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E-mail: editor@dailyemerald.com
Online: www.dailyemerald.com
Friday, May 28, 2004
Oregon Daily Emerald
COMMENTARY
Editor in Chief:
Brad Schmidt
Managing Editor:
Jan Tobias Montry
Editorial Editor:
Travis Willse
Picture Pilliod
gulping down
stiff lemonade
on Buttercup
Rachel Pilliod, former ASUO president during 2002-2003, sits
on the State Board of Higher Education. She is a senior majoring
in political science and women's and gender studies. Pilliod sat down
with the Emerald for Quick Quacks — a short cjuestion-and-answer
session aimed at giving readers a look at campus and community
members' thoughts.
Emerald: What's the best restaurant in Eugene?
Pilliod: Currently I like the Lucky Noodle.
Emerald: What's harder, being ASUO president or being on
the State Board of! ligher Education and, somewhat hopeless
ly, trying to make higher education affordable?
Pilliod: Being ASUO president.
Emerald: Why?
Pilliod: More hours.
Emerald: If you had a yacht, what
would you name it?
Pilliod: Buttercup.
QUICK
QUACKS
Emerald: Who is to blame for the high price of education?
Pilliod: The voters.
Emerald: Taylor's or Rennie's?
Pilliod: Rennie's, hands down.
Emerald: Drinking a ... ?
Pilliod: Rennie's Lemonade.
Emerald: Where will Rachel Pilliod be in five, ten and 20
years?
Pilliod: Five, medical school. Ten, probably finishing up my
residency. Twenty, probably back in Portland.
Emerald: What's the last Oregon athletic event you attend
ed?
Pilliod: Basketball game. Men's basketball ... Not true! I
went to my friend's Club sports soccer game.
Emerald: What's the most interesting thing Bill Clinton had
to say when you met him ?
Pilliod: I can't really remember, it's all pretty much a blur.
Emerald: Anything stand out at all?
Pilliod: Yeah, out of all the politicians ... he was the only
one to say 'hello' to me and everybody else on stage.
Emerald: Critique the 2003-2004 ASUO Executive. Was it a
success?
Pilliod: I thought you'd ask me this, too. I should've
thought about this more. I think certain elements of it were
successful. 1 think it's also very difficult to run any successful
campaign in a non-Legislative year. It's just harder to quantify
results. But I'm excited about the housing (standards). I'm glad
they did the Venus Festival again.
Emerald: What's the last book you read, and why did you
read it?
Pilliod: Book of poetry my grandmother gave me, because
my grandmother gave it to me.
Emerald: Where can Rachel Pilliod be found on a typical
Friday night?
Pilliod: At work until probably six or seven. Then at the
movies.
LETTER TO THE EDITOR
Olympic policy editorial
exhibits lack of research
Thanks, guys, for another fine piece of journalism ("New
Olympic transgender policy creates inequity issue," ODE, May
20).
The anxieties people have about things they don't really know
anything about are always fascinating. The androgen blockers
that transwomen take before surgery lower their testosterone lev
els below what non-trans women produce naturally.
It's not like you should be expected to know that; it's a pret
ty detailed piece of information about an issue that is widely
misunderstood. But you should be expected to do a modicum
of research before publishing arrogant, long-winded diatribes
about issues with which you are completely unfamiliar.
Austin Shaw-Phillips
junior
planning, public policy, and management
HUMANS
MADE TO ORDER
Back in the politically quieter summer
of 2001, a few (evidently shortsighted)
pundits suggested that President Bush's
decision on stem cell research would be
the most momentous of his tenure. After
all, what could possibly be so controver
sial, what could so preoccupy commen
tators, as how we treat the very seeds of
human life?
That fall, of course, the deaths of about
3,000 people in the Sept. 11 terrorist at
tacks changed what Americans — and
their president — saw as important.
Since then, the political and economic
fallout of the attacks — not to mention
the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq —
have eclipsed most of the media atten
tion once allocated to bioethics issues.
And while terrorism and U.S. foreign
policy obviously merit much attention
and discussion, cutting-edge biological
research — work that often raises thorny
moral questions — has progressed un
abated, albeit under the surface of popu
lar consciousness.
For example, shortly after Sept. 11, the
Center for Human Reproduction an
nounced that it would offer gender selec
tion by in vitro embryo creation and test
ing at its clinics in New York and Illinois.
(About this time, an American Society
for Reproductive Medicine official wrote
a letter endorsing this method for "fami
ly gender balancing.")
For some time, couples have been able
to stack the genotypic odds of having a
child of a preferred sex. For example,
spinning a sperm sample in a centrifuge
often does the trick: Heavier, X chromo
some, girl-spawning sperm is spun to the
outside; while the lighter, Y chromo
some, boy-making sperm sits in the mid
dle. Some companies claim an 80 per
cent success rate with this method, but
it's still far from foolproof.
Travis Willse
Rivailess wit
But picking a gamete from a sperm
sample is innocuous; creating, selecting
and destroying embryos is an altogether
stickier proposition ethically (forgive the
pun). After all, the destruction of em
bryos — cell masses with the potential to
develop into biologically independent
humans — lies at the center of the stem
cell debate. (Ends don't justify means,
but it's worth noting here that gender se
lection is probably of more dubious val
ue than, say, researching potential thera
pies for life-threatening illnesses.)
Suppose experts and society accept
this technique. Issues of gender discrimi
nation aside (such concerns are obvious
ly important, but are outside the scope of
this piece), it's not much of a leap from
picking zygotes by sex chromosomes to
selecting zygotes by genes, or even modi
fying individual genes. (A zygote, a cell
formed by the fusion of a sperm and egg,
undergoes mitosis, successively splitting
to form an embryo.)
Genetically "fixing" a zygote's predis
position for hemophilia, leukodystro
phy, progeria or any other of a myriad of
genetic disorders, should be acceptable
to all but the most restrictive interpreta
tions of how man should be allowed to
tamper with nature (whatever that might
mean). But what about less "essential"
traits, those that don't (or shouldn't)
materially affect quality of life? Should a
parent be able to pick eye color or hair
color? What about handedness? Height?
Skin color?
Still, phrased as such, this discussion
begs the question, "What is essential?"
With corrective lenses, my vision is bet
ter than 20/30, but I still need lenses to
drive, not to mention recognize my
friends at 30 feet. My nearsightedness
thus constitutes an inconvenience, but is
n't life-threatening; ought that be cor
rectable?
And what about brain power? Some
early evidence suggests at least a partial
genetic basis for intelligence. Is it okay to
preemptively 'cure' retardation? What
about mere mental dullness?
In November 2001, Massachusetts
based Advanced Cell Technology, Inc.
announced that it had removed DNA
from human eggs, cloned embryos and
coaxed it to grow into a six-cell mass. The
short of it: If you implanted such a cell,
you could get a cloned human.
Once largely the domain of a distant
science fiction future, many medical and
genetic possibilities are very real and of
fer unimaginable potential, both good
and bad. Nanomolecular cures for can
cer? Cloning? A baby with three biologi
cal parents? Or maybe seven? Prevention
of genetic diseases? Life extension? Re
placement organs grown to order?
Previously hypothetical discussions
about many bioethical dilemmas are be
coming very applicable, and demand the
public attention they haven't received in
recent years.
The future, it seems, is now, and we
ought to start discussing it accordingly.
Contact the editoriaf editor
attraviswillse@dailyemerald.com.
His opinions do not necessarily
represent those of the Emerald.