What Makes “Ethical” Stem Cell Research Ethical?

By Elizabeth Calhoun

December 2009

Stem cell research has always been a hotly debated topic, but a University of Wisconsin scientist named James Thomson heated the controversy to a boiling point in 1998 when the scientist and his team isolated human embryonic stem cells through a process that destroyed human embryos. Although Thomson showed the stem cells' potential to rejuvenate and develop into tissues that might aid in healing degenerative diseases, the question had to be asked: when is taking one life for another permissible?

Thus, a scientific issue became an...