Uh, if I have a choice I'll choose the stem cells

Here's Dr. Richard Houghten, president and director of the Torrey Pines Institute for Molecular Studies:

"You can already grow a human ear in the intestinal tissue of a mouse. Your heart in a beaker -- that's going to happen. The question is whether it's your heart tissue or whether it can be stem cells. ... There's been some cool work with baby teeth recently...

"That's been a driving force -- mortality, time, the ticking clock —- for my whole career. We're going to die, Steve! And what's going to keep us from maybe not dying? 'Cause you and me, we're not going to heaven, way up there in the clouds." He's laughing again. "What is the one thing that might not make that happen? Science. ...

"In the end what's going to happen is, we are going to live as long as we want to, until we get bored. 'I'm bored,'" Houghten shrugs, pretending to be about 200 years older than he is. "'I'm bored with it all -- I want out.'" He laughs.

What a cheerful guy. We're all going to die! But we don't have to die -- until we're bored to death!

stem cell research, biotech