Posted on 12/03/2005 6:18:54 AM PST by Right Wing Professor
Yes, suitable hearts at that age are extremely hard to get. Plus you don't know that they didn't search for a heart.
The surgeon had dedicated much of his career to finding a solution for a tragic birth defect. Hypoplastic left-heart syndrome (HLHS), a lethal underdevelopment of the left side of the heart, causes otherwise perfectly formed babies to die shortly after birth. HLHS occurs once in 12,000 live births in the United States. In such babies, the left side of the heart is usually unable to pump sufficiently to sustain life for more than a few days.
To appreciate the problem Bailey faced, one cannot ignore the historical context under which this surgery took place. It has been estimated that approximately 10,000 newborns died from hypoplastic left-heart syndrome in America alone between the first and only newborn-heart transplant (performed in 1967) and Baby Fae's surgery (in 1984). The 1967 operation was performed in New York by Dr. Adrian Kantrowitz, using the heart of an anencephalic (brain-absent) donor, a type of baby that today legally is not considered acceptable as a donor because it usually does not meet brain-death criteria. That patient died within hours of the operation. At the time of Baby Fae's surgery, heart transplantation for a newborn had not been attempted in the United States for almost 17 years.
So, to you, now the doctor's unbelief in evolution is not the failing, but that he didn't care enough for the child and wanted to attempt some stunt for fame?
Yes, it's conjecture. Just speculating from what is presently known from human nature.
So then you have no problem with teaching astrology in science classes, or pretending that Marilyn Monroe surpasses George Washington in historical importance, or claiming that our founding fathers were all racists, etc.
Since academe is imperfect, anything goes.
We come here to be ignored!
or is it...We come here to ignore everybody else? And you'd better notice that we're ignoring you, but don't tell us, because then you wouldn't be ignoring us.
perhaps ...We come here to demand that we be ignored! Or else.
er...Don't expect us to let you know who the Ignored Ones are, or who the Ignoring Ones are, because that'd be cheating, and we'll tell...er...we'll tell someone who doesn't happen to be ignoring us at that particular moment. Something like that.
I dunno. You explain it--or ignore it. It'd really help if ya'll got together and wrote The Ignoring Maniefesto, so that we could ignore it and make you happy. Or the Manifesto of the Ignored. Les Invisibles.
Never, since whatzisname's Cat, have so many worked so hard to convince other people to ignore them.
LOL--ya'll really ought to stop being so amusing. It's making it hard to ignore you.
I read the puff piece you're quoting from.
Both the puff piece and the attack article have limitations, but at least mine had some solid refs which I'm checking back on.
There is a limited amount of objective data available: genetically (documentable even if you don't believe in evolution) chimps are closer to humans than baboons, he used a baboon.
The puff piece provides no explanation for this. It does not document an unsuccessful search for a human heart either.
Doctor Bailey may be a fine surgeon and a good person, but he goofed up badly on Baby Fae. My guess is that he learned from experience. Nevertheless, the Baby Fae procedure was not justified according to any information currently available.
OK. Let's start collecting virtual names. Do we need to virtually advertise? Maybe convince Junior to add it to his info sheet?
I'sa so confusa
Virtual pingsa or namesa?
Who found Jar Jar as noxious as I did?
Who can do the dialect better?
(RA included because he posted earlier)
I'm outta here for the night...I've got galls to id by tomorrow. There's a joke in there somewhere but I can't find it.
Everyone! Outta here too.
So? Your attack piece is as worthless as the puff piece you imagine the Loma Linda article to be.
First, though chimps are genetically closer to humans than pigs are, we use pig valves in heart operations, not chimp valves. Though chimps are genetically closer to humans than pigs are, we used pig and cow insulin rather than chimp insulin.
Second, as I mentioned previously, the decision was not just up to Dr. Bailey, it was a group decision. Finally, Put up. You assert that current information has determined that the Baby Fae procedure was not justified. Well, besides being Monday morning quarterbacking, you have not provided such information other than that some people didn't like it. And you have slipped far afield from the accusation that somehow the procedure was destined to failure because the Dr. did not believe in evolution. It failed because the child was very sick. The operation was performed 12 days after her birth. She lasted 20 or 21 days after the operation. That was longer that the first human to human heart transplant.And yes, the team learned from the experience. We all do.
Yeah I think Akyol works both sides of the fence.
As for the scientists working in their labs, some of them need to get out of their labs once in a while and shmooze a bit. What they do IGNORE may bite them in the rear.
Now sir, what of my other points, mainly the dilution of proper western education by the liberals in our public schools; I think that has had a far more damaging effect than religious folk ever will have had. Come on admit it, what has damaged public education more in the past 50 years?
Well stated. I wish more people would grasp this point.
hear, hear! The proponents of evolution should indeed step back to see who the real enem-
ies to science are!
Let's try this again.
Dr. Bailey used a baboon heart.
Baboons are evolutionarily more distant from humans than chimps.
He has been quoted as saying that he did not believe in evolution (btw, I have another source since I couldn't dig up my natural history magazine to quote.
http://zoology.okstate.edu/zoo_fclt/lovern/antolin_herbers2001.pdf
International Journal of Organic Evolution, Vol 55 No.12 (2001) Perspective: Evolution's Struggle For Existence In America's Public Schools
Michael Antolin and Joan Herbers
"...Ethical and procedural questions aside, a troubling aspect of the story is that Leonard Bailey, the lead surgeon for Baby Fae's operation, when interviewed by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (1985),
Bailey described how he chose baboons as donors because their hearts were the right size and were available. Furthermore he said, ˜The scientists that are keen on the evolutionary concept that we actually developed serially from subhuman primates to humans, with mitochondrial DNA dating and that sort of thing, the differences have to do with millions of years. That boggles my mind somehow. I don't understand it well, and I'm not sure that it means a great deal in terms of tissue homology." *
The original broadcast was June 3, 1985, during the program Health Report hosted by Dr. Norman Swan.
I only see one side for Akyol, can you elaborate?
I agree it would be helpful if scientists had more political and social presonalities, but then they might not go into science.
As for public education, I am not really qualified to comment. I went to extraordinarily high quality public schools in the 40's and 50's (yes, I'm that old) where I was taught that one could not subtract a larger number from a smaller one, but otherwise got a broad and deep education.
My sons had some specific "dumbing down" issues in high school but I don't know if it was the school or all schools. My grandkids in public school are getting a more enriched education than the private school one, but, again, it may be a local situtation; the public school neighborhood is around a Prestige U. and has highly involved parents.
Yes, so what? Pigs are evolutionarily more distant from us but we use their tissues.
Here is a quote from your latest link.
In particular, consider organ transplants. Because the number of patients requiring organ transplants generally exceeds the supply of human organs, xenotransplantation (cross-species donation) is an active area of research (Auchincloss and Sachs 1998). One of the best-known cases is Baby Fae, an infant born with an underdeveloped heart who was given the heart of a baboon at Loma Linda University Medical Center (Loma Linda, CA), in 1984 (Bailey et al. 1985). The baboon donor was one of five that had been tested for immunological similarity based on three HLA genes. Three baboons showed relatively low responses to the infant’s lymphocytes, and the baboon with the lowest immunological response was chosen as donor. Baby Fae survived for 20 days after surgery with the help of the immunosuppressive drug cyclosporine, but eventually died from rejection of the transplanted heart and other organ failure. The main cause of failure was a mismatch of ABO antigens between the baboon (blood type A) and the infant (type O). Ethical and procedural questions aside, a troubling aspect
This paper is wrong. The heart was not rejected. Baby Fae died due to organ failure caused by the ABO mismatch as noted in your citation. ABO mismatch occurs even between humans, and it was considered in the decision. You will note that they thought the cross-species aspect was more alarming than the ABO problem. It was the ABO problem that was the main cause for failure.
One concern was the difference in blood groups of the potential donors and the recipient: common baboons are virtually all AB, A, or B types. The recipient was type O. Crossing the ABO barrier has historically been shunned. However, scattered reports of human kidney- and heart-transplant survival, despite ABO mismatching, were of some encouragement. The transplant team also felt that crossing the ABO barrier might be less significant than crossing the species barrier and that the baby's immune system might fail to recognize it as being as significant as the species barrier.
That was from my previous link.
I notice you did not address the quote.
There was a chance for a better match, unless you are arguing that chimps were somehow unavailable.
That chance was not taken because the doctor didn't understand evolutionary relationships.
I did.....Yes, so what? Pigs are evolutionarily more distant from us but we use their tissues.. Care to back that up?
I was reading soem of Akyol's other writings and while he calls for peace and speaks of abhorring jihadist violence, I never get the clear sense that he names names and clearly denounces specific violence done in Allah's name. He sounds like the ANSWER and CAIR crowd..."Oh we hate violence but it's all America and GW's fault and the jews too!"
The Wahabists don't seem to have caught on that many folk do see thru their disengenuousness of speech when we compare it to their actions.
Good solid propagandist... he sounds calm and reasonable so we should just meet him halfway.. not!
During WWII it was the "German-American Friendship Bund" after all we shared a common culture and what did Jews have to do with it, we really ought to support Germany or at least stay out of the war. They were effective for a while.
And Akyol's suckered in a bunch of willing listeners in Kansas.
I have never had any problem with people of faith accepting a literal creation. The keyword being faith. It's the pseudoscience science education underminers that trouble me. Look to the background and something unsavory generally pops up: moonies with foreign ties, Islamists.
A demurrer here. Many who post here are honest and sincere in their beliefs and I'm absolutely not saying they are in bed with these guys or even advancing their cause. I believe in freedom of expression and religion, especially for folk who disagree with me ... forces me to examine my own positions more carefully.
But at least some probably are agents or the bad guys are missing an easy bet.
I keep wondering who persuaded the Kansans to call in Akyol.
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