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Ethical storm as scientist becomes first man to clone HIMSELF
by Daily Mail
Thanks to EJ Ashcraft III for the link.
Reposted from:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/technology/technology.html?in_article_id=508887&in_page_id=1965
A scientist has achieved a world first... by cloning himself.
In a breakthrough certain to provoke an ethical furore, Samuel Wood created embryo copies of himself by placing his skin cells in a woman's egg.
The embryos were the first to be made from cells taken from adult humans.
Although they survived for only five days and were smaller than a pinhead, they are seen as a milestone in the quest for treatments for diseases such as Alzheimer's and Parkinson's.
But critics fear the technology could be exploited by mavericks to clone babies and accused the scientists of reducing the miracle of human life to a factory of spare parts.
Researchers from the Californian stem cell research company Stemagen employed the same technique used to make Dolly the sheep, the world's first cloned mammal, to create the embryos.
They took eggs donated by young women having IVF and replaced genetic material with DNA from the skin cells of two men.
Click to enlarge
The eggs were then zapped with an electric current to induce fertilisation and the creation of embryos.
Some of the skin cells came from Dr Wood, Stemagen's chief executive officer and a leading fertility specialist, while the others came from another member of staff.
The result was a handful of embryos, at least three of them clones of Dr Wood and the other man.
Although all were destroyed in the process, the technique is seen as a vital step in the creation of cloned embryos rich in stem cells, which are "master cells" capable of becoming any type of body tissue.
Original: Dolly the sheep paved the way for human cloning
Such stem cells could be invaluable in the study of diseases and the testing of drugs.
They could ultimately be used to replace the damaged tissues behind diseases from Alzheimer's to diabetes.
Stem cells taken from cloned embryos would be a perfect match to the patient, whose body would not reject them.
Dr Wood, who has degrees in medicine, psychology, biochemistry and molecular biophysics, called the research "a critical milestone" in the development of treatments.
Breakthrough: Scientists recently revealed they had cloned rhesus monkeys
The unmarried father of two, who is in his forties, is working on extracting stem cells from such embryos - a process that inevitably leads to the death of the embryo.
John Smeaton, of the Society for the Protection of Unborn Children, said: "We have got scientists wandering around in an ethical wilderness, forgetting about matters of justice relating to our fellow human beings.
"We have people creating human beings with the intention of destroying them. That's appalling."
And the Vatican condemned the cloning of human embryos, calling it the "worst type of exploitation of the human being".
"This ranks among the most morally illicit acts, ethically speaking," said Monsignor Elio Sgreccia, president of the Pontifical Academy for Life, the Vatican department that helps oversee the Church's position on bioethics issues.
Stem cell experts gave the U.S. breakthrough, published in the journal Stem Cells, a cautious welcome.
Professor Robin Lovell-Badge, of the Medical Research Council's National Institute for Medical Research, said: "This is another step along what has turned out to be a tortuous road.
"However, it is still a long way from the goal of achieving embryonic stem cells."
U.S. researcher Professor Robert Lanza questioned the validity of the research and said the embryos looked "very unhealthy".
Josephine Quintavalle, of the campaign group Comment On Reproductive Ethics, said: "Human cloning is unethical, unsafe, and completely unnecessary.
"It is time that scientists started to put some brakes on."
Dr Calum MacKellar, of the Scottish Council on Human Bioethics, said the creation and destruction of human embryos was "extremely offensive to millions in the UK".
Although Dr Wood's team is the first to create human embryos from adult cells, human embryos have been cloned before.
Scientists at Newcastle University created cloned human embryos in 2005 using cells from embryos rather than adults, seen as less useful in creating potential treatments.
British law says created embryos must be destroyed in 14 days and cannot be implanted in a woman.
The news came as it was revealed that animal-human hybrid embryos will be created in British laboratories within weeks after the research was allowed by the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority.
Two teams have been licensed to make cow-human hybrids for research into incurable diseases.
Scientists say they are needed because of a shortage of human eggs for research.
The embryos would be more than 99 per cent human and would have to be destroyed after two weeks.
But Mr Smeaton said: "It is creating a category of beings regarded as sub-human who can be used as raw material to benefit other members of the human family.
"How wrong can something be before a scientist understands you cannot just do it because of the perceived good for human beings."
Reposted from:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/technology/technology.html?in_article_id=508887&in_page_id=1965
A scientist has achieved a world first... by cloning himself.In a breakthrough certain to provoke an ethical furore, Samuel Wood created embryo copies of himself by placing his skin cells in a woman's egg.
The embryos were the first to be made from cells taken from adult humans.
Although they survived for only five days and were smaller than a pinhead, they are seen as a milestone in the quest for treatments for diseases such as Alzheimer's and Parkinson's.
But critics fear the technology could be exploited by mavericks to clone babies and accused the scientists of reducing the miracle of human life to a factory of spare parts.
Researchers from the Californian stem cell research company Stemagen employed the same technique used to make Dolly the sheep, the world's first cloned mammal, to create the embryos.
They took eggs donated by young women having IVF and replaced genetic material with DNA from the skin cells of two men.
Click to enlarge
The eggs were then zapped with an electric current to induce fertilisation and the creation of embryos.
Some of the skin cells came from Dr Wood, Stemagen's chief executive officer and a leading fertility specialist, while the others came from another member of staff.
The result was a handful of embryos, at least three of them clones of Dr Wood and the other man.
Although all were destroyed in the process, the technique is seen as a vital step in the creation of cloned embryos rich in stem cells, which are "master cells" capable of becoming any type of body tissue.
Original: Dolly the sheep paved the way for human cloning
Such stem cells could be invaluable in the study of diseases and the testing of drugs.
They could ultimately be used to replace the damaged tissues behind diseases from Alzheimer's to diabetes.
Stem cells taken from cloned embryos would be a perfect match to the patient, whose body would not reject them.
Dr Wood, who has degrees in medicine, psychology, biochemistry and molecular biophysics, called the research "a critical milestone" in the development of treatments.
Breakthrough: Scientists recently revealed they had cloned rhesus monkeys
The unmarried father of two, who is in his forties, is working on extracting stem cells from such embryos - a process that inevitably leads to the death of the embryo.
John Smeaton, of the Society for the Protection of Unborn Children, said: "We have got scientists wandering around in an ethical wilderness, forgetting about matters of justice relating to our fellow human beings.
"We have people creating human beings with the intention of destroying them. That's appalling."
And the Vatican condemned the cloning of human embryos, calling it the "worst type of exploitation of the human being".
"This ranks among the most morally illicit acts, ethically speaking," said Monsignor Elio Sgreccia, president of the Pontifical Academy for Life, the Vatican department that helps oversee the Church's position on bioethics issues.
Stem cell experts gave the U.S. breakthrough, published in the journal Stem Cells, a cautious welcome.
Professor Robin Lovell-Badge, of the Medical Research Council's National Institute for Medical Research, said: "This is another step along what has turned out to be a tortuous road.
"However, it is still a long way from the goal of achieving embryonic stem cells."
U.S. researcher Professor Robert Lanza questioned the validity of the research and said the embryos looked "very unhealthy".
Josephine Quintavalle, of the campaign group Comment On Reproductive Ethics, said: "Human cloning is unethical, unsafe, and completely unnecessary.
"It is time that scientists started to put some brakes on."
Dr Calum MacKellar, of the Scottish Council on Human Bioethics, said the creation and destruction of human embryos was "extremely offensive to millions in the UK".
Although Dr Wood's team is the first to create human embryos from adult cells, human embryos have been cloned before.
Scientists at Newcastle University created cloned human embryos in 2005 using cells from embryos rather than adults, seen as less useful in creating potential treatments.
British law says created embryos must be destroyed in 14 days and cannot be implanted in a woman.
The news came as it was revealed that animal-human hybrid embryos will be created in British laboratories within weeks after the research was allowed by the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority.
Two teams have been licensed to make cow-human hybrids for research into incurable diseases.
Scientists say they are needed because of a shortage of human eggs for research.
The embryos would be more than 99 per cent human and would have to be destroyed after two weeks.
But Mr Smeaton said: "It is creating a category of beings regarded as sub-human who can be used as raw material to benefit other members of the human family.
"How wrong can something be before a scientist understands you cannot just do it because of the perceived good for human beings."
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Posted: Saturday, January 19, 2008 | PermalinkComments 1 - 50 of 71 |
Reload Comments | Back to Top | Page Numbers2. Comment #113526 by Janus on January 19, 2008 at 11:57 pm
Excellent!I see no problem with this as long as the embryo is killed swiftly enough. Better yet would be to keep its brain from forming at all, thus ensuring it doesn't even begin to become a person.
Other Comments by Janus
3. Comment #113530 by He-man Daunted World on January 20, 2008 at 12:07 am
My handy dandy Theological dictionary says "The majority of catholic theologians agree that the soul is infused at the moment when the cells of the parents are united (not at birth: D 1185; and not upon the first intellectual act: D 1910)."Other Comments by He-man Daunted World
4. Comment #113537 by devolve on January 20, 2008 at 12:41 am
The concept of the "cow-human hybrid" suggests a clever one-liner involving the target audience of TV shows like "The View" and "Oprah", but I can't seem to think of what it could be. Other Comments by devolve
5. Comment #113538 by Szkeptik on January 20, 2008 at 12:45 am
I hate that ethical stuff. How can all these people cry about a clump of 100 or less cells when we are so near a whole bunch of medical breakthroughs with which we could heal real people?PS: Cow hybrids FTW! Let's create useless stuff yay!
Other Comments by Szkeptik
6. Comment #113539 by JemyM on January 20, 2008 at 12:52 am
People are always mistaken in what it is about a life, human or person that we value. We do not value life. We do not value humans. Not even people within religion do this. No, we have values that are way more complex than that. Other Comments by JemyM
7. Comment #113540 by epeeist on January 20, 2008 at 12:56 am
Daily Mail AlertFor people living outside the UK you should understand that the principle marketing method of the Direly Maul is to give its readers something to hate, regardless of the consequences.
Other Comments by epeeist
8. Comment #113542 by mr-zero on January 20, 2008 at 1:12 am
This is just fatuous bollocks. A major point of creating embryonic stem cells from skin rather than embryos was to appease the religious nutters. No that there has been some success the nutters are out critising and mis-representing again. This is not about making clones of himself, this is about stem cell research.The Daily Mail, natural home of such manifest loonies as Melanie Philips and Richard Littlejohn.
Z
Other Comments by mr-zero
9. Comment #113544 by octopus on January 20, 2008 at 1:24 am
Ethical storm as scientist becomes first man to clone HIMSELF
Scientist uses his DNA for creation of few hundred cells
What a difference , eh?
Other Comments by octopus
10. Comment #113545 by Nefrubyr on January 20, 2008 at 1:30 am
But critics fear the technology could be exploited by mavericks to clone babies and accused the scientists of reducing the miracle of human life to a factory of spare parts.
Translation: destroying the illusion of the miracle of human life by demonstrating that it can be reproduced by a factory of spare parts.
Can't have people finding out they're not specially created, can we?
Other Comments by Nefrubyr
11. Comment #113548 by Quetzalcoatl on January 20, 2008 at 2:08 am
I honestly can't see what the big deal is. These embryos were only a few hundred cells, smaller than a pinhead, yet we have people talking about "matters of justice relating to fellow human beings". Then of course the Vatican wades in."The miracle of human life" is no more miraculous, when you think about it, than the formation of any other type of life.
Other Comments by Quetzalcoatl
12. Comment #113550 by AshtonBlack on January 20, 2008 at 2:20 am
Ethical storm as scientist becomes first man to clone HIMSELF
Scientist uses his DNA for creation of few hundred cells
What a difference , eh?
Awwwww and there was I hoping that I could have a clone to go to work for me whilst I took some "me" time... hehe.
Typical Daily Hail bollocks.
Other Comments by AshtonBlack
13. Comment #113557 by Darwin's badger on January 20, 2008 at 2:49 am
So is it Sam Wood in the photo, or his clone? How do we know that the clone didn't destroy the scientist, huh?? We're going down a bad road, folks, where your mother, sister and lover could end up coming from the same cells.Saying that, the A47 Norwich ring road already fits that description.
Other Comments by Darwin's badger
14. Comment #113559 by MatthewL on January 20, 2008 at 3:07 am
I think these groups are having delusions of granduer about human life.Edit: Also, this is the Daily Mail, you can't really take it's opinions as fair, it's possibly the worst newspaper in Britian.
Other Comments by MatthewL
15. Comment #113560 by Geoff on January 20, 2008 at 3:28 am
I'd like to see people using the more accurate term "blastocyst" rather than embryo. If nothing else it might remove some of the emotive baggage associated with so-called embryonic research.I'm convinced most people (especially DM readers!) envisage a tiny homunculus, rather than the reality of a virtually invisible cluster of cells.
Other Comments by Geoff
16. Comment #113561 by Ian (South Africa) on January 20, 2008 at 3:29 am
Fascinating stuff. I fully support this sort of research. The luddites who would force this particular genie back into the bottle are no better than Ostriches who would have us all consulting Witch Doctors (Sangorma here in the Regime) for medical issues.
I would love to see the likes of Parkinsons and Alzheimers go the way of Polio and Small Pox.
Other Comments by Ian (South Africa)
17. Comment #113562 by AllanW on January 20, 2008 at 3:32 am
Always look at the source. In this case, as a few posters have said above, it's the Daily Mail. In the dictionary under 'knee-jerk reactions filled with fear, loathing and bile and based on no fact-gathering at all' it says 'See Daily Mail'.This is the rag that did most to cause the MMR vaccination scandal. Never forget that.
Other Comments by AllanW
18. Comment #113564 by epeeist on January 20, 2008 at 3:47 am
Comment #113562 by AllanWNot forgetting its targeting of "paedophiles" and the vigilantism that caused for which it took no responsibility.
This is the rag that did most to cause the MMR vaccination scandal. Never forget that.
Other Comments by epeeist
19. Comment #113569 by dreamsphere on January 20, 2008 at 4:17 am
The title of this article plays on the widespread confusion between therapeutic cloning and the cloning of an entire organism. This ploy is also used by opponents of therapeutic cloning.This confusion needs to be combated to allow rational debates on the ethical implications of this technology. A call for conscience raising, perhaps?
Other Comments by dreamsphere
20. Comment #113573 by irate_atheist on January 20, 2008 at 4:27 am
2. Comment #113526 by Janus -Better yet would be to keep its brain from forming at all, thus ensuring it doesn't even begin to become a person.Please, no! We don't want clones of Alastair McGrath wandering around.
Other Comments by irate_atheist
21. Comment #113574 by Richard Morgan on January 20, 2008 at 4:29 am
Janus :Better yet would be to keep its brain from forming at all, thus ensuring it doesn't even begin to become a person.
Well, that's already been done so often - how else do you explain phenomena like Falwell, Ted Haggard and Dinesh D'Souza?
Other Comments by Richard Morgan
22. Comment #113576 by epeeist on January 20, 2008 at 4:40 am
Comment #113526 by Janus
Better yet would be to keep its brain from forming at all, thus ensuring it doesn't even begin to become a person.
Doesn't work I'm afraid. There was a case of an Irish Catholic girl who became pregnant and whose baby had anencephaly. She was initially refused permission to travel to have an abortion.
I didn't see the argument from the Catholic church, but it almost certainly would have been that the embryo and become "en-souled", even though it was missing large amounts of its brain.
Other Comments by epeeist
23. Comment #113579 by AfraidToDie on January 20, 2008 at 5:09 am
And the Vatican condemned the cloning of human embryos, calling it the "worst type of exploitation of the human being".
And what about all that mind control and accumulation of wealth on the Vatican's part all for the propagation of a myth?
"extremely offensive to millions in the UK".
Then just think how many are offended in the US?
10. Comment #113545 by Nefrubyr: Can't have people finding out they're not specially created, can we?
Fantastic point!!!
Maybe that's how the miracle birth took place and how Jesus was the son of God… he was cloned! Pretty amazing; I think I'll dedicate my life to that theory.
Other Comments by AfraidToDie
24. Comment #113581 by home8896 on January 20, 2008 at 5:29 am
This article was definitely an opinion piece. The close association of embryo and human and person throughout the article is infuriating. There is no attempt to view it from any other position. The quotes used to describe the scientists' side seem unfinished. It might not be overt in tone of being outraged by the idea, but the author seems to have gone out of his/her way to ensure the public feels outrage. I really hate reading this kind of drivel. Other Comments by home8896
25. Comment #113585 by Peacebeuponme on January 20, 2008 at 5:51 am
Ah, the Hate Mail, that pinnacle of Britsh news reporting.I'm am tired, tired, tired of the automatic right of religious types to get a say on any topic. Absolutely no relevant experience, just wear silly clothes and believe in fairy stories, therefore somehow able to have a clear view on the appropriate way forward.
The Pope
And the Vatican condemned the cloning of human embryos, calling it the "worst type of exploitation of the human being".Lets just compare: destroying a few cells the size of a pinhead, or living in luxury off the back of millions of people's donations?
Religious people should be out of the dicussion by default, since they bring bias to the table.
Other Comments by Peacebeuponme
26. Comment #113590 by Matt7895 on January 20, 2008 at 6:24 am
Ah the Daily Mail, top quality journalism you can trust. Other Comments by Matt7895
27. Comment #113591 by rod-the-farmer on January 20, 2008 at 6:25 am
Mr. Smeaton, of the "Society for the Protection of Unborn Children" saysyou cannot just do it because of the perceived good for human beings.
Oohh-kay. Whose good SHOULD we do things for ? Plants ? A church ? Someone needs to follow him next time he sees a doctor, and make sure he gets only medicines that are NOT "for the good of human beings".
And AfraidToDie - "Jesus was cloned". Hilarious. Howcum no one thought of THAT before ?
Other Comments by rod-the-farmer
28. Comment #113592 by Szymanowski on January 20, 2008 at 6:25 am
Classic Daily Mail standards of reporting, but it could have been worse.Wait a minute, does that rhesus monkey have painted fingernails?!
Other Comments by Szymanowski
29. Comment #113596 by Vadjong on January 20, 2008 at 6:35 am
Don't pooh-pooh just a pinhead of cells. State of the art often has a way of exploding in your face after a seemingly trivial breakthrough.Okay, so what if it became possible to clone, let's say, Hitler ?
You will only get another human being, growing up in the twenty first century, with similar bone structure and eye colour as the infamous Führer, but no way of growing up in 19th century Austria, experiencing WW I and all the things that led to the creation of the monster.
He (or she !) might become a nurse in a old people's home, an archbishop or a contestant on Idols, who is to say ?!
Even if this twin became a miserable git and throw regular tantrums, would you fear the resurrection of the Nazi party and another holocaust ?
I think genetic manipulation will have much more farreaching implications than just simple cloning.
Other Comments by Vadjong
30. Comment #113599 by Steve Zara on January 20, 2008 at 6:44 am
I didn't see the argument from the Catholic church, but it almost certainly would have been that the embryo and become "en-souled", even though it was missing large amounts of its brain.
Fascinating. To be consistent, they must surely not accept the idea of "brain death" then, when all higher mental functions have been disrupted beyond any chance of recovery.
Other Comments by Steve Zara
31. Comment #113600 by BMMcArdle on January 20, 2008 at 6:45 am
The guy's clone could do nothing but utter profanities, so he pushed him off a cliff, and was arrested for making an obscene clone fall.Other Comments by BMMcArdle
32. Comment #113603 by Radesq on January 20, 2008 at 6:51 am
Sounds like this cloning thing still requires a human egg which are a bit hard to obtain. Why should an egg cell be necessary for this procedure? Other Comments by Radesq
33. Comment #113604 by Peacebeuponme on January 20, 2008 at 6:52 am
And would this soul be a new soul or Samuel Wood's?Other Comments by Peacebeuponme
34. Comment #113606 by Radesq on January 20, 2008 at 6:56 am
There may not be a soul PBUM if the spirit Mormons withhold their spirit child from entering (or substitute God here if you prefer). So if a clone lives to adulthood it would be no more than a soulless zombie human or subhuman and there is the ethical dilemma for a religionist. I would suppose... Other Comments by Radesq
35. Comment #113608 by Steve Zara on January 20, 2008 at 6:59 am
The guy's clone could do nothing but utter profanities, so he pushed him off a cliff, and was arrested for making an obscene clone fall.
I wonder if Josh could add another flag to posts: "Don't read. Will give you pain."
:)
Other Comments by Steve Zara
36. Comment #113609 by Peacebeuponme on January 20, 2008 at 7:02 am
So if a clone lives to adulthood it would be no more than a soulless zombie human or subhuman and there is the ethical dilemma for a religionist. I would suppose...Its this type of question that keeps university theology departments running.
Other Comments by Peacebeuponme
37. Comment #113610 by alexmzk on January 20, 2008 at 7:03 am
And the Vatican condemned the cloning of human embryos, calling it the "worst type of exploitation of the human being".
the Vatican, as ever, a superlative source of quotes.
Other Comments by alexmzk
38. Comment #113615 by AfraidToDie on January 20, 2008 at 7:22 am
29. Comment #113596 by Vadjong on January 20, 2008 at 6:35 am
Okay, so what if it became possible to clone, let's say, Hitler ? You will only get another human being, growing up in the twenty first century, with similar bone structure and eye colour as the infamous Führer, but no way of growing up in 19th century Austria, experiencing WW I and all the things that led to the creation of the monster. He (or she !) might become a nurse in a old people's home, an archbishop or a contestant on Idols, who is to say ?!
Just to hedge our bets, let the first experiments be cloning people with souls that will go to hell anyway… say Dawkins, or most of us who are a theist (sorry, atheist). And if it grows up to be a famous scientist in the field of evolution, we'll know it is more nature than nurture!
Other Comments by AfraidToDie
39. Comment #113619 by Steinsky on January 20, 2008 at 7:40 am
I see I'm a little late, but I just had to flag up this quote too:And the Vatican condemned the cloning of human embryos, calling it the "worst type of exploitation of the human being".
Wow. Yes. That's the billion strong Roman Catholic church. What was that about us atheists always picking up on the extremists with ludicrous ethical ideas that nobody really holds?
Other Comments by Steinsky
40. Comment #113620 by liberalartist on January 20, 2008 at 7:42 am
Being able to show the science of cell production takes away the magic. Take away the magic and all those priests have no purpose. Its another coffin in the nail of religion...anyone got a hammer!? Other Comments by liberalartist
41. Comment #113635 by SomeDanGuy on January 20, 2008 at 8:37 am
Steps remaining before this can become useful:1) Learn how to screen for accumulated mutations in the donor nucleus (although the ability to even survive takes care of some of this)
2) Find a way to reset the epigenetic marks on the donor DNA. I'm concerned about trying to push forward to therapeutics before solving these problems, especially the second.
Other Comments by SomeDanGuy
42. Comment #113636 by notsobad on January 20, 2008 at 8:38 am
I'd like to ask all the millions of offended and their self-appointed speakers what they are doing about those 15,000 already born children that die because of undernutrition every day.And the Vatican condemned the cloning of human embryos, calling it the "worst type of exploitation of the human being".
That'd be brainwashing and indoctrination, sometimes combined with molestation.
Other Comments by notsobad
43. Comment #113638 by SomeDanGuy on January 20, 2008 at 8:45 am
My handy dandy Theological dictionary says "The majority of catholic theologians agree that the soul is infused at the moment when the cells of the parents are united (not at birth: D 1185; and not upon the first intellectual act: D 1910)."
I wish I could ask those guys what they think of twins! Twining occurs well after this 'soul infusion' - around 2 weeks or so. You can actually create a twin experimentally by dividing the blastodisc in half. Did I just cut a soul in half??
Other Comments by SomeDanGuy
44. Comment #113646 by dysolution on January 20, 2008 at 9:26 am
But critics fear the technology could be exploited by mavericks to clone babies and accused the scientists of reducing the miracle of human life to a factory of spare parts.
What's a miracle? I don't remember that coming up in biology class.
Okay, so what if it became possible to clone, let's say, Hitler ?
[...]
He (or she !) might become a nurse in a old people's home, an archbishop or a contestant on Idols, who is to say ?!
Mr. Show, anyone? :)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ymfs21xeDc
Other Comments by dysolution
45. Comment #113701 by Barbara on January 20, 2008 at 11:03 am
Please bear with me as I don't really understand how this works.In a breakthrough certain to provoke an ethical furor, Samuel Wood created embryo copies of himself by placing his skin cells in a woman's egg.
Does this mean the skin cells from Samuel Wood came from a skin scraping?
If the embryo copies were not created by uniting sperm with egg, then how can anyone claim these embryo copies have a soul? (Doesn't the Christian Bible say something like 'Every sperm is sacred'?) Surely, these embryos couldn't possibly have souls since no sperm was used in their creation. Without a soul, where does the objection to stem cell research come from?
Other Comments by Barbara
46. Comment #113705 by quill on January 20, 2008 at 11:23 am
Oh, no! They're murdering human beings! Microscopic, unicellular human beings!I hope they keep this up, haha. The US population is overwhelmingly in favor of embryonic stem-cell research, and the religious crowd only make themselves look silly when they oppose it on grounds like this.
Other Comments by quill
47. Comment #113733 by tybowen on January 20, 2008 at 12:13 pm
Thats bad ass. I know several people who have been affected by parkinsons (my grandfather died from it when I was two). Its awe inspiring to think that such diseases might be effectively treated by such men as this Other Comments by tybowen
48. Comment #113753 by hyperdeath on January 20, 2008 at 12:49 pm
I wish I could ask those guys what they think of twins! Twining occurs well after this 'soul infusion' - around 2 weeks or so. You can actually create a twin experimentally by dividing the blastodisc in half. Did I just cut a soul in half??
Lord Voldemort managed to do it. Then again, the plot of Harry Potter was far more grounded in reality than Christian theology.
Other Comments by hyperdeath
49. Comment #113830 by Cartomancer on January 20, 2008 at 5:31 pm
The idea that the human embryo has a soul right from the moment of conception or even beforehand was not the position of the church until quite recently. In fact it is a twentieth century dogma and actually runs quite contrary to Catholic thinking on the subject throughout the Middle Ages. I've recently finished a chapter on this very topic in my thesis as it happens, so hearing silly stuff like this from catholics who have no idea just how far they are diverging from traditional dogmas makes me very amused indeed.Most patristic and medieval discussions of this issue leave it as an unanswered question of physics that is open to doubt. Augustine made quite a fuss of not knowing whether the soul is present from the beginning or arrives once the body is sufficiently able to recieve it. Many medieval commentators took the mosaic law in Exodus 21:22 as evidence that the soul does not arrive for forty days, or even up to six weeks, after conception.
The shadowy Honorius Augustodunensis even theorised that if a foetus is killed before this point then the matter of it will be resurrected as part of the mother rather than as a separate human being at the day of Judgement. Anselm suggests that the rational soul (the important bit as far as salvation is concerned) does not take root until after birth even, so there is still a chance to baptize the infant before it has a chance to sin and die unbaptized, and thus to avoid punishment in the afterlife.
The main impetus for thinking a soul was present from the beginning was actually not Scripture or the Church Fathers, but Aristotle and the Galenic medical texts translated from the Arabic at Salerno / Monte Cassino and Cordoba in the twelfth century. Essentially this scientific tradition posited that all growth and augmentation in living bodies is caused by intermediary generated spirits that actualise the powers of the soul in the physical world. Without the presence of a soul, and hence these spirits, the embryo could not grow at all and hence they must be present from the beginning. Of course Aristotle's soul was not quite what the Scriptures had in mind (it was the substantial form of the body and little more), but the concepts merged in time.
As to the state of twins with regard to their souls, this matter was actually considered a very tricky one by medieval thinkers. You constantly find it in collections of thirteenth century quodlibetal questions, which are one of the best ways to guage what was considered a burning topic of discussion at the time because they are disputations on questions fired at the disputant university master blind, and without a set topic ("quod libet" means basically "[ask] what you wish"). Generally medieval solutions pointed out that to tie the generation of an immortal soul to the physical processes of the body was a form of the traducianist heresy (basically making the soul dependent on the body and thus inferior to it, rather than directly dependent on god). Thus the body might split in half, but god is still able to put a separate and entirely different soul in each part when the time comes to do so.
Other Comments by Cartomancer
50. Comment #113832 by BAEOZ on January 20, 2008 at 5:49 pm
Cartomancer. My understanding of the change in the church's stance came because early users of microscopes thought they saw little men "homunculi" in sperm. Pregnancy then became the growth of a little man, implanted in the womb via sperm, into a baby. If the embryo already contained a little man, he must already have a soul. Before this time, the church had a teaching, which has never been repudiated that the soul entered the body after conception. I read this in Rachel's book Principles of Moral Philosophy. Other Comments by BAEOZ
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1. Comment #113525 by TheTrueScotsman on January 19, 2008 at 11:52 pm
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