A new argument occurred to me as I read Bush's latest scrap with rationality. Embryonic stem cells are valued because they're not specialized into the various components that comprise the body. That a human requires extreme and precise specialization to produce complex systems means non-specialized states aren't human. The same logic applies to embryos unless it can be shown they possess all the functioning biological systems of a human.

The counterpoint that stem cell research opponents would raise is that the embryos have the capacity to become human, and that even as embryos they are alive, and posses a soul and the essential god-given elements of humanity. This of course can’t be proved or disproved logically. You can believe what you say, but it’s not a winning argument in the political arena.

My point (which I raised earlier on this board) is that the same argument about the essential humanity of all embryos can be made about the hundreds of thousands of embryos that routinely are lost and/or discarded through fertility treatment, and that there is either an ignorance about or a disregard for these embryos. At least, there is a logical disconnect. Are these embryos somehow “less human”? And if not, does that mean that infertile couples should be denied fertility treatment? To me, that’s the moral, and political, corner that stem cell research opponents are boxed into.

and I agree with all that. Have for a long time. I was more concerned with definitions. In the political arena, the people who are most knowledgeable about a subject should define it. I have a hard time believing that, in 2007, some people think a group of 12 cells is a human being. I...don't know what to say! They've never looked inside an anatomy textbook, that's for sure.

Not that I disagree on the matter of 12 cells = human, but you might consider the ridiculousness of the observation that the seat of human consciousness lies in the gnarled and twisted passages of that grey organ in the cranium. That the "soul" lies in the heart, or that strongest emotions lie in the enodcrine glands. Don't be so quick to judge surface appearances and believe that we know everything about what it takes to be "human". If you are an atheist and believe like myself, you would believe that there is no soul, no "me", and everything I am is the outcome of chemical reactions. If you subscribed to Plato's school of philosophy you would believe something very different. There are far far too many unknowns in life for us to feel smug about what we know about the human body.

Potential to become a human? Well, how about sperm. Each and every one of the millions of sperm we produce in one ejaculation has the potential to become a human being but only one makes it to the egg. That is, unless you're masturbating.

Should we ban masturbations? How about collecting every sperm after we ejaculate playfully and save them for future use in case a woman is in need of them. Or just freeze them until we conquer other planets and need to populate them.

I wonder what would Jesus do?

Maybe I don't understand your reply in context with the thread under discussion.

It isn't the moral and political dilemma you make it out to be necessarily. It isn't even a logical dilemma --well of course that depends on your background. There are some who would try to draw some distinction between the life lost in the petri dish at the hand of a scientist and that which is lost in a fertility center at the hands of a clinic doctor. There are many however who don't.

Life is life. And both destructions are tragic. The researcher's embryonic guinea pig is tragic because of its denial of life to what few people deny is human life. When we were kids we were told about a few things that distinguish humans, fingerprints, personalities, etc. But we find as adults that some of these don't necessarily apply. Or, at least they don't apply in the ways we once thought. Fingerprint analyses and iris/retinal identification don't really apply to those without fingers or born without eyes. Distinguished personailty does not apply to some who are mentally retarded to the points of having barely any distuinguishable personhood.

The most basic salient expression of a human, we've found very recently, is an individualized genetic pattern. The new embryo shares his/her own with no other human being which ever has nor ever will exist with the exception of the identical twin. That is why humanity starts at the embryo. Whether that embryo is carried to full term, experimented on before fully developing, discarded when it is not seen as useful for its parents' use, pulled apart in its mother womb, or vaccuumed out, it is or was a individual life.

There are some of us who ascribe to the Seamless Garment theory of life. It opposes equally (and uncompromisingly) embryonic stem cell research and destrucive fertility practices.

the more I see the wisdom of really hard materialism. Sure, that sunset over the ocean is beautiful. You can write songs and stories about it. But that feeling you get from it is the result of neurons firing. I realize the danger with this line of thinking is reducing the human experience to purely mechanical terms, but that's a risk I'll take. Otherwise, you mix messages and generally create confusion.

For example, in biological terms, as you admit, you can't hold that 12 cells equal the trillions of cells that comprise the human body. Logically, no one can. The only thing that could persuade you is some fiction about these 12 cells being endowed with humanity. Whether or not they are is a separate debate. Much like with evolution, biologists should not have the burden to confront these myths.

We could do the epistemological run-around all day, but let's just say the "soul" is a metaphor, a figure of speech. It's been shown that, logically, words don't have to refer to things in the world, due to quirks in the structures of our languages. These quirks are naturally the sources of our myths.

There's no point in trying to combine the various modes of thinking into a harmonious whole. Either you're serious about wanting to know the nature of the universe, or you want to delude yourself. The two can't co-exist well.

Statistical analysis suggests that 7 out of 10 fertilized human eggs DO NOT become live births.

Of the 70 percent of fertilized eggs that die, the woman did not know she was pregnant except for a very few – most die within hours or a few days. The woman will be aware of only a few fertilizations and will grieve for those that do not result in a live birth.

While it's true that an IVF derived embryo has a unique genetic code, to define one's humanity by this nascent indicator of life's potential is limiting and deterministic. The fact or condition of being human is not merely defined by genetic code, but by the experiences of the individual. Indeed, life-experiences alter how that very code is expressed and vice versa (via gene-environment interactions). As a matter of fact, the unique code held within the blastocyst cannot live without a host, respond to even the most basic stimuli, or express a sense of self: in what way does it define humanity then? Via the DNA whose expression is undetermined sans time and experience? Genetically as well as actually it is only potential. It's personhood has yet to be established.

To take the debate to a level of personhood is unnecessary though. The fact of the matter is that regardless of our actions, these stored and frozen embryos will be discarded (less than 3% will ever be adopted, and of those 3% more than half will not make it through the IVF procedure). Which is more morally reprehensible then: taking no action and perhaps preserving some life, or taking the only action that can ultimately help all of established humanity? Saying that you are against IVF because it destroys life, doesn't justify idleness by virtue of principle. Knowing the fate of these embryos, the only responsible course of action is to use them to help all of humanity.

As you say, there aren’t the moral and logical dilemmas in your argument; both stem cell research and in vitro fertilization are objectionable from your perspective. The political dilemma for opponents of stem cell research (and in vitro fertilization), though, is that fertilization treatment is much less controversial and more widely accepted, pretty much across the political spectrum. And to oppose stem cell research on the grounds of destruction of embryos becomes a political problem when that same logic is applied to fertilization treatments. For you personally, that appears to be less of a problem. I wonder, though, what you think about Bush’s stated position on this. He treads a line about “federal funding” of stem cell research, because of destruction of embryos, which he tries to portray as strong and principled, while sidestepping privately funded stem cell research (and for that matter fertilization treatment). Is there any way this can be seen as a sensible way out of the dilemma? Is there a way out of the dilemma, other than outright banning of fertilization treatment?

Eigenvector, oh please...

Next you'll be telling everyone that phlogiston is what gives living things that spark of life.

For a self-described atheist, you have a very woolly view of reality. Our science has shown nothing in living things that is chemically distinct from non-living matter. The materialist view of life is the only one that is consistent with all our research and science.

Whlie it is true that we have barely scratched the surface of the deep mysteries of the human body and life, at least we know what some of those mysteries are. No legitimate scientist is pursuing a supernatural explanation for any of those questions. To do so is not only not science, but antithetical to the very notion of a rational understanding of the physical world.

Enough idiots continue to delude themselves with supernatural forces and deities for intelligent people to cater to even a shadow of their irrational thinking.