Stephan: The march to Homo Superior continues. That's not what they're saying, of course, but that's where it is going.
The DNA double helix.
Credit: AFP PHOTO
UK scientists have applied for permission to genetically modify human embryos for the first time as part of research into the earliest stage of human development.
Stem cell scientists at the Francis Crick Institute in London have asked the government’s fertility regulator for a license to perform controversial genome editing on human embryos.
Researchers hope the experiments will help scientists to learn more about genes in the first few days of human fertilization.
Chinese researchers became the first researchers in the world to announce they had altered the DNA of human embryos in April.
The news prompted a fresh debate over the ethics of cheap and simple new genetic techniques, dubbed genome editing, which enable scientists to modify human genes.
Scientist Kathy Niakan wants to use embryos donated by couples with a surplus after IVF treatment for the research, which she hopes will shed light on why some women lose their babies.
Embryos cannot be studied for more than […]
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Sunday, September 20th, 2015
Kristen Holmes, CNN White House Producer - CNN
Stephan: This hasn't drawn much attention but it represents a very important data point on the equality trend. Just a very big deal for the military.
WASHINGTON — resident Barack Obama on Friday nominated Eric K. Fanning to be secretary of the Army, which could make him the first openly gay secretary of a U.S. military branch.
The U.S. Senate must confirm Fanning before he can lead the Army.
“Eric brings many years of proven experience and exceptional leadership to this new role,” the President said in a statement. “I am grateful for his commitment to our men and women in uniform, and I am confident he will help lead America’s Soldiers with distinction.”
This historic move is one of many steps the Obama administration has taken to advance the rights of the LGBT community in the armed forces. In 2010, the President signed a law ending the “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy that prohibited gays and lesbians from serving openly in the military, and earlier this year, the President moved to allow those who identify as transgender to openly serve as well.
Fanning has served as acting under secretary of the Army since June, and before that, served as chief of staff to Secretary of Defense Ash Carter. Fanning also served as under secretary of the Air Force and deputy undersecretary of the […]
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Saturday, September 19th, 2015
The Editorial Board, - The New York Times
Stephan: I take it as a sign of the decay of the American political process that the eleven people in the varsity event, and those in the JV warm-up, are of such a low caliber intellectually, morally, ethically, and historically. It ought to alarm people that moral bankrupts, blowhards, liars, and fantasists are being put forward to lead the country.
Credit: The New York Times
Eleven presidential candidates had three prime-time hours on the national stage on Wednesday to tell the American people why they should lead the country.
Nobody forced them to be there. They were there freely, armed with the best arguments they and their policy advisers had come up with, to make their cases as seasoned politicians, business leaders and medical professionals — the Republican Party’s “A-Team,” as one of them, Mike Huckabee, said at the outset.
And that, America, is frightening. Peel back the boasting and insults, the lies and exaggerations common to any presidential campaign. What remains is a collection of assertions so untrue, so bizarre, that they form a vision as surreal as the Ronald Reagan jet looming behind the candidates’ lecterns.
It felt at times as if the speakers were no longer living in a fact-based world where actions have consequences, programs take money and […]
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