The Right's "Science" Problem

Isaac Chotiner (and various commenters) seem to think it's self-evidently ridiculous for me to put quotation marks around the "Science" that liberals claim to be defending against conservatives, given that conservatives are, in fact, arrayed against the scientific consensus on several issues. By coincidence, I wrote a piece on roughly this subject in 2005, during the intelligent design debate, and here it is. It's behind the TNR firewell, so I've pulled out some excerpts below the fold.

... In the long run, though, intelligent design will probably prove a political boon to liberals, and a poisoned chalice for conservatives. Like the evolution wars in the early part of the last century, the design debate offers liberals the opportunity to portray every scientific battle--today, stem-cell research, "therapeutic" cloning, and end-of-life issues; tomorrow, perhaps, large-scale genetic engineering--as a face-off between scientific rigor and religious fundamentalism. There's already a public perception, nurtured by the media and by scientists themselves, that conservatives oppose the "scientific" position on most bioethical issues. Once intelligent design runs out of steam, leaving its conservative defenders marooned in a dinner-theater version of Inherit the Wind, this liberal advantage is likely to swell considerably.

...

If liberals play their cards right, this collapse could provide them with a powerful rhetorical bludgeon. Take the stem-cell debate, where the great questions are moral, not scientific--whether embryonic human life should be created and destroyed to prolong adult human life. Liberals might win that argument on the merits, but it's by no means a sure thing. The conservative embrace of intelligent design, however, reshapes the ideological battlefield. It helps liberals cast the debate as an argument about science, rather than morality, and paint their enemies as a collection of book-burning, Galileo-silencing fanatics.

This would be the liberal line of argument anyway, even without the controversy surrounding intelligent design. "The president is trapped between religion and science over stem cells," declared a Newsweek cover story last year; "Religion shouldn't undercut new science," the San Francisco Chronicle insisted; "Leadership in 'therapeutic cloning' has shifted abroad," the New York Times warned, because American scientists have been "hamstrung" by "religious opposition"--and so on and so forth. But liberalism's science-versus-religion rhetoric is only likely to grow more effective if conservatives continue to play into the stereotype by lining up to take potshots at Darwin.

Already, savvy liberal pundits are linking bioethics to the intelligent design debate. "In a world where Koreans are cloning dogs," Slate's Jacob Weisberg wrote last week, "can the U.S. afford--ethically or economically--to raise our children on fraudulent biology?" (Message: If you're for Darwin, you're automatically for unfettered cloning research.) Or again, this week's TNR makes the pretty-much-airtight "case against intelligent design"; last week, the magazine called opponents of embryo-destroying stem cell research "flat-earthers." The suggested parallel is obvious: "Science" is on the side of evolution and on the side of embryo-killing.

...

And this formula can be applied to every new bioethical dilemma that comes down the pike. Earlier this year, for instance, the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) issued ethical guidelines for research cloning, which blessed the creation of human-animal "chimeras"--animals seeded with human cells. New York Times reporter Nicholas Wade, writing on the guidelines, declared that popular repugnance at the idea of such creatures is based on "the pre-Darwinian notion that species are fixed and penalties [for cross-breeding] are severe." In other words, if you're opposed to creating pig-men--carefully, of course, with safeguards in place (the NAS guidelines suggested that chimeric animals be forbidden from mating)--you're probably stuck back in the pre-Darwinian ooze with Bishop Wilberforce and William Jennings Bryan.

Comments

the google cache of TNR's pieces are usually available.

Posted by razib | July 28, 2007 1:10 PM

The issue is that substantial portions of the right don't just say "Yeah, we agree about what the science says, we just think it's ethically wrong." Instead, they say "Global warming isn't really happening", "Plan B is too dangerous to approve", "Other types of therapies have just as much potential as stem cells", "Terri Schiavo responds to our questions".

Remember the CEI's "Carbon Dioxide, they call it pollution, we call it life" ads? Remember Bill Frist claiming he could diagnose Terri Schiavo based on watching a single video? Remember the original rejection of selling Plan B over-the-counter?

It's not all like that. But the reason that the opponents on these issues get painted as "book-burning, Galileo-silencing fanatics" is because a substantial amount of the opponents are pretty damn close to that. Not everyone, mind you; but when I look at these debates, I see a big gathering of people on one particular side who I really do feel would have been gleefully calling Galileo a heretic, people whose response to a reality that conflicts with their current view of how the world should be is to attack those who try to explain the world as it is.

In other words, people who will buy into misleading pseudoscience simply because it supports their worldview. This isn't a problem confined exclusively to them, but they are by far the largest and most influential group for which it is a major problem. (It also contributes that their conflicts tend to be with the harder sciences, while what the far left tends to go overboard on is often the social sciences, which are inherently murkier).

So that's why. And I never see many conservatives condemning the psuedoscientific claims that get made by their allies whenever these issues come up. There's always a few brave people who do, but most just let it pass, and some praise it or pass it along "without comment", probably figuring that nothing that helps their side of the issue should be rejected, no matter how false.

Posted by m | July 28, 2007 1:53 PM

I really disagree with the notion that liberals in general are in favor of cloning, or the creation of chimeras. I mean, pig men? Liberals are lining up to create pig men?

Here's a more general question I have, though: what precisely is the ethical opposition to cloning? How, precisely, is the creation of a human life that has exact genetic information of another human immoral? I don't get it. The difference between a clone and an identical twin is very small. So what's the big deal? The clone won't have the original person's memories or personality. What's the big deal?

It seems like people object to some of the possible uses of clones-- a clone army, organ harvesting, whatever-- but why should that stop cloning in general? I don't particularly see the need for a new method to create human life, but I can't see the way in which a clone is fundamentally different from any other child. And I don't find the ick factor alone logically compelling to rule out all cloning.

Posted by Freddie | July 28, 2007 3:07 PM

Ross, I find your writing on this topic evasive and mostly off-topic. There ARE scientific issues that conservatives misrepresent when it comes to stem cells, and empirical facts very often are relevant to moral questions.

You sort of glibly imply that liberals toss off moral implications as beneath them, but your brief quotes are hardly enough to establish that people's views are so simple or that you have represented them in full.

Of course, you're too cryptic in any case to have a real idea over what you're actually driving at.

Posted by plunge | July 28, 2007 5:37 PM

As an orthodox Catholic reader of this blog who is rigidly opposed to abortion, stem cell research, cloning, and contraception, I agree that Ross is being cryptic here. I also agree with m that Christians (particularly evangelicals) love to trot out baloney science to make their moral arguments for them. My opposition to the litany above is entirely theological. You see I am an actual believer in the Magesterium of the Catholic Church. I often wish that Ross would tip his hand on things Catholic. Ross, are you a Catholic? Really? If so, speak the truth on these great moral questions of the day. Are you afraid of what your liberal policy wonk friends might say? Quit being so cute.

Posted by Aaron | July 28, 2007 6:08 PM

Re: Other types of therapies have just as much potential as stem cells

From what I've read on the subject adult stem cells do have as much potential, in fact may be superior to embryonic stem cells. In principle at least adult stem cells could be taken from the patient and cultured to provide some sort of therapy then used on the patient without concern for tissue rejection or the danger of developing melanomas (massive, fast progressing cancers that are often produced in animals when embryonic stem cells are used). The Left has a science problem on this one too: over-touting embryonic stem cells as if they were a proven panacaea and were without serious drawbacks.

Re: My opposition to the litany above is entirely theological.

Um, don't you mean "moral" or perhaps "ethical"? In my lexicon at least theology involves the study of God (e.g., Trinity etc.) and perhaps His relationship to man (e.g., Incarnation etc.). The questions you cite are moral not theological questions and ought have the same answers no matter what one believes about the Trinity, or even whether one believes in God or not.

Posted by Jonf | July 28, 2007 6:22 PM

Jonf:

Fine, moral; but the morality I speak of is derived from God. It is nor pragmatic, scientific, or subject to public policy debates. Thanks for the pedantic comment, though.

Posted by Aaron | July 28, 2007 6:40 PM

Jonf:

After looking at a dictionary, I withdraw my concession. My objection to stem cell research etc. is indeed theological i.e. "based upon the nature and will of God as revealed to humans." Maybe you should expand your "lexicon," smart guy.

Posted by Aaron | July 28, 2007 6:48 PM

Um, don't you mean "moral" or perhaps "ethical"? In my lexicon at least theology involves the study of God (e.g., Trinity etc.) and perhaps His relationship to man (e.g., Incarnation etc.). The questions you cite are moral not theological questions and ought have the same answers no matter what one believes about the Trinity, or even whether one believes in God or not.

A little off topic, but if you're religious, to what extent do you believe that these theological questions and answers have moral consequences? It sounds like you just said "to no extent whatsoever," at least on the standard pro-life issues, but that can't be right.

jenny

Posted by jenny | July 28, 2007 6:50 PM

"From what I've read on the subject adult stem cells do have as much potential, in fact may be superior to embryonic stem cells."

I'll hazard a guess that you didn't read this in a peer-reviewed science journal. One part of the "Republican War on Science" thesis is indisputably true: conservative activists distribute vast quantities of "scientific facts" to their supporters that would not be identified as facts by scientists in the relevant field.

There are really two separate phenomena that need to be discussed here. The moral objections to human embryonic stem cell research, as Ross points out, can't be fairly reduced to an "anti-science" position. I'm strongly in favor of public funding for embryonic stem cell research, just as I support abortion rights, but these issues aren't defined by one's attitude toward "science."

What Ross glosses over completely is the way that Republican political appointees at federal agencies have been censoring and overriding the judgments of scientific researchers, in matters ranging from morning-after birth control to global warming. This is at the heart of scientists' objections to Republican science policy-- a willingness to fit the facts around the ideology which seems to have metastasized into the GOP mainstream from the creationist fringe.

Posted by LaFollette Progressive | July 28, 2007 6:55 PM

What Ross glosses over completely is the way that Republican political appointees at federal agencies have been censoring and overriding the judgments of scientific researchers, in matters ranging from morning-after birth control to global warming.

Right. To me the most damning example of Republican resistance to science, besides the intelligent design stuff, is the complaints by the former head of NASA about the Bush administration suppressing science involving global warming, and now the former Surgeon General making similar complaints.

Posted by Freddie | July 28, 2007 7:26 PM

What Ross glosses over completely is the way that Republican political appointees at federal agencies have been censoring and overriding the judgments of scientific researchers, in matters ranging from morning-after birth control to global warming. This is at the heart of scientists' objections to Republican science policy-- a willingness to fit the facts around the ideology which seems to have metastasized into the GOP mainstream from the creationist fringe.

These claims are mostly a crock, as is Mooney's book. Not in the sense that some of the incidents haven't occurred, or that they aren't improper, but in the sense that they are blown completely out of proportion while similar incident that work the other way are ignored.

First of all, political decisions get made all the time that distort, ignore, or otherwise marginalize what the science says on any particular issue - Mooney simply gives a tendentious rundown of examples that irk him because of his ideological stance and makes it sound as if some sort of coherent ideological program is being enacted.

Second, intra-science disputes are frequently highly politicized, because there is a lot of big money and big egos involved. The idea that science itself is some sort of pristine, objective realm where the truth is always obvious don't know anything about how science is actually done.

Third, the science is in fact very rarely clear cut on any given issue in the sense that it clearly indicates a particular policy. Even if one were to grant (for the sake of argument) that the standard story on Global Warming, for example, is correct, that still doesn't automatically mean that drastic top-down cuts in CO2 emissions would be the best policy for dealing with the problem. Yet people who dare to argue that it would be more effective to pursue adaptationist policies instead are dismissed as oil industry shills with an ideological agenda. Who is really locked into a rigid ideological stance here?

Fourth, liberals have their own obvious ideological blinders when it comes to various scientific findings. One is the resistance to genetically modified foods in certain quarters. Another is the continued rejection of the notion that there is a genuine human nature that cannot simply be molded away by changing social structures.

Fifth, as a group scientist tend not to be very political. But of those that are, they tend to be strongly left/liberal (unsurprisingly since they predominantly hail from the academy). Groups like the Union of Concerned Scientists are strongly leftist in their political views, but they try to pass themselves off as a neutral scientific group. But there aren't very many such groups with a rightish bent.

The one area where there is a clear and consistent ideological objection to the science is of course evolution. But there hasn't been any sort of anti-evolution or pro-ID push on the part of any politicians or bureaucrats - simply a few statements vaguely supportive of ID. So the notion that a "willingness to fit the facts around the ideology" has "metastasized" from the creationist fringe doesn't make any sense in the policy arena.

Posted by Mike S. | July 28, 2007 8:59 PM

Re: Fine, moral; but the morality I speak of is derived from God.
and
Re: After looking at a dictionary, I withdraw my concession.

I believe even the Catholic Church teaches that morality is independently knowable without reference to theological axioms. Isn't this what "natural law" is all about? I happen to agree that The Good finds its source in God, but that's true of everything, mathematics and logic and aesthetics too. Just as you don't need theology (or the magisterium of a church) to know that 2+2=4 so too you do not need them to know that it is unethical to experiment of an unwilling or incapacitated human subject.

Re: I'll hazard a guess that you didn't read this in a peer-reviewed science journal.

Actually I happen to know something about this from very direct experience. There most certainly is promise in adult stem cells (though there is reason to worry about exactly where that promise may lead and who benefits), and if liberals are attempting to deny that, then they are just as bad as conservatives who attempt to deny the possibilities of embryonic stem cell research. A plague on both houses for politicizing science! I do agree that the Right has been more guilty than the Left of late, if only because the Right, and notably its wingnut fringe, has been in power for a while, whereas the Loony Left (the Afrocentrists, Luddite Earth Firsters, gender feminists, etc.) has come no where near the levers of power for time out of mind. Occasionally in academia certain lines of investigation are verboten due to leftwing political correctness, but this does not really compare to the parade of horribles, from young earth creationists placing their literature at national parks to outright cover-ups of climate science, that the Bush adminsrtation has inflicted on the US.

Posted by JonF | July 28, 2007 9:12 PM

I'll hazard a guess that you didn't read this in a peer-reviewed science journal.

Why don't you point us to a peer-reviewed article highlighting the success of an embryonic stem-cell treatment in humans?

Posted by Mike S. | July 28, 2007 9:12 PM

Here's a more general question I have, though: what precisely is the ethical opposition to cloning? How, precisely, is the creation of a human life that has exact genetic information of another human immoral? I don't get it. The difference between a clone and an identical twin is very small. So what's the big deal? The clone won't have the original person's memories or personality. What's the big deal?

It seems like people object to some of the possible uses of clones-- a clone army, organ harvesting, whatever-- but why should that stop cloning in general? I don't particularly see the need for a new method to create human life, but I can't see the way in which a clone is fundamentally different from any other child. And I don't find the ick factor alone logically compelling to rule out all cloning.

There are two reasons for the objection: 1) As you said, many people object to the intent behind most cloning efforts. Currently, people either want to clone human beings for the sole purpose of destroying the newly created clone (so-called "therapeutic" cloning - therapeutic for whom?), or they have megalomaniacal reasons for wanting to produce the first human clone. 2) As you say, there are some possibly legitimate reasons for trying to clone someone - in certain respects it could be considered analogous to IVF procedures - but the problem is the technology is not well-developed. Thus many clones will have to be created and destroyed in order to make technical progress (back to point 1)), and there is a high likelihood that clones would be brought to term that would have unforeseen abnormalities. Thus we would be essentially producing deformed babies as "experiments".

Posted by Mike S. | July 28, 2007 9:19 PM

I said above:

Fourth, liberals have their own obvious ideological blinders when it comes to various scientific findings.

To wit.

Posted by Mike S. | July 28, 2007 9:23 PM

JonF

a) What on earth are you getting at? What does any of this have to do with my original post, you insufferable pedant?

b) You write: "I believe even the Catholic Church teaches that morality is independently knowable without reference to theological axioms." Nonetheless, we have theological axioms. Are you saying that because morality is self evident, it should not be discussed or referred to by use of theological inquiry? Are you just messing with me? I don't get it.

Posted by Aaron | July 28, 2007 10:17 PM

Aaron, it isn't pedantic to be against the divine command theory of morality, and to think that it matters. Or, if it is pedantic, then the current Bishop of Rome is a pedant.

Neither Left nor Right like science that contradicts their confirmation biases. Both are willing to confuse fact and value.

Posted by Pithlord | July 28, 2007 11:46 PM

I really would like to see evidence that cloning and genetic engineering are liberal issues: my sense is that a lot of the environmentalist left is at least as fervently anti genetic-engineering as any conservative. Mention Monsanto and these people just turn red.

The other thing is that the self-same people who made their living denying that tobacco was either addictive or caused cancer have been hired to deny global warming and so on (see Tech Central Station). And these people are all, surprise surprise, Republicans. However various issues play out, I don't see anything like this among liberal groups.

The only charge that I can perceive you making stick is that science doesn't say much about stem cells. But science does say quite a bit about global warming, tobacco, intelligent design, and whether or not scientists should be allowed to publish their results without higher ups fixing the data. If you're so worried that conservatives are seen as anti-science, you might try getting them to not actually embrace positions which involve denying scientific facts.

Posted by Justin | July 28, 2007 11:49 PM

As I noted previously, the conservative position on stem cells is so nonsensical that they haven't even thought through their tactical playing up of the benefits of adult stem cells. That is, if adult stem cells fulfill their research promise, the result will be... basically embryonic stem cells, i.e. "potential human life" according to those who don't think these things through.

Of course, this only underscores how nonsensical views based on concepts like "moment of conception" or "start of life" are, when the reality is that neither of those things are really true. Sexual reproduction is a subset of, not something distinct from, asexual reproduction. Life does not "begin," and even conception is a process, not a bright line. Nearly every cell in your body is a potential new human being... but just like an embryo, it merely isn't one yet.

Posted by plunge | July 29, 2007 12:11 AM

Divine command theory of morality? Did you actually read my original post?? Am I living in a parallel universe? JonF is a pedant for objecting to my use of the word "theological." You must be aware that the Catholic Church has an pretty well developed moral theology. That the Bishop of Rome, from time to time, speaks infallibly on matters of faith and morals. The fact that humans--according to the Church--possess morals independent of the Magesterium of the Church does not change the fact that there IS a Magesterium and it describes a particular moral theology. I'm not really sure what you guys are objecting to. All I wrote was "My opposition to the litany above is entirely theological." In other words my position on abortion etc., is in line with the moral theology of the Catholic Church. What does that have to do with Divine command theory?

Posted by Aaron | July 29, 2007 1:19 AM

Please see here

Posted by jip | July 29, 2007 4:45 AM

> Fifth, as a group scientist tend not to be very
> political. But of those that are, they tend to
> be strongly left/liberal (unsurprisingly since
> they predominantly hail from the academy).
> Groups like the Union of Concerned Scientists
> are strongly leftist in their political views,
> but they try to pass themselves off as a
> neutral scientific group. But there aren't
> very many such groups with a rightish bent.

BS. Global warming or Darwin's theory of evolution are either True or False -- it does not matter whether the proponents of those theories are left-wing or not.
---
Does the extreme left have its own "luddite" problem? You bet (see e.g. nuclear power or genetically modified food) -- but it is difficult to argue that American social conservatism under Bush has been increasingly "faith based" to a bigger extent than their left wing opponents. You will hardly find *any* credible biologist or climate scientist doubting the theories that I mention in my first paragraph, yet opinion polls show an overwhelming majority of Republican voters reject both theories an atheist/liberal scam. There seems to be a general "bunker mentality" on the Right e.g. due to the Iraq fiasco. Sometimes it manifests itself in rather amusing ways, see e.g. http://www.conservapedia.com/ which was founded by Phyllis Schlafly's son since Wikipedia supposedly is "biased" against conservatives.

MARCU$

Posted by MARCU$ | July 29, 2007 7:29 AM

"Why don't you point us to a peer-reviewed article highlighting the success of an embryonic stem-cell treatment in humans?"

Way to move the goalposts, Mike S. JonF said he had read that adult-derived stem cells had "just as much potential" and may even be "superior" to embryonic stem cells. This is not a claim that a biological researcher would be likely to made. Adult-derived stem cells may eventually have many useful applications, but pluripotent adult stem cells have only been identified in certain types of tissue, and even some of those claims are still controversial.

Nobody here, or anywhere else, has claimed that therapeutic stem-cell treatments were ready for human research. Disinformation and misdirection-- par for the course when conservative activists discuss scientific issues.

Your response, from beginning to end, is nicely illustrative of the disingenuous political gamesmanship that helps explain why so many scientists feel that conservative groups are actively hostile to scientific research. While there are certainly some groups on the Left who oppose animal research and genetically-modified food (particularly in Europe), your effort to draw a facile equivalence between these movements and the efforts of Republican Administration officials to censor the output of government agencies is laughable. Furthermore, your claim that a "continued rejection of the notion that there is a genuine human nature" is mainstream among the Democratic Party is utter wingnut tripe, unworthy of a serious response.

Posted by LaFollette Progressive | July 29, 2007 12:09 PM

There are few things more pernicious to good-faith debate than the parenthetical paraphrase. Ross deploys this device two sentences in a row here, both times with maximum intellectual dishonesty:

"Already, savvy liberal pundits are linking bioethics to the intelligent design debate. "In a world where Koreans are cloning dogs," Slate's Jacob Weisberg wrote last week, "can the U.S. afford--ethically or economically--to raise our children on fraudulent biology?" (Message: If you're for Darwin, you're automatically for unfettered cloning research.) Or again, this week's TNR makes the pretty-much-airtight "case against intelligent design"; last week, the magazine called opponents of embryo-destroying stem cell research "flat-earthers." The suggested parallel is obvious: "Science" is on the side of evolution and on the side of embryo-killing."

Weisberg is encouraging people to think outside the box, being provocative. Is that the same thing as drawing an "automatic" link between belief in Darwinism and advocacy of no-holds-barred cloning? Certainly not; and to see this as Weisberg's message is simply hysterical. In the same way, to call opponents of embryo-destroying stem cell research 'flat earthers' does not mean that science is "on the side" of "embryo killing," it just means what it says, that there are no scientific grounds for opposition to stem-cell research.

Posted by lampwick | July 29, 2007 12:26 PM

Kevin Drum makes the good point that it was not so long ago that the left was being accused of being irrationally OPPOSED to eugenics: refusing to believe that IQ was genetic or some of the stronger implications of sociobiology. Now, apparently, the left is guilty of exactly the opposite.

What will movement conservatives decide people on the "left" believe next? It's sure to be entertaining, if not enlightening.

Posted by plunge | July 29, 2007 1:19 PM

"Of course, this only underscores how nonsensical views based on concepts like "moment of conception" or "start of life" are, when the reality is that neither of those things are really true. Sexual reproduction is a subset of, not something distinct from, asexual reproduction. Life does not "begin," and even conception is a process, not a bright line."

If human life really is such an indistinct process, ethical caution is the proper response rather than indifference. If one is hunting at twilight, one does not fire unless positive it is not a human being in one's sights.

"Nearly every cell in your body is a potential new human being... but just like an embryo, it merely isn't one yet."

Every cell in one's body is a potential human being only in the sense that human ova and sperm in close proximity are potential human beings. And of course much less work is required to jumpstart the process in the latter case than the former. I don't see why that is particularly relevant.

Human Embryos possess many of the same traits as their adult forms: organismic integrity, self-directed growth on the cellular level, and the same genetic plan among other things. The unity of being between embryo and adult is obvious. I do not see why only latter stages of development should qualify as a human being.

Posted by Kevin Jones | July 29, 2007 1:58 PM

Re: But of those that are, they tend to be strongly left/liberal

Since when? Maybe if you are talking about tehsocial sciences, and maybe even biology. But "hard" science guys were usually Establishment type guys (male word used deliberately here), Eisenhower Republicans. Not, to be sure, rock-ribbed rightwingers, but center-right types, if only because their jobs depended on major corporations and the defense industry.

Re: Why don't you point us to a peer-reviewed article highlighting the success of an embryonic stem-cell treatment in humans?

Um, not everything gets published. Some of it gets stamped with some sort of governmental secrecy stamp. Especially these days, but even in the golden age of Clinton. And, sorry, I am not able to say anything beyond that.

Re: What does any of this have to do with my original post, you insufferable pedant?

Is it necessary to insult people gratuitiously when they disagree with you? Isn't that a little childish (not to mention unChristian)?

Re: Are you saying that because morality is self evident, it should not be discussed or referred to by use of theological inquiry?

I am not saying that morality is "Self-evident". Where did you get that idea? Differntial geometry is not self evident either, but differential geometers need not agree on the double procession of the Holy Spirit to agree on its conclusions. I am simply saying that morality is knowable (though maybe not easily or obviously) without theological input. This refers only to "earthly" morality of course, human-human interactions. Morality that involves matters of worship and man-God issues in general obviously does require a theological referrence.

Re: JonF said he had read that adult-derived stem cells had "just as much potential" and may even be "superior" to embryonic stem cells.

Not what I said, but thanks (seriously) for trying to clear it up. I was involved directly and in a somewhat unique way in this matter, about which I am not able to say anything more. By the way, the superiority of adult stem cells lies in the lack of tissue rejection (when transplanted into the subject from whom they were taken) and the fact that they do not produce lethal megalomas as embryonic stem cells often do in animal subjects. That much is part of the literature in the subject. I have to say I don't see much promise in a "therapy" which may, perhaps, cure one condition but also kill the patient with catastrophic cancer.

Posted by JonF | July 29, 2007 2:11 PM

LaFollete Progressive,

Way to move the goalposts, Mike S. JonF said he had read that adult-derived stem cells had "just as much potential" and may even be "superior" to embryonic stem cells. This is not a claim that a biological researcher would be likely to made. Adult-derived stem cells may eventually have many useful applications, but pluripotent adult stem cells have only been identified in certain types of tissue, and even some of those claims are still controversial.

The point is that adult-derived stem cells are currently being used for therapies, and have been for years. There is zero evidence that embryonic stem cells can be used for therapies - that is merely informed speculation. Thus it is perfectly accurate to claim that adult-derived stem cells have more potential than embryo-derived stem cells. It is an assumption that pluripotent stem cells are superior to non-pluripotent ones, but that again is not supported by experimental evidence. As JonF points out, there are currently serious problems with ESC as a treatment option. These problems might be resolved, and they might not, but it's not unreasonable to think that they might ultimately prove inferior to adult cells. And, as you acknowledge, it may be possible to turn adult-derived cells into pluripotent cells.

While there are certainly some groups on the Left who oppose animal research and genetically-modified food (particularly in Europe), your effort to draw a facile equivalence between these movements and the efforts of Republican Administration officials to censor the output of government agencies is laughable.

Where is the evidence for such censorship, and the evidence that it supercedes that seen in previous administrations.

Furthermore, your claim that a "continued rejection of the notion that there is a genuine human nature" is mainstream among the Democratic Party is utter wingnut tripe, unworthy of a serious response.

Tell that to Steven Pinker. The Blank Slate was not well-received in the academy.

Posted by Mike S. | July 29, 2007 2:53 PM

"If human life really is such an indistinct process, ethical caution is the proper response rather than indifference."

This isn't much of a coherent response. There's nothing _indistinct_ about the process of reproduction: it's simply that the claim that there is a moment of conception or a beginning of life is a falsehood, as are those explanations of moral worth based on those falsehoods. You can't base a system of personal existence and rights on idea that there is some distinct point in which it comes to be.

"If one is hunting at twilight, one does not fire unless positive it is not a human being in one's sights."

Which is precisely why stem cells are morally like skin cells, rather than like even fetuses. They aren't even close to being like the beings we have all sorts of good reasons to ascribe rights too. They don't have nervous systems: they barely even have tissue differention. Worse, they aren't an "individual" because they can develop into several individuals, or none, all depending on external conditions. They are about as UNLIKE specifically humans as something can get and still be an organism.

"Every cell in one's body is a potential human being only in the sense that human ova and sperm in close proximity are potential human beings."

Well yes: and in the exact same sense than a embryo is a potential human being, which is to say that it's one step on a long and continual causal chain necessary to develop a human being. But it is not at or anywhere near the point in which the thing in question has been constructed.

DNA is a set of instructions not for a specific person, but for a construction process that if carried out will ultimately construct a person. But the instructions and a couple of the necessary raw materials (i.e. cell structure) are not themselves the finished product.

People like yourself are like someone who would arrest an architect for terrorism if they crumpled up their plans and tossed out some prefab materials.

"And of course much less work is required to jumpstart the process in the latter case than the former. I don't see why that is particularly relevant."

Well, only because it demonstrates the complete vacuity of the idea that merely being a cell containing human DNA that has the capacity to divide and then develop into a fetus when placed in a womb makes someone human. If that were true, then every cell in your body is by definition just a step or two away from being a human being too.

"Human Embryos possess many of the same traits as their adult forms: organismic integrity, self-directed growth on the cellular level, and the same genetic plan among other things."

So? They also have no feelings, interests, nervous systems, nor even a single one of the functional capacities relevant to moral consideration. I don't even know what you mean by "organismic integrity given that we are talking about something that can subsequently become an indefinite number of organisms. All cells in all tissues have self-directed growth on the cellular level, and they all have the same genetic plan. Try again, maybe?

Unless you care deeply about the pathetic fallacy "wish" of cells to divide, I don't see a lot of consistency or sense in your position.

"The unity of being between embryo and adult is obvious. I do not see why only latter stages of development should qualify as a human being."

Because at least those stages are functionally more than just mostly undifferentiated cells: at that point they have at least developed SOME of the core and distinct elements that set humans apart from, say, any other form of life.

Talking about a "unity" is nonsense, it's you reading your own hopes and imaginings and expectations onto a biological process that does not have them. Cells don't "care" about what happens to them. PEOPLE care: people that have, at a minimum, say, brains of at least SOME sort.

Posted by plunge | July 29, 2007 3:04 PM

The ongoing assumption is when conservatives distort science its wrong (stem cells, evolution, GCC, etc.) its bad, but when liberals distort science (obesity is "socially contagious", GMO foods, solar power works for everyone) its good.

Posted by Liam Colvin | July 29, 2007 4:45 PM

plunge,

That is, if adult stem cells fulfill their research promise, the result will be... basically embryonic stem cells, i.e. "potential human life" according to those who don't think these things through.

If it is possible to produce ESC without destroying embryos in the process, the moral objections would disappear. It is the embryo that is a human life (not just potentially, but actually), not the stem cell. The objection is to the destruction of embryos, not to the use of stem cells for research or for therapies.

Kevin Drum makes the good point that it was not so long ago that the left was being accused of being irrationally OPPOSED to eugenics: refusing to believe that IQ was genetic or some of the stronger implications of sociobiology. Now, apparently, the left is guilty of exactly the opposite.

The progressive movement of the early 20th century was fully on board with the eugenics movement. Progressives currently favor an unlimited license to abortion, which is resulting in practices such as aborting Down syndrome babies.

You will hardly find *any* credible biologist or climate scientist doubting the theories that I mention in my first paragraph

Biologists, yes; climate scientists, no.

Posted by Mike S. | July 29, 2007 6:21 PM

Mike S.: the academy != the Democratic Party.

Liam: none of the positions you ascribe to liberals have a major following within the Democratic Party.

Posted by Elvis Elvisberg | July 29, 2007 6:23 PM

"If it is possible to produce ESC without destroying embryos in the process, the moral objections would disappear. It is the embryo that is a human life (not just potentially, but actually), not the stem cell"

Mike, simply put, that's absurd. An embryo is a stem cell that has divided a couple of times according to a particular instruction set in the DNA. If THAT is the crux of the "moral" distinction, then I must say that someone seems to have completely missed the entire point of morality, and is just confusing themselves with rules they don't understand the meaning of.

Posted by plunge | July 29, 2007 8:19 PM

Me-- "Furthermore, your claim that a "continued rejection of the notion that there is a genuine human nature" is mainstream among the Democratic Party is utter wingnut tripe, unworthy of a serious response."

Mike S. -- "Tell that to Steven Pinker. The Blank Slate was not well-received in the academy.

By this same marvelous bit of logical reasoning, one could also conclude that Democrats really are engaged in a scheme to destroy America's greatness, because Rush Limbaugh's "The Way Things Ought to Be" was not well-received in the academy.

Pinker's book was poorly received by the academy because it was a jumble of well-informed observations about biology and ridiculous straw men. Few Democrats, and even fewer social scientists, cling to an extreme "blank slate" view of human nature. Pinker also spent a significant portion of the book criticizing the humanities despite understanding very little about the subject matter, as Louis Menand pointed out.

Which is to say that the book was roughly as well-received by the academy as Richard Dawkins' "The God Delusion" was received by theologians, for more or less the same reasons.

Posted by LaFollette Progressive | July 29, 2007 8:28 PM

plunge,

Mike, simply put, that's absurd. An embryo is a stem cell that has divided a couple of times according to a particular instruction set in the DNA.

A stem cell is a component of an embryo, not the other way around. The embryo is the complete, growing organism. The stem cell is a component of the organism which is capable of transforming into any of the three germ layers. This is straightforward developmental biology found in any biology textbook (or on Wikipedia, for that matter).

Posted by Mike S. | July 29, 2007 8:48 PM

oes the extreme left have its own "luddite" problem? You bet (see e.g. nuclear power or genetically modified food) -- but it is difficult to argue that American social conservatism under Bush has been increasingly "faith based" to a bigger extent than their left wing opponents.

I think the left's denial that race exists, or that IQ is important as a measurement has a tremendous number of negative social consequences that are far more deleterious socially than Intelligent Design.

By the way, the most serious objection to cloning, that one of you asked about but that was never in my opinion, adequately answered, is that the directed creation of persons and the directed design and engineering of persons tends to blur the line between subject and object.

That is, when we start constructing people, the line betweeen a person, who is defined by experiencing things, and object, which is defined by others experiencing it, becomes more shady.

One more point is that naturalistic materialism tends toward the denial of personhood, as consciousness ulitmately would become reducible to information (i.e. like a modifiable computer program), and therefore lack the continuousness and identity required for personhood to exist. (It's the old question, when teleporting Kirk to the planet, did they send Kirk, or was he killed by the transporter beam and a copy of him reconstructed. If it's a copy, then isn't it also true that Kirk is dying every instant and a copy of him being reborn the next? What connects his moments into a continuous person?)

Posted by Glaivester | July 29, 2007 8:52 PM

By this same marvelous bit of logical reasoning, one could also conclude that Democrats really are engaged in a scheme to destroy America's greatness, because Rush Limbaugh's "The Way Things Ought to Be" was not well-received in the academy.

Only if you ignore the reasons why the arguments in the book were rejected. I also suppose there is a question surrounding the definition of "the Democratic party". If by that you mean "all registered Democrats", then I'd be more inclined to agree with you. But if you mean "influential donors and activists at the national level", then the academy is basically coincident with the Democratic party.

Perhaps we should try some other examples. Larry Summers. Randy Thornhill. Welfare reform. Same-sex marriage. The Bell Curve. All of these cases saw vociferous objections from the academy and Democrat party elites because they challenged the pet notion that human nature is malleable, and can be changed & improved by simply imposing the correct social structures (in a top-down way, to be determined by said elites, of course).

Posted by Mike S. | July 29, 2007 9:10 PM

"A stem cell is a component of an embryo, not the other way around."

It's essentially both. Any cell which contains a complete component of DNA when activated in the right way will begin to divide and play out embryonic development. Heck, egg cells can be induced to simply double their genes and then start dividing in that way, which is how parthogenesis (virgin birth) works. All we're talking about is different cellular machinery being activated.

"The embryo is the complete, growing organism."

By that definition, so is a cluster of HeLa cells in a petri dish.

"The stem cell is a component of the organism which is capable of transforming into any of the three germ layers. This is straightforward developmental biology found in any biology textbook (or on Wikipedia, for that matter)."

You need the advanced version then I'm afraid. Yes, the embryonic stem cells in question are harvested by picking apart an embryo, but an embryonic stem cell itself, alone, is also capable of becoming a new embryo provided that it has not differentiated. In fact, as I noted, ANY cell is potentially capable of doing this, since cells (well, not every cell type, but most) all have "human DNA" in them and simply have to have it told to divide in the correct way (though its a lot more complicated than that in practice given that cellular components are not all the same).

Again, as I noted: the end result of adult stem cell research will be a cell that we can stick in a womb and end up with a baby.

Posted by plunge | July 29, 2007 9:17 PM

Glav, consider that maybe the reason we don't confuse subject and object is that our morals actually have some relevance and meaning to the beings in question, as opposed to being arbitrary rules that are ultimately nihilistic.

For instance, I don't see why cloning is any more objectifying than having sex: both are things done that produce people. But it's the people that are morally relevant: we care about their interests not because of how they were made, but because of what they are. Most of your fears, indeed, seem premised on the idea that we are all sociopaths (i.e. that our "morality" is based purely on selfish calculation rather than things like empathy). Well, if you lack empathy and morals, I can see why that might be a worry. If not, not. Supernaturalism certainly offers nothing in the way of any more coherent justification for or explanation of personhood or identity, so I'm not sure why that's a relevant distinction.

Posted by plunge | July 29, 2007 9:24 PM

"But if you mean "influential donors and activists at the national level", then the academy is basically coincident with the Democratic party."

The beautiful thing about Mike S. is that he's so thoroughly self-discrediting.

There isn't much to be said in response to that. I suppose if one had never spoken with a living, breathing liberal Democrat in his entire life, and had read nothing but conservative blogs and op-ed columns for the past 15 years, then your argument might seem reasonable.

If you can find some real-world examples of major Democratic donors denying the existence of human nature, perhaps we can discuss them. As it stands, though, I'm not really interested in arguing with a scarecrow.

Posted by LaFollette Progressive | July 30, 2007 11:32 AM

Elvis:

They don't? When were they taken over by aliens?

Oh - sorry. That was a joke, wasn't it?

Posted by Liam Colvin | July 30, 2007 12:12 PM

The main issue with stem cells lies in the right wing nutbars' unwillingness to help actual living people with soon-to-be-dead blastocysts. In thousands and thousands and thousands of cases, actual people are injured. The soon-to-be-discarded blastocysts are .... soon to be discarded, but the defenders of pre-discarded blastocysts are unwilling to allow them to be used to help real living human beings.

Amazing.

It's yet more information reminding us that, to the right wing nutbars, life begins at conception, and then ends at birth.

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