Stem cells . . . again

College is a chance to expand one's horizon and really open one's eyes to things that were once clouded by naivety, small town obliviousness, and the constant eyes over shoulder of the parents. Once these influences and possible barriers are removed, a college student is essentially, free to do whatever it is they please whether it be participating in a round of beer pong, studying religion, or being friends with all different ethnicities.

Fortunately at Michigan, they allow us, rather, encourage us, to do all of those things and more. There are over 1,000 clubs here to join that range from feeding local Ann Arbor squirrels to volunteering time to outreach to prison inmates.

Not only are there plenty of clubs to join, there are an unhealthy number of classes ranging in subjects and opinions. There's religion classes dedicated to the life of Christ and religion classes dedicated to the like of the Dalai Lama. There are math classes and there are math classes that relate strictly to science. There are English classes devoted to death and English classes devoted to technology in the 18th century. Look at the University of Michigan, and you will find, my friend, exactly what you were looking for. Or you may stumble up on something that you didn't know you were looking for.

In taking these classes of course, one must begin with the extremely boring and general intro level classes. These classes consist of an overload of information that is hardly necessary for the targeted specifics of the upper level classes. Yet every underclassmen is subjected unwillingly to these "wonderful" classes that help to narrow our choices and decisions and "weed out" those who aren't willing to put in the time. The other problem with intro classes is they teach you about the things you don't care to learn about. I admit there are things that I am curious about but there are things that I want nothing to do with, regardless of further knowledge of the subject would aid me in a heated argument.

For example, stem cells. This subject was brought up once in high school during a research paper class and I, along with the majority of the class, picked apart the presenter as he tried to support his thesis that stem cell research is actually not harmful or degrading to the human species and technological developments throughout all of these years.

False. At first, I was an uneducated, liberal arts student who thought stem cell was not that bad. Honestly, I do believe I voted to okay stem cell research and now I completely regret this. I mean, I highly doubt that my one vote was the swing vote in the actual poll/election (I am so uneducated about politics) but whatever.

Now I have learned of my passion for this subject. Taking something that had a given purpose before anyone else knew and forcing it into what WE want it to become is just a game of playing God, which should not be a game. It shouldn’t occur at all.

As we discussed in Biology yesterday, stem cell research is progressing at a rate that I don’t find particularly comforting. People in Japan are cloning their pets, scientists in the US are furthering their research in ways never thought plausible.

Perhaps I am still uneducated.