You didn't read the bill either, I see. If memory serves me, the bill had provisions to explicitly stop donors from receiving any profit whatsoever. Thus what happened in the UK would not happen here, because the bill over here was more carefully written, in an attempt to alleviate concerns such as this (though that hardly helps if those voting against it haven't read the bill, which seems evident by the comments many of them made).
While the bill that was vetoed kept the donors from receiving any profit from their "donation," that is not what happened in the UK or probably what would have happened here. The UK donors weren't receiving renumeration for the donation of the eggs to research, at least not directly. They were paying for their fertilization treatment with the eggs. Once those eggs were assigned over to the clinic, once they were no longer the couple's property, they could be sold for research purposes. Are you saying that the US bill did not allow the eggs to be sold, so that the fertility clinics were just going to hand them over for no fee whatsoever? Or where the safeguards to protect the woman from selling her fertilized eggs?
As for the rest of your post, I agree it was smart on his part politically, however, he is a lame duck. I am not sure, however it was smart for the members of his party who ran on a pro-life ticket and now are seen as backing away from that, because in the eyes of many of their constituents, the destruction of living embryos is a pro-life issue. So for Bush it may not hurt him, but it seems problematic for the republican party.
As for the comment about what my point was about, it is simply this. If this bill passed and wasn't vetoed, it still would require appropriations to have funding occur. Yes, it would ease the burden of placing colored dots on equipment to keep from violating what research and equipment is using federal funding and what is not, etc., but without the appropriation, no additional money would have flowed. Although I am not a Bush supporter, I think it was much more honest of him to veto it outright, then to let it pass and then not fund it (like so many other political issues).
What the public doesn't seem to realize is that in the US there is quite a bit of embryonic stem cell research going on without federal funding. We have large grants from several pharmaceutical and biotech companies. Most of it, however is going to a select number of universities, hand-picked. The rest of the universities want on the band-wagon so to speak but can't get the money.
Of course, it's quite simple to get private funded research grants. You just need to show a potential ROI. The easiest way to do that is to use government funded research on something that is allowed, say embryonic stem cell research from lower primates. Since the physiology is quite similiar, the research is directly transferrable and from there private foundation grants do flow. The only controversy with such an approach is with PETA and even that's not too great, since no harm is being done to the chimps themselves.
The only reason we keep hearing about all of this is because the lobbyists and politicians are using the whole thing for political manuvering and gain. Meanwhile, the real stem cell research both embryonic and adult continues at a good clip.
While it is true that the Pope banned doing research on cadavers. It was also outlawed in just about every civilized country prior to the ban. Why might that be? Well, the spread of plague and disease was a big one. Even today it's against the law to do any type of research on a cadaver unless the person or their family specifically allow for it. As for Harvard, I'm pretty sure they have all the legal documentation to support the use of the cadavers they have.
Senator Harkin might want to do some basic research before using the something like that again. If I'm not mistaken, in his home state grave robbing is still a crime, so maybe it's not the a dead politician from 800 years ago (the catholic church was a political leader back then), but the living ones today.
And they *are*. The problem is that they are doing it in other countries and there has been a significant brain drain from the US to those countries of scientists and their staff. These are high paying US jobs (and the resulting tax base) that have left the country.
So the problem with Bush not funding embryonic stem cells is about economics? I'm assuming it's not really about the number of US researchers leaving the US but the potential loss of the biotech industry to other countries that is the concern.
While I have always know this to be the case with my own research grants (that they must have a potential ROI), I wasn't expecting to see it pop up as such on slashdot. In reality, I would venture to guess that the whole embryonic stem cell debate is ultimately about money and who is going to controll it. As I mentioned in another post, if Bush allowed federal funding, but with the string attached that any cures or treatment derived had to be royalty free proportionately to the amount of federal funding utilized in the research, I speculate that there would not be too many takers of that funding.
I don't know about Utah, but where I'm at, the university is counting on those royalties.
While I am not a supporter of Bush or his veto of this bill, I do think you are a bit naive if you think that only embryos that were going to be destroyed would have been used if this bill had been passed. The BBC reported this week on a similar bill passed in parliment in the UK allowing for the use of embryos that were going to be destroyed anyway. Actually that wasn't the gist of the article. The article was about how fertility clinics across the UK were now allowing couples to pay for their treatment by "donating" excess embryos. Kind of using the embryos as cash, so to speak.
While there is a lot of propaganda on both the pro-embryonic and the anti-embryonic stem cell battle. Don't think it is all coming from the anti-embryonic stem cell brigade. The State of Missouri has a constitutional amendment that evidently bans human cloning, by redefining human cloning not to occur until the embryo is implanted into the woman's womb. Instead of using the term embryonic stem cells, it's supporters now call them "early" stem cells. According to news reports, the supporters of the ammendment evidently are in some kind of trouble because they have been running 10 minute political ads as "documentaries" without the required political disclosures.
So, while you are correct in the sources you list as being highly misleading, inflammatory, or outright wrong. The "other" side is not neccessarily being forthright, either.
Personally, I think Bush probably screwed up, but not for the reasons you mention. There was overwhelming support for this bill in congress and the public. There were protections to ensure ethical research, etc. He could have emphasized that along with the notion the embryos were going to be destroyed. Instead, he has caused problems for his party and strengthened the opposition.
Will his veto have any negative impact? Not immediately, nothing was removed, nothing was taken away. Private research still continues (as the Time article points out, several private biotech firms are getting ready to pettition the FDA for human trials). The only thing that has happened is that researchers, like myself, who work at universities wanting to do this research have the same restrictions we did before the veto. Research still continues.
Also, what is the difference between one celled bacteria that we kill every day regularly, and an 8 cell embryo?
Many would argue that the 8 cell embryo is still fully a human being. The difference between that embryo and a human adult is just a developmental one, just as a newborn infant is developmently immature compared to a toddler compared to a preschooler compared to a prepubescent teenager etc., etc. A human embryo is just an earlier stage yet, but still a human being.
As such, the use of human embryos or human beings or worse yet the creation of them for research would be morally wrong or so the argument goes.
Now many would argue that this is a religious distinction and it shouldn't hinder the advance of science. However that is only half true. They are correct, it is a religous or at least a meta-physical distinction, which by definition is outside the realm of science. And being that science cannot and never will be able to answer the question of when does life begin or whether an embryo is a human being or not, the discussion cannot be left upto the scientists, because they are ill equiped to answer it. It can only be answered by the philosphers, be they religious or otherwise.
Your question of why a one cell bacteria is unimportant but an 8 cell embryo is not, is just such a question. It is a philosophical one. Science can only deal with what can be measured and/or observed. It answers the questions of "Can we?" Science doesn't answer the question of "Should we?"
The politicians, for better or worse, are involved specifically to answer the questions that science cannot. The fact that they corrupt the debate to turn it towards their own political gain is a whole different issue.
The cells in question (some 400,000 of them) are being discarded en masse from in vitro fertilization labs anyways, so it's a choice between either letting them get thrown away-- or using them for research that could save lives.
As the BBC reported this week, once Britain started allowing embryos that were going to be discarded to be used for embryonic stem cell research, fertility clinics started to allow people to pay for their fertility treatments with the "donation" of extra embryos. How long do you think before that practice would occur here?
Besides, as the full article in Time points out, most of the frozen embryos were not selected because they were deemed to be not the healthiest. Plus, they've been frozen for a very long time in many cases, so nobody is quite sure how useful they would be.
The good news for parkinson's is that, according to the longer Time article (linked to from the slashdot link) the adult stem cells from the umbilical cord blood can be used to for brain cells.
We as researchers talk all we want about noble causes for our research to bring cures to people. And on a personal basis, that may be true. However, noble causes is not why any of us are employed by our institutions, whether public or private. The real reason anybody pays any of us or our staff to conduct our research is for the potential profit it will bring if a cure or treatment is discovered. (This isn't how things always have been with research, but have only really become that way since the 1980s).
I wonder how many institutions would be willing to take federal funding to conduct their stem cell research, embryonic or not, if the government restriction was that any cures or treatment had to be released royalty free since it was provided through taxpayer funding (or at least royalty free to the amount of government funding provided).
Would I still do my research? Sure. Would my institution have me do it? Maybe, maybe not. Would they want government funding for the research? Probably not. Research labs are being run more and more like their private industry counter-parts and looking at ROI. If you remove the potential profit motive, you remove the reason most institution keep us employed.
You use the wrong example for the locksmith. It should be this is like your locksmith rekeying the locks on your house with a special key that only they can produce and you must get from them. This is much like the automakers did with "smart" keys. It used to be if you needed an extra car key, you could get a copy made for a dollar or so. Now, you have to go to the dealer and pay $35 or more, depending on make or model.
Has the "new" car key approach made it harder to hack or steal cars, no, just more of a hassle for honest owners of the vehicle. Will the change being made by Microsoft ultimately make Windows more secure and harder to hack into? Likewise, no. It's all for the appearance of security, but until Microsoft changes the basic nature of Windows being able to connect to any device anywhere and automatically sharing files with Aunt Mary, there will always be holes to exploit.
Until Microsoft truly takes security seriously, they are still putting band-aids on top of fundamentally insecure systems. It's far cheaper to offer the appearance of security than to actually do it. Doing so would mean a whole new code base. Apple did it with OSX, the question is whether Microsoft has the ability to let go of the past to build for the future and do it, too.
Whether it's GM selling me a $1.00 key for $35 or Microsoft selling me a "trusted computing" platform, neither one will prevent someone from getting what is mine if they really want it.
I was just wondering if Microsoft submitted the concept of charging your beta testers to the patent office like they did for using advertising instead of charging fees. Wait, I've got it! How about if the beta copies of Office have advertising imbeded in them! Then, Microsoft could give still allow testers to have them for free!
I agree with all that you say in this and your other posts on this thread. I only take exception with the remark about not being able to make money by listening to others, which I assume you are meaning money managers/advisors except for insider trading.
However, while that may seem true, given that historically, nothing beats the S&P 500 performance in the long term, many funds have out performed it in any given shorter period. Obviously, the money managers of those funds must know something. Of course, these same funds also, for any given period, have also under performed it, too. So, the real question to figure out, is "When to be in those funds or not?"
For the average person, I don't believe, they are going to have the ability to monitor everything they need to monitor to effectively manage their own portfolio, whether in mutual funds or individual stocks and bonds. Nor, are they really going to know how. I make this generalization based on the statistics of the low savings rate in the U.S. and how poorly performing most people's self-managed IRA and 401(k)/403(b) accounts are doing. While I do not advocate turning the whole decision making process over to an investment manager, I do think the average person needs help or advice.
If nothing else, a good investment manager, is not going to be giving advice on how to make money, but how to keep from losing it. I know too many people (and businesses) that tried to personally manage their own investments and more or less became day traders (or close to it) and lost a lot of money. It's lot like gambling. Some people can go into the casino and look at it as entertainment and spend a fixed amount of money and that's it, win or lose. Others, get hooked and can't help themself.
All of that said, I do think the investment industry needs to change how it charges. Fees are based on the value of the portfolio, but not the actual work or transactions. Take and 401(k), for example. If I have $250,000 spread over three different funds and $1,000/month being contributed. Why should that cost more than if I only have $20,000 spread over three different funds and $1,000/month being contributed. The 401(k) manager in both cases is doing the same work: sending my $1,000 to the three funds each month and sending me reports. After that, the work is being done by the individual funds.
Anyway, for really small investors, maybe they can get by doing it on their own (particularly if they don't listen to the people on the radio or TV -- because once something is announced to buy or sell on the airwaves, it's too late to get in on it). But for most people, I still think they need guidance to maximize their return.
Btw, your original post of investing early, which is good advice, would contradict your own statement that nobody makes money by listening to others. Here's another piece of good advice that if people follow will make them money "Buy low, sell high."
Most TVs are relatively inexpensive and the service from the broadcast networks is free, being paid from via advertising. The Microsoft proposal doesn't say the hardware would be free, by the way.
This is only true, to a point. If you had started your investing in 1960, at the end of the year 2,000, you would not have had $45 for that initial $1 investment. The market fluctuations do come into play. That is why the close one comes to actual retirement, the more they need to shift retirement assets into less volatile investments.
Here is sage investment advice. Start saving early in life to take advantage of compounding of investment returns. Also, a longer investment time frame gives more time to weather fluctuations in the market. Earlier in life, it's alright to have more investments in equities (more risk) the closer you get towards retirement, however, the investment mix needs to shift towards investments that are less likely to loose value (albeit at a lower return rate). Now for the best advice: Most companies have 401(k) plans or 403(b) plans. They provide free retirement planning advice as part of the plan. Granted, it is tailored towards the investment vehicles the plan offers, but the rational used is the same whether you are electing to contribute additional funds to your company's plan, your own IRA or general investing.
While you might want to believe that you cannot make money listening to others, you would be wrong. However, it is definately true that for most people, you can easily lose money by NOT listening to others.
So when the the BBC writes Scientists believe the most useful stem cells come from the tissue of embyros. they are just lying bastards?
I'll believe them.
No, but then on the other hand, since the BBC is writing for probably a sixth grade level they do have to simplify things. The article does say that Scientists believe the most useful stem cells come from the tissue of embryos, however, it makes no mention of what scientists. The next few paragraphs gives a hint, though when they talk about scientists believing that "it should be possible..." and again "Theorecically, it should be possible..." In otherwords, they are referring to research scientists, because they are the ones who mainly deal in the realms of theory and hypothesis.
However, if you read further into the article, you will see where the BBC points out that adult stem cells are produced by the body's major organs to repair the organs. So, instead of coaxing an embryonic stem cell to turn into a liver cell, you could just use an already existing liver stem cell.
The article further explains the benefit of this by pointing out as it says the "huge" benefit of adult stem cell therapies and that is in the rejection problem (or lack thereof) from using adult stem cells from one's own body.
The last three paragraphs spell out, minimistically the concerns of real researchers using embryonic stem cells. Since they are in fact manipulating the human genes to get these cells to differntiate, there is great concern that they may introduce some new kind of virus or disease that the body will not be able to fight off. Second, since there is also great concern over introducing some cross virus between the animal products used to clone the human embryos to produce embryonic stem cells. Like the first concern, this could be devestating to the patient and if it were communicable, it could be a pandemic. The third issue it points out, is that so far, anyway, they can't control the growth of embryonic stem cells and they quickly turn into cancer cells in the body (along with other tissue type besides the desired type).
So, by all means, believe the BBC, I do. However, just don't read more into their articles than what is really there.
Maybe they (the anti-virus vendors) are just being the front-man for the software industry. Maybe it's really the other software vendors who don't want full disclosure because they don't want people to find out that even after all these years of promoting secure computing, and paying for all those upgrades, things are still not secure.
Then on the otherhand, maybe it really is just the anti-virus vendors. Very often, with full disclosure, the researchers also say what can be done to protect against the exploit. Maybe McAfee feels threatened, particularly with Microsoft coming out with their own anti-virus product.
Since the OSS model or full disclosure model as the article calls it is widely available to the anti-virus companies (ie commercial programmers) and the malware programmer simultaneously and the malware programmer beats the commercial programmer out the door, does that mean that the OSS programmer is a better programmer?
Put a different way, and not to simplify it too much, but the anti-virus programmer needs to write a patch to detect a piece of code which has been handed to him/her. The malware has to write a program that actually impliments, propigates and hides from detection. Which should be the easier task? It seems that full disclosure should benefit the anti-virus company as much, if not more than the malware programmer.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to bash the anti-virus companies or their programmers. They have a tuff job to do. However, blaming OSS and it's "full-disclosure" model is simply ludicrous and makes as much sense as blaming McDonalds for people being overweight.
However, if they said that their slow response to software threats being released in the public was the cause, likewise, people's overeating and underexercising for being overweight, well, then, that would make a lot of sense, but would hardly be the fault of OSS (or McDonalds).
The online school is because, at least so far, the millions of dollars spent on improving the schools doesn't seem to be working. Are they pushing the online school for everyone? No, of course not. It's just another option available for those struggling with the traditional (failing) model and for those who home schooling is not an option.
What is interesting in Chicago, is that the Catholic school system seems to be doing quite well. While it is true that they can be selective about who they take, etc. That usually applies to the independent private schools. The local parish schools take parishoner's kids. The Catholic school system in Chicago has higher test scores, higher graduation rates and does all of this on a lower per pupil cost than the public school. So, assuming that Catholics aren't somehow intellectually superior to the rest of us, it must be attributed to something they are doing that public schools in Chicago aren't. Most likely it's because they have fewer administrative staff per student and concentrate more on core academic courses.
Public schools in Chicago (and many large cities) are in trouble. Things like this distance learning are band-aid attempts to attack the symptoms of the real underlying problems. However, unless there is real educational reform, things will only get worse until the reform is forced by the public. Chicago already has a working model to base reform on. They only have to choose to impliment it or wait for their system to continue to go downhill and have a referendum impliment something for them instead.
'You can't sit a child in front of a computer and expect him to learn things he needs to succeed in society,' said unimpressed Chicago Teachers Union president Marilyn Stewart of the Chicago Virtual Charter School, which will open to Chicago elementary school students this fall if approved by the state board of education."
It seems that you can't sit a child in the Chicago public schools and expect him to learn things he needs to succeed in society, either.
While it is true that males have an X and two Xs can be used to me used to a female, the article isn't talking about cloning a human being, but using a stem cell to produce a sperm. Now, if men have stem cells capable of producing the egg that is a totally different story.
Reading the article, they produced a male embryo to get the stem cells to produce the sperm. While the article doesn't use the phrase "male embryo," it does say they used spermatogonial stem cells. That would require the genetic equivalent of a male (as a female would be developing stem cells that would later become her eggs). The point of the research isn't embryonic stem cells. Again, the researcher states the intention is to harvest the stem cells from the adult males by using a testicular biopsy.
So until women start having testes, it's going to be hard to do that biopsy. Since women can't produce the sperm stem cells and men don't have eggs, it's seems pretty unlikely that there will be same-sex couple having biological children.
Since the media tends to only report the fetal side of stem cell research, that would explain why you are only hearing the scientist with an interest in it. However, if you try and look at sources outside of the U.S. or look at the medical journals and research grants themself, you will find that it is the adult stem cell research that has all of the break throughs.
I would surmise that the media reporting is due to it's distaste with anything about the Bush administration. And while the adult stem cell research is not related to it, only reporting on the fetal side makes the administration look bad because of the perceived restriction on fetal stem cell research (Bush was the first US president to allow any federal money to be used for fetal stem cell research, much to the disdain of the pro-life lobbyists).
Anyway, most of the major news media in the U.S. are not very reliable sources for obtaining scientific news. They tend to be politically biased or try and simplify it so much that everything sounds like a miracle cure. Good sources are the various medical research journals dealing specifically with the topic. These are based on the actual research and studies. However, they are a lot more difficult to digest as the general public is not the intended audience. (The reason these tend to be such good sources is because people's professional reputations are at stake, so there aren't any wild-ass claims being made, just solid verifialbe research).
Anyway, if you remove the public media, you will find that the majority of researchers don't claim that either is better. Fetal stem cells are good for producing test lines for research because the can remove variables that might cause variations in results (much like the genetically pure laboratory rats are used for testing). However, the same researchers also point out that outside of general research, it is the body's own stem cells that produce the best hope of providing specific cures for an individual. This is mainly because of the rejection problems associated with foreign cells that would be absent in using your own cells.
In short, what the research has found is that the human body has the capability to pretty much heal itself if they can turn the right switches on in the right (adult) stem cells. Fetal stem cell research is about figuring out how to get generic non-differentiated stem cell to turn into the right kind of adult stem cell. Adult stem cell research is about finding the right stem cell already being produced in the body. Neither one will produce the miracle cures that are hyped about in the media.
As of last fall, world wide, there have been 83 approved treatments using adult stem cells, with zero from fetal stem cells. It's certainly not from a lack of funding or from a lack of trying. It's because after the initial excitement of fetal stem cell research had worn off and research started to deal with the real obstacles, they focussed instead on the adult stem cells because they have a greater chance of success.
This the norm for medical research. When there are limited research dollars (whether public or private), and there are always limited research dollars, the research will gravitate to that which has the greatest potential to produce results at a minimal risk.
What proof are you asking for? To date, world wide, there has not been one cure or treatment from fetal stem cells and yet billions of dollars are being poured into it. There are even scientists who believe there are too many obstacles for fetal stem cells to ever produce treatments. However, adult stem cells have produced numerous cures and treatments and have been used for years. Bone marrow transplants are in fact an application of an adult stem cell treatment that has been around longer than use of the popular phrase "stem cell" in the media.
I don't need to prove anything. The research and the data is widely available in the medical journals and internet sources. It just isn't reported widely in the U.S. media. I'll leave the speculation as to why up to others.
Here is a simple solution if ABC gets there way (other than not watching ABC). For every commercial you are forced to watch because your fast forward button is now disabled, send a letter (not email) to the company with something like the following: Dear sirs,
I was forced to watch your commercial on my dvr last night because ABC has taken it upon themselves to somehow deactivate the fast forward button function. They state they do so to benefit their advertisors. Why your company and ABC believes it has the right to break a piece of equipment that I worked very hard to save for and to purchase, I do not understand. However, since that is your position and my dvr is no longer functioning correctly, I am no longer going to purchase the products you manufacture. Not only that, I am telling my friends and family to boycott your products as well.
Sincerely,
Then follow through on it. Most likely, you will get a letter back saying it is not their policy to do this, but ABC and that they have no control over it. However, companies take serious the threats of boycotts, particularly when they are on grounds such as these. If they have enough complaints, they'll pressure ABC to quit or they will pull their advertising. Either way, in the end, ABC will have to change the practice.
I will try and get back and post some research links. Otherwise try googling about on stem cells. Almost all of the "breakthroughs" are with adult stem cells. Even bone marrow transplants are adult stem cells and have been done for years. The problem is you have to wade through all of the hype about what was called embryonic and now more correctly fetal stem cells vs adult stem cells. To date, though, adult stem cells have been used to successfully treat diabetes, spinal,nerve and brain injuries, parkinsons, heart and kidney disease and a host of other things (83 or so approved or pending treatments last time I checked, probably more by now). To date, fetal stem cells have yet to produce 1.
It seems that the problem with fetal stem cells is getting them to quit differentiating. For instance, turning on the gene to turn them into heart muscle cells works, but a few of them also turn into bone cells. These continue to grow as bone once injected into the damaged heart. As you can imagine, it's not good to have bones growing in one's heart. The other problem is that they tend to grow out of control and produce cancerous tumors. Again, not a desirable feature. Adult stem cells are already differentiated, so the first problem doesn't occur and since they don't have to be stimulated to grow, unlike fetal stem cells, uncontrolled growth is highly unlikely.
Again, the information is available. However, the mainstream media doesn't pick it up. Most is in medical journals, etc. Another source of information that is in plain English, although many would consider "tainted" is from United States Catholic Conference of Bishops. Regardless of what one thinks about the Catholic Church, their info on stem cell research seems pretty up to date and main stream. Even if you dismiss their oppostion to fetal stem cell based on their life begins at conception and abortion fews, their data on adult stem cells is accurate and is prepared by medical professionals and not theologians. A lot of the pro-life groups may have info, too.
I would not use the Catholic Church or pro-life groups as the final answer, but more as a starting point of gathering information. Besides the occasional media article, such as the Canadian one, most of the info will be in medical journals, etc.
As I stated in a previous post, this isn't a religious argument. Religion is only being used as a smoke screen to keep the discussion from focussing on the facts. The facts are, as you alluded to, fetal stem cells aren't working. Even with the limited research in the U.S., the rest of the world is doing research at a far greater pace than we would be doing even without the ban.
The real difference between fetal and adult stem cells in lay terms is that fetal stem cells are undifferentiated (they can turn into anything), adult stem cells are differentiated and depending on where they are from limits what they can turn into. The irony, is that to use fetal stem cells, they first have to become differentiated, so they must be made into the equivelant of adult stem cells (are bodies don't like undifferntiated cells growing in them. we call them cancer). So, for fetal stem cells to work, means that adult stem cells have to work, too.
As for funding issues and loosing funding, I'm not sure you have that correct. In it's simplest form, I guess it is, but in practice, must universities could simply set up a seperate life-sciences foundation to do the stem cell research which wouldn't then jeapordize their other grants. I'm pretty sure that UCLA and other colleges and universities in California are still getting federal grants even though the state is funding fetal stem cell research.
Again, the media and others want the public to think that funding is cut off. However, prior to Bush releasing the limited stem cell lines, there was no federal research allowed. So, in effect, he allowed an increase in funding (I am not a Bush fan, by the way, just trying to set the record straight). With the limited lines he released, you can do any kind of research you want. As it turns out, though the lines aren't as useful as first thought.
There is also no ban on fetal stem cell research with non-human species. Almost every other area of medical research always began with animals. Even adult stem cell research uses animals, first. However, with fetal stem cells, the researchers insist on using stem cells from a human fetus as their first course. One can only assume that since animal fetal stem cells would be less controversial, less costly and more readily available, they would be a no-brainer and yet only a handful of labs in the U.S. use them.
The rest try to convince the public that the religious right or the Catholic Church or some other group is trying to keep cures from the public. When in reality, that is untrue. The Catholic Church, for instance is supportive of adult stem cell research, just not the destruction of the fetus to obtain fetal stem cells (which seems consistent with their stand on abortion, etc.). But why would the researchers and the media as their pawn use such a tactic? Well first, there is big money involved, billions in grant money, even more in the selling of cures. Second, the science shows that it is adult stem cells that hold the potential. By keeping people focussed on the bogus religious argument, they hope people won't realize the shaky science used to support their position (remember, to use fetal stem cells, you first have to differentiate them or make them adult stem cells). Third, it is the religious types, whether fundamentalist or Catholic or whatever that are trying to get some facts out -- if they are portrayed as the villian in all of this, then their arguments will be dismissed.
One last thing, you make the statement that it is no wonder that private funding isn't available. However, there is plenty of private funding available. It's just that the majority of it is going to adult stem cell research because of it's proven track record. Venture capitalists aren't stupid. They don't usually get wrapped up in the emotional and moral side of the argument but look simply at the return on their investment. Which course has the best chance of providing a return on their investment? Adult stem cells.
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You didn't read the bill either, I see. If memory serves me, the bill had provisions to explicitly stop donors from receiving any profit whatsoever. Thus what happened in the UK would not happen here, because the bill over here was more carefully written, in an attempt to alleviate concerns such as this (though that hardly helps if those voting against it haven't read the bill, which seems evident by the comments many of them made).
While the bill that was vetoed kept the donors from receiving any profit from their "donation," that is not what happened in the UK or probably what would have happened here. The UK donors weren't receiving renumeration for the donation of the eggs to research, at least not directly. They were paying for their fertilization treatment with the eggs. Once those eggs were assigned over to the clinic, once they were no longer the couple's property, they could be sold for research purposes. Are you saying that the US bill did not allow the eggs to be sold, so that the fertility clinics were just going to hand them over for no fee whatsoever? Or where the safeguards to protect the woman from selling her fertilized eggs?
As for the rest of your post, I agree it was smart on his part politically, however, he is a lame duck. I am not sure, however it was smart for the members of his party who ran on a pro-life ticket and now are seen as backing away from that, because in the eyes of many of their constituents, the destruction of living embryos is a pro-life issue. So for Bush it may not hurt him, but it seems problematic for the republican party.
As for the comment about what my point was about, it is simply this. If this bill passed and wasn't vetoed, it still would require appropriations to have funding occur. Yes, it would ease the burden of placing colored dots on equipment to keep from violating what research and equipment is using federal funding and what is not, etc., but without the appropriation, no additional money would have flowed. Although I am not a Bush supporter, I think it was much more honest of him to veto it outright, then to let it pass and then not fund it (like so many other political issues).
What the public doesn't seem to realize is that in the US there is quite a bit of embryonic stem cell research going on without federal funding. We have large grants from several pharmaceutical and biotech companies. Most of it, however is going to a select number of universities, hand-picked. The rest of the universities want on the band-wagon so to speak but can't get the money.
Of course, it's quite simple to get private funded research grants. You just need to show a potential ROI. The easiest way to do that is to use government funded research on something that is allowed, say embryonic stem cell research from lower primates. Since the physiology is quite similiar, the research is directly transferrable and from there private foundation grants do flow. The only controversy with such an approach is with PETA and even that's not too great, since no harm is being done to the chimps themselves.
The only reason we keep hearing about all of this is because the lobbyists and politicians are using the whole thing for political manuvering and gain. Meanwhile, the real stem cell research both embryonic and adult continues at a good clip.
While it is true that the Pope banned doing research on cadavers. It was also outlawed in just about every civilized country prior to the ban. Why might that be? Well, the spread of plague and disease was a big one. Even today it's against the law to do any type of research on a cadaver unless the person or their family specifically allow for it. As for Harvard, I'm pretty sure they have all the legal documentation to support the use of the cadavers they have.
Senator Harkin might want to do some basic research before using the something like that again. If I'm not mistaken, in his home state grave robbing is still a crime, so maybe it's not the a dead politician from 800 years ago (the catholic church was a political leader back then), but the living ones today.
And they *are*. The problem is that they are doing it in other countries and there has been a significant brain drain from the US to those countries of scientists and their staff. These are high paying US jobs (and the resulting tax base) that have left the country.
So the problem with Bush not funding embryonic stem cells is about economics? I'm assuming it's not really about the number of US researchers leaving the US but the potential loss of the biotech industry to other countries that is the concern.
While I have always know this to be the case with my own research grants (that they must have a potential ROI), I wasn't expecting to see it pop up as such on slashdot. In reality, I would venture to guess that the whole embryonic stem cell debate is ultimately about money and who is going to controll it. As I mentioned in another post, if Bush allowed federal funding, but with the string attached that any cures or treatment derived had to be royalty free proportionately to the amount of federal funding utilized in the research, I speculate that there would not be too many takers of that funding.
I don't know about Utah, but where I'm at, the university is counting on those royalties.
While I am not a supporter of Bush or his veto of this bill, I do think you are a bit naive if you think that only embryos that were going to be destroyed would have been used if this bill had been passed. The BBC reported this week on a similar bill passed in parliment in the UK allowing for the use of embryos that were going to be destroyed anyway. Actually that wasn't the gist of the article. The article was about how fertility clinics across the UK were now allowing couples to pay for their treatment by "donating" excess embryos. Kind of using the embryos as cash, so to speak.
While there is a lot of propaganda on both the pro-embryonic and the anti-embryonic stem cell battle. Don't think it is all coming from the anti-embryonic stem cell brigade. The State of Missouri has a constitutional amendment that evidently bans human cloning, by redefining human cloning not to occur until the embryo is implanted into the woman's womb. Instead of using the term embryonic stem cells, it's supporters now call them "early" stem cells. According to news reports, the supporters of the ammendment evidently are in some kind of trouble because they have been running 10 minute political ads as "documentaries" without the required political disclosures.
So, while you are correct in the sources you list as being highly misleading, inflammatory, or outright wrong. The "other" side is not neccessarily being forthright, either.
Personally, I think Bush probably screwed up, but not for the reasons you mention. There was overwhelming support for this bill in congress and the public. There were protections to ensure ethical research, etc. He could have emphasized that along with the notion the embryos were going to be destroyed. Instead, he has caused problems for his party and strengthened the opposition.
Will his veto have any negative impact? Not immediately, nothing was removed, nothing was taken away. Private research still continues (as the Time article points out, several private biotech firms are getting ready to pettition the FDA for human trials). The only thing that has happened is that researchers, like myself, who work at universities wanting to do this research have the same restrictions we did before the veto. Research still continues.
Also, what is the difference between one celled bacteria that we kill every day regularly, and an 8 cell embryo?
Many would argue that the 8 cell embryo is still fully a human being. The difference between that embryo and a human adult is just a developmental one, just as a newborn infant is developmently immature compared to a toddler compared to a preschooler compared to a prepubescent teenager etc., etc. A human embryo is just an earlier stage yet, but still a human being.
As such, the use of human embryos or human beings or worse yet the creation of them for research would be morally wrong or so the argument goes.
Now many would argue that this is a religious distinction and it shouldn't hinder the advance of science. However that is only half true. They are correct, it is a religous or at least a meta-physical distinction, which by definition is outside the realm of science. And being that science cannot and never will be able to answer the question of when does life begin or whether an embryo is a human being or not, the discussion cannot be left upto the scientists, because they are ill equiped to answer it. It can only be answered by the philosphers, be they religious or otherwise.
Your question of why a one cell bacteria is unimportant but an 8 cell embryo is not, is just such a question. It is a philosophical one. Science can only deal with what can be measured and/or observed. It answers the questions of "Can we?" Science doesn't answer the question of "Should we?"
The politicians, for better or worse, are involved specifically to answer the questions that science cannot. The fact that they corrupt the debate to turn it towards their own political gain is a whole different issue.
The cells in question (some 400,000 of them) are being discarded en masse from in vitro fertilization labs anyways, so it's a choice between either letting them get thrown away-- or using them for research that could save lives.
As the BBC reported this week, once Britain started allowing embryos that were going to be discarded to be used for embryonic stem cell research, fertility clinics started to allow people to pay for their fertility treatments with the "donation" of extra embryos. How long do you think before that practice would occur here?
Besides, as the full article in Time points out, most of the frozen embryos were not selected because they were deemed to be not the healthiest. Plus, they've been frozen for a very long time in many cases, so nobody is quite sure how useful they would be.
The good news for parkinson's is that, according to the longer Time article (linked to from the slashdot link) the adult stem cells from the umbilical cord blood can be used to for brain cells.
We as researchers talk all we want about noble causes for our research to bring cures to people. And on a personal basis, that may be true. However, noble causes is not why any of us are employed by our institutions, whether public or private. The real reason anybody pays any of us or our staff to conduct our research is for the potential profit it will bring if a cure or treatment is discovered. (This isn't how things always have been with research, but have only really become that way since the 1980s).
I wonder how many institutions would be willing to take federal funding to conduct their stem cell research, embryonic or not, if the government restriction was that any cures or treatment had to be released royalty free since it was provided through taxpayer funding (or at least royalty free to the amount of government funding provided).
Would I still do my research? Sure. Would my institution have me do it? Maybe, maybe not. Would they want government funding for the research? Probably not. Research labs are being run more and more like their private industry counter-parts and looking at ROI. If you remove the potential profit motive, you remove the reason most institution keep us employed.
You use the wrong example for the locksmith. It should be this is like your locksmith rekeying the locks on your house with a special key that only they can produce and you must get from them. This is much like the automakers did with "smart" keys. It used to be if you needed an extra car key, you could get a copy made for a dollar or so. Now, you have to go to the dealer and pay $35 or more, depending on make or model.
Has the "new" car key approach made it harder to hack or steal cars, no, just more of a hassle for honest owners of the vehicle. Will the change being made by Microsoft ultimately make Windows more secure and harder to hack into? Likewise, no. It's all for the appearance of security, but until Microsoft changes the basic nature of Windows being able to connect to any device anywhere and automatically sharing files with Aunt Mary, there will always be holes to exploit.
Until Microsoft truly takes security seriously, they are still putting band-aids on top of fundamentally insecure systems. It's far cheaper to offer the appearance of security than to actually do it. Doing so would mean a whole new code base. Apple did it with OSX, the question is whether Microsoft has the ability to let go of the past to build for the future and do it, too.
Whether it's GM selling me a $1.00 key for $35 or Microsoft selling me a "trusted computing" platform, neither one will prevent someone from getting what is mine if they really want it.
I was just wondering if Microsoft submitted the concept of charging your beta testers to the patent office like they did for using advertising instead of charging fees. Wait, I've got it! How about if the beta copies of Office have advertising imbeded in them! Then, Microsoft could give still allow testers to have them for free!
I agree with all that you say in this and your other posts on this thread. I only take exception with the remark about not being able to make money by listening to others, which I assume you are meaning money managers/advisors except for insider trading.
However, while that may seem true, given that historically, nothing beats the S&P 500 performance in the long term, many funds have out performed it in any given shorter period. Obviously, the money managers of those funds must know something. Of course, these same funds also, for any given period, have also under performed it, too. So, the real question to figure out, is "When to be in those funds or not?"
For the average person, I don't believe, they are going to have the ability to monitor everything they need to monitor to effectively manage their own portfolio, whether in mutual funds or individual stocks and bonds. Nor, are they really going to know how. I make this generalization based on the statistics of the low savings rate in the U.S. and how poorly performing most people's self-managed IRA and 401(k)/403(b) accounts are doing. While I do not advocate turning the whole decision making process over to an investment manager, I do think the average person needs help or advice.
If nothing else, a good investment manager, is not going to be giving advice on how to make money, but how to keep from losing it. I know too many people (and businesses) that tried to personally manage their own investments and more or less became day traders (or close to it) and lost a lot of money. It's lot like gambling. Some people can go into the casino and look at it as entertainment and spend a fixed amount of money and that's it, win or lose. Others, get hooked and can't help themself.
All of that said, I do think the investment industry needs to change how it charges. Fees are based on the value of the portfolio, but not the actual work or transactions. Take and 401(k), for example. If I have $250,000 spread over three different funds and $1,000/month being contributed. Why should that cost more than if I only have $20,000 spread over three different funds and $1,000/month being contributed. The 401(k) manager in both cases is doing the same work: sending my $1,000 to the three funds each month and sending me reports. After that, the work is being done by the individual funds.
Anyway, for really small investors, maybe they can get by doing it on their own (particularly if they don't listen to the people on the radio or TV -- because once something is announced to buy or sell on the airwaves, it's too late to get in on it). But for most people, I still think they need guidance to maximize their return.
Btw, your original post of investing early, which is good advice, would contradict your own statement that nobody makes money by listening to others. Here's another piece of good advice that if people follow will make them money "Buy low, sell high."
Most TVs are relatively inexpensive and the service from the broadcast networks is free, being paid from via advertising. The Microsoft proposal doesn't say the hardware would be free, by the way.
CompuServ + Circuit City. PeoplePC. Altavista. Walmart.
Better yet, ABC, NBC and CBS they've used this business model for years.
This is only true, to a point. If you had started your investing in 1960, at the end of the year 2,000, you would not have had $45 for that initial $1 investment. The market fluctuations do come into play. That is why the close one comes to actual retirement, the more they need to shift retirement assets into less volatile investments.
Here is sage investment advice. Start saving early in life to take advantage of compounding of investment returns. Also, a longer investment time frame gives more time to weather fluctuations in the market. Earlier in life, it's alright to have more investments in equities (more risk) the closer you get towards retirement, however, the investment mix needs to shift towards investments that are less likely to loose value (albeit at a lower return rate). Now for the best advice: Most companies have 401(k) plans or 403(b) plans. They provide free retirement planning advice as part of the plan. Granted, it is tailored towards the investment vehicles the plan offers, but the rational used is the same whether you are electing to contribute additional funds to your company's plan, your own IRA or general investing.
While you might want to believe that you cannot make money listening to others, you would be wrong. However, it is definately true that for most people, you can easily lose money by NOT listening to others.
So when the the BBC writes Scientists believe the most useful stem cells come from the tissue of embyros. they are just lying bastards?
I'll believe them.
No, but then on the other hand, since the BBC is writing for probably a sixth grade level they do have to simplify things. The article does say that Scientists believe the most useful stem cells come from the tissue of embryos, however, it makes no mention of what scientists. The next few paragraphs gives a hint, though when they talk about scientists believing that "it should be possible..." and again "Theorecically, it should be possible..." In otherwords, they are referring to research scientists, because they are the ones who mainly deal in the realms of theory and hypothesis.
However, if you read further into the article, you will see where the BBC points out that adult stem cells are produced by the body's major organs to repair the organs. So, instead of coaxing an embryonic stem cell to turn into a liver cell, you could just use an already existing liver stem cell.
The article further explains the benefit of this by pointing out as it says the "huge" benefit of adult stem cell therapies and that is in the rejection problem (or lack thereof) from using adult stem cells from one's own body.
The last three paragraphs spell out, minimistically the concerns of real researchers using embryonic stem cells. Since they are in fact manipulating the human genes to get these cells to differntiate, there is great concern that they may introduce some new kind of virus or disease that the body will not be able to fight off. Second, since there is also great concern over introducing some cross virus between the animal products used to clone the human embryos to produce embryonic stem cells. Like the first concern, this could be devestating to the patient and if it were communicable, it could be a pandemic. The third issue it points out, is that so far, anyway, they can't control the growth of embryonic stem cells and they quickly turn into cancer cells in the body (along with other tissue type besides the desired type).
So, by all means, believe the BBC, I do. However, just don't read more into their articles than what is really there.
Maybe they (the anti-virus vendors) are just being the front-man for the software industry. Maybe it's really the other software vendors who don't want full disclosure because they don't want people to find out that even after all these years of promoting secure computing, and paying for all those upgrades, things are still not secure.
Then on the otherhand, maybe it really is just the anti-virus vendors. Very often, with full disclosure, the researchers also say what can be done to protect against the exploit. Maybe McAfee feels threatened, particularly with Microsoft coming out with their own anti-virus product.
People shouldn't blame McAfee. They're just really stressed out. You'd be too, if you had to make Windows a secure OS.
Since the OSS model or full disclosure model as the article calls it is widely available to the anti-virus companies (ie commercial programmers) and the malware programmer simultaneously and the malware programmer beats the commercial programmer out the door, does that mean that the OSS programmer is a better programmer?
Put a different way, and not to simplify it too much, but the anti-virus programmer needs to write a patch to detect a piece of code which has been handed to him/her. The malware has to write a program that actually impliments, propigates and hides from detection. Which should be the easier task? It seems that full disclosure should benefit the anti-virus company as much, if not more than the malware programmer.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to bash the anti-virus companies or their programmers. They have a tuff job to do. However, blaming OSS and it's "full-disclosure" model is simply ludicrous and makes as much sense as blaming McDonalds for people being overweight.
However, if they said that their slow response to software threats being released in the public was the cause, likewise, people's overeating and underexercising for being overweight, well, then, that would make a lot of sense, but would hardly be the fault of OSS (or McDonalds).
The online school is because, at least so far, the millions of dollars spent on improving the schools doesn't seem to be working. Are they pushing the online school for everyone? No, of course not. It's just another option available for those struggling with the traditional (failing) model and for those who home schooling is not an option.
What is interesting in Chicago, is that the Catholic school system seems to be doing quite well. While it is true that they can be selective about who they take, etc. That usually applies to the independent private schools. The local parish schools take parishoner's kids. The Catholic school system in Chicago has higher test scores, higher graduation rates and does all of this on a lower per pupil cost than the public school. So, assuming that Catholics aren't somehow intellectually superior to the rest of us, it must be attributed to something they are doing that public schools in Chicago aren't. Most likely it's because they have fewer administrative staff per student and concentrate more on core academic courses.
Public schools in Chicago (and many large cities) are in trouble. Things like this distance learning are band-aid attempts to attack the symptoms of the real underlying problems. However, unless there is real educational reform, things will only get worse until the reform is forced by the public. Chicago already has a working model to base reform on. They only have to choose to impliment it or wait for their system to continue to go downhill and have a referendum impliment something for them instead.
'You can't sit a child in front of a computer and expect him to learn things he needs to succeed in society,' said unimpressed Chicago Teachers Union president Marilyn Stewart of the Chicago Virtual Charter School, which will open to Chicago elementary school students this fall if approved by the state board of education."
It seems that you can't sit a child in the Chicago public schools and expect him to learn things he needs to succeed in society, either.
While it is true that males have an X and two Xs can be used to me used to a female, the article isn't talking about cloning a human being, but using a stem cell to produce a sperm. Now, if men have stem cells capable of producing the egg that is a totally different story.
Reading the article, they produced a male embryo to get the stem cells to produce the sperm. While the article doesn't use the phrase "male embryo," it does say they used spermatogonial stem cells. That would require the genetic equivalent of a male (as a female would be developing stem cells that would later become her eggs). The point of the research isn't embryonic stem cells. Again, the researcher states the intention is to harvest the stem cells from the adult males by using a testicular biopsy.
So until women start having testes, it's going to be hard to do that biopsy. Since women can't produce the sperm stem cells and men don't have eggs, it's seems pretty unlikely that there will be same-sex couple having biological children.
Since the media tends to only report the fetal side of stem cell research, that would explain why you are only hearing the scientist with an interest in it. However, if you try and look at sources outside of the U.S. or look at the medical journals and research grants themself, you will find that it is the adult stem cell research that has all of the break throughs.
I would surmise that the media reporting is due to it's distaste with anything about the Bush administration. And while the adult stem cell research is not related to it, only reporting on the fetal side makes the administration look bad because of the perceived restriction on fetal stem cell research (Bush was the first US president to allow any federal money to be used for fetal stem cell research, much to the disdain of the pro-life lobbyists).
Anyway, most of the major news media in the U.S. are not very reliable sources for obtaining scientific news. They tend to be politically biased or try and simplify it so much that everything sounds like a miracle cure. Good sources are the various medical research journals dealing specifically with the topic. These are based on the actual research and studies. However, they are a lot more difficult to digest as the general public is not the intended audience. (The reason these tend to be such good sources is because people's professional reputations are at stake, so there aren't any wild-ass claims being made, just solid verifialbe research).
Anyway, if you remove the public media, you will find that the majority of researchers don't claim that either is better. Fetal stem cells are good for producing test lines for research because the can remove variables that might cause variations in results (much like the genetically pure laboratory rats are used for testing). However, the same researchers also point out that outside of general research, it is the body's own stem cells that produce the best hope of providing specific cures for an individual. This is mainly because of the rejection problems associated with foreign cells that would be absent in using your own cells.
In short, what the research has found is that the human body has the capability to pretty much heal itself if they can turn the right switches on in the right (adult) stem cells. Fetal stem cell research is about figuring out how to get generic non-differentiated stem cell to turn into the right kind of adult stem cell. Adult stem cell research is about finding the right stem cell already being produced in the body. Neither one will produce the miracle cures that are hyped about in the media.
As of last fall, world wide, there have been 83 approved treatments using adult stem cells, with zero from fetal stem cells. It's certainly not from a lack of funding or from a lack of trying. It's because after the initial excitement of fetal stem cell research had worn off and research started to deal with the real obstacles, they focussed instead on the adult stem cells because they have a greater chance of success.
This the norm for medical research. When there are limited research dollars (whether public or private), and there are always limited research dollars, the research will gravitate to that which has the greatest potential to produce results at a minimal risk.
What proof are you asking for? To date, world wide, there has not been one cure or treatment from fetal stem cells and yet billions of dollars are being poured into it. There are even scientists who believe there are too many obstacles for fetal stem cells to ever produce treatments. However, adult stem cells have produced numerous cures and treatments and have been used for years. Bone marrow transplants are in fact an application of an adult stem cell treatment that has been around longer than use of the popular phrase "stem cell" in the media.
I don't need to prove anything. The research and the data is widely available in the medical journals and internet sources. It just isn't reported widely in the U.S. media. I'll leave the speculation as to why up to others.
Here is a simple solution if ABC gets there way (other than not watching ABC). For every commercial you are forced to watch because your fast forward button is now disabled, send a letter (not email) to the company with something like the following:
Dear sirs,
I was forced to watch your commercial on my dvr last night because ABC has taken it upon themselves to somehow deactivate the fast forward button function. They state they do so to benefit their advertisors. Why your company and ABC believes it has the right to break a piece of equipment that I worked very hard to save for and to purchase, I do not understand. However, since that is your position and my dvr is no longer functioning correctly, I am no longer going to purchase the products you manufacture. Not only that, I am telling my friends and family to boycott your products as well.
Sincerely,
Then follow through on it. Most likely, you will get a letter back saying it is not their policy to do this, but ABC and that they have no control over it. However, companies take serious the threats of boycotts, particularly when they are on grounds such as these. If they have enough complaints, they'll pressure ABC to quit or they will pull their advertising. Either way, in the end, ABC will have to change the practice.
I will try and get back and post some research links. Otherwise try googling about on stem cells. Almost all of the "breakthroughs" are with adult stem cells. Even bone marrow transplants are adult stem cells and have been done for years. The problem is you have to wade through all of the hype about what was called embryonic and now more correctly fetal stem cells vs adult stem cells. To date, though, adult stem cells have been used to successfully treat diabetes, spinal,nerve and brain injuries, parkinsons, heart and kidney disease and a host of other things (83 or so approved or pending treatments last time I checked, probably more by now). To date, fetal stem cells have yet to produce 1.
It seems that the problem with fetal stem cells is getting them to quit differentiating. For instance, turning on the gene to turn them into heart muscle cells works, but a few of them also turn into bone cells. These continue to grow as bone once injected into the damaged heart. As you can imagine, it's not good to have bones growing in one's heart. The other problem is that they tend to grow out of control and produce cancerous tumors. Again, not a desirable feature. Adult stem cells are already differentiated, so the first problem doesn't occur and since they don't have to be stimulated to grow, unlike fetal stem cells, uncontrolled growth is highly unlikely.
Again, the information is available. However, the mainstream media doesn't pick it up. Most is in medical journals, etc. Another source of information that is in plain English, although many would consider "tainted" is from United States Catholic Conference of Bishops. Regardless of what one thinks about the Catholic Church, their info on stem cell research seems pretty up to date and main stream. Even if you dismiss their oppostion to fetal stem cell based on their life begins at conception and abortion fews, their data on adult stem cells is accurate and is prepared by medical professionals and not theologians. A lot of the pro-life groups may have info, too.
I would not use the Catholic Church or pro-life groups as the final answer, but more as a starting point of gathering information. Besides the occasional media article, such as the Canadian one, most of the info will be in medical journals, etc.
As I stated in a previous post, this isn't a religious argument. Religion is only being used as a smoke screen to keep the discussion from focussing on the facts. The facts are, as you alluded to, fetal stem cells aren't working. Even with the limited research in the U.S., the rest of the world is doing research at a far greater pace than we would be doing even without the ban.
The real difference between fetal and adult stem cells in lay terms is that fetal stem cells are undifferentiated (they can turn into anything), adult stem cells are differentiated and depending on where they are from limits what they can turn into. The irony, is that to use fetal stem cells, they first have to become differentiated, so they must be made into the equivelant of adult stem cells (are bodies don't like undifferntiated cells growing in them. we call them cancer). So, for fetal stem cells to work, means that adult stem cells have to work, too.
As for funding issues and loosing funding, I'm not sure you have that correct. In it's simplest form, I guess it is, but in practice, must universities could simply set up a seperate life-sciences foundation to do the stem cell research which wouldn't then jeapordize their other grants. I'm pretty sure that UCLA and other colleges and universities in California are still getting federal grants even though the state is funding fetal stem cell research.
Again, the media and others want the public to think that funding is cut off. However, prior to Bush releasing the limited stem cell lines, there was no federal research allowed. So, in effect, he allowed an increase in funding (I am not a Bush fan, by the way, just trying to set the record straight). With the limited lines he released, you can do any kind of research you want. As it turns out, though the lines aren't as useful as first thought.
There is also no ban on fetal stem cell research with non-human species. Almost every other area of medical research always began with animals. Even adult stem cell research uses animals, first. However, with fetal stem cells, the researchers insist on using stem cells from a human fetus as their first course. One can only assume that since animal fetal stem cells would be less controversial, less costly and more readily available, they would be a no-brainer and yet only a handful of labs in the U.S. use them.
The rest try to convince the public that the religious right or the Catholic Church or some other group is trying to keep cures from the public. When in reality, that is untrue. The Catholic Church, for instance is supportive of adult stem cell research, just not the destruction of the fetus to obtain fetal stem cells (which seems consistent with their stand on abortion, etc.). But why would the researchers and the media as their pawn use such a tactic? Well first, there is big money involved, billions in grant money, even more in the selling of cures. Second, the science shows that it is adult stem cells that hold the potential. By keeping people focussed on the bogus religious argument, they hope people won't realize the shaky science used to support their position (remember, to use fetal stem cells, you first have to differentiate them or make them adult stem cells). Third, it is the religious types, whether fundamentalist or Catholic or whatever that are trying to get some facts out -- if they are portrayed as the villian in all of this, then their arguments will be dismissed.
One last thing, you make the statement that it is no wonder that private funding isn't available. However, there is plenty of private funding available. It's just that the majority of it is going to adult stem cell research because of it's proven track record. Venture capitalists aren't stupid. They don't usually get wrapped up in the emotional and moral side of the argument but look simply at the return on their investment. Which course has the best chance of providing a return on their investment? Adult stem cells.