pz

Uh, I hate to rain on a parade, but there is such a thing as a deaf culture, and in addition to having some unique and interesting traits, it tends to be rather insular. I had a job interview at Gallaudet University a few years ago, and it was a fascinating place. Signing has its own poetry, its own modes of expression, and the people within that culture have bonds with each other that we can't really grasp.

The situation is much more complex than just "deafness is a handicap that ought to be corrected." Imagine what it would be like if information was swapped on the internet via recorded voice messages, and people started telling you that you'd be better off if you got rid of that keyboard and replaced it with a microphone. Would you object?

On the other hand, though, there is some silliness to deaf culture. Some people were outraged at new surgeries to correct deafness, for instance, and some of the deaf felt that people who got such surgeries were traitors. I really think that the core of the culture isn't the absence of an ability, but rich tools they have developed to express themselves, so it is wrong-headed to campaign against techniques to correct the disability. What I'd like to see is that ASL had wider currency, because it really is a beautiful thing.

Gallimore

Ageofreason,

<a href="http://prc.csun.edu/," target="_blank">http://prc.csun.edu/,</a> then click "guidelines."

I'm not a comedian bullshitter.

brighid

PZ,

No one has denied the existence of deaf culture, of it’s value to society and the people it encompasses, but what has been argued is that the potential destruction of deaf culture is a valid reason to argue the immorality of ESC research, and therefore the ban on such research to find cures for a myriad of devastating disease.

Brighid

ageofreason2000

Link no work
But I'll take your word for it, it just seems so strange to want to be deaf!
All hail for making a normal life for yourself.
But to purposely inflict deafness on someone if the technology is in place to stop it, in order to keep your "culture", seems bizarre in the extreme.

dk

brighid: ESC experiments do harvest stem cells (not human beings even if the cells come from human subjects), I am not sure what role fertilization plays in ESC experiments but neither have any moral implication. However, to suggest that the motive for research is the merciless, inhumane, malicious or having no JUST foundation is categorically false! Perhaps you could provide some evidence to the motives of scientists and citizens who have a vested interest in seeing this research move forward.
dk: First I didn’t use the words “merciless, inhuman, malicious“. Second, hES cells are harvested by destroying an embryo. Third, the pluripotent stem cells described in the NIH Guidelines can become human embryos, therefore violate the Congressional ban see <a href="http://"http://www.ewtn.com/library/ISSUES/STEMCELL.HTM"" target="_blank"> Stem Cells that become Embryos </a> . .
brighid: It seems to me the desire to attempt to cure disease like cancer, diabetes, paralysis, Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s and other debilitating and life-threatening illnesses through this promising research is anything but a wanton disregard or destruction of human life. If anything those who “morally” oppose this research based on the idea that human life begins at conception show a wanton disregard for human life by damning millions of people to suffer and die needlessly when a cure may very well be found. I think the LIVING and not the potential human being (as found in stem cells) that will through the very natural course of nature (such as never being fertilized or being naturally aborted) never actually becomes HUMAN, take precedence in ALL cases.
dk: Josef Mengela would have certainly agreed with you brighid. From an ethical standpoint to destroy one life to better another life virtually violates every civilized standard of law. It seems to me human embryonic research arbitrarily ranks embryos as nonhuman. As a sequence human life begins at conception, and continues until death. The idea of intentionally destroying one human life to benefit another under law rationalizes murder as a cure for disease. If an embryo isn’t human, than what is it?
.
brighid: If you would also care to provide scientific evidence that supports your theory (certainly not a FACT) that the moment a sperm and egg become united that a human being is fully human, and therefore deserving of protection (that not even your God seems to give since miscarriage is so prevalent.)
dk: Science has known empirically for 110+ years that human life begins as a zygote, and the term embryo dates back to the 16th Century. A human zygote, blastula, and embryo are in every sense an organism, alive and human, therefore empirically exist as human life. I’ve been working from the NIH Guidelines and the Congressional Ban on Embryonic Research. You’ve asserted an embryo to be a potential human life contrary to the empirical evidence. An organism is defined as a cell or group of cells that can independently carry on a complex array of functions to support life. A human embryo has the autonomous capacity to reproduce, absorb energy and heal itself.
.
brighid: I really have no idea what 2 and 3 are suppose to mean, more or less imply. Unless of course you are able to prove that a 16 or 60-celled organism that possesses human DNA is capable of determining anything, but most specifically “self as the means to its own end.”
dk: Human beings are created as individuals with an innate right to life, or not. Clearly human embryos are human life. People asleep or unconscious periodically become incapable of self-determination, and occasionally may be incapacitated for extended periods by illness or injury, and the right to life transcends these periods because the right to life is innate. Justice applies the facts of law, to the evidentiary facts. The fact of law establishes a right to life, and the facts of evidence establish that the human organism begins life as a zygote. Since human life empirically has the capacity (potential) for self determination, then the moral question turns on whether people are created equal under the law. The moral question is philosophical not scientific, and argues whether one human life can ethically be destroyed to benefit another. If a community, society and government determine that scientific knowledge justifies the destruction of human life, then the rights of scientific knowledge supersede the right to life, in the same way a women’s rights to abortion supersedes the right to life of the baby she carries.
.
brighid: How can morally upright people overlook the suffer of real living, breathing, feeling, human beings and place more “value” on human cells frozen in a laboratory that will never actually become fully human?
dk: You’ve now introduced another question. Does the process of in vitro fertilization violate the sanctuary established by to protect the right to life? Once again the facts of law must be applied to the facts of evidence. In this case a laboratory process of “in vitro fertilization” requires more human embryos than the mother can possibly carry. The surplus can be preserved but for what justifiable purpose and at whose expense? Can a potential parent wantonly abdicate their parental rights and obligations? The idea of test tube babies envisions vats to grow bio-engineered babies apart from the human parents. I suppose some might envision and justify such a future as a final stage of human evolution that melds technology with biology to author a new species. The moral question of course is whether such a future experiment would be suitable for human beings. While the question is valid it is also well beyond the scope of this thread, but if human beings submit their “right to life” to the establishment of science, then science becomes god in a metaphysical sense. Personally I would argue human civilization rests on a sanctuary established to protect human life and self determination with virtue, good-will and prosperity, to make the nuclear family the building block of civilization. To the extent science denigrates human life or self determination as “a means to an ends” the establishment of science becomes an unreliable destabilizing force that threatens the future of all people with tyranny that generates envy, animosity, inequality, viciousness, injustice and hatred.

[ November 26, 2002: Message edited by: dk ]</p>

brighid

Dk
You must then be unfamiliar with the defintions of wanton. I would encourage you take a dictionary and look it up.

I fail to see the relevancy of the information you posted regarding possible implantation of monozygotic twinning. You do understand that ESC Research is done in a laboratory and there will be no implanation capablities?

Edited to add because I hit reply button prematurely:

Boys and girls – can anyone name what fallacy dk has just employed? Unfortunately, you have failed to make any sustainable argument that blastocysts or other cells with human DNA should be extended the same protections an ACTUAL human life should be given.

And embryo is a conglomeration of cells that possesses the ability to achieve full human being status, but an 8,10,60, or 1 million celled organisms isn’t a human life, even if it is a live and possess human DNA.

Arbitrarily damning millions of people to suffer and die from disease that could be cured because you refuse to understand the difference between an actual human being and a bunch of fertilized (or unfertilized) cells in a laboratory is what appears to be the rather irrational position. I prefer to deal with the rights of living (and dieing) than with hypothetical non-beings that only posses the potential to be actualized

Please define human being? Also I would not deny that a human embryo, zygote etc. are organism that are alive and have human DNA, but they are no more human than a human skin cell, tumor, or other cells and organisms. No all organisms of human origin deserve protection. This is what you have to address.

Yes, quite correct so how shall we differentiate between the millions of different cells/organisms that do such things - do blood cells, cancer cells, sperms cells, brain cells, etc. deserve protection so as their death through scientific, medical or genetic intervention takes precedence over the COMPLETE human being?

Human beings aren't "created" and although I do believe that as a human being there are intrinsic values each possesses I do not believe there is an absolute right to life and I certainly don't place all organisms, because they possess human DNA on the same value plane as an actual fully developed, functioning, thinking human being even if at time that human being may or may not possess consciousness.

An individual human being begins the uncertain journey toward birth and full human potential the moment an egg and sperm unite, but you have failed to support WHY this stage deserves MORE value then those who have already passed this process and are fully human, and not simply an uncertain conglomeration of cells that isn't guaranteed to ever become anything.

I have certainly NOT introduced another question, you have. NOTHING has established a sancturay by which to protect the right of life of any living organism. Whether or not an organism is living does not imbue it with inalienable rights.

The surplus can be reserved for future inseminations in the event the original does not take place and in regard to this discussion for the purposes of scientific research to help eliminate disease and prolong life.

How ironic that you take a position of self-determination in regard to this discussion. The diseased and dieing certainly aren't able to make any sort of self-determination (even though they have the mental capacity that a blastocyst doesn't) when the living are denied access to viable treatment and cures because the value of the living human potential is placed at that higher plateau. By refusing to allow scientific research to fully develop itself you deny these actual PEOPLE the rights you so highly regard: their right to life, self-determination, good will and prosperity by "wantonly" denying their actual right to life by the very nature of your argument. Dk - why do living human beings mean less to you then human cells?

Perhaps when you have removed your circular reasoning this discussion can proceed somewhere productive but as your reasoning goes this is your argument - organisms are alive and therefore should not be denied their rights, but since you make no differentiation between a cell, a blastocyst, an embryo and a human being of any age , all organisms have equal rights but you deny certain organisms the right to continued life because you favor the rights of other organisms over their right to life of others. Are you getting dizzy?

Brighid

[ November 26, 2002: Message edited by: brighid ]</p>

LordSnooty

I don't really mind, but I am surprised that a moderator hasn't stepped in with a word about personal attacks on this thread. If I say anything then people tend to jump down my throat.

Paul

Gallimore

I should accept ESC research as a possible cure for the myriad of diseases. But since it plays a critical role in the moral constitution of a people, we must strike a true balance. Genetic research is going to be a cutting edge issue, in that employers will be able to obtain genetic information about interviewees. Therein lies discrimination, which portends to the already potential ethnic cleansing, if not intentionally, of deaf culture. The basic controversy is about power. Here we ought to impose control on it, and then just as it will serve as a cure of many deadly diseases, so it will serve as a preserver of cultures.

But what was at one point vague now become painfully obvious: This is Darwinism at best. If deaf communities had crumbled or collapsed under the ESC weight, it does promote a cause that is compatible with the theory of natural selection.

dk

I think deaf culture make a significant comment and contribution to humanity as a whole. What at first glance may appear to be a genetic defect through self-determination establishes "a right to life" that suitably subscribes science to human nature, not visa versa.

LordSnooty

Right, but you're using a strawman. The reason such a high value is placed on human life is because human beings are sentient, concious, and capable of thought and feeling. The life forms we're discussing are not sentient. They have no thoughts, understanding, or emotion. They would be no more aware of their own existence than a rock would be.

We do not destroy one human life to save another. But tiny embryos are not in posession of those very qualities that give human life value in the first place. We should place no more moral value in these tiny cell clusters than we should in an individual sperm.

To summarise, I fully support destroying human life in circumstances where the human concerned does not have a brain or nervous system. I hope that clears up this cretinous argument of semantics for you.

The only cause for objection is if you believe the embryo is somehow endowed with supernatural powers of magic (ie, a soul), a view which has little credence amongst people of reason.

Incidentally, for you to evoke the name of Josef Mengele to support your pathetic argument is truly disgusting. Mengele experimented on real, living, sentient humans, not blobs of cells. You are a disgrace to your cause. And that's really saying something.

Paul