Wesley J. Smith

Michael Fumento’s work on explaining adult stem cells is stellar. Perhaps, that is because, of the many hats he wears, one is that of a science writer. In this article in the American Spectator, Fumento explains how the mistakes in Dr. Catherine Verfaillie’s paper that first identified . . . . Continue Reading »

Marilyn Golden is a disability rights activists who I have worked with over the years in opposing assisted suicide. She is smart, effective, and understands the stakes in this debate for her community and indeed, for each of us.In this column, she writes cogently about why we should reject assisted . . . . Continue Reading »

The notorious Silver Springs Monkey Case launched PETA to prominence and almost destroyed the career of Dr. Edward Taub, one of our most brilliant medical researchers. In this Brave New Bioethics podcast I tell the story of this profound near-injustice, which serves as an example of the ultimately . . . . Continue Reading »

This is a wonderful story: An infant apparently died and didn’t breathe for 30 minutes, but then spontaneously came back to life. After surgery, he is none the worse for wear. The moral of the story? It’s Not Over Until It’s Over: Unless It Isn’t Really . . . . Continue Reading »

Mark Pickup’s blog, Humanlife Matters has had some technical difficulties. For those interested, he is now blogging . . . . Continue Reading »

The media and many scientists treat the ESCR/human cloning debates as if they were scientific in nature, rather than about ethics and philosophy—which cannot be determined by the scientific method. Now, a scientist writing in Nature, of all places, makes the same point. (I take no position on . . . . Continue Reading »

The Dutch apparently have a real problem with suicidal desires. According to this story, there are nearly 100,000 suicide attempts each year, with about 1,600 resulting deaths. From the story: “The official figures from Statistics Netherlands (CBS) indicate that 1,600 people actually commit . . . . Continue Reading »

This is a disturbing story in the Los Angeles Times: A doctor is under investigation for overdosing an organ donor with pain medication to hasten his death in order to procure organs. If so, it is a terrible breach of organ donation ethics and a profound act of wrongdoing.We should not prejudge the . . . . Continue Reading »

I reported earlier on the mainstream media’s jumping to over blow a story of process mistakes made by Dr. Catherine Verfaillie, with regard to the potential that she derived pluripotent adult stem cells from bone marrow. My point was further verified today when the San Francisco Chronicle . . . . Continue Reading »

"Choice" my foot: If the new bill to legalize assisted suicide in California (A.B. 374) becomes law, Catholic nursing homes will be legally required to permit assisted suicide to be committed within their premises, even though doing so would be a profound violation of Catholic moral . . . . Continue Reading »