Stem cell research

Mr Obama is about to reverse some of Mr Bush's stem cell research funding rules. With this in the works there was a news item featuring an interview with Michael Fox. Mr Fox spoke to his hope that stem cell research could lead to treatments of Parkinson's, a devastating disease that Mr Fox has.

There was a quality to Mr Fox's remarks that struck me. He expresses what might well be reasonably characterized as a religious hope in stem cell treatments. Now, Parkinson's is a terrible disease. It is easy to understand that anyone with the disease will look to any hope for treatment. Moreover, there are some positive indications that stem cell treatments may be beneficial for Parkinson's. But what of this almost religious faith in science and technology?

During my life there have been many technologies that were going to fundamentally change life and society. Things like gene therapy, artificial intelligence, several revolutionary drugs, and others come to mind. Each in their time were widely regarded as the solution to some problem. Each failed!

My point here is that science and technology are more often than not like that. Progress is made most often not by great leaps. Rather progress is often made by failures where each failure eliminates one wrong path. It is only what is left after all the failures, only the things that worked, that provide progress.

Will stem cell research provide a treatment for Parkinson's? I don't know. I'm hopeful. Parkinson's is a devastating disease. My father suffered from it and I painfully remember how it affected all the family. But, for all of that I would caution everyone that science and technology are far more often wrong than right. Science and technology are most often about what is left after all the failures not about magic bullets.

That said, my heart goes out to Mr Fox and all other Parkinson's sufferers. I to hope that stem cell research provides a treatment.