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Green Light for Human/Animal Hybrids
Henneshoe writes "BBC News is reporting that two research facilities have been given the green light to create part human, part animal embryos. According the the report, 'Scientists want to create hybrid embryos by merging human cells with animal eggs in a bid to extract stem cells. The embryos would then be destroyed within 14 days.' The decision to allow the embryos was made after research showed that people in large are OK with the idea."
"Your Honour, I was just working on creating a Human/Sheep hybrid."
Trolling is a art,
Dibs on platypus!
Do they speak English in Iarge?
"It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education." -Albert Einstein
I am glad that we are trusting the unwashed masses to make important technical decisions that they know nothing about. If Britney says it's safe, then it must be. God bless Democracy.
I, for one, welcome our species hopping virus overlords.
Dr. Moreau unavailable for comment.
Since when should the perception of the public decide what research is done and which is not? I can at least understand why a panel such as the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority would want to have their opinion heard, but why would they waste their time consulting the public?
Why even create such a government body if they were just going to conduct opinion polls to make their decisions? If you are going to assemble a panel of scientists and ethicists to regulate the scientific community (well at least in the UK), at least you would hope they would use their expertise instead of referring to the public.
-- All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing. -- Edmund Burke
Furries across the world rejoiced in their parents' basements.
Approved over 4 years after Chinese scientists apparently already began experimenting with the same.
Oh, and the obligatory "I for one welcome our new <insert your own human/animal hybrid here> overlords."
Saying Android is a family of phones is akin to saying Linux is a family of PCs.
The embryos would then be destroyed within 14 days.
So, anyone else consider that the single most dissapointing part of this?
They'd almost certainly not live long enough to ever call them infants, but even in the steps they do last through, we could learn so much by watching how they develop differently from either human or other-half embryos.
And if they actually lived to term, well, I would consider their cognitive develpment nothing short of fascinating to observe.
No wait, a human-roach hybrid, now that could like become the actual true master race...
I know a lot of people are against cloning human embryos extracting the stem cells and then aborting them. So how on earth could splicing humans cells with animals, harvesting it, and then aborting it possibly be construed as better? Personally I don't care either way, but I can't see how you could be happier with cross species embryos than with good old cloning from a moral standpoint
Sure they did. They rooted for the fly.
"Who is the Journal of Quantum Physics going to believe?" --Stephen Hawking
The embryos would then be destroyed within 14 days.
I have a hunch that some lab tech would end up with a private Island of Doctor Moreau in their garage, via a few test tubes that were somehow misplaced at the lab.
Dan East
Better known as 318230.
This is animal cruelty, plain and simple.
Because 14-day-old embryos have such well-developed nervous systems that they can appreciate (nevermind even "experience") pain?
Do you know how many embryos are going to be destroyed
No. Do you?
More importantly - So what? At that stage of life, you have organic scum in a tube. What it could someday turn into has no relevance to its status at that developmental level.
There are better ways to get stem cells people.
Yes - Yes, we do indeed have better ways. But the goddamned fundies don't seem inclined to let us use the numerous extra embryos from human fertility therapies (nevermind abortions), so we need to find new, even more absurd, ways to get them.
... welcome our new Manimal overlords.
Especially if they are in Neko Mimi Mode.
So you not only take issue with human stem cells, but animal stem cells as well. You have concern for the small number (say 10,000) of animals which may die to provide the embryos.
Somehow you seem more horrified that those 10,000 die to provide embryos (which you so clearly point out can be used to ease human suffering) than the millions upon millions of animals that die every year to feed us (inefficiently, from a calorie viewpoint), or the thousands of animals which get tested on.
Why people care so much about things which are never self-aware, let alone capable of feeling pain, yet turn a blind eye to the suffering of people (and animals) that is very real astounds me. Darfur? No, you're more outraged about stem cell research.
You can have moral issues with both, but please get your priorities straight. Hundreds of thousands dying and starving for NO good reason compared to cells with hundreds of deaths that were going to happen anyway (abortion isn't going away, even if made illegal) that may alleviate the suffering of millions.
I am not an expert. If I am misled in something, please correct me.
You were half right with that. I hear the Dems were considering his likeness for their logo.
Resistance is futile. Your technological distinctiveness will be added to our own. You will become one with the morgue
Something half pig, half manbear must come out of this.
Better call Al Gore.
Will there be overlords?
What you have is a little blob of animal stem cells with a few human stem cells thrown into the mix. Both are multiplying, but we mostly have animal cells. What would likely happen is once the embryo's cells begin specialization and an immune system develops, it would kill off all the human cells leaving itself crippled, deformed and dying.
Remember how everyone said "Aww shucks! We're just going to use cloning for stem cell research! We'd NEVER do anything funky like crossing humans and animals!" in response to cloning critics?
Well now those critics have been validated, and the Religious Right has more ammunition with which they can stall actual valid medical research.
This is what unrestrained morbid curiosity gets you. Too bad productive science as a whole has to suffer.
"Ask not what your country can do for you." --John F. Kennedy
There already are two furry conventions in the UK - RBW and ConFuzzled. See the furry convention map for more worldwide.
So, it is not cruel when one does not "appreciate" or "experience" pain? You could then sedate a person to the point of being incapable of doing either in order to morally kill them? Your argument is stupid and you know it, so why bother posting it?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/7193820.stm
I find this incredibly irritating. The specifics of the term "hybrid" are not elaborated upon and the continual use of the term"human-animal hybrid" allows for people to develop the notion that scientists out there are actually creating some monster chimeric creature.
Not. True. If you click on "Q&A Hybrid Embryos", found in the right hand nav bar, you'll see what I mean. I've provided the link below:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/6233415.stm
This second link elaborates on why these eggs are considered "hybrid". Genetic material (DNA) is essentially removed from animal cells, leaving an empty nucleus and functional cellular machinery. In other words, you have a cell without DNA that looks very much like a human cell without it's DNA. The scientists then inject human DNA into the animal cell's nucleus; at this point the animal cell reads instructions off the DNA and carries them out. The end product is essentially A HUMAN CELL, but with left over proteins and cellular material generated from the old animal DNA.
This is FAR different from what people appear to be assuming. It's not going to generate some half cow-half human monster/creature, and does NOT "blur" the boundaries between humans and other species.
Can be a creepy result... A sheep with a human brain... Or the opposite... Those are extremes...
But what about a human with polar bear fur?
Never mind - there are better features that I would have had... Better eyesight maybe? Birds are able to see UV-radiation, and some birds have a lot better vision than humans. On the other hand the genome for UV isn't lost in humans - it's actually changed into blue instead, probably because it's more useful that way. (so we can see the BSOD from M$)
Or a simple feature - why does humans really need toilet paper? Most animals can keep themselves clean anyway!
And the XXX industry would like to have a man hung like a horse...
And the athletes would like to be able to run like a cheetah.
But don't forget - humans are actually one of the more adaptable species in the world, even if laziness and sex drive are the most prominent features of a human. (don't underestimate the amount of work a human can do to avoid work later...)
If builders built buildings the way programmers wrote programs, then the first woodpecker would destroy civilization.
Nobody seems to have asked for donated human material, with consent to use the cells in this fashion. I'm sure male cells can't be hard to obtain...
(Hmm - "Wank for research material! Form orderly queue here!")
Why is it that the hairdresser throws away my hair, donating blood is laudable, organ donation saves lives - but donating some of my hundreds of useless eggs (how many kids I am realistically going to have?) is morally outrageous and really quite hard to do - neither my doctor nor the local fertility clinic had any clue on how to do such.
Who do we vote out / mob / de-fund to get some common sense injected to reasearch ethics committees?