recreate the Windows API for Linux. Not one of which is 100% right, half of which require you transplant "working" copies from a real installation to work correctly, etc. Because the ES, in this case the API, is closed and illegal to take appart, your forced to look at the AS (software behaviour), and **guess** what it is actually doing. Its certainly not impossible, but its buggy, complicated, confusing and tends to fail 90% of the time. Nor is it always clear why it works the 10% of the time it does. If we want a cure for some stuff in our life times, we need ES, but if we are willing to wait 100 years....
Posted by: Kagehi | July 19, 2006 2:01 PM
So, does the soul come from the oocyte, or from the nucleus? And if the former, what happens if a soul happens to come into possession of the wrong genetic material? And what happens to identical twins; does the soul happen to undergo binary fission at the same time as the division of the embryo? Or does God have to provide an emergency soul?
And consider the following fiendish experiment; you take the divided oocyte at the two-cell stage, when each cell is pluripotent, and separate the two cells. You use one for research, and implant the other. Have you destroyed a human life?
Posted by: Gerard Harbison | July 19, 2006 2:15 PM
Just a point of clarification:
"If we want to make AS cells that are functionally equivalent to ES cells, we need to understand ES cells--but they want to deny us the ability to look at ES cells."
By opposing the stem cell funding bill they are *not* denying anyone the ability to look at ES cells, they are denying the government the ability to use everyone's tax dollars for that purpose.
What bothers me about Bush's veto is not that it is cutting government funding for scientific research--that's a libertarian principle that I'm for. No, what bothers me is that he's differentiating funding levels based on religious principles. As a libertarian, the fact that he's vetoing the bill *should* be a net positive for me because it gets the government out of at least one small area of science. But because the principle underlying the veto is so screwed up, those principles in the end are going to make things worse off for people of my political leanings.
An interesting market-based look at stem cell research, as well as the increase in private donations int he wake of the government's ban on funding embryonic stem cell research here:
http://www.tothepeople.com/2006/07/overdosed-on-stem-cells-yet_19.html
Posted by: Jim | July 19, 2006 2:29 PM
Hmmm, I may have overstated my point a little. I believe there are those social conservatives who would criminalize embryonic stem cell research, but that is a different debate than whether the federal government should fund embryonic stem cell research.
Posted by: Jim | July 19, 2006 2:31 PM
Most like it is opposed by people who do not understand what embryonic stem cell research actually consists of but do have a vague grasp of a few key words.
blastocyst = embryo = fetus = baby
Oh my god they are killing babies! They are probably sucking their innards out with a big scary needle then throwing away the husks!
Most likely they also do not understand where the blastocysts come from nor that they are slated to be destroyed anyway. In all likelihood they don't really care. If they did they would be swarming fertility clinics to adopt the blastocysts slated for destruction.
Everyone has to remember that this is not a debate between two groups of rational people with coequal points of view. The opponents of embryonic stem cell research made up their minds the instant they read or heard the words embryonic and research. No amount of logic, facts, benefits, or rational discussion will ever convince them that embryonic stem cell research is a good idea. They have adopted their point of view on this matter as a part of tribal identity. I believe in X, I consider myself a good person, good people believe X, if you disagree you are evil.
The only option that I can see is to keep the debate public. Show the other side to be the ignorant hypocrites that they are so that those who have not made up their minds can have all the facts and come to their conclusions honestly.
Posted by: commissarjs | July 19, 2006 2:43 PM
So far, from everything I have so far heard, seen or read on the subject, the amount of differentiation in "all" AS cells so far has been close to 0
I assume that what you are referring to is differentiation of adult stem cells derived from one tissue (e.g. neuronal stem cells) into a differentiated cell of another. That adult stem cells, such as neuronal stem cells can differentiate into neurons has been well documented. By contrast, the question of whether a neuronal stem cell can differentiate into an insulin producing b-cell, for example, you are right, the evidence for that is flimsy. So the use of adult stem cells might have significant limitations.
I assume that within a few years we will know how an oocyte manages to reprogram a differentiated nucleus into one with pluripotency. Then we might be able to turn any body cell back into an ES-like cell and the whole discussion of whether an embryo is equivalent to a person will become moot. In the meantime we should focus research on both types of cells, ES and AS cells.
Posted by: kamensind | July 19, 2006 2:46 PM
And consider the following fiendish experiment; you take the divided oocyte at the two-cell stage, when each cell is pluripotent, and separate the two cells. You use one for research, and implant the other. Have you destroyed a human life?
This has, indeed, been accomplished by removal of embryonic cells from an eight-cell embryo. Any selfrespecting every-embryo-is-sacred nut would argue that if you split an embryo and both halves turn into blastocysts you have in fact generated two "human persons" and killing the second one would just be as wrong as knocking off the first one.
Posted by: kamensind | July 19, 2006 2:59 PM
Narc, someone summed this up (I can't remember where I read it but I think it was a 20th-century French thinker):
Rightists tend to see society as more or less a uniform whole. In their view, the majority of people in a society agree on what is "right" and "wrong". If they don't, they either enemies as noted below, or have been misled.
Everyone else is an enemy of the society, whether they are internal or external. This is why righties use simplistic labels like "communist" and "terrorist" and "rogue state" to refer to external enemies. Internal enemies are labelled in such a way as to exclude them from "proper" society--to make it clear they don't belong, hence terms like "un-American", "godless", "elitist", etc.
Posted by: False Prophet | July 19, 2006 3:09 PM
What I find most ironic about Bush's pose with the "snowflakes" is the fact that embryo implantation is not a foolproof procedure. It can be argued that any couple who chooses to "adopt" embryos and has failed implantation(s) is guilty of murder(s). After all, if the little darlings had remained frozen, they would be "not dead", wouldn't they?
One consolation is that there are other sources of funding for stem cell research, Dubya will go down in history as the stupidest President we've ever had, and "George" will become the slang term for "willfully moronic". [With apologies to those of you innocently named George by parents who had no idea...]
Posted by: DominEditrix | July 19, 2006 3:20 PM
To see the politics of the stem cell debate explained with visuals and how the Bush argument is ultimately an absurd manipulation of the facts...link here:
www.thoughttheater.com
Posted by: Daniel DiRito | July 19, 2006 3:27 PM
Well, that's the problem with the whole binary life/nolife thang. It doesn't survive even minimal philosophical inquiry.
Posted by: Gerard Harbison | July 19, 2006 3:31 PM
This is not an issue of need. The adult stem cell argument discussion is aimed only at appeasing the uninformed folk in the middle ground. The idea is those people that do not support the ban on embryonic stem cells, might go along with / tolerate the ban if they feel that ESC's are not critical to medical success.
The ban is purely a religious ban from those that believe an embryo is a human life with the rights and protections of any post birth human (sans convicted felons on death row who are obviously no longer humans in these religious views somehow - sans Catholics who I respect, yet disagree, due to their consistency in opposition to the death penalty).
Bush is hypocrite. He supports state sponsored murder and torture of human life yet vetoes this bill the relies on the use of embryos that are far from developed into a human. This is the most muddled, confused and inane view possible ... but it is a Bush-league view.
Posted by: George | July 19, 2006 3:33 PM
Somewhat off-topic, but what the hell... I'm curious as to who you think would do science in the absence of government funding. The amound of science funded by private philanthropists and public corporations is miniscule compared to government funding. And it's not (just) because corporations are too short-sighted, it's due to the nature of science.
One of the key elements of strong science programs is openness. You write your paper using what you learned from someone else's work, and someone yet else goes on to build on yours. The net benefit is to the general population, not to the specific researcher. Corporations have a responsibility to maximize their profit, which makes large-scale sponsoring of science difficult to impossible.
Personally, I suspect many corporations would serve their long-term interests better by maintaining a stronger research program, but let's face it, who's going to drop 10 billion dollars on science when the benefit accrues almost equally to you and your competitors?
Think about the corporation that historically had the most vigorous program in basic research: Bell Labs. Oh, how about that, funded by their government-sanctioned monopolistic pricing structure. What happened to Bell Labs when they no longer had that income? Shrinkage.
Science is inherently a type of commons; the cost is borne by the researcher, while the benefit accrues to all. If you can think of a workable way to internalize those externalities, great! Until then, the government is going to be the primary funding source for basic science.
Posted by: Johnny Vector | July 19, 2006 3:35 PM
If, as research suggests, over fifty per cent of concepta end in spontaneous abortion, is it beyond the wit of man to recover embryonic stem cells from this source?
Posted by: Ian H Spedding | July 19, 2006 3:46 PM
In libertarian universe, all commons should be eliminated. If science is a common, well, then just get rid of this Evil Socialist Theft. ( I 've seen one who seriously proposed that the atmosphere should be made unbreathable so we would have to buy air in bottles )
Posted by: T_U_T | July 19, 2006 3:50 PM
Question: can anyone here point to where embryonic stem cells are beating out adult stem cells when it comes to actual treatments and cures? Anyone? Beuller? Beuller? Beuller? Frye? Frye?
Research is all well and good, folks, but at what point do you decide that the research isn't going anywhere and never will? At what point do you decide to start putting time, effort and money towards helping people instead of feeding them vast - but empty - promises?
Posted by: Jason | July 19, 2006 3:52 PM
Ian: I'm not expert, but cells from aborted concepta might be flawed material -- there could be a reason they aborted, e.g. bad chromosomes.
Posted by: Damien | July 19, 2006 3:57 PM
Jason:
Numbers (of the non-David-Prentice variety) on investments in AS vs. ES research and documentation of "actual treatments and cures" from each?
Posted by: rrt | July 19, 2006 4:01 PM
So, does the soul come from the oocyte, or from the nucleus...
This calls for an experiment. Easily enough done: which is the better dancer?
Personally, I think I'm going to argue that the soul travels in the mitochondria, just for the hell of it. We can get the fundies on board by pointing out that that mitochondrial reproduction is essentially asexual; I'm sure they'd love that. Ramifications are:
1. You don't get your soul from your daddy.
2. Every time a man ejaculates, countless souls die. Even the soul of the lucky spermatazoan that makes it to the egg is still dooooomed.
(Yes, this is the correct spelling of 'dooooomed'. Sound it out.)
3. We can add a new colloquial term for menses. Now, in addition to saying 'Aunt Flo is paying me a visit', you can instead say 'Hi honey. Just so you know, I'm shedding souls.'
4. Mitochondrial Eve is also now known as 'Da Godmother of Soul'
Well, I'm off to write my paper.
Posted by: AJ Milne | July 19, 2006 4:03 PM
Research is all well and good, folks, but at what point do you decide that the research isn't going anywhere and never will? At what point do you decide to start putting time, effort and money towards helping people instead of feeding them vast - but empty - promises?
How about after giving it a good try? You know that it's not just a binary thing: either have no good research results, or have completion of all research. It's like cancer research -- we're doing better; we're not finished. It's been decades and we're not finished with cancer -- so should we stop doing any research on it? At what point do we give up on cancer research because we can't cure all forms of cancer at all times? Or do we keep going, getting slowly more knowlegdeable and having more results, just like every other form of research?
In other words, why should we treat stem cell research -- its funding and "when we give up on it" -- unlike any other form of research?
Posted by: QrazyQat | July 19, 2006 4:06 PM
Jason:
You might begin to suspect that research won't pan out once you've explored every reasonable avenue several times and failed. Even that won't rule out a later breakthrough, but it might argue for putting a particular project on the backburner and working on something that seems more likely to bear fruit.
You definitely don't make such a decision when basic research into a field is in its infancy. It will be amazing if stem cells do not have significant therapeutic value. That doesn't mean the research will pay off soon. E.g., it took several decades for microprocessors to pay off in measurable productivity. Lots of people thought that having many inexpensive computers around would be useful, but the value proposition was fairly specialized until maybe the mid-1980s when everyone suddenly saw the use of spreadsheets and word processors. It also took decades for automobiles to be obviously preferable to horse-drawn vehicles; for that matter, it took decades to turn the basic idea of an internal combustion engine into a functioning automobile.
That's how research works. The idea of just calling it quits because there is no shortcut for dummies is about the most moronic thing I've seen on this entire thread.
Posted by: PaulC | July 19, 2006 4:08 PM
AS: several dozen
ES: none
I provided a list in the comments of an earlier entry, but of course the well-referenced list was rejected pretty much sight unseen because of the [alleged] bias of the source.
Posted by: Jason | July 19, 2006 4:13 PM
I guess this is what you get when you don't RTFA. Now, it's true, the article ultimately linked combines state and private monies (federalism and libertarianism), but there were several examples you could have chosen from without having me cite them here--Geron, The Starr Foundation, Weill Cornell Medical College (from a private $15 million grant), an anonymous donor gave Johns Hopkins University a $58.5 million gift to launch an Institute for Cell Engineering, a grateful patient pledged $25 million over the next 10 years to finance stem-cell research at the University of Texas Health Science Center in Houston.
The truth is that government funding of research is so ingrained that it is seemingly hard for anyone within the system to even try envision how things would work any other way, ironically atypical for scientists IMO. Charitable foundations funded by private donations could place restrictions on their funding such as requiring results to be openly available. It's not all about corporations, much as those who love strawmen like to position libertarians solely as corporate lackeys.
And I'm not here to say "This is how it would work", because that is specifically both exactly the point and exactly not the point--in other words, I don't know what kind of a structure the market would end up adopting, but government systems are about people claiming to have the answers about how things should work rather than allowing them to work in their natural way.
Libertarians are about the progression of economics into optimal organization by its environment (the market,or market forces), which one might think would be naturally appealing to someone predisposed to evolution. Maybe not, but I don't know why.
Posted by: Jim | July 19, 2006 4:13 PM
Except there's no valid alternative to cancer research that has many proven treatments and cures, so your analogy doesn't fit.
But let's use your analogy and modify it to fit the situation: let's say that there are two lines of cancer research going on. One line is long on promises, but very, very short on results - there have been no results, in fact. Defenders of this line go on at length about how the critics of this research are "anti-science Christian fundies," but they never, ever address the problems with the research and the lack of results.
The other line of research has actually provided results: dozens and dozens of treatments and cures for many types of cancer. Critics of this line claim it's not as good as the other line and are ignorant or willfully blind to the treatments and cures produced by the other line of research.
So, who do you listen to? Which line of research do you put your support behind - the one with no treatments or cures or the one that has produced and continues to produce treatments and cures?
Posted by: Jason | July 19, 2006 4:21 PM
And many libertatarians don't understand externalities. Can you point me to a competent economist who thinks the market would support enough basic research that doesn't have short-term applications?
Posted by: Steve LaBonne | July 19, 2006 4:23 PM
Jim: one point that I heard someone make recently on NPR is that most labs mix government and private funding. This makes it difficult for them to do embryonic stem cell research because they need to guarantee that government funds are not used for that part of their research. I don't know the exact requirements, but, for instance the person interviewed claimed that a pipet purchased with federal government money could not be shared between unapproved embryonic stem cell research and other kinds of research.
I agree that you can envision doing research while restricting your funding sources, but labs are usually trying to get more funding, not less. They're also competing with other labs for the earliest breakthroughs. So the actual result of restricting government funding is not to cause labs to eschew such funding but to work on non-restricted research to keep their funding sources as healthy as possible.
Posted by: PaulC | July 19, 2006 4:23 PM
Yes, the "anti-stem cell research crowd" that supports adult stem cell research. Oooooo-kay. Way to be hilariously contradictory, PZ. I still find it amazing that you managed to get a PhD.
Posted by: Jason | July 19, 2006 4:25 PM
Jason:
If something has "many proven treatments and cures" that does not make it an alternative to something else unless it completely replaces it. Aspirin has surprisingly many proven uses, but it's not an alternative to some other treatment, provided that other treatment does even one thing that aspirin does not do.
If it were possible to take an adult stem cell and somehow convert it into the equivalent of an embryonic cell, then you would have a point. That technology does not currently exist. I don't think anyone here is suggesting that anyone stop researching the potential of adult stem cells. The point is not to limit the research to adult stem cells, since embryonic cells have properties that the adult cells lack.
Posted by: PaulC | July 19, 2006 4:32 PM
Jason, don't treat me like an idiot, and don't play the fool yourself, 'kay? You completely ignored the most important half of my question: What are the numbers for funding? How that relates to the existence of genuine (and I'm happy to recognize that you disagree on the definition of "genuine") treatments and cures is what I want to know. THAT'S where you could start to convince me.
But even so, by making this argument your bias is showing: If adult cell research was clearly going to be the most productive field, why would we ignore embryonic research? This situation would not make embryonic research worthless. Nor do I concede our Dear Leader's opinion that embryonic stem cells are human beings. This central point is frequently underplayed or ignored when this subject is discussed and debated in public, with a heavy emphasis on the potential for treatments and cures.
You ask: "At what point do you decide that the research isn't going anywhere and never will?" For me, the answer is most emphatically not "at the point I became a Christian."
Posted by: rrt | July 19, 2006 4:34 PM
Wow...what a zinger Jason. You nailed PZ but good man. Totally beat him down and crushed him. And way to go questioning his ability to get a PhD. Everyone here totally trusts your authority. I bet he bought his PhD from some outfit on the web for $129.00 (frame mounting extra).
Posted by: Alex | July 19, 2006 4:34 PM
"I bet he bought his PhD from some outfit on the web for $129.00 (frame mounting extra)."
Taking a leaf out of "Dr." Hovind's book, no doubt.
Posted by: j | July 19, 2006 4:37 PM
Jason - are you really this dense, or are you just trying to bait people? Lines of research, are, of course, not an all-or-nothing, either-or proposition. The number of advances that come out of one line of research (say, adult stem cells) has no bearing on the potential of another line of research (i.e. ES cells). It is possible, even probable, that both approaches will bear results and treatments, and it is certain that knowledge gained in one area informs and improves the other.
Your "logic" here is akin to the ID movement: you start with a premise (ES is bad because my god/church/pastor told me so) which you won't admit to, and then try to to use an (illogical) line of argument to prove a different point (i.e. ES is worthless because it hasn't solved the world's problems yet), which, it just so happens, is consistent with your original premise.
Posted by: Keith Wolter | July 19, 2006 4:38 PM
Because he did not include "embryonic" in anti-stem cell research crown, you're calling him out on that? Because you couldn't figure that out?
It says a whole lot more about you than it does about PZ. It's a blog, not a research paper. Get a grip.
Posted by: Jim | July 19, 2006 4:41 PM
Jason, quit being such a dick. There's not a reason in the world NOT to do ES research, and if scientists think there is a reason to continue research, then guess what? I'm going to pay attention to them rather than you. I find it more than a little hard to believe that researchers are clamoring for funding for a program without any promise, don't you? Or is this really Ann Coulter writing in, and you think scientists are part of that evil left that just wants to kill babies as a sort of sacrament? Grow up.
And just how vigorously, Jason, are you promoting barrier methods of contraception such as condoms? Have you convinced the Catholic Church and fundamentalist Christians to join you in this crusade? Because "natural family planning" results in nonviable fertilized eggs at a significantly higher rate than condom use does.
Posted by: Greg Peterson | July 19, 2006 4:41 PM
Well, if the AS-only crowd is against any and all research with ES for what's little more than a vaugely icky feeling, tinged with with religious misdirections and what can only be hopeless ignorance on the actual facts of stem cell research, I'd say, yes, the AS-only crowd is "anti-stem cell research". It's like the anti-choice crowd really being just against choice and not for the actual well-being of actual living humans. They lie and misdirect and try to cast the entire argument as a moral one, where the only morals that actually count are fundamentalist religious ones. Or the anti-gay marriage crowd. I really don't see the difference in any of the three.
Lies, misdirections and religious queasiness.
Posted by: Matt T. | July 19, 2006 4:41 PM
Who gets to decided when that time has come? People who blindly support ESCR (e.g. people here) or people who are well-informed about both sides?
So I guess we should restart the research into turning lead into gold. Who knows? There might be a breakthrough in some imaginary, distant future.
How about working on something that already HAS born bushels of fruit?
ESCR is NOT in it's infancy. At the very least, it's middle-aged.
[ridiculous and pointless false analogy to microprocessors ignored]
No shortcut for dummies or anyone else is needed. Just proven treatments and cures. Adult stem cells have them. Embryonic stem cells don't.
Incidentally, the most moronic thing I've seen on this thread and, in fact, the entire blog is the ignorance and just plain pig-headed rejection of proven adult stem cell treatments and cures. The second most moronic thing is the attack on people who support ASCR as "anti-stem cell research." The third most moronic thing is the half-baked, false analogies.
Posted by: Jason | July 19, 2006 4:43 PM
Nobody here is against adult stem cell research. What we don't understand is why anybody is against embryonic stem cell research.
Posted by: j | July 19, 2006 4:45 PM
If stem cells derrived from an adult are truly stem cells and could form any and all cell types, they, could form a human. Thus, under the proper circustance (albiet perhaps beyond our technology today) all adequate stem cells are potential humans. Yet, this is the objection Bush puts forth for banning use of ES cells. So AS cels are no substitute, on the religious basis.
Taking a bit of a leap, perhaps with advanced enough technology most any cell could be co-opted to form an embryo - so all cells have the potential...
No more biopsies for medical tests folks, those cells could be humans (blood tests may be okay if you take only red cells) .... no wait that would be a clone we can't have that... good grief no more medical practice allowed...
Really, this how silly the Bush position is.
My second objection to Bush's view, is that this is the imposition of the state establishing a religion. There is no scientific basis that establishes an embryo as a human. This is purely a theistic view.
Posted by: George | July 19, 2006 4:49 PM
Jason:
No, because we have a theoretical understanding of why it cannot be done chemically. We also know that it can in principle be done by other means, although the energy cost would be prohibitive and certainly not economical compared to other sources of gold. This is a moronic analogy (your specialty it seems), because we understand the issue in great depth and can come to very rigorous conclusions about what possibilities are feasible. Embryonic stem cell research is very new, despite your strenuous and uninformed protests to the contrary. Every day brings new insights into what could be possible.
Posted by: PaulC | July 19, 2006 4:51 PM
So I guess the short answer to my initial question is that no one can produce any evidence of embryonic stem cells beating out adult stem cells when it comes to actual (or even promised) treatments and cures. That's the same answer it always has been and always will be. No one has an answer, so you just vomit up all these red herrings and other logical fallacies to distract from it. Typical.
Well, be sure to let me know when embryonic stem cells start producing anything other than cancerous cells and other failures, m'kay? Also let me know when you succeed in turning lead into gold.
Posted by: Jason | July 19, 2006 4:51 PM
What's moronic is not researching ESCs because claims are made that it murdering a baby. Completely irrational and illogical. That argument currently is only made by authority. I have found no way to reason that it is murder. Period.
Posted by: Alex | July 19, 2006 4:53 PM
Jason:
Well they produced you, or was that covered under "failures."
Posted by: PaulC | July 19, 2006 4:53 PM
Uh, I don't see any of the organizations you mentioned in either DarkSyde's article or the Neurotopia article. Excuse me for not following every link on the web.
Uh huh. That's 1/10,000 of the NIH budget over the same time period, assuming NIH funding is flat. Notice all the numbers you mentioned start with an "m". I don't care how many millions you're talking about, it's a pittance compared to government spending.
If you think medical research should be reduced, go ahead and argue that, but if you think the private sector is going to come up with anything close to the current funding level for science, I want some of what you're smoking.
Come back when you're ready to explain how to internalize the inherent externality of scientific benefits, without turning all scientific results into trade secrets.
Thanx.
Posted by: Johnny Vector | July 19, 2006 4:54 PM
Hey, Jason, if you keep being this adorable, maybe the president will come up behind you and give your neck a little massage. That what you're after, Jas?
Posted by: Greg Peterson | July 19, 2006 4:54 PM
Turning lead into gold is technically possible. Can you tell us how? Read Pauls post. What red herrings and logical fallacies? How do you know that No treatments will be found? You sure like to beat your chest alot, but your positions are mostly made of straw.
Posted by: Alex | July 19, 2006 4:58 PM
So, again, Jason claims adult cell research has left embryonic cell research in the dust without addressing the disparity between the investment in both.
That's not an invalid question, right? Does anyone here know of any reason to expect embryonic research to produce results much slower than adult, given equivalent funding? It doesn't address the other point Jason's ignoring, that there's no reason to ignore embryonic research even if it does turn out to be a relatively barren field, but it's relevant to his claim that we should be seeing lots of embryonic-based results by now...no?
Posted by: rrt | July 19, 2006 5:00 PM
Milton Freidman.
Also, try something like this:
http://www.cato.org/testimony/ct-jt040997.html
It's easy to be dismissive when you entitle yourself to make sweeping generalizations such as "many libertarians don't understand externalities". Unfortunately that also makes you misinformed.
Posted by: Jim | July 19, 2006 5:01 PM
Sez Jason:
Well, be sure to let me know when embryonic stem cells start producing anything other than cancerous cells and other failures, m'kay? Also let me know when you succeed in turning lead into gold.
I'd call that statement asinine, but that's self evident.
What you fail to have grasped that everyone here has been saying is that you do not get to claim that a line of research is "invalid" because it doesn't turn up the results YOU think it should.
Among other things, finding stems cells that have become cancerous is actually an important discovery - merely one that leads in new directions for cancer research.
Research often turns up results that weren't expected, that doesn't invalidate the research.
The very efforts to turn "lead into gold" (better known as Alchemy), ultimately resulted in the work of Boyle that served as the basis for modern chemistry. Can you claim that Alchemy was invalid research? No - it just didn't turn up the results that were anticipated.
Posted by: Grog | July 19, 2006 5:05 PM
Milton Friedman. D'oh.
Posted by: Jim | July 19, 2006 5:06 PM
Jason, can you come up with a reason to pass a law that bans embryonic stem cell research?
Posted by: j | July 19, 2006 5:09 PM
To Jason,
Oops.
"Transmutation of lead into gold isn't just theoretically possible - it has been achieved! There are reports that Glenn Seaborg, 1951 Nobel Laureate in Chemistry, succeeded in transmuting a minute quantity of lead (possibly en route from bismuth, in 1980) into gold.
There is an earlier report (1972) in which Soviet physicists at a nuclear research facility near Lake Baikal in Siberia accidentally discovered a reaction for turning lead into gold when they found the lead shielding of an experimental reactor had changed to gold.
Today particle accelerators routinely transmute elements."
http://chemistry.about.com/cs/generalchemistry/a/aa050601a.htm
I don't know, maybe they're making this all up as a conspiracy so we all can gang up on Jason about ESC research.
Posted by: Alex | July 19, 2006 5:12 PM
As someone in a position to care about efficiency:
If the new model is more efficient, current funding levels may not be necessary.
Seriously, on a broader scale, how can anyone who buys so wholeheartedly into evolution (which I do, in case you were wondering) simultaneously argue against capitalisma and market forces? Economics and evolution are full of parallels. Arguing against market forces is like arguing for Intelligent Design.
Posted by: Jim | July 19, 2006 5:12 PM
Two things:
My Ph.D. didn't cost any money at all: in fact, I was paid to receive it. I worked for 5 years as a TA and on a genetics training grant, which covered all of my expenses and let me live on the princely sum of something less than $10K/year.
The question of the value of embryonic stem cells is settled. Catherine Verfaillie, a Very Big Name in adult stem cell research, insists that both ES and AS cell research should be funded. She's been saying this for years.
Posted by: PZ Myers![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/nav-commenters.gif)
|
July 19, 2006 5:17 PM
Thanks, half-pint, you just saved me a lot of investigative work.
Note the "m" at the start of that number.
And let's see, how many scientific papers did they publish on that project while they were working on it? I'm starting to think you have a problem distinguishing basic research from directed product development.
And no, that paper from the Cato Institute convinces me not at all. It appears (yes, I only skimmed it) to be entirely of the form of the bullet list you quoted: a series of loosely connected facts and statistics, without anything to compare it to. Sure, some corporate science has been done (far more in the past than now), but until you can show me that private sector funding (or "results", if you can define that) is comparable to government spending, you're just fact-mining.
Posted by: Johnny Vector | July 19, 2006 5:17 PM
Yippee! It's the false dichotomy! I'm not 100% in favor of absolutely unfettered free markets, so clearly I must be one of them commies that doesn't believe in market forces.
I would have thought my use of the word "externality" would be a clue.
(shrug)
Posted by: Johnny Vector | July 19, 2006 5:22 PM
Not to slide into this particular tarbaby argument, but evolutionary theory implies that change and development occur without any sort of outside interferance. I admit to not being schooled enough to say the same thing about pure economic theory, but I do know enough to say it's pretty silly to think any such purity exists in the real world. Just about any popular economic theory - be it capitalism or communism - is marked with a human flaw. That is, people cheat the system, and the easier it is for them to cheat the system, history tells us the more they'll do it. I'm not trying to make that as a ringing endorsement of government funding - personally, i'm down with a mix of government and private funding - but it's silly to compare "anti-market forces arguments" with ID, except that both require some unseen hand making decisions that doesn't exist in the real world.
Also, I've never seen any evidence that a purely private source of funding - defining that to mean absolutely no public funding - would be free of the same ideological and anti-science bias that plagues government funding today. Remember, someone's funding all these Christian Rights groups.
Posted by: Matt T. | July 19, 2006 5:25 PM
Jason,
Are the dozens and dozens of therapies you mention have come out of AS research the same as the ones mentioned here?
Posted by: Pharmer | July 19, 2006 5:33 PM
You're doing exactly what Jason is doing, in case that isn't ridiculously self-evident. Go back and take a look.
Your rather derisive (and again misinformed, a pattern perhaps?) half-pint comment only demonstrates that you have run out of intellectual ammunition.
btw don't forget to factor inflation into the 1986/1987 numbers. I know that would be self-evident to someone who, you know, understands economics so I wanted to make sure I held your hand through it.
Posted by: Jim | July 19, 2006 5:35 PM
The fact that human flaw exists within economics does in no way invalidate economic models that, "Johnny"'s protestations aside, doesn't invalidate the comparison (much less make it silly). I just think it's hard for someone who is predisposed to believe that government involvement is a good thing to see the rather obvious comparison.
Posted by: Jim | July 19, 2006 5:46 PM
Jim,
Simple. Government involvement, for all its faults and strenghths, is a human endevor. ID requires something above humanity, indeed above nature. Therefor, the comparison is silly.
And for what it's worth, I for one don't think human flaws invalidate economic models, but those same economic models aren't iron-clad rules. If you ignore those human flaws in putting those models into practice and insist that it's how it'll work out, you're wasting your time and mine.
I also don't think government involvement is a all-or-nothing "good thing". I do, however, think acountability is. Our model of government has, in theory, acountability built in. The fact that most Americans ignore that wonderful little bit of knowledge in know way renders government invalid.
When it gets down to the real nitty gritty, this is more or less a gut thing. Personally, I don't trust government to do what's right without someone keeping an eye on it. An unfettered businessman, and I may just be cynical, is just as untrustworthy, if not more.
Posted by: Matt T. | July 19, 2006 6:00 PM
Please excuse my cut and paste...
Posted on Tue, Jul. 18, 2006