Bio-Politics Update

Obama victory delights stem cell researchers

Advocates of stem-cell research are counting the days until the swearing-in of President-elect Barack Obama. Although President George Bush has strictly limited stem-cell research from cell lines derived from human embryos, Obama has long favored such research and is likely to put a quick end to the federal ban that limits funding of research.
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An excerpt from The Organ Factory, by William Saletan [Part 3 of a 5 part series appearing on Slate.com in July 2005]:

Start with individuality. About two weeks after conception, the human embryo develops an alignment of cells called the primitive streak. Until this moment, according to the California report, "the pre-embryo is not necessarily one individual—it could lead to identical twins." If it isn't an individual, it can't have a soul or be a person, so it's eligible for research. I've never found this argument reassuring, since it just means we could be aborting two embryos instead of one. But what's interesting is how we came up with the argument.

Read the series...