Mad Social Scientist

Saletan writes up a new proposal for harvesting stem cells being considered by the bioethics committee: genetically engineer cells eggs cells to divide without ever forming an embryo. This avoids creating new human life under any definition currently espoused; instead, you can make a big mass of organs with no organizing principle. As I was reading, I first felt horror, then realized that my revulsion had little moral basis (just squeamishness). I suspect anyone who's actually taken gross anatomy or performed an organ transplant would find this mostly unobjectionable in itself. A clever end-run around the whole issue of when life begins.

My prediction is that conservative bioethicists will love it (because it fits with their moral views), but rank-and-file conservatives will deplore it as an abomination (because they are guided less by abstract notions of morality than by gut feelings about what is natural or unnatural). When they say "protect life", they really mean "no tampering in God's domain".

Which brings me to an interesting article on the commonalities of fundamentalism, fascism, and evolution; the argument being that fundamentalisms and fascist movements the world over seem so similar because they result from inherited territorial impulses. Interesting speculation, though I wonder how one would go about testing the hypothesis.