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Human-monkey chimera embryos created in lab

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Re: Human-monkey chimera embryos created in lab

#171

Post by [deleted] »

scoopertrooper wrote: post #122
warent wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just how many women create a fetus and abort it in the name of science? Human embryos are not manufactured for experimentation. What you're talking about is completely orthogonal. Now, breeding/manufacturing animals for experiments is awful and morally complex--ethically unclear (at least to me). But the line must be drawn somewhere, and we can very easily draw it at manufacturing human-monkeys, human-pigs, or human-…

At what point does a thing become a human-thing? Imagine there was a way to copy a few human genes over to a mouse so that its immune system more closely resembled a human, but it was still, in every other respect, a mouse. Would it be a human-mouse?

[deleted]

Re: Human-monkey chimera embryos created in lab

#172

Post by kaba0 »

warent wrote: post #158
scoopertrooper wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At what point does a thing become a human-thing? Imagine there was a way to copy a few human genes over to a mouse so that its immune system more closely resembled a human, but it was still, in every other respect, a mouse. Would it be a human-mouse?

It's a great discussion to have when the matter at hand is that subtle. Frankensteining together human stem cells and monkey blastocysts until something works is pretty far from surgically selecting specific genes. From the article: The announcement of the new chimeras will no doubt be labelled “unnatural” or “playing God” by some people – but the same could be said about many scientific breakthroughs. An iPhone is u…

I agree that we should be maximally wary of ethical considerations here, but a uniform mass of cells is a uniform mass of cells. We do know when important structures develop.

For example, one of the most important cell line in research is called HeLa, which was harvested from a woman with the same initials without consent from a cancerous growth. Since then, it was grown to a huge biomass (couldn’t find exact number). Other than the lack of consent which is obviously amoral, would you consider research on this human cell line bad?

Re: Human-monkey chimera embryos created in lab

#173

Post by em-bee »

dqpb wrote: post #111
em-bee wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

the common definition of a natural process is one that happens without human intervention. you are applying a different definition that is problematic. by your definition murder could be considered natural

Murder is natural. I never said everything natural is good. I merely said that everything is natural.

uhm, bringing up natural as an argument in defense of the creation of sentient beings heavily implies that you consider everything natural as good.

since we obviously agree that murder is not good, and you also agree that not everything natural (by your definition of natural) is good either, using natural in support of your argument no longer works.

this doesn't invalidate your argument. we can still discuss whether creating sentient beings is acceptable or not. just arguing whether it is natural or not does not help us here

Re: Human-monkey chimera embryos created in lab

#174

Post by kaba0 »

Edman274 wrote: post #31
0_gravitas wrote: post #27

Awesome, love this bit mentioned: ``` “It is sometimes argued that … [the creation of part-human chimeras] will undermine an important moral view: that it matters, morally, which species we belong to,” the report reads. ”This argument assumes that we ought to preserve the view that boundaries between species are fixed, natural, and morally relevant, with full moral status reserved exclusively for humans. Yet even if…

From my perspective, the fact someone could say that a line is drawn "arbitrarily" is absolutely a worthless red herring. You could argue that the difference between pre-birth and post-birth fetuses is fuzzy and arbitrary, but we still don't allow people to kill newborns. You could argue that the difference between a child and an adult is a fuzzy, arbitrary line, but we still don't allow the exploitation of children.…

> You could argue that the difference between pre-birth and post-birth fetuses is fuzzy and arbitrary

If you don’t view the “attached” women as a living person that can die from childbirth.. Also, there is a very real difference between a first trimester fetus and a third trimester one. The latter is only ever aborted when the life of the mother is in danger (eg. with mothers less than 18).

Just a nitpick.

Re: Human-monkey chimera embryos created in lab

#175

Post by caconym_ »

Aeronwen wrote: post #132
caconym_ wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It seems contradictory to suggest at the same time that a) these hybrids might teach us that the line between humans and animals isn't as stark as a lot of people think, and b) these hybrids will not be human and therefore will be suitable for medical research that could not be ethically performed on "real" humans. If you buy the former, it seems to suggest we should be going in the opposite direction with the latter…

You're assuming they're opposed to human testing, so you see the first statement as, "animals are people too" instead of "humans are just animals." From there, the second statement a solution to a legal problem they have, and not the moral one they don't have.

> so you see the first statement as, "animals are people too" instead of "humans are just animals."

You're assuming a lot yourself by telling me how I interpret the point about the line between humans and animals, and (in fact) you have assumed incorrectly.

The article includes a quote about how they intend to follow "all the ethical, legal, and social guidelines in place". So I don't think the point I made about their stance being contradictory is way off base. Of course, they could actually be aliens from the planet Omicron Persei 8 with zero genuine concern for human or animal life. Or whatever.

Re: Human-monkey chimera embryos created in lab

#176

Post by kaba0 »

Edman274 wrote: post #47
hello333 wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm pretty sure the idea that drawing a line somewhat arbitrarily implies there shouldn't be a line is a straw man. Who is arguing this? The quote from the article advocates for more stringent morals--that beings that aren't fully human should be given similar moral weight as humans. It also suggests, more broadly, that we should reconsider both where these lines are drawn and if they should really be lines instead o…

I took issue with the quoted part: "it is unclear why it is important for us to preserve the view that biological humanness is both necessary and sufficient for full moral status." Notice how they said both "necessary and sufficient "? When both are included, there's an implication here that it might be possible for someone to be fully biologically human and yet without full moral rights - that, for example, someone…

I think the other direction is implied, that is someone not being biologically human can be considered conscious and “human” like a chimp, or some hybrid chimera monkey-human.

Re: Human-monkey chimera embryos created in lab

#177

Post by catlifeonmars »

em-bee wrote: post #98
mb_72 wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"...create something which is horribly mutated, fucked up genetically, and experiences only pain for its entire life." 'God' does this all the time already. Friends of mine recently had a baby girl; she is missing part of one of her chromosomes. The family is very religious, and is being torn apart trying to understand how their 'loving God' could have done such a thing. So this 'morality' you speak of is making a tr…

i heard someone make this interesting observation: handicapped people could be a test of god for the rest of us. but your friends may also consider this: any suffering in this life is rewarded in the next life (the life after death) god doesn't give us tests that we couldn't possibly pass. if you are compassionate, i hope you won't ridicule your friends for their belief but try to help them come to terms with their s…

> god doesn’t give us tests that we couldn’t possibly pass

I get that you’re framing this in a context that OPs friend might take solace in, but when you put it like that it just sounds like a cruel joke to me.

Re: Human-monkey chimera embryos created in lab

#178

Post by kaba0 »

slumdev wrote: post #96
Ar-Curunir wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So, are trans folks immoral? Organ transplants? Prosthetics? Where do you draw the line?

> So, are trans folks immoral? Yes. > Organ transplants? OK, as long as they were taken from someone who was actually dead. Not all organs can be taken after death. In these cases, the transplant surgeon ends the donor's life in the process of harvesting. > Prosthetics? OK.

Is biological death the same as clinical one? Should someone be resurrected?

Re: Human-monkey chimera embryos created in lab

#179

Post by brobdingnagians »

themgt wrote: post #60

These chimeras pave the way for more accurate models of human biology and disease The goal, the team says, is to make better models for studying biological development, evolution, disease progression and treatments. "As we are unable to conduct certain types of experiments in humans, it is essential that we have better models to more accurately study and understand human biology and disease," Interestingly, the revie…

The other disturbing thing is that it can be read two ways and the reverse is implicating that because they think they can do live experimentation on animals, they think doing the same experimentation on humans would be fine. Maybe their experimentation on monkeyman will lead to atrocities on people. That seems more likely than having people accept experimentation on monkeypeople and then deciding to stop abusing animals.

I think animals have enormous intrinsic worth, emotions, and value; I think humans have even more. Maybe we should stop doing this type of testing on either one.

Re: Human-monkey chimera embryos created in lab

#180

Post by caconym_ »

Ericson2314 wrote: post #161
caconym_ wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It seems contradictory to suggest at the same time that a) these hybrids might teach us that the line between humans and animals isn't as stark as a lot of people think, and b) these hybrids will not be human and therefore will be suitable for medical research that could not be ethically performed on "real" humans. If you buy the former, it seems to suggest we should be going in the opposite direction with the latter…

It's not a contradiction if you believe experiments on human embryos should also be deemed ethical. In formal logical, that means it's not a contradiction, unless you've already ruled out that premise.

Yes. So the point of my comment was to illustrate that either they haven't thought their position through very well, or they're being disingenuous in their claimed intent to follow "all the ethical, legal, and social guidelines in place". If they want to start rocking the ethical boat, it's at best a lie of omission.

Generally, I think bioethicists will look askance at attempts to skirt current guidelines around experimenting on human specimens by creating human/monkey hybrids that are human enough to be useful to science but not enough for the letter of the law to call them human. That's the context.

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