In case you missed the news this week:

1. Scientists Clone Human Embryos To Make Stem Cells

2. This is not the first time human embryos have been cloned, but it is the first time they have survived long enough to either be implanted in a uterus or destroyed for their stem cells (these scientists did the latter).

3. Let the Cloning Obfuscation Begin — Wesley Smith on the misleading info about cloning science in the media. No, scientists did NOT “clone stem cells”. They cloned human embryos, human beings in their earliest stages of development, and harvested them for their stem cells.

4. Cloning Obfuscation 2 — more junk science.

5. Human Cloning Obfuscation 3 — and even more.

6. Three Parent Embryos and the Brave New United States — note that this latest cloning “breakthrough” like the first one, was not done in some underground lab in China, but in the good old USA (Oregon to be exact) where there are no restrictions on this or other once unthinkable kinds of human experimentation currently in practice.

7. Self Regulation Science Doesn’t Work — Wesley Smith again. This is important. It is disturbing how willing we are to leave important ethical decisions up to anybody wearing a white coat. Scientists aren’t necessarily ethicists. And, to quote Pope Benedict:

“If technical progress is not matched by corresponding progress in man’s ethical formation, in man’s inner growth (cf. Eph 3:16; 2 Cor 4:16), then it is not progress at all, but a threat for man and for the world.” (Spe Salvi, 22)

Check out the latest episode of BioTalk for more on what the Catholic Church has to say about biotechnology.

Bonus: Would Human Clones Have Souls? — a few conversations I’ve had with my grandfather and with former MO Governor Matt Blunt about so-called “reproductive” human cloning. Both Wesley Smith and Rebecca Taylor agree that, whether they admit it or not, ultimately this is where researchers want to take this science.

Go see Jen for more QTs!