Posted by Cockney Robin |
I am so bloody fed up with the self-congratulatory gloating of American conservatives. Deconstructing Demagogue quotes Charles Krauthammer---who does more self-serving rationalisation to prove wrong thinking is right than practically any pundit ever----as follows "the embryonic stem cell debate is over. The verdict is clear:
Rarely has a president -- so vilified for a moral stance -- been so
thoroughly vindicated. (quoted in Is Bush’s Stem Cell Policy Vindicated?) I'll give him 'vilified.'
The reason the new procedures had to be developed was to placate
the arrogant sods who hold theories---generally based on bad religion
as well as bad science--- who are sure they have been vouchsafed the
mystery of life and therefore have the right hold up progress that
might alleviate actual human suffering while they force science to take
bypaths and detours around their half-baked theories.
Is embryonic stem cell tissue human? Does life begin at conception? If so, what about before that? Is every sperm sacred?
If God intended every bit of potential human tissue to develop into human beings, or considered every tiny blob of potentially human tissue to be sacred and imbued with soul, would there be spontaneous miscarriages? Would women menstruate and each man be provided with enough sperm to seed a small state? Should we go back to the days when contraception was banned and young boys were told they'd go blind?
Oh sod it. The argument that challenges religious line-drawing (why here and not there? why there and not here?) is not only futile it is also dangerous. There is nothing too absurd or far-fetched for the pillocks who think they've got the peephole into their God's most secret thoughts, to believe; and nothing, once they do believe it, to constrain them from trying not only to impose the same belief on their fellow human beings but to build their lives on it.
But Americans had better watch out for that slippery slope that leads down hill between the Jeffersonian ideal of separation of church and state and theocracy. 'Separation of church and state' ought to mean that religion keeps its nose out of the test tubes and other people's business and focuses on trying to live a godly life, whatever that means to each individual.
But of course focusing on the progress of one's own hypothetical soul is more difficult and boring than meddling in the souls of others, including the souls of strictly hypothetical others. And of course it is most difficult for those who believe that God has imposed on them a narrow and rigid code of behaviour and belief. Hence the propensity of fundamentalist religious types from every system of belief to try to force others, including those actually attempting to help the ill and the old and the lame and the halt, to swim in the same narrow channels.
There is none so deaf (or dumb) as he---or she---who will not hear! Deconstructing Demagogues sets out the arguments that regularly fall on deaf ears. I've made them myself, but this is the nutshell version.
The term "human embryo" is at least somewhat loaded in so far as it implies that an embryo meets the criteria to count as an individual. It does not, for this reason: as late as two weeks after conception a single embryo can spontaneously split in two and begin developing as twins. Simply put, individuality, personhood, and the soul are not concepts that can be appropriately applied at an embryo’s earliest stages. This point is reinforced by the fact that as many as 75% of fertilized embryos spontaneously abort before implanting. Nature is simply wasteful and indifferent in the extreme. (Is Bush’s Stem Cell Policy Vindicated?)
Which is what I was saying and which---for reasons mentioned above---is doomed from the start because these geezers only grapple with data which their religion doesn't filtre out. Everything else just pours right through the holes in their sieve-like reasoning processes. Anyway they've heard it all before and filtred it out, so DD is simply squandering his or her time in trying to get them to see, to comprehend.
Right-to-life advocates, however, are wedded to the doctrine that life begins at conception. This view is often attended by wooly metaphysical dogma about the infusion of soul and body taking place at conception. This view, of course, is difficult to square with the facts cited above (the vast majority of embryos spontaneously abort and a single embryo can spontaneously become twins two weeks after conception).(Is Bush’s Stem Cell Policy Vindicated?)
Oddly enough the selfsame 'right to life' advocates---as if the notion of such a 'right' weren't itself a presumptuous slap in the face to anyone's omnipotent God--- have very little concern for the souls of the born as opposed to the unborn. What price, for example, the lives that they destroy through capital punishment (which all of them seem to favour)? To quote my God-friendly colleague Damozel, do they believe that Christ---who, unlike many who profess to follow him---understood what mattered to God and what didn't, was joshing when he enjoined his followers not to presume to judge the worth of another human soul?
But back to DD, who has more.
It doesn’t follow from this, however, that the moral value of an embryo is nil. Given the right circumstances an embryo has the potential to become a human being. Thus, when we speak of a "human embryo" we should remember that we are using that designation primarily to refer to the genetic material as being distinct from that of other species, but we are not referring to a distinct individual that has the moral status of a human person. If we were, then it would be wrong to create surplus embryos to help infertile couples have children. But even most on the religious right aren’t too keen on creating a fuss over surplus embryos created as a byproduct of helping infertile couples have children. (Is Bush’s Stem Cell Policy Vindicated?)
Yes, they are happy to accept the benefits of science and not look too closely at the moral questions it presents or too deeply into the techniques it uses so long as no one mentions the word 'abortion.'
Nevertheless, conservative pundits use the term "human embryo" as a rhetorical sleight of hand, subtly implying each and every embryo is a unique human being. But deep down, most serious people don’t believe this because, or there would be calls to ban in vitro fertilization and outlaw privately funded embryonic stem cell research. As it stands, Bush’s policy does not prohibit embryonic stem cell research that is privately funded. Since federal funding invariably entails greater ethical oversight, however, Bush’s policy actually creates the worst of all possible worlds; less dollars where they are needed and less oversight where it is needed.(Is Bush’s Stem Cell Policy Vindicated?)
Christ, DD, don't give them any more bad ideas.
The discovery that scientists can coax ordinary skin cells into becoming stem cells is a remarkable breakthrough. The ability to bypass even a perceived ethical quandary is welcome, but it would be mistaken and way premature to insist that this new procedure vindicates Bush’s decision, it does not. The approach of countries like Great Britain, however, has been even more high-minded and serious because the debate there has not been distorted by abortion politics. Those crowing about Bush stem cell policy being vindicated should be a little way of declaring "mission accomplished." (Is Bush’s Stem Cell Policy Vindicated?; emphasis added)
I'm sure that most people are relieved that science found a possible way around the embryonic stem cell dilemma because, Christ knows (and perhaps he does), that the whole dispute was holding back progress that could eventually save actual functioning human beings with souls and nervous systems and the capacity to feel pain and moral/emotional anguish from illnesses which diminish their lives and eventually extinguish it?
Furthermore, the technology that uses skin cells instead of stem cells still is not perfected and the gloating, as DD points out above, is still premature. There are some significant obstacles still to be overcome, as discussed in the various articles I cited here.
All Bush's policy has 'vindicated' is the policy that says religion has the right to make science do what I believe is called an 'end run' round a set of artificial restrictions that can never be verified or disproved (the great advantage of the argument from personal conviction.)
And there is only one sentence in the above-quoted blog with which I disagree and it is this: "Bush’s
decision, and the reasoning behind it, deserve respect as a serious
effort to grapple with profound and difficult questions." I would reframe it thus: "Bush’s
decision, and the reasoning behind it, DO NOT deserve respect as a serious
effort to grapple with profound and difficult questions."
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