Cosmos-Liturgy-Sex

There has been a bit of interest on this so I thought I might try to summarize the two positions here in a little more detail. In a subsequent post I will show how some proponents might respond to the criticisms of the opponents. The original statement signed by 35 pro-life leaders in various fields, outlined a proposal for using a form of Altered Nuclear Transfer (ANT), in other words Oocyte Assisted Reprogramming (OAR), which they believe would allow the production of pluripotent (i.e. cells which act like embryonic stem cells but do not have the capacity to organize into a fetus) stem cells without creating and destroying embryos. I should emphasize that their proposal is for initial research using only non-human animal cells. Research with human cells would only be allowed to proceed if it can be established beyond a reasonable doubt that no embryo is formed. The proponents initial analysis seemed to indicate that this was a distinct possibility.

OAR is based upon the position that the nature of a cell is defined by its epigenetic state (i.e. the process by which an embryo develops through successive stages), in other words, which subset of the approximately 30,000 human genes are turned on or off and if turned on, at what level. The protein called “nanog” is present in pluripotent embryonic stem cells but is not present in the oocyte (ovum) or zygote (single cell embryo) but it is present in the inner cell mass (ICM) of the blastocyst (approximately a week old embryo). Thus, this OAR proposal is supposed to evaluate whether it is possible to reprogram a somatic nucleus inserted into an enucleated oocyte (i.e. the nucleus is removed), to immediately produce pluripotent stem cells by turning on the relevant gene in chromosome 7, and thereby bypassing the formation of an embryo.

There have been several criticisms leveled against this proposal. The first was published by Communio editor, David Schindler. A second critique was proffered by neurologists William Burke, M.D. and Patrick Pullicino, M.D. together with ethicist Fr. Edward Richard published in the web-based magazine Women for Faith and Family, on August 15, 2005 and entitled “Is Oocyte Assisted Reprogramming (OAR) a Moral Procedure to Retrieve Embryonic Stem Cells?” A third is by Catholic journalist Vivian W. Dudro, published in the on-line magazine Ignatius Insight. Dudro’s article is essentially a popularization of the first two critiques. There is some overlap among these articles, especially the third with the first two. Here I have space only to briefly summarize some of the most salient criticisms.

The first four come from Schindler (however, the first argument is also put forth by the other two articles as well). The first argument is the assertion that the proponents are being, mechanistic in presuming that the epigenetic state defines the being, or ontology, of a cell, as I mentioned in my previous post. The contention is that the status of the entity created by the insertion of the reprogrammed somatic nucleus into the oocyte may very well be a deformed embryo rather than simply a pluripotent stem cell. In other words, the ontological status of this entity, which comes about by a process which mimics conception, cannot be determined by the empirical evidence which would result from any experimentation. This procedure would then be no different from other ANT proposals which simply limit the ability of the embryo to develop. A second argument prescinds from the first but focuses on the fact that OAR presupposes that we can exhaust the knowledge of the beginnings of human life through scientific inquiry and thus by using this knowledge OAR supposes that it can control life’s origins. However, the mystery of the human person cannot be exhausted in this manner. We do not and cannot exhaustively know or control the beginning of human life, thus OAR is fundamentally unjustifiable. The third issue is formulated primarily in a question that should be answered. One big difference between adult stem cells and embryonic stem cells for stem cell research is that the former have reached their finality naturally while the latter is an attempt to artificially force the cells into a particular finality in vitro. The question is does the complete failure of progress in workable treatments with embryonic stem cells suggest a fundamental but unobservable difference between them that is perhaps unreachable through empirical means. Schindler stresses that this is not an appeal to ignorance but rather an admonition to caution. Finally, he asks whether the apparent tacit capitulation to the use of the oocyte as a tool for production and harvesting of parts is consistent with the Church’s theology of the body because the oocyte is bound so intimately to the body and its reproductive organs. Given these issues which have not seemingly been addressed, Schindler asks if the proponents have not been too hasty in publicly advocating this proposal by appearing to short-circuit the discussion.

The second article, in addition to its agreement with Schindler’s first issue, adds four mostly technical (biological) issues associated with OAR. The first suggests that OAR underestimates the reprogramming power of the oocyte and thereby finds that it is doubtful that simply controlling the nanog transcription factor will prevent it from reprogramming the donor cell to totipotency (i.e having the capacity to organize into an embryo). The second, which is a biological analog to Schindler’s first issue, is that that OAR assumes that the presence of nanog indicates the overcoming of totipotency. This critique claims that what nanog does is to prevent the zygote from differentiating past a certain stage of development so that OAR does no more than produce a crippled embryo incapable of developing into a healthy infant. The third criticism is that the term pluripotent is ambiguously applied and not universally employed by scientists. In fact, they say that distinguishing pluripotency from totipotency is making a distinction without an essential difference making it an unworkable criteria for determining if the entity formed by OAR is a zygote or not. Finally, they present the issue of statistical uncertainty and the current limits in determining the presence or absence of the protein, nanog. Current detection limits together with the limited statistical uncertainty of ascertaining the non-presence of nanog does not approach the moral certainty required for OAR, assuming that the other issues can even be resolved. Again, the final article simply popularizes these issues and so we will not review it here.

So goes the main criticisms of which I am aware. In my next post, I will suggest the way that some of the proponents would respond to these criticisms.