NationStates Jolt Archive

http://www.news.com.au/story/0,23599,23476268-38200,00.html?from=public_rss

So, scientists created an embryo that lived for three days - 99% human, but 1% cow. Nothing too startling there - science is cool, and we'll be seeing a bunch of neat stories like this in the near future, I'm sure. However, this little bit of the article kinda stood out, and made me wonder:

"What is being created is life.

"No one knows exactly what would grow from these embryos.


No one knows?! Damn. Now I'm curious. So I decided: I wanna see cow-baby! Or rabbit-man, or one of the other embryos that have been created, which the law says must be destroyed in a certain amount of time, brought to life! Think of it! :)

http://www.sensesofcinema.com/images/directors/02/eraserhead.jpg

And so cuddly, too!

So, what about everyone else? Aren't you just a little curious? Admit it! :p

I am indeed curious...if not slightly disturbed.

Is the title a description of LG?

The Catholic Church in Britain branded the creations as "monstrous" - a view supported by Caroline Chisholm Centre for Health Ethics director Fr Kevin McGovern.

"An almost-human embryo is being created and then it's being destroyed," he said.

"I cannot see that that respects human life or the dignity of human life.

"Human beings - or even almost human embryos - are not just things that you can use in a laboratory experiment.

"What is being created is life.

"No one knows exactly what would grow from these embryos.

"If this is approved in the UK, there will be renewed pressure to permit it here, and we will travel further down the slippery slope of allowing just about anything."
Scaremongering, as that 1 per cent of DNA is mitochondrial and is far from the half-man half-cow monster inferred. The product would be a human, but that is irrelevant since the embryo can only grow for 14 days. A topical point, given the Human Fertility and Embryology Bill being currently debated in the UK, but still scaremongering.

This one blurrs the line between disturbing and curious. I'd love to see it be studied, but if it's 99% human, will have feelings? How will we know? Thats what I want to know.

It has allready been done before.
Don't beleive me?
Ya' gott'a meet my x-wife.

I voted no. Sorry but to me just because we can do something doesn't necessarily mean we should. :( jmo

It has allready been done before.
Don't beleive me?
Ya' gott'a meet my x-wife.

I have, those cat-women are wild.

Scaremongering, as that 1 per cent of DNA is mitochondrial and is far from the half-man half-cow monster inferred. The product would be a human, but that is irrelevant since the embryo can only grow for 14 days. A topical point, given the Human Fertility and Embryology Bill being currently debated in the UK, but still scaremongering.

It's literally part cow, part human. The article is clear enough, I think, that the cow part is quite small at 1%. Still - why the 14-day prohibition? If the government can work with scientists in extreme cases, such as those where pig stem cells are injected into humans, to make sure the subjects don't ever procreate, can't it do the same with the embryos, if they were allowed to develop? I'm wondering where the prohibition comes from, is all: is it froma fear that the lifeform will get out of hand, or simply from a concern for voters' sensibilities? Something else?

Is the title a description of LG?

I am 99% human and 1% mud. Give or take. *nod*

I am 99% human and 1% mud. Give or take 98%. *nod*

fixed ;)
http://i236.photobucket.com/albums/ff315/Sarothai/Smileys/pie.gif

It's literally part cow, part human. The article is clear enough, I think, that the cow part is quite small at 1%. Still - why the 14-day prohibition? If the government can work with scientists in extreme cases, such as those where pig stem cells are injected into humans, to make sure the subjects don't ever procreate, can't it do the same with the embryos, if they were allowed to develop? I'm wondering where the prohibition comes from, is all: is it froma fear that the lifeform will get out of hand, or simply from a concern for voters' sensibilities? Something else?
Since the embryos are only used for research, a line needs to be drawn to prevent these hybrids being brought to full term. It is not that it would get out of hand (i.e., out of control), but that it is deemed neccessary to limit research to 14 days so nothing 'scary' or unethical is created.
A better article is in the Guardian (http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2008/apr/02/medicalresearch.ethicsofscience), which asserts a more accurate figure of 0.1 per cent cow DNA (i.e., the mitochondria).

Since the embryos are only used for research, a line needs to be drawn to prevent these hybrids being brought to full term. It is not that it would get out of hand (i.e., out of control), but that it is deemed neccessary to limit research to 14 days so nothing 'scary' or unethical is created.
A better article is in the Guardian (http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2008/apr/02/medicalresearch.ethicsofscience), which asserts a more accurate figure of 0.1 per cent cow DNA.

Yeah, that sounds about right. I was thinking along the lines of it getting ethically out of hand - say, if the rights of the child had to be limited in some way, or the question of its legal guardianship complicated, etc. So that wouldn't be likely in a lab setting, even if it's a possibility - it still wouldn't be anything entirely new though, which makes me think that it's on the horizon somewhere, if not in this country. The percentage of animal to human might make the result kinda boring, if it's really so small, but as a first step toward more integrated hybrids, it still seems pretty interesting.

This one blurrs the line between disturbing and curious. I'd love to see it be studied, but if it's 99% human, will have feelings? How will we know? Thats what I want to know.

Umm coz it's human DNA in the egg of a cow.

I voted no. Sorry but to me just because we can do something doesn't necessarily mean we should. :( jmo

Agree with you 100%. It's called responsibility. It's the way the world operates. Can't live with it, prepare to never have any power.

Spider-Man rules in that way, IMO. ;)

99% human, but 1% cow.

Should we consider it human or something else?

anyway, http://www.forla.net/monociglione/rums.jpg

"Oh, Ted, they've got a spiderbaby!"

I'm afraid the benefits to medicine far outweigh any grievances from the Catholic church.

Has it occurred to anyone here to bother asking why this experiment was performed? Unlike what some rather conservative church-goers might think of science, it wouldn't have been done without at least a decent reason, and I am honestly curious what that reason might have been.

Has it occurred to anyone here to bother asking why this experiment was performed? Unlike what some rather conservative church-goers might think of science, it wouldn't have been done without at least a decent reason, and I am honestly curious what that reason might have been.

Lacking any info as to the real reason, I'm going to go with boredom... :D

Has it occurred to anyone here to bother asking why this experiment was performed? Unlike what some rather conservative church-goers might think of science, it wouldn't have been done without at least a decent reason, and I am honestly curious what that reason might have been.

Research into curing/diminishing effects of alzheimer's and other diseases.

Has it occurred to anyone here to bother asking why this experiment was performed? Unlike what some rather conservative church-goers might think of science, it wouldn't have been done without at least a decent reason, and I am honestly curious what that reason might have been.

One of the possibilities of future stem cell based cures is a technique known as therapeutic cloning. The idea is that we would take DNA from a patient's cells, transfer it into an egg cell, get it to start dividing, and isolate embryonic stem cells. Those cells would match the patient, and would thus not be resisted by the immune system. We could then differentiate the cells into whatever the patient needed and implant them. (Essentially - there are certainly more details).

One of the biggest problems that we might end up seeing with techniques like this is the lack of available egg cells. It's no trivial process to get egg cells from a woman, and we would want to have basically a steady supply. If we can use egg cells from another species and still produce functional ESCs, we would be able to solve that problem.

And, even before we get to the therapy stage, we could possibly create more ESC lines for use in research without the need for donated embryos or human egg cells.

This is the road genetic studies *must* take if we ever want to have humans with gills or humans with super strength or humans with cat fur. We can't get there without doing this research. Speaking against this kind of research is speaking out for humans stagnating.

This one blurrs the line between disturbing and curious. I'd love to see it be studied, but if it's 99% human, will have feelings? How will we know? Thats what I want to know.

If it survives it will have feelings, it will pretty much be human. the 0.1% is mitochondrial DNA which is mostly used to make certain enzymes necessary in metabolism, this is very important of course but I don't think mitochondrial DNA effects anything like emotions etc., only functions that have something to do with metabolism.

It won't look anything like a cow, here (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mitochondrial_dna#Genes) are the 37 genes in mDNA, the only thing they do is produce proteins used in cell respiration (production of energy in the cell) and make protein synthesis possible in the mitochondrion (in order to produce the previous proteins), so the hypothetical human wouldn't have more hair and horns or something.


EDIT: I didn't vote on the poll, I don't I would support real animal hybrids, but I do think this is valuable research. The goal wasn't to make little cowmen (actually it would be counterproductive to have real cowgenes in these cells because that would lead them to be rejected by the receptors) but to find a replacement for egg cells.

Since the embryos are only used for research, a line needs to be drawn to prevent these hybrids being brought to full term.

Why?

It is not that it would get out of hand (i.e., out of control), but that it is deemed neccessary to limit research to 14 days so nothing 'scary' or unethical is created.


What would be unethical about the creation?

It is not okay to let a hybrid embryo develop to a baby if that baby would become handicapped. At some point the blob of cells becomes an individual with rights and it is not okay to cause another person to become handicapped. On the other hand if they can be sure that the result will have a healthy life then it'd be okay.

What they did here doesn't seem to be anything to panic over though.

and isolate embryonic stem cells.

How exactly would the therapy stage look like? What would they do with the ESCs once they have them?

Why?Because it would increase the numbers of Scientologists, Mormons, Jehovah's Witnesses, Pentecostals, Jews, and other fatuous groupings. :p

Why?

This is only the research stage, nobody can be sure that the resulting persons would be healthy. Besides, there are already enough people.

How exactly would the therapy stage look like? What would they do with the ESCs once they have them?

Differentiate them into a needed cell type or use them to grow a needed tissue.

There are a lot of ways this could go. It could be a simple matter of differentiating the right type of cells and injecting them into the affected area. It's more likely, however, that we'll have to provide more cues to ensure that the cells form the proper tissue structure. In some cases, it may be a matter of growing tissue in vitro and then implanting it essentially fully formed.

Brb, building a maze to house this freak of nature abomination.

Because it would increase the numbers of Scientologists, Mormons, Jehovah's Witnesses, Pentecostals, Jews, and other fatuous groupings. :p
No, just Moooonies.

Link (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_Merrick)

holy retard fish frog of heaven and his heavenly bs bla, this is playing god!!, cloning and genetic engineering is so not mentioned in the bibel!!! its illegal or something....

seriously though i support genetic experiments, well not monetary though so i guess i root and condone more than support

i know its far fetched but imagine the day that all humans have wings to fly, now that would be amazing, although still more than a century away

imagine every sci-fi scenario would eventually come true, i can just see hunting nuts demand a designed animal to be the perfect prey, and eventually every human gets killed by this most likely man-bear-pig super prey, unless bureaucracy is still in effect 200 years from now... but still we could breed half humans half turtles then train them to be ninjas or something and by the time those freaks hit puberty..... teenage mutant ninja turtles!!!!

plus a lot of the disease immunities that animals have could be transferred onto humans.......ninja turtles OMG!!!

One of the possibilities of future stem cell based cures is a technique known as therapeutic cloning. The idea is that we would take DNA from a patient's cells, transfer it into an egg cell, get it to start dividing, and isolate embryonic stem cells. Those cells would match the patient, and would thus not be resisted by the immune system. We could then differentiate the cells into whatever the patient needed and implant them. (Essentially - there are certainly more details).

One of the biggest problems that we might end up seeing with techniques like this is the lack of available egg cells. It's no trivial process to get egg cells from a woman, and we would want to have basically a steady supply. If we can use egg cells from another species and still produce functional ESCs, we would be able to solve that problem.

And, even before we get to the therapy stage, we could possibly create more ESC lines for use in research without the need for donated embryos or human egg cells.

Oh, I see...in other words, it's a very valuable line of research.

Carry on then, and ignore the misinformed Catholics.

This is the road genetic studies *must* take if we ever want to have humans with gills or humans with super strength or humans with cat fur. We can't get there without doing this research. Speaking against this kind of research is speaking out for humans stagnating.

Now *that* needs to be outlawed - no matter how much the Japanese may want it. :p I don't need to be alergic to the guy in the next cubicle, or an adjacent seat on a bus. Ugh.

holy retard fish frog of heaven and his heavenly bs bla, this is playing god!!, cloning and genetic engineering is so not mentioned in the bibel!!! its illegal or something....the space shuttle is not in the bible. its illegal or something....

The world will bow down to our new overlords!
the chickenogs, chickens mixed with dogs!
It would have pathetic wings, lay eggs and then pee on them. isn't that great? well it's a step above humanity that's for certain.
That or the rhinodiles, a crocodile mixed with a rhino.
It would have a big body, with a long jaw, it could swim and trample over you!
then again i think another conversion could be the...killer Kangaroo, a mix of Kangaroo and Killer whale, it jumps all over the place, then it is protected by animal rights for eating people, awesome.

A combination of baby and beef? Sounds delicious.

whoa, some people here sound pretty badly informed. Obviously some of the posts were jokes, but were they all? :/
no one is doing this with the aim of creating part human/part animal creatures.
No we could never fly, birds are completely differant anatomy wise :/
We don't have that kind of control over genetics, that we could just cut and paste 'fur' dna. And we tend to find that it's not so simple as just 'dna' codes for 'green eyes, exactly this tall, etc, etc'....
and the reason the embryo isn't allowed to mature is, you create something with no purpose that leads a life of torture (physchological and physical, most likely) and then probably dies pretty early.
Great.... that's ethical.

On the other hand, embryo's that are NOT life :/ omg here comes debate... being used for research to cure disease... now that is ethical.

Yus!

The UK wins the Utterly Crazy Science With Animals Race again! Huzzah!