Embryonic Stem Cell Research for dummies ... like me!

The Egg (Ovum) only moments after fertilization
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And within a few days we have a Zygote!
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Which can hardly be distinguished from an Embryo ...
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... and just when, between any of the pictures above and this one, does life begin?
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I've done a lot of thinking since a couple of days ago when I berated our Congress for wasting its time debating what was a foregone conclusion ... a "yea" vote from both houses of Congress followed by a Bush Veto. I would have rather they debated the occupation in Iraq or maybe Global warming or ... anything other than embryonic stem cell research! And I meant it, partly, I suppose because it made me very uncomfortable. The caption under the last picture above was exactly what was swimming uncomfortably in my head.

I not only left the impression that I wasn't all that sure of the right or wrong of embryonic stem cell research, whether funded by the federal Government or not -- which was what the votes and veto were all about, after all; that is, federal funding, not morality -- I indeed wasn't sure of the rightness or wrongness of the issue.

That's right! The reason I left that impression is/was because I wasn't at all that certain of embryonic stem cell research's rightness or wrongness (nonexistent English words, I suppose, but I'll let my brother, Richard from Connecticut, look them up in his Yankee Dictionary). And I sure wasn't sure about the rightness or wrongness of either what Congress was saying in their "yea" votes or what Mr. Bush was saying in his veto (a "Nay" vote, I suppose).

But one thing's for sure -- he lived up to his self-inflicted title, the "decider." There will be no Federal funding for embryonic stem cell research. However, Mr. Bush did state his support for a future bill that would fund adult stem cell research.

And today I think that Mr. Bush's veto was 100% correct.

What? I think hear several of my liberal friends barking obscenities towards me.

But the fact is, I'm not sure any of us know when "life" begins for a human -- or any organism ... nor when God "inserts" a soul into the new human baby/fetus/embryo/zygote/fertilized ovum. I make the assumption here that most of us believe that there is a God and that humans do have souls, etc. -- which for some of you is not the case, I know.

What do we know? Well, medical persons and scientists have determined that the embryo begins to develop stem cells within a single week. Embryonic stem cells are unique among cells in that they are not yet "differentiated" and, unlike adult stem cells, have a marvelous ability to divide -- that is, they haven't decided what kind of cell they'll be when they grow up -- and they divide very readily. But the embryo from which they are taken is either a human or it's not and ... (the catch) ... the embryo must be "killed" in order for its stem cells -- even one -- to be extracted.

"Okay," most of the proponents of embryonic stem cell research say, but the only embryonic stem cells to be used in research could be restricted to those that are in frozen storage, having been extracted for purposes of in vitro fertilization (IVF) and would be discarded (killed!) anyway.

And on and on the arguments go ... getting complicateder (new English word, I know, Richard) and complicateder.

My feelings today are about the same as they are with capital punishment and war ... we have been told by our creator "thou shall not kill!" Thus, I wouldn't vote "yea" for private funding of embryonic stem cell research any more than I'd vote for Government funding -- local, state and/or Federal.

God is the "decider," and Mr. Bush correctly upheld His decision.