Missouri Prop 2

[hank franklin]

Yr comment is why I say at its heart it's an economic development issue. Business X won't do business in your town if an alderman might pass a law outlawing it after the fact.

Stem cell R & D investment money won't come to Missouri if there's not a law protecting it in the first place. The stem cell business couldn't get a law through the legislature so they went the initiative petition route instead, putting it on the ballot.

That's all this is really about.

[gonefishin]

My opinion, if they have to be protected and have to have doubtful ammendments made to our constitution then we dont need them. Let them go elsewhere and see if they can find a state willing to ammend their constitution and guarentee them public fundng. I think they are trying it here becasue they think we are backwoods country hicks that arent smart enough to figure it out.

JMHO

[crappiefisherman]

Lilley lets have a vote, or a readers pole yea or nea, I say no

[Wayne SW/MO]

I think someone else is going to do that Tuesday.

[crappiefisherman]

in here?

[3wt]

Hank,

Your thinking scares me.

I don't really care what "greater good" is being served. This is not war, so your a-bomb argument is inapplicable. Think of the travesties that could be brought about by the greater good argument. If I could tell you that aborted fetuses may have the same research potential as the embryos we're talking about, then would you change your mind on abortion? I hope not. These are either lives or not. I don't care what sad cases can be cured, I'm not willing to gamble here.

This is becoming hypocrisy at it's worst. If we can't say that these aren't humans, then lets not kill them. If you can't get that simple concept, then there is no point arguing here.

Decide when a human becomes a human (please base it on something besides "I feel this way"). Anything before that point is fair game. Anything after that point is protected, no matter what "greater good" can be served.

[gonefishin]

The answer to the argument of when life begins is really simple. THe instant an egg is fertalized it begins growing and will continue to grow until it becomes a mature human or it quits growing and dies. As a fertalized human egg has no choices other than to live and grow or die and not; life obviously starts at the instant fertalization takes place. It does not matter where, how or when fertilazation takes place the instant it happens the egg starts to grow and that means it is life. Some argue that at early stage a fertalized human egg is only a few cells and is a shapless blob therefore it is not recoginizable and as such is not life. Strange argument. Would these same people also argue that an amebia (cingle cell blob)is not life. Or how about the horseshoe crab. Green Blood certainly is not recoginizable as life therefore horseshoe crabs must not be alive. Just because something is small or unrecognizable does not mean it isnt life.

<quote>'Smallest life form' found off Iceland

By David Derbyshire, Science Correspondent

(Filed: 02/05/2002)

A NEW life form discovered in volcanic waters off Iceland may be the smallest living thing in the world, scientists said yesterday.

At 400 millionths of a millimetre across, more than six million of the microbes would fit on the head of a pin.

The microbes belong to a new group of archaea, one of the three giant branches of life along with bacteria and eukaryotes, organisms with cell nuclei.

A team of German scientists from the University of Regensburg reported in Nature that they found them 360ft down.</quote>

These scientists must be wrong because whatever it is they found it is obvioulsly way to small to be life.

[3wt]

GF - Good analysis. Just to mine a little further...

If a human egg is living (indisputable), then it is a living 'what?'

Things that are alive are of a kind or species.

Then what species or kind is a fertilized human egg.

Science does not recognize "almost" species, only species.

The fertilized egg can only be human.

So, it is human, and it is alive. It must then be as valuable as any living human.

[hank franklin]

3wt, I don't have any problem with your position. I wonder, do you oppose capital punishment? I do.

I agree there's some situational ethics at play, and the issue can be murky. But the following line from the Amendment is what my point is based on: (2) No human blastocyst may be produced by fertilization solely for the purpose of stem cell research.

You start creating lives and then killing them for the purpose of research = bad.

Take lives that are not going to live and then use them for some "greater good"? Acceptable in my book.

Very dicey ethically, I agree. But once the genie is out of the bottle, you can't ban it.

If I was a doctor, would I pursue this research? No way. I'd stay out of that game.

But as a government make it illegal? Can't do it.

I really don't have any problem with people voting against the amendment. I personally have no strong feeling for the amendment either way. It'll be a tough vote tomorrow. I hate to take a pass on an issue but on this one I just might.

[Phil Lilley]

Last word...

I think amendments are way too easy to be brought to the ballet. In this case, it seems that one person is behind the amendment and his money is backing it. Should anyone be allowed to buy an amendment to the state constitution esp if he has a financial interest in it? Gambling is another case in point. One guy funded the Rockaway Beach effort in an attempt to make money for himself. I don't think it's right regardless of the issue. But I know- it's the system.

Anyhow- I respect all views on this matter and thank everyone for the discussion. I hope it's been enlightening for everyone.