Genetic Screening :: DNA Science Genes Essays

Genetic Screening Five year old Jacob Turner is a healthy boy without many cares in this world. His father takes sole care of him because his mother died suddenly. Genetic testing after death, showed a genetic mutation in Jacob's mothers genes that caused her to have an irregular heart. Unfortunately, Jacob has also inherited this mutation, but fortunately, this disorder can be controlled by medications. Now, Jacob's father has another problem. No insurance company will cover young Jacob because of his known heart irregularity. Situations like Jacob's are now a relatively common with the advent of genetic screening. People can now look into their genetic make up to find out if they carry a deleterious gene or genetic predisposition to a disease. No longer must many people with high risk families worry about whether or not they may contract the same disease as their ancestors. Diseases and disorders such as Huntington chorea, Alzheimer's, Multiple Sclerosis, Muscular Dystrophy, Hemophilia, and some kinds of cancer such as breast, colon, thyroid, ovarian, and skin can now be identified on a particular gene and can likely predict the probability of disease onset. But with this technology comes many physiological and ethical problems. Within this paper, I will define genetic screening, look at the controversial ethical viewpoints, and give a brief overview to this situation. Genetic Screening is a relatively new concept that is just now becoming more widespread. In simple terms, the process uses techniques that enable the technician to identify mutant DNA in the person's genetic make up. If a mutant is found, medical precautions can be taken. If none is found, then it can be assumed that the person does not carry the deleterious gene and has the same risk of contracting the disease as anyone else in the population. The screening requires that a tissue sample be taken from the individual to be tested. Where and what kind of tissue depends on the condition being screened. When screening for a specific cancer, tissue of that organ is most helpful. When screening for a noncancer disease, blood or urine will produce results. Because the tissue sample is small, a process called Polymerase Chain Reaction (PCR) is used. PCR is a technique that enables more than a million copies to be made from a single strand of DNA. This can be done in a precancerous or cancerous cell. The copied DNA can then be hybridized.

The Social Fuction of Sports

This report, presented to the Helsinki European Council on 11 and 12 December 1999, is the result of the mandate given to the Commission by the Vienna European Council on 11 and 12 December 1998. 2. Sport is one of the areas of activity that most concerns and brings together the citizens of the European Union, irrespective of age and social origin. More than half of them regularly practice a sport, either in one of the 700 000 clubs that exist in the Union or outside these clubs. Almost two million teachers, instructors and voluntary workers spend their working or leisure time organising sporting activities. These people play an essential role of education and social integration, at a time when our societies are experiencing major problems of social cohesion and cultural identity. 3. This social function of sport, which is in the general interest, has for some years been affected by the emergence of new phenomena of a different nature which sometimes call into question the ethics of sport and the principles on which it is organised: phenomena such as violence in the stadiums, corruption, the spread of doping, the exploitation of young sportsmen and women, and the search for quick profits to the detriment of a more balanced development of sport. 4. In spite of certain differences between the Member States, there are many common features in the ways in which sport is practised and organised in the Union, and it is therefore possible to talk of a European approach to sport. For several years, the European approach to sport has been affected by several phenomena:  · the rise in the popularity of sport in terms of the numbers of practitioners and spectators;  · the internationalisation of sport, with the increase in the number of international competitions;  · the unprecedented development of the economic dimension of sport, with the spectacular increase in television rights. 5. These phenomena provide certain advantages for sport and society. For example, the number of jobs created directly or indirectly by the sport industry has risen by 60% in the past ten years to reach nearly 2 million. It has to be recognised, however, that these phenomena may also strain, or even contradict, certain basic principles of sport:  · the overloading of sporting calendars may be considered to be one of the causes of the expansion of doping;  · the increase in the number of lucrative sporting events, which may end up promoting the commercial approach, to the detriment of sporting principles and the social function of sport;  · the temptation for certain sporting operators and certain large clubs to leave the federations in order to derive the maximum benefit from the economic potential of sport for themselves alone. This tendency may jeopardise the principle of financial solidarity between professional and amateur sport and the system of promotion and relegation common to most federations;  · the hazardous future facing young people who are being led into top-level competitive sport at an increasingly early age, often with no other vocational training, with the resulting risks for their physical and mental health and their future integration into other employment;  · the search for quick profits (effects of over-commercialisation), linked to the internationalisation of sport, may lead to inequalities for certain smaller or less populous countries whose top-level sportsmen and women choose to go abroad to exercise their talents, thereby weakening the level of sport in these countries. Strengthening the educational and social role of sport 6. The Declaration on sport annexed to the Amsterdam Treaty â€Å"emphasises the social significance of sport, in particular its role in forging identity and bringing people together†. Sporting activities therefore need to have a place in the education system of each Member State. 7. The values that sporting activities represent (equal opportunities, fair play, solidarity, etc.) must also be passed on by sports associations, which make a key contribution to education and training of young people and to democratic life and to the life of society. This is because sport has become one of the most important mass phenomena in our societies. It affects all social classes and age groups and is an essential tool for social integration and education. 8. With this in mind, Community action could focus on the following objectives:  · improving the position of sport and physical education at school through the Community programmes;  · promoting the retraining and future integration into the labour market of sportsmen and women;  · promoting convergence between the training systems for sports workers in each Member State. Better defining the legal environment 9. The development of positive measures to preserve the social function of sport must go hand in hand with the creation of a more certain and more stable legal environment, so that this social and educational function can be reconciled with the increase in the economic dimension of sport. This new approach should be founded on the reaffirmed and updated principles of sporting ethics and the Olympic ideal and should clarify the legal framework for sports operators. The European Union has an essential part to play in implementing this new approach, given the increasing number of conflicts in the world of sport and the divergent responses, notably through court proceedings. 10. The increase in the number of court proceedings is the sign of growing tension: for example, the Bosman judgment, delivered by the Court of Justice in December 1995 on the basis of the principle of freedom of movement for workers, has had major repercussions on the organisation of sport in Europe. It has done much to eliminate certain abuses and to promote the mobility of sportsmen and women. However, it has affected the economic balance between clubs and players and has caused problems for the training of young people in clubs. Certain clubs which had established training centres for professional sportsmen and women have seen their best people leave, without the clubs being able to obtain any compensation for the investment they have made in training. Principles for partnership between the European Institutions, the Member Sates and the sports organisations 11. There is a need for a new partnership between the European institutions and Member States on the one hand, and the sports organisations on the other, in order to encourage the promotion of sport in European society, respect for sporting values and safeguarding of the autonomy of sports organisations and the principle of subsidiarity. 12. This partnership will be based on the following principles:  · the European Union recognises the eminent role played by sport in European society and attaches the greatest importance to the maintenance of its functions of social integration, education and contributing to public health and to the general interest function performed by the federations;  · the integrity and autonomy of sport must be preserved. The purchase of sports clubs by commercial bodies (media groups, etc.) must, if permitted, be governed by clear rules, out of concern for the preservation of sporting structures and ethics;  · the system of promotion and relegation is one of the characteristics of European sport. This system gives small or medium-sized clubs a better chance and rewards sporting merit;  · doping and sport are diametrically opposed. There can be no tolerance in the fight against doping;  · the â€Å"trade† in young sportsmen and women must be combated. Each young sportsman or woman trained by a club for top-level competition must receive vocational training in addition to sports training. The absence of coordination between the sports protagonists (federations, Member States and the European Community), all of them working in isolation, could thwart the efforts to achieve these common principles. In contrast, the convergent efforts of the European Community, the Member States and the sports federations could make an effective contribution to the promotion in Europe of sport in a form that remains true to its social role, while enabling its organisational aspects to take account of the new economic order.

Whitmans Song of Myself Spirituality and Religion

Spirituality is a mixed bag for the great American  poet, Walt Whitman.  While he takes a great deal of material from Christianity, his conception of religion is much more complicated than the beliefs of one or two faiths mixed together. Whitman seems to draw from the many roots of belief to form his own religion, putting himself at the center. Examples From the Text Much of Whitmans  poetry resounds with Biblical allusions and innuendo. In the very first cantos of Song of Myself, he reminds us that we are formed from this soil, this air, which brings us back to the Christian Creation story. In that story, Adam was formed from the dust of the ground, then brought to consciousness by the breath of life. These and similar references run throughout Leaves of Grass, but Whitmans intent seems rather ambiguous. Certainly, he is drawing from Americas religious background to create poetry that will unify the nation. However, his conception of these religious roots seems twisted (not in a negative way) — changed from the original conception of right and wrong, heaven and hell, good and bad. In accepting the prostitute and murderer along with the deformed, trivial, flat, and despised, Whitman is trying to accept all of America (accepting the ultra-religious, along with the godless and un-religious). Religion becomes a poetic device, subject to his artistic hand. Of course, he also seems to stand apart from the grime, putting himself in the position of the  observer. He becomes a creator, almost a god himself, as he speaks America into existence (perhaps we could say that he really sings, or chants, America into existence), validating every element of the American experience. Whitman brings philosophical significance to the most simple objects and actions, reminding America that every sight, sound, taste, and smell can take on a  spiritual importance to the fully aware and healthy individual. In the first cantos, he says, I loafe and invite my soul, creating a dualism between matter and spirit. Throughout the rest of the poem, though, he continues this pattern. He constantly uses the images of body and spirit together, bringing us to a better understanding of his true conception of spirituality. Divine am I inside and out, he says, and I make holy whatever I touch or am touchd from. Whitman seems to be calling to America, urging the people to listen and to believe. If they wont listen or hear, they may be lost in the perpetual Wasteland of the modern experience. He sees himself as Americas savior, the last hope, even a prophet. But he also sees himself as the center, the one-in-one. Hes not leading America toward  T.S. Eliots  religion; instead, he is playing the part of the Pied Piper, leading the masses toward a new conception of America.