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July 20, 2006

Stem Cells

There's something that I do not really understand in the debate over President Bush's veto of a bill to federally fund stem cell research: why should the government, absent any moral concerns, fund stem cell research?

Let me back up to a higher level: why should the government fund any scientific research, other than that needed for its other legitimate purposes (such as defense, survey work, weather monitoring, and so on)? It's not the government's job to decide what scientific avenues should or should not be pursued; it's the government's job to create an environment in which science (and for that matter any other private pursuit not threatening the society at large) can be pursued. Have universities and medical companies folded up shop? Clearly not. So why is the government involved in this? The only reason I can think of is that we seem, as a people, to have lost sight of a very fundamental truth on which America was founded: the government exists not to determine the shape of society, but to create and protect a just and free environment so that the people can, through their invididual exercise of rights including the pursuit of happiness, make society into whatever shape they choose.

Fundamentally, just because something is good (and I do believe that stem cell research has the potential to create good medical therapies) does not mean that the government should do it.

Posted by jeff at July 20, 2006 11:02 AM

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Comments

Nit pick? Umm...

If the problem is that civilians are being killed, isn't the problem of figuring out who the civilians are kind of important? Isn't it in fact pretty critical to determine whether a house that was destroyed was just a house with a family in it, or whether it was a house with a family and a rocket launcher in it? Or a house with a family and a vault of Hizb'allah funds in it?

The terrorists use methods calculated to make it harder for civilized and compassionate enemies (like the US and Israel) to fight them: go back and take a look at that gunman firing from the midst of a group of kids. Would you fire on that group of kids, if there were any way you could avoid it? Most civilized people wouldn't. But imagine if Israel were to do that. Imagine if Israel were to keep civilians out of bomb shelters in the North of Israel, and forbid them from leaving the area. Imagine if Israel, when it sends troops into South Lebanon to find bunkers, were to put a bunch of kids on its tanks so that Hizb'allah wouldn't fire at them. Do you think Hizb'allah would hesitate for a moment before firing at those kids, given that Hizb'allah makes a practice of deliberately targeting Israeli civilians, and of putting their own civilians right on top of Hizb'allah fighters, weapons and military installations? And were Israel to so use those kids, wouldn't Israel be at fault, rather than Hizb'allah, for endangering them?

Yet you seem perfectly ready to excuse Hizb'allah for doing that, and condemn Israel for not letting themselves be attacked with impunity. It seems to me that if you are going to make moral judgements of another person's/group's actions, you should do so with more depth than the back of a cereal box permits.

Posted by: Jeff Medcalf [TypeKey Profile Page] at July 21, 2006 9:12 AM

(Jeff - your comment is on the wrong post :)

Posted by: Nemo [TypeKey Profile Page] at July 21, 2006 11:33 AM