Playing God with Neanderthals

Bluejay writes:Hi, Peter. But, I thought you were comparing the cloning of Neanderthals to the cloning of mammoths. So, the assumption should be something about the differences between the worth of Neanderthals and the worth of mammoths.To me, "there is something wrong in doing so" sounds more like a conclusion based on somebody's views of ethics, rather than an assumption. ----- So, go looking, then!You don't do much good by assassinating the king and leaving the nation in turmoil: propose a republic or something!

Taq writes:If a drug is toxic for mice more than likely it is also toxic in humans. If a drug is not toxic in mice there is no guarantee that it is not toxic in humans. Just to give you an idea of how these things are currently handled in biomedical research . . .In bioethics this is a grey area. The Hippocratic Oath states that you should first do no harm. Giving a patient an untested drug of unknown toxicity flies in the face of this oath. Also, the rules for human subjects in scientific research place a lot of stress on recognizing compromised subjects, those subjects who may be unduly pressured by circumstance to participate in scientific experiments. In most cases, giving untested drugs to terminally ill patients crosses this line because the subjects are desparate and may participate in experiments that are too risky. However, an independent review board can ok these types of studies, but they usually require at least some toxicity testing in non-primate mammalian species first (e.g. mice, rats).

Taq writes:If you are going to argue that rights are inherent and inalienable then how can they be "applied"? What do you mean by this? And how are we going to stop people from violating the rights of others if not through the threat of punishment? Isn't it arrogant of you to decide for everyone what is and is not egocentric?

Dr Adequate writes:Yes, that was my point --- my fridge is vastly more useful to me than you are. In which case, in order for me to grant you more rights than a refrigerator (which presumably you will admit is desirable) I need some other way of judging this. Whether by mere instinctive empathy, or by what one might argue are equally sentimental criteria such as your ability to reason or to feel pain, I am in effect using similarities to myself as criteria.

Taq writes:You still run the risk of increasing pain and suffering as well as taking away time that the patient has very little left of. All of these factors are weighed when testing highly experimental drugs in terminally ill patients. That is certainly worth discussing.For non-humans we do not look at it in terms of consent since none can be given. Instead, the use of animals is justified by the knowledge that can be gained in the experiments. Those justifications are reviewed by various independent committees usually called Institutional Review Boards (IRB's). At least in the US, an IRB is required to have at leats one person from the community on the board with voting power. We have a pastor from a local church on our IRB. The IRB reviews the animal protocols for adherence to regulations as well as judging whether or not the suffering and/or death of the animals is justified by the knowledge that the experiments will uncover. They also look at the experimental protocols to see if suffering is kept to a minimum. This same IRB also reviews experiments that involve humans.Do you think this should be approached differently? If so, how?

Taq writes:Like I said above, there is the Hippocratic Oath to consider. The first rule of Doctor Club is "do no harm". The second rule of Doctor Club . . . well, you get the idea. Secondly, terminally ill patients are not as objective about the risks. I am not saying that this type of testing should not occur. In fact, this type of testing has been done and is being done in very limited clinical trials. What I am saying is that you have to be very, very careful in how these trials are conducted and in how you get consent to run these experiments. If at all possible, these types of studies should be avoided.From my understanding, a drug has to at least show promise in animal studies before it can be considered for these types of clinical trials in terminally ill patients, even if that drug has unknown or even known toxicity in animal or human models. Bias is the right word. There is a bias towards non-primate species in animal testing.What sane, non-terminally ill human would consent to a study that might kill them or cause permanent damage? I think it is immoral to even ask people to participate in such a study, especially when the good data can be acquired through animal studies. There are even experiments where the subject is expected to suffer and/or die, such as finding the right dose of antibiotics for fighting massive infections.