Re: Blending of species raises ethical issues

[Mary Ann Ryan <bentwillow@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Jo Ann wrote;
of life, for which we were both very grateful.
> I certainly hope Bush's program (as much as I like him,. I would have to
> disagree with him on this), doesn't affect that because many lives would
> be lost.  I wish he had a neurologist on his staff.

There is an ethical problem with developing chimeras (human stem cells
injected into animals).  The New York Times article that I quoted a couple
of weeks ago addressed this very issue.  The Times has always been viewed 
as
a liberal publication - so I was surprised by the caution expressed in the
article that it might be too easy to go too far with this kind of
experimentation.

When is an  animal an  animal - and when does an animal become too human to
be viewed as an animal any more?  What happens when monkeys injected with
human stem cells give birth to a human baby because both father and mother
contained more human reproductive potential than animal?  That was what the
article questioned - albeit, the animal that was discussed was a mouse, not
a monkey.

The question made me uncomfortable.  There is more to human stem cell
research than just developing organs and parts - we may be developing an
entirely new species for our own benefit.  That new species might be more
'us' than 'them.'  Is this slavery re-visited?
------------
God bless
Mary Ann (CG Jamie 65/25)

----------------------------------------------------------------------
To sign-off Parkinsn send a message to: 
mailto:listserv@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
In the body of the message put: signoff parkinsn