Whisky Tango Foxtrot?!

[kandrathe]

Frankly I think ethics should be removed from the legal system altogether.  Stem cell research has promise, but I seem to remember it getting flak from various sources because it was considered ethically unsound, yet it has the potential to cure various terminal illnesses and permanent disabilities; would it be encouraged, given the potential benefits, if ethics were removed from the equation?
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Well, then you might have some of the nightmare sci-fi plots unfold. If law were not based on our moral traditions and ethics we would be very well justified in a utilitarian state to terminate the elderly, criminals, and otherwise unproductive to harvest their organs for repairing the productive members of society. We might encourage baby farming, or women getting pregnant to donate embyonic tissue to aid rich people to live extended life spans.

Remove stem cell research, and insert something like nuclear weapons reseach and see if you are still willing to give science a blank check in the ethics department. Many new technologies have great potential benefit, and great potential harm if misdirected.

"Technological change is like an axe in the hands of a pathological criminal." -- Albert Einstein