h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

What is your thought on Embryo testing????

I'd love to get into it but right now I've got an exam in a short number of hours.

That might depend on a couple of factors.

It's not one with an easy answer. It's one thing to use stem cells from the actual person but something else to "create" a whole new person just to use bits of them. Though I don't know enough about it all to really understand it.

With this hybrid stuff, I think people have the idea that it'll create minotaurs etc, but it can't really mean that.

Think if we were filled in on it all more it would help us to understand and make an opinion. Like the media keeps talking about "human-animal hybrids".......scares people I think coz we're not told what that means.

"Think if we were filled in on it all more it would help us to understand and make an opinion. Like the media keeps talking about "human-animal hybrids".......scares people I think coz we're not told what that means.



A night class in GCSE or A level biology would cost a few hundred quid, a decent text book would cost about £20 or even just a few pennies if you scoured a charity bookshop or car boot sale.

If you dont have the time or money for any of those have you thought of trying the internet. I hear its very good! There are even sights like H2G2 where people can post questions and get answers from people who know stuff and within that site there is even an area called SEx (Science Explained).

If you dont know these things then it is really no one's but your own fault that you havent found them out yet. There already is massive public education programme of FREE AND COMPULSORY schooling till the age of 16 if there were other ones people like SWL would be tearing their hair out especially if the pampphlets were translated into the many languages spoken here in the UK.

The media can only boggle the minds of the masses because they A) read the sort of crap that most of the media pump out and B) dont make the tiny amount of effort needed to even find the real informatino let alone attempt to understand it.

I'd agree with that blicky!
Far too many people want to be spoonfed info... and then complain when they only told what the media/government/vested interests want them to know about... If you're concerned about something or want to know more there really is no excuse in this day and age for not finding out (you just have to be careful that you know your souces - esp on t'internet - and are aware of any hidden agendas or bias)

Yeah. but at the same time, the media should be careful about how it presents things. I've heard newspapers like the Sun and Daily Mail being descrbed as the "ones that tell the truth".

For smart people like ourselves, we know that the media can exaggereate etc, butn there are so many people who have no desire to check stuff out, and are happy to believe every word printed in their chosen paper.

So it's vital that things are told accruately and without the drama and hype that are given.

Now would that be growing and harvesting embryos specifically for use in therepeutic stem cell treatments or use of embryos that were otherwise going to be discarded anyway?

Those are two different ... (for want of a better word) things, yes?

Good point. It all has to be carefully defined where the genetic material comes from. I've heard of so many ways of obtaining it that I've got muddled.

I'm a little dusty/rusty at this because it was some years ago when I had to study it but I think the three basic types people talk about are there's the embryonic stem cells (ES), embryonic germ cells (EG), and adult stem cells (AS).
My memory isn't great right now but if it serves me correctly enough the ES were obtained at the 8 cell stage? and the EG were obtained from fetus's?

They can obtain AS cells from other kinds of tissue samples like from harvested fat but the adult stem cells were the most differentiated of the three kinds of undifferentiated stem cells and therefore gave rise to less different kinds of more specialized cells? They still can give rise to different ones for different tissues just I think the deal was that the kinds that were obtained at earlier points in development were able to give rise to more cell types because they were less differentiated already? Something to that effect.


What noone was too specific on was what happens to the 7 cells that are left when you take one away from the... is it at the blastocyst stage? Now I can't remember.

All sounds a bit technical when you delve deep. for info though.

You're welcome.
I havden't studied too much into the current bioethics about it yet though but that was the basic idea behind classifying those three types from what I can remember...

There was an interesting show on the beeb last night about the possibilities of human genetic engineering in the near future and how we'd be able to grow various body parts and 'design' (although I don't really like that word) children.

Anyone catch it?

Never knew it was on. Was it any good?

Yeah, I thought it was. It was hosted by a Japanese scientist (I think physicist) and 'futurist'. He went through what we are now able to do with genetic engineering and what he thinks we will be able to do in the future, what the implications are, whether or not we should be selecting for various genes and the like. I thought it was very interesting, esp the bit where he was having himself screened for Alzheimers because both his parents have had it and he discussed the benefits of knowing this kind of information and how it could be used against you (with life insurance/job applications, etc).

Those are some pretty good bioethics staples from what I can remember. [I] really ought to specifically study the subject in earnest though... oops.

Just a bio guy. Don't mind me.

Yeah, It's a wee while ago since I watched so I can't remember all the specifics he and the various sciency talking-heads went into but I do remember being fascinated enough to stay up way past my bedtime which generally doesn't happen (usually it's 'woe betide the sap that gets between me and my sleep!' ). Mostly though it was pretty amazing to see haow far we've got already. Makes a bit of a mockery of a lot of the hand-wringing I hear about 'Franken-child' science cos the actual science is way beyond what most hand-wringers think we should ban
Having a fairly close and direct line of possible inheritance of lovely diseases like Parkinsons and Alzheimers I'm always fascinated by the possibilities which (fingers crossed) mean I might be worrying about nothing.... although I have almost convinced myself that I'll take after my dad's side of the family - nice, swift heart-attack; job done!

Though if you could find out if you were likely to develop Parkinsons or Alziermers would you want to know?? I'm not sure. Can see that it's help you prepare, but you could get so depressed by it too.

Oh I'd do it... and if I got a positive result I'd procure a little cyanide pill for when the time came. The I could relax knowing I'd never see the worst of it!
It's the possibility of others finding out that would concern me more.

Do you mean personal friends and family or insurers and employers PP.


"Though if you could find out if you were likely to develop Parkinsons or Alziermers would you want to know?? I'm not sure. Can see that it's help you prepare, but you could get so depressed by it too.

Well just the chance that they will get such illnesses can and does depress some people. It would depress me even more if I thought someone had the power to stop it but did nothing to prevent such suffering, but then again if you do believe in the bigG then I suppose you also believe in the final pay-off of heaven. Still a lifetime of suffering is a hefty price anyway you loo at it.


I have lived a fairly charmed life health wise other people around me (depression, cancer, mobility and sensory problems) havent been so lucky. The issue at the heart of this is do we try to cure something for humanity that hasnt hampered us much anyway?

Why not just let people die painful and slow deaths in the grips of their conditions because they are going to die anyway.

Is their quality of life and the resources we expend caring for them worth or not worth more than the lifeforms created by embryo research?

one love

Insurer and employers... I would have friends and family informed of what should happen (or at least I like to think I have the guts to let them know)

>Why not just let people die painful and slow deaths in the grips of their conditions because they are going to die anyway.<

While I'm not pro-euthanasia per se I *do* think we should keep upping medication to ensure maximum comfort - if that means someone in massive pain with terminal cancer gets a fatal dose of morphine in an attempt to ease their pain so be it, better that than lingering in pain with zero quality of life for several more months/years. The only issue for me is how to regulate it so that it only happens when it gets to that point and not before.