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Bob, No flame war intended. I have always had the highest respect for you and your opinions even though we may strongly disagree at times.. Creating a human life just for sacrifice is not the case with stem cell research and I am glad to see that you separate the issues. We can disagree on abortion and still agree that stem cell research should go forward. I would hope that as a pro-life physician, you will write to Congress and point out these subtile but important differences that may be lost on the layman not familiar with these issues. The "casual discarding of human beings" (as you would call the embryo) is going to occur anyway in IVF and some good can come from the process. I don't think that the beginning of life can be rigidly determined as you do and personally do not have significant objection to the process of obtaining the cells. But, I think that people who believe as you do can play a valuable role in the Stem Cell debate, by supporting extremely promising stem cell research while being strongly pro-life. The 2 positions are compatible. Again Bob, I wanted to encourage debate, not start a flame war and I hope you accept these comments in that spirit. Charlie At 01:20 PM 10/4/00 -0700, you wrote: >On 4 Oct 00, at 12:28, Charles T. Meyer, M.D. wrote: > > > With all due respect IMHO your thinking is more "scary" than the > > procedure being discussed here. Anything that could have helped that > > child short of > > taking the life of a fully formed human being should have been tried. > >Charlie and group, > >I really don't want to start a flame war about this. I am pro-life and I >believe that once conception has occurred, a human embryo/fetus is a >human being. I believe that there are certain situations where it is >justified to take a human life (self-defense),; but to *create* a human >life for the sake of sacrificing it, to me, is asking for a Hitlerian >"slippery slope". It is, to me, not unlike "growing" human babies so >that one could "harvest" organs for transplantation. > >I do not object to stem cell research. What I object to is the casual >"discarding" of human beings. I do not oppose IVF, either, but the >practice of "discarding" the embryos bothers the h*ll out of me for >the reasons stated above. > >My opinions are strongly held (Charlie, we have debated this before, >and I have not changed my mind). Let's leave them that way. > > >Best, > >Bob > > >Robert A. Fink, M. D., F.A.C.S. >Professional Corporation >2500 Milvia Street Suite 222 >Berkeley, California 94704-2636 USA >Phone: 510-849-2555 FAX: 510-849-2557 >WWW: <http://www.dovecom.com/rafink> > >"Ex Tristitia Virtus" Charles T. Meyer, M.D. Middleton, WI PD DX 12 years (at age 44) Age 56