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Following is an excerpt regarding ACT from the "Today's Papers" feature at slate.com, written by Eric Umansky. The full article covering all the news can be found at http://slate.msn.com. Kathleen <<Everybody except the NYT fronts a Massachusetts company's announcement that they have created the first cloned human embryo. Scientists at the company (named Advanced Cell Technology, for you stock trader types) say they have no intention of actually cloning humans. Instead, they say that their goal is to grow the embryos for a few days in order to harvest embryonic stem cells, which offer significant possibilities for treating illnesses. The Post says that the experiment "breaks new ethical ground by creating the beginnings of a human being from a single parent." (Today's Papers is aware of the potential drawbacks of asexual reproduction. But given that we live in an age of anonymous sperm donors, it would have appreciated another sentence explaining why this is an ethical issue.) The paper also reports that the approach has raised "concerns because it would require the creation of human embryos with the sole intent of destroying them." Count the Bush administration among the concerned. "The president has made it clear that he is opposed to any type of human cloning," said a White House spokesperson. Some critics, though, said their beef wasn't so much with the ethics surrounding the experiment as with what they saw its iffy science. The announcement was "nothing but hype," said one scientist who pointed out that the company has yet to reveal any details of its experiment.>> ---------------------------------------------------------------------- To sign-off Parkinsn send a message to: mailto:[log in to unmask] In the body of the message put: signoff parkinsn