.       The science community, those interested in the right to choice,
those wanting to see humane scientific progress, must restore to the
science community the right to make scientific definitions , and not
give it to religious fundamentalists. Religions defining scientific
organisms or defining anything in the sciences, through law, violates
Separation of Church and State.
        It's based on a religious definition, adopted by the "dead or
alive" pro-death penalty President, that "human life (e.g., a baby)
begins at conception.
        A six-cell embryo is hardly a "baby" or a "human being." It's
argued that an embryo is "potentially" a human being, therefore "human
life."
        The same "potential" could be claimed for an egg or sperm or a
"gleam in the eye." It's literature, or poetry, and all fine, but it's
not science. It makes no more sense to claim this for a new embryo, than
to say a woman's egg is a "baby;" or that a sperm is a "human life." The
only difference is that intercourse (or another method) fertilized the
egg, making it an "embryo." This is the scientific definition of that
level of life.
        That's why science called it an embryo, not a baby: Because it
is still scientifically *different* from a sentient, independent human
being. That is, until the religious right browbeat the defining of
scientific terms into law along its own biases.
        Hypocrisy enters the fray when we hear Bush and others say,
"it's wrong to kill one innocent human being even if to save others from
an evil disease." This, from the people who tell us we must accept
"collateral killing" of innocent people in the greater good of stopping
evil.
         The issue to re-fight now is again for Separation of Church and
State, of Church and public, of Church and Science.
        It's one thing to resist cloning human beings (or placing a
cloned embryo into a womb). This is not proposed.
        The whole procedure takes place using one's own genetic
material, altered and returned, to heal a sick organ, spine, etc., and
should be a right of "choice" in the control of one's own body.
        The only "ethic" here lies in the power struggle of zealots
further dictating to the state and to science.
Bob Fink

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