Posted by Jonathan Adler:
Stem Cells and Science (Policy) Fiction:
http://volokh.com/archives/archive_2009_03_08-2009_03_14.shtml#1237036745
I've had a busy travel and writing week, so I did not have time to
comment on President Obama's stem cell policy announcement and
accompanying statement on the "restoration" of "scientific integrity
to government decision-making." Fortunately, Charles Krauthammer wrote
an [1]excellent column on the announcement (even if he overdid his
praise of President Bush). Here's a bit of it:
Obama's address was morally unserious in the extreme. It was
populated, as his didactic discourses always are, with a forest of
straw men. Such as his admonition that we must resist the "false
choice between sound science and moral values." Yet, exactly 2
minutes and 12 seconds later he went on to declare that he would
never open the door to the "use of cloning for human reproduction."
Does he not think that a cloned human would be of extraordinary
scientific interest? And yet he banned it.
Is he so obtuse as not to see that he had just made a choice of
ethics over science? . . . Obama did not even pretend to make the
case why some practices are morally permissible and others not. . .
.
Science has everything to say about what is possible. Science has
nothing to say about what is permissible. Obama's pretense that he
will "restore science to its rightful place" and make science, not
ideology, dispositive in moral debates is yet more rhetorical
sleight of hand -- this time to abdicate decision-making and color
his own ideological preferences as authentically "scientific."
Whether or not one agrees with the specifics of the President's new
stem cell policy -- Krauthammer, who found the Bush policy too
restrictive, thinks the Obama policy too permissive with the use of
federal funds -- there is no defense of the accompanying science
charade.
References
1.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/03/12/AR2009031202764.html
_______________________________________________
Volokh mailing list
[email protected]
http://lists.powerblogs.com/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/volokh
