A question for pro life/ anti stem cell people.

[Sean]

You are walking down the street past an infertility clinic, when you notice the place is going up in flames. Inside is a single baby in a crib and one thousand frozen embryos in storage. You can only save one or the other. Which one? Why?

 

[LittleJade]

You are walking down the street past an infertility clinic, when you notice the place is going up in flames. Inside is a single baby in a crib and one thousand frozen embryos in storage. You can only save one or the other. Which one? Why?

The baby.

Why?

Because it can feel pain.

 

[Drinking Cap]

The baby.

Why?

Probably worth more on the black market.

 

[Saint Peter]

The baby. The stuff in the freezer might survive the fire.

 

[fgarvb1]

You are walking down the street past an infertility clinic, when you notice the place is going up in flames. Inside is a single baby in a crib and one thousand frozen embryos in storage. You can only save one or the other. Which one? Why?

The disturbing thing is that you had to ask.

 

[garbage can]

Can you fry up, and eat frozen embryos? Is a 1000 embryos a big plate...

 

[Sean]

The disturbing thing is that you had to ask.

According to the pro life lobby, embryos are human beings, right? So you'd allow 1000 humans to die to save one?

 

[fgarvb1]

According to the pro life lobby, embryos are human beings, right? So you'd allow 1000 humans to die to save one?

If you had ever been in life and death situations with the end time clock running, you would know that you remove the victims in the order of the most alive and closest first. If you make it out alive you have plenty of time to have nightmares about what you might have done given more time.

Have you nothing better than to lay traps for people?

 

[fgarvb1]

Oh, I get it now.

Trying to sucker the newbies in.... sorry.

My bad!

 

[Sean]

If you had ever been in life and death situations with the end time clock running, you would know that you remove the victims in the order of the most alive and closest first. If you make it out alive you have plenty of time to have nightmares about what you might have done given more time.

Have you nothing better than to lay traps for people?

Actually, it was a thought experiment I heard during a debate on BBC Radio 4 this afternoon. I wanted a pro life person to justify the inherent dichotomy in claiming that a foetus is a human being and then, if they were honest about it, rescuing the baby.

If you're interested, the radio prog is here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/programmes/beyond_belief/index.shtml
Click on the drop down menu for 3rd Sep. It's 30 minutes long.

 

[Image]

I'm neither pro life nor anti stemcell...

If I choose do you gaurantee I'll walk away with my own life?

 

[fgarvb1]

Actually, it was a thought experiment I heard during a debate on BBC Radio 4 this afternoon. I wanted a pro life person to justify the inherent dichotomy in claiming that a foetus is a human being and then, if they were honest about it, rescuing the baby.

If you're interested, the radio prog is here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/programmes/beyond_belief/index.shtml
Click on the drop down menu for 3rd Sep. It's 30 minutes long.

SeanH, Not all pro-life people are crazy and neither are not all pro-abortion people.

And yes, in this world choices sometimes have to be made.

Some of us chose a path of life by choice, instinct or religion and some don't.

Lying about such things only fool the people who don't get to know you.

Which in veiw of our elections coming up in 2008 is very interesting.

Coming to know their ways is an important tool in knowing who to vote for.

I also wonder what other people think.

I certainly don't trust the 99% the news I hear.

 

[Mr.L.J.M]

According to the pro life lobby, embryos are human beings, right? So you'd allow 1000 humans to die to save one?

... oh dear.... you nearly had me man...

 

[BlackShanglan]

Actually, it was a thought experiment I heard during a debate on BBC Radio 4 this afternoon. I wanted a pro life person to justify the inherent dichotomy in claiming that a foetus is a human being and then, if they were honest about it, rescuing the baby.

If you're interested, the radio prog is here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/programmes/beyond_belief/index.shtml
Click on the drop down menu for 3rd Sep. It's 30 minutes long.

I'm on the other side from you on this one, Sean, and I think that fgarvb1 put it pretty well. I know removing the baby will certainly save its life; I have no idea how to remove frozen embryos in such a way as to not kill them in the process. Even if I could get them out, I wouldn't have any way to prevent them from thawing and dying before I could do anything about it.

Possibly a more reasonable analogy would be to ask what my choice would be if, in the same fire, I had to choose between rescuing a person who was pregnant and a person who wasn't. If (in the manner of bizarre hypothetical situations) I somehow knew that I could definitely only save one of the two adults, I would pick the one who was pregnant, as it would allow me to save two lives.

 

[Sean]

I'm on the other side from you on this one, Sean, and I think that fgarvb1 put it pretty clearly. I know removing the baby will certainly save its life; I have no idea how to remove frozen embryos in such a way as to not kill them in the process. Even if I could get them out, I wouldn't have any way to prevent them from thawing and dying before I could do anything about it.

Possibly a more reasonable analogy would be to ask what my choice would be if, in the same fire, I had to choose between rescuing a person who was pregnant and a person who wasn't. If (in the manner of bizarre hypothetical situations) I somehow knew that I could definitely only save one of the two adults, I would pick the one who was pregnant, as it would allow me to save two lives.

OK, it's a thought experiment. If the embryos were in a nice, easy to carry, insulated container?

 

[Sean]

SeanH, Not all pro-life people are crazy and neither are not all pro-abortion people.

And yes, in this world choices sometimes have to be made.

Anyone that takes decisions based on the existence of a mythical being is crazy as far as I'm concerned. But, leaving that aside, isn't one of the major planks of the pro life movement the contention that even a day old embryo is a human being?

 

[sophieloves]

for what it's worth, the living baby. it has experienced being alive, possessing a body. i can see no other option.

 

[Sean]

for what it's worth, the living baby. it has experienced being alive, possessing a body. i can see no other option.

Shut up, Poppy.

 

[BlackShanglan]

OK, it's a thought experiment. If the embryos were in a nice, easy to carry, insulated container?

They still won't be able to survive if I haven't got a facility to take them to and then people who wanted to have them implanted - and none of those things are available to me in the example. That, to me, is the problem. My choice isn't driven by a belief that they have any less right or reason to survive; it's driven by the knowledge that it's highly unlikely that they will.

Just to clarify that it's chances of survival and not my perception of their status as actual human beings that is that issue, if I had a similar skew of ratios of survival without the people involved being at different stages of life, I would make the same decision. Give me two ships I might be able to prevent from sinking, one with one person on it but a 100% of saving the ship and passenger, the other with a thousand passengers on it but only a .5% of success and a 99.5% chance that everyone would die, and I would still choose to devote my efforts to saving the savable person. If we gradually raise the odds of saving the thousand, the decision becomes more difficult, but the difficulty does not lie in deciding whether the thousand are human - only when the gamble is worth sacrificing a definite save for a potential save.

 

[Sean]

They still won't be able to survive if I haven't got a facility to take them to and then people who wanted to have them implanted and raised - and none of those things are available to me in the example. That, to me, is the problem. My choice isn't driven by a belief that they have any less right or reason to survive; it's driven by the knowledge that it's highly unlikely that they will.

Just to clarify that it's chances of survival and not my perception of their status as actual human beings that is that issue, if I had a similar skew of ratios of survival without the people involved being at different stages of life, I would make the same decision. Give me two ships I might be able to prevent from sinking, one with one person on it but a 100% of saving the ship and passenger, the other with a thousand passengers on it but only a .5% of success and a 99% chance that everyone would die, and I would still choose to devote my efforts to saving the savable person. If we gradually raise the odds of saving the thousand, the decision becomes more difficult, but the difficulty does not lie in deciding whether the thousand are human - only when the gamble is worth sacrificing a definite save for a potential save.

But a baby in a crib has no chance of survival without suitable backup and support, does it?

 

[ksmybuttons]

When you get to disaster triage, then you take and treat the ones who have the greatest potential for continued life.

I guess I would wonder why a fertility clinic with a baby inside wasn't staffed. I wouldn't work in a fertility clinic...

 

[sophieloves]

Shut up, Poppy.

remove your blinkers. call me whatever you like, i remain Sophie.

 

[Image]

Personally, I view an embryo, even a day old one, as possessing a soul. I'm not pro life or against stem cell research.

To me, no matter what circumstances surround a pregnancy or birth of a human being, they (the fetus or infant) themselves determine the course of life (or not) that they will take...

Some choose to die in infancy or become hope, as a cell, for someone already alive...

Fvgarvb1 may want to reconsider his take on craziness

 

[Sean]

Personally, I view an embryo, even a day old one, as possessing a soul. I'm not pro life or against stem cell research.

To me, no matter what circumstances surround a pregnancy or birth of a human being, they (the fetus or infant) themselves determine the course of life (or not) that they will take...

Some choose to die in infancy or become hope, as a cell, for someone already alive...

Fvgarvb1 may want to reconsider his take on craziness

So you'd rescue the box of embryos?

 

[bisexplicit]

The baby.

Why?

Probably worth more on the black market.

I literally laughed aloud.

I needed that.

Thanks.