Donor Withholds $60M for Research Updated: Fri, Aug 31 5:57 PM EDT

Current quotes (delayed 20 min.) SGI 0.44 -0.03 (6.38%) SAN FRANCISCO (AP) - Netscape founder Jim Clark is withholding $60 million he pledged to build a biomedical research center at Stanford University to protest President Bush's restrictions on stem cell research and congressional attempts to ban human cloning.

"Our country risks being thrown into a dark age of medical research," Clark wrote in an opinion column in The New York Times on Friday.

Clark said he was suspending payment of the balance of $150 million he pledged in 1999 because it would be futile for private funding to supplant federal grants. He also cited recent decisions to limit research to existing stem cell lines.

"It now seems that creating genetically compatible new skin cells for burn victims, pancreas cells for diabetics, nerve cells for those with spinal cord injuries and many, many other potential advances will soon be illegal in the United States," wrote Clark, a billionaire who also founded Silicon Graphics, Healtheon and MyCFO.

"Driven by ignorance, conservative thinking and fear of the unknown, our political leaders have undertaken to make laws that suppress this type of research."

Earlier this month, Bush announced a policy to limit federal funding for medical research on embryonic stem cells. Bush, an abortion opponent, said it was important to "pay attention to the moral concerns of the new frontier."

Stem cells are created by removing an inner cell mass from a 5- to 7-day-old embryo, a procedure that kills the embryo. When properly nurtured, the cells are able to replicate, or divide, virtually forever, creating what is called a stem cell line.

Clark was apparently also objecting to legislation passed by the House of Representatives that would ban human cloning - not just cloning for reproductive ends but also so-called therapeutic cloning. Such cloning would produce stem cells by creating embryos from the cells of a single person, giving scientists an exact tissue match to develop treatments for that person.

Construction of the Stanford facility is already under way and university officials said Friday that Clark's decision would not affect its 2003 completion target.

Stanford President John Hennessy said the university was "saddened" by Clark's decision, though he also expressed concern that restrictions on stem cell research and cloning could slow development in disease treatments.

The center will house projects that include efforts to grow healthy organs from other tissues. Construction of the 225,000-square-foot building, informally known as Bio-X, has been estimated to cost around $200 million.

-- Jimmy James (jimmyj85@hotmail.com), August 31, 2001

Answers

No! Mr. Clark isn't right. I would advise anyone who thinks stem cell research is "alright" to read Aldous Huxley's Brave New World.

-- Paul (skypilot99@aol.com), September 01, 2001.

correction.

Pres Bush is not "restricting" research. He is limiting use of federal tax dollars.

Andrew Carnegie used no tax dollars to build railroads.

Private funds can be used for any research.

-- vlad (strelok60@yahoo.com), September 01, 2001.

vlad--I'm sorry my answer has taken so long to compose. Sometimes I forget my History and have to do a bit of research. Andrew Carnegie didn't need much public money for railroads. He was given the land the railroad runs on between 1873 and 1893. Please see below.

"The end of the 19th Century saw one of the biggest public land giveaways in U.S. history, with the federal government agreeing to allow large railroads rights to use of huge tracts of federal lands for development of transnational railways.

In their remarkably detailed book describing this historical action, "Railroads and Clearcuts", Derrick Jensen, George Draffen, and Dr. John Osborn, relate the following, "In 1864 President Lincoln signed into law the largest of the railroad land grants, the Northern Pacific railroad land grant. This law conditionally granted public lands for the purpose of building and maintaining a railroad from Lake Superior to the Pacific Ocean. The law gave public lands for a railroad right-of way upon which to lay the tracks and 40 million acres (an area slightly smaller than Washington state) to raise capital need to build and maintain the railroad."

If I were given 40 Million acres of land by the goverment I don't think I'd need "tax dollars" to build a railroad.

I think I might just sit down and build myself a summer cottage.

-- Jimmy James (jimmyj85@hotmail.com), September 01, 2001.

Mr. Paul--I read Huxley about 25 years ago...It's insightfull, but I still prefur 2001. Clark is a much better read. Also History seems to support Clark much more than Huxley. I thank you for your insight. In your spare time please try the "Critique of Pure Reason"- -I haven't yet made it through the full toumb yet but it's a very insightfull work. btw... written by Kant. You might also want to read "The Sacred and the Profane"--It was written by one of the Catholic Popes--I'm sorry I can't remeber which one. (John Paul the something)-- but I'm probably wrong-- also a very good book. Sorry for taking up too much of your time. Jimmy.

-- Jimmy James (jimmyj85@hotmail.com), September 01, 2001.