There's been much triumphalism on the right over news that Dr. James Thomson has managed to nudge adult cells to become pluripotent cells -- stem cells. He does this now without destroying an embryo. Thus, no controversy. Thus, according to many, most recently Charles Krauthammer today, vindicating George W. Bush's decision to forbid the US of federal money for embryo-destroying research.

Just one problem. Had Mr. Bush's prohibition been in place just a few years earlier we'd never have reached this place. Dr. Thomson's initial research, the research that proved that stem cells could be isolated and grown -- leading to the hope that they could be used to form other sorts of tissue -- involved the destruction of embryos. (Blastocysts.)

In other words, had Mr. Bush dealt with the issue just a few years earlier . . . we might be nowhere today.

I never had much of a problem with the destruction of embryos in this way, particularly since the embryos in question were leftovers from in vitro fertilization. I'm happy to avoid controversy now. But the lesson to be drawn is not that ideologues should hold sway over science. The lesson is, rather, that left alone science will do what science does. In this case a superior method of producing pluripotent cells has been discovered. Kudos to Dr. Thomson. The man is a genius. The right-wing triumphalists? Not so much.

update: Michael Kinsley making similar points, and others as well:

Finally, the position a politician takes on an issue tells you something about his or her character, values and intellect. And that understanding doesn't disappear even if the issue itself does. Over the past six years, Bush and most Republicans in Congress have done their best to stop medical research that could cure many diseases, including one that I have. They claimed that morality and ethics required no less, yet they demonstrated by their indifference toward in vitro fertilization that they couldn't possibly be serious about this. Now they hope that science will spring them from the trap they walked into with full knowledge. Bush Administration apologists even say the President deserves credit because he directed research away from embryonic stem cells and encouraged scientists to look for more acceptable alternatives. In fact, the new research would not have been possible without the kind involving embryonic stem cells, which Bush believes is immoral.

This entry was posted by Michael Reynolds, on Friday, November 30, 2007. You can leave your response.