I just want to point out that anti-gambling statutes are blocking the
development of a potentially extremely useful mechanism for reaching
an honest consensus about difficult scientific questions.
The average citizen is quite ignorant about most scientific issues, and a single
charismatic scientist can be highly influential in persuading people
to pursue wrongheaded ideas. For example, Paul Ehrlich, author of The
Population Bomb, has been arguably the most influential person in spreading
the idea that the earth is "overpopulated." In the early 1970's he predicted many dire
consequences as result of population growth. Among other things, he predict that ten's of millions of children would starve in countries like India.
Ehrlich supported rather drastic measures to prevent the catastrophe
he believed to be inevitable--including such things as the forced
sterilization of all Indian men with three or more children, and
adding contraceptives to food and water supplies.
Julian Simon, an economist at the University of Maryland, challenged Ehrlich's theories. He
argued that humans were the "ultimate resource" and that the results
of human ingenuity--better fertilizers, new crop varieties, more efficient farming techniques--would allow humans to keep pace
with expected population growth.
One of Ehrlich's predictions was that the price of limited resources, such as elemental metals, would rise as more humans competed for the same resources.
Simon offered Ehrlich a wager centered on the
market price of metals. "...Ehrlich would pick a quantity of any five
metals he liked worth $1,000 in 1980. If the 1990 value of the metals,
after adjusting for inflation, was more than $1,000 (i.e. the metals
became more scarce), Ehrlich would win. If, however, the value of the
metals after inflation was less than $1,000 (i.e. the metals became
less scare), Simon would win. The loser would mail the winner a check
for the change in price.
Ehrlich agreed to the bet and chose copper, chrome, nickel, tin and tungsten.
By 1990, all five metal were below their real price level in
1970. Ehrlich lost the bet and sent Simon a check for $576.07. Prices
of the metals chosen fell so much that Simon would have won the bet
even if the prices hadn't been adjusted for inflation..." (see Brian
Carnell's overpopulation.com
for more details about the wager.)
Robin Hanson took the idea of wagering about scientific questions a step further, proposing to create an
idea futures market. "...Imagine a betting pool on disputed science questions, where the
current odds are treated as the current intellectual consensus. For
example, people might bet on whether cold fusion will be used to
produce power by the year 2020. Right now the odds would be fairly low
- say 20-to-1 against. But as the results of new research became known, and if more people became convinced that cold fusion worked, the odds would rise. And if cold fusion became a reality by 2020, those early supporters would
make a bundle.
Such betting markets would become "idea futures" markets - like corn
futures markets, except you'd bet on the future settlement of a
scientific controversy instead of the future price of corn. The system
could increase the public's interest and role in science, and betting
odds could serve as a scientific barometer to guide mass media and
public policy...."(Idea Futures: How making wagers on the future can
make it happen faster by Robin Hanson. WIRED, Sept. 1995, Idees Fortes section, p.125 )
State gambling
laws unfortunately prohibit the formation of such markets. As a
result, a potentially very valuable mechanism for eliminating
dangerously unfounded ideas is thwarted.
For too long, employer's in California have imported cheap IT labor,
from nearby low-wage states like Idaho, Nevada, Oregon, Arizona, and
New Mexico. These cheap non-California laborers are willing to work
longer for less money, thereby driving down wages for all Californian
programmers. Older programmers are hardest hit--these out-of-state
programmers have often already learned the most useful programming
skills, either in their in state universities, or on their own. As a
result, greedy employers often refuse to pay to retrain older
programmers, or pay them higher salaries. Some of these out-of-state
nationals are so happy to be off the dairy farm, that they're willing
to work under sweat shop conditions in "cubicle farms." Why, some of
these places don't have cappucino machines! Or free sodas! These are
unacceptable working conditions for California workers. Oh my, and the
accents some of these hicks have! I can hardly understand them.
The solution is clear. We must extend the INS's authority, and
require all out-of-state nationals who want to work in California to
apply for C1-B visas. Then we must set quotas for each state. We
might allow say, 1000 Idaho programmers each year to enter California to
work. Of course, they can only work for companies that sponsor them,
and when their employment ends, we must truck them back to Idaho.
We've got to protect California programmer's jobs, keep our salaries high,
and protect our standard of living. It's insane to allow open
borders between California and these low-wage states. Stop the insanity and
close California's borders!
Yes, there's a risk that transplant recipients will contract disease via mutated pig viruses, and they may in turn pass it on to other people, thereby possibly initiating an epidemic.
However, as I pointed out, all new technologies have associated risks. Would you support xenotransplant experiments if you felt that sufficient precautions were taken, and if the benefits outweighed the risks? If so, under what conditions? For example, if the pigs were raised in a sterile enclosure, would that satisfy you that the risk of disease transmission was low enough to proceed with the experiments? What if transplant recipients were monitored weekly for 5 years post transplant for signs of infection?
As you point out, we are already subject to substantial risk of disease transmission from pigs. Yet is it appropriate to discriminate against potential xenotransplant recipients, who, after all, depend upon transplants for their lives? Why not shut down all pig farms as well? The existence of pig farms,if we accept the argument above, led to the existence of a virulent strain of swine flu that killed 27-50 million people, after all. If we're willing to tolerate pig farms in order to have bacon for breakfast, can we not tolerate a somewhat higher risk of disease in order to save people's lives?
What benefits do xenotransplants offer? Xenotransplants offer benefits to everyone, not just those currently on transplant waiting lists.
No doubt you would regard it as a terrible tragedy if everyone on the face of the earth died instantly in a nuclear holocaust. Would it be any less of a tragedy if they all died in a day? A week? A year? A hundred years? Yet all of us face physical decline and eventual death unless we figure out how to stop/reverse aging. For example, heart disease is the number one cause of death in the U.S. In 1997, according to the National Center for Health Statisitics, 730,000 people died from heart disease. If healthy, young hearts were inexpensive and readily available, we could replace everyone's heart when they turned 50, prevent most of those deaths, and buy those people many more years of life. Likewise, all of the other organs could be similarly replaced. But this is not an option if organs remain rare, expensive, and difficult to obtain. Xenotransplants can change that.
Unacceptable by what criteria? Keep in mind that all technology, no matter how beneficial, can cause harm to some people. Vaccines for example, cause fatal allergic reactions in some people. People kill themselves in car accidents. Abundant food supplies have contributed to obesity which in turn contributes to heart disease, diabetes, and cancer. Yet I wager few people would give up vaccines, cars, and abundant food supplies because of these negative side effects.
Yes, some people may become infected from pig organs, and other people may in turn contract disease from them. But we're not helpless in the face of disease. Pigs can be tested for the presence of pathogens prior to transplant. Individuals can be monitored for the presence of bacteria and viruses (and you can be sure that people receiving pig organs will be closely monitored.) Individuals who contract diseases can be quarantined.
Also, we already face the risk of become infected with diseases and parasites from other species. You can contract trichonosis by eating undercooked pork. Slaughterhouse workers are exposed to pig blood and offal on a daily basis. Transplant recipients are simply a new transmission vector among many other pre-existing vectors.
Finally, keep in mind that we can be certain that people will die if they don't get organ transplants. According to the Council of Europe's home page:
Nearly 40,000 patients are at the moment waiting for a kidney in Western Europe whilst the
number of cadaveric donors remains stable at around 5,000 each year. This is also the case in USA where the gap between the number of available organs and patients on the waiting list is also very high. They have more than 30,000 patients on the waiting list and the number of cadaveric donors is around 5,000 each year. Mortality rates while waiting for a heart, liver or lung transplant generally range between 15% and 30% but are even higher in some reports depending on the type of the organ needed. In 1994 there were no
suitable livers for some 400 European citizens and around a further 400 died while waiting for a heart.
Keep in mind that this doesn't represent the true need for organ transplants, as only patients who're most likely to benefit from a transplant are put onto the waiting list. The benefits of saving these patients lives, outweighs the admittedly unknown, but probably low, risk of disease transmission.
Slashdot Mirror
The average citizen is quite ignorant about most scientific issues, and a single charismatic scientist can be highly influential in persuading people to pursue wrongheaded ideas. For example, Paul Ehrlich, author of The Population Bomb, has been arguably the most influential person in spreading the idea that the earth is "overpopulated." In the early 1970's he predicted many dire consequences as result of population growth. Among other things, he predict that ten's of millions of children would starve in countries like India.
Ehrlich supported rather drastic measures to prevent the catastrophe he believed to be inevitable--including such things as the forced sterilization of all Indian men with three or more children, and adding contraceptives to food and water supplies.
Julian Simon, an economist at the University of Maryland, challenged Ehrlich's theories. He argued that humans were the "ultimate resource" and that the results of human ingenuity--better fertilizers, new crop varieties, more efficient farming techniques--would allow humans to keep pace with expected population growth.
One of Ehrlich's predictions was that the price of limited resources, such as elemental metals, would rise as more humans competed for the same resources.
Simon offered Ehrlich a wager centered on the market price of metals. "...Ehrlich would pick a quantity of any five metals he liked worth $1,000 in 1980. If the 1990 value of the metals, after adjusting for inflation, was more than $1,000 (i.e. the metals became more scarce), Ehrlich would win. If, however, the value of the metals after inflation was less than $1,000 (i.e. the metals became less scare), Simon would win. The loser would mail the winner a check for the change in price.
Ehrlich agreed to the bet and chose copper, chrome, nickel, tin and tungsten.
By 1990, all five metal were below their real price level in 1970. Ehrlich lost the bet and sent Simon a check for $576.07. Prices of the metals chosen fell so much that Simon would have won the bet even if the prices hadn't been adjusted for inflation..." (see Brian Carnell's overpopulation.com for more details about the wager.)
Robin Hanson took the idea of wagering about scientific questions a step further, proposing to create an idea futures market. "...Imagine a betting pool on disputed science questions, where the current odds are treated as the current intellectual consensus. For example, people might bet on whether cold fusion will be used to produce power by the year 2020. Right now the odds would be fairly low - say 20-to-1 against. But as the results of new research became known, and if more people became convinced that cold fusion worked, the odds would rise. And if cold fusion became a reality by 2020, those early supporters would make a bundle.
Such betting markets would become "idea futures" markets - like corn futures markets, except you'd bet on the future settlement of a scientific controversy instead of the future price of corn. The system could increase the public's interest and role in science, and betting odds could serve as a scientific barometer to guide mass media and public policy...."(Idea Futures: How making wagers on the future can make it happen faster by Robin Hanson. WIRED, Sept. 1995, Idees Fortes section, p.125 )
State gambling laws unfortunately prohibit the formation of such markets. As a result, a potentially very valuable mechanism for eliminating dangerously unfounded ideas is thwarted.
The solution is clear. We must extend the INS's authority, and require all out-of-state nationals who want to work in California to apply for C1-B visas. Then we must set quotas for each state. We might allow say, 1000 Idaho programmers each year to enter California to work. Of course, they can only work for companies that sponsor them, and when their employment ends, we must truck them back to Idaho. We've got to protect California programmer's jobs, keep our salaries high, and protect our standard of living. It's insane to allow open borders between California and these low-wage states. Stop the insanity and close California's borders!
However, as I pointed out, all new technologies have associated risks. Would you support xenotransplant experiments if you felt that sufficient precautions were taken, and if the benefits outweighed the risks? If so, under what conditions? For example, if the pigs were raised in a sterile enclosure, would that satisfy you that the risk of disease transmission was low enough to proceed with the experiments? What if transplant recipients were monitored weekly for 5 years post transplant for signs of infection?
As you point out, we are already subject to substantial risk of disease transmission from pigs. Yet is it appropriate to discriminate against potential xenotransplant recipients, who, after all, depend upon transplants for their lives? Why not shut down all pig farms as well? The existence of pig farms,if we accept the argument above, led to the existence of a virulent strain of swine flu that killed 27-50 million people, after all. If we're willing to tolerate pig farms in order to have bacon for breakfast, can we not tolerate a somewhat higher risk of disease in order to save people's lives?
What benefits do xenotransplants offer? Xenotransplants offer benefits to everyone, not just those currently on transplant waiting lists. No doubt you would regard it as a terrible tragedy if everyone on the face of the earth died instantly in a nuclear holocaust. Would it be any less of a tragedy if they all died in a day? A week? A year? A hundred years? Yet all of us face physical decline and eventual death unless we figure out how to stop/reverse aging. For example, heart disease is the number one cause of death in the U.S. In 1997, according to the National Center for Health Statisitics, 730,000 people died from heart disease. If healthy, young hearts were inexpensive and readily available, we could replace everyone's heart when they turned 50, prevent most of those deaths, and buy those people many more years of life. Likewise, all of the other organs could be similarly replaced. But this is not an option if organs remain rare, expensive, and difficult to obtain. Xenotransplants can change that.
Yes, some people may become infected from pig organs, and other people may in turn contract disease from them. But we're not helpless in the face of disease. Pigs can be tested for the presence of pathogens prior to transplant. Individuals can be monitored for the presence of bacteria and viruses (and you can be sure that people receiving pig organs will be closely monitored.) Individuals who contract diseases can be quarantined.
Also, we already face the risk of become infected with diseases and parasites from other species. You can contract trichonosis by eating undercooked pork. Slaughterhouse workers are exposed to pig blood and offal on a daily basis. Transplant recipients are simply a new transmission vector among many other pre-existing vectors.
Finally, keep in mind that we can be certain that people will die if they don't get organ transplants. According to the Council of Europe's home page:
Keep in mind that this doesn't represent the true need for organ transplants, as only patients who're most likely to benefit from a transplant are put onto the waiting list. The benefits of saving these patients lives, outweighs the admittedly unknown, but probably low, risk of disease transmission.