Stem cells to retinal cells

October 2, 2004 4:52 PM

"If only you could see what I've seen with your eyes."
posted by homunculus (12 comments total)

I've seen things you people wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. I watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate. All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain. Time to die.

Not meaning to derail the thread at all. I just find those words, and that scene in the movie, for some inexplicable reason so compelling.

And I've worked with (mouse embryonic) stem cells. They're so cool. If you omit the things in the culture medium that keep them undifferentiated they exuberantly form all kinds of cool cell types and (proto) tissues. As the person quoted in the Wired article said, "these things want to form eyeballs". How could you squander this resource, with all its capacity to help people, for religous reasons?
posted by Turtles all the way down at 5:10 PM on October 2, 2004

How could you squander this resource, with all its capacity to help people, for religous reasons?
There's no reason at all, and it's a shame we're already falling behind in research on this stuff. It's just amoral, especially when fertilized eggs are being thrown away all the time.
posted by amberglow at 5:15 PM on October 2, 2004

Sorry--"religious", obviously.
posted by Turtles all the way down at 5:20 PM on October 2, 2004

in your eyes
the light the heat
in your eyes
I am complete
in your eyes
I see the doorway to a thousand churches
in your eyes
the resolution of all the fruitless searches
in your eyes
I see the light and the heat
in your eyes
oh, I want to be that complete
I want to touch the light
the heat I see in your eyesPeter Gabriel, "Your Eyes"
posted by five fresh fish at 5:25 PM on October 2, 2004

Stem-Cell Research Moves Forward
posted by homunculus at 5:31 PM on October 2, 2004

Nope. Sorry, the baby jeebus told me this is wrong. You must stay blind. Have a nice day.
posted by photoslob at 5:48 PM on October 2, 2004

Metafilter: Sorry, the baby jeebus told me this is wrong. You must stay blind. Have a nice day.
posted by amberglow at 5:51 PM on October 2, 2004

This is really the way to go, growing a new retina instead of implanting a silicon one as I said two years ago.
posted by euphorb at 6:59 PM on October 2, 2004

These borrowed eyes
posted by jb at 12:16 AM on October 3, 2004

Dolly Creators Seek Clone License
posted by homunculus at 12:30 AM on October 3, 2004

Dolly, Dolly, Dolly, get your stem cells here...
posted by homunculus at 12:33 AM on October 3, 2004

An obscure amendment attached to an appropriations bill could throw a wrench into John Kerry's plans to reverse President Bush and fund embryonic stem-cell research.
posted by homunculus at 12:42 PM on October 5, 2004