[Pflienews] PharmFacts E-News Update: Who's determining totipotency? Important definitions for potential liquidation of millions of embryos

Thu Jan 1 09:21:37 MST 2009

*PharmFacts E-News Update -- 1 Jan 2009 AD

*
 From Prof. Dianne Irving, PhD:

[Note:  Imagine, actually thinking that such a by-invitation-only 
cloistered group has the background, capacity, or professional and 
academic credentials and expertise to determine with ultimate 
scientific accuracy these critically important purely scientific facts! 

Since Condic never once mentioned or referred to the /Carnegie Stages of 
Early Human Embryonic Development /or the international nomenclature 
committee on human embryology in her White Paper, I doubt that any of 
those at this "conference" did either (and, be sure, that they KNOW 
about them).  Or, how about checking out PubMed??  So what's up?  
"Scientific" justification for ANT, OAR, iPS, all manner of genetic 
engineering, etc.?  You'd think they'd learned their lesson with the 
concoction of the fake "scientific" term "pre-embryo". 

Now we'll have the "pre-zygote" for many more decades.  And what if 
they're wrong?  What about the thousands of innocent living human 
embryos who will be sacrificed?  Sad.  Dangerous.  Pure 
unadulterated arrogance, bordering on delusions of scientific grandeur. 
-- DNI]

http://www.westchesterinstitute.net/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=384&Itemid=115 
<http://www.westchesterinstitute.net/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=384&Itemid=115>

Westchester Institute for Ethics and the Human Person

On the Criteria for Determining the Totipotency of the Human Embryo

****The sixth Westchester Institute Scholars Forum returned to the 
issues raised by the previous forums on Altered Nuclear Transfer (ANT) 
and the definition of the human embryo. With the desire of bringing 
closure the moral evaluation of altered nuclear transfer, we undertook a 
deeper exchange over /the possibility of identifying the minimal 
threshold indicators of "totipotency" in human embryos and of applying 
that knowledge to determining the moral status of biological human 
constructs./ Clearly such an exchange has been necessitated by the 
evident and unfolding itinerary of developmental biology and the 
bioengineering enterprise which, with growing frequency, will challenge 
the moral community with an array of bioengineered products, the moral 
status of which will in most cases require careful discernment. 
 Building upon two previous forums in which we initiated a process of 
moral analysis of ANT, and then explored /whether/ human understanding 
can rationally distinguish embryonic human life at its earliest stages 
from naturally occurring biological aberrations, we here attempted to 
uncover /how precisely we can recognize/ human totipotency and 
articulate a set of criteria that could be applicable within the field 
of stem cell science and developmental biology.

Princeton professor Robert P. George moderated the sessions, and 
presenters included Institute Senior Fellow Markus Grompe, M.D., William 
Hurlbut, M.D., (who originally developed the _ANT stem-cell proposal 
<http://www.bioethics.gov/reports/white_paper/index.html>_), Stuart 
Newman, Maureen Condic, Nicanor Austriaco, O.P., Kevin Fitzgerald, S.J., 
Shoukhrat Mitalipov; and Patrick Lee. A dozen other scholars contributed 
to the discussions including Fr. Kevin Flannery, S.J., professor of 
philosophy at the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome who 
participated via teleconference.

*We asked a select group to formulate their own definitions of 
_totipotency_. Specifically, we asked them to formulate their definition 
in response to the following questions:*

*That is, we are asking you to propose a set of scientific criteria for 
defining what is and what is not an embryo, as well as the underlying 
justification for these.  In addition, we ask you to be prepared to 
address the following issues:*

*1. Based on your proposal, what specific characteristics/attributes/or 
biological events distinguish a newly formed embryo from the cell/cells 
that immediately give rise to it or precede it developmentally?*

*2.  Can these distinguishing attributes be measured/determined 
empirically, and if so, how and to what degree of accuracy?*

*3. Does the embryo have a moral status different from a somatic cell, 
and if so, what is the basis of this status?  That is, what specific 
traits, characteristics or properties establish the moral status of the 
embryo distinct from a somatic cell?*

While the forum revealed that there is still much to be debated on this 
vital question, we nonetheless came away more firmly convinced that 
science, aided by philosophy, certainly holds the tools necessary for 
sustaining both the scientific and moral determination of the 
biologically and metaphysically minimum requirements for human 
organismic existence with its set of primary indicators.

As we continue to pursue these questions we are all the more confident 
that we will acquire the necessary knowledge on which to base moral 
judgments regarding the creation, use, and moral status of an array of 
artificially confected biological entities of genetically human origin.

------------------------------------------------------------------------
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