Wesley J. Smith

In the wake of the Supreme Court ruling in Gonzales v. Oregon, I have a piece in today’s San Francisco Chronicle addressing the context in which assisted suicide would be conducted. Context can be everything, and in a regime of legalized assisted suicide, it would be . . . . Continue Reading »

The old photo posted on the site was about 6 years old, so I have updated it with one taken about 2 months ago. I am so middle aged! How did that . . . . Continue Reading »

This time, in the Lancet. It would seem that the current methods of peer review definitely need . . . . Continue Reading »

My co-author of Power Over Pain wrote me an interesting note about the recent SCOTUS opinion on assisted suicide: “I began to read the Gonzales decision last night. I noticed something very interesting in the first few paragraphs of the majority opinion. It refers to Oregon as being “the . . . . Continue Reading »

I am quoted in this Christian Science Monitor story about the Supreme Court assisted suicide decision. What irritates is that I pointed out this Pew Poll result to the reporter who interviewed me, noting that to support and opposition to assisted suicide was evenly divided 46-45%. (I blogged this . . . . Continue Reading »

This story demonstrates why we should be very wary of removing feeding tubes. An eleven year-old little girl named Denise Monteiro was apparently beaten by her step-father. She was diagnosed as PVS. Doctors said she would never improve. The court ordered her removed from respirator and tube feeding. . . . . Continue Reading »

The woman who was paralyzed for 19 years and had partial movement and feeling restored through umbilical cord blood stem cells has had a terrible setback. The story says it was an infection, but it also appears that she may be the victim of unethical human experimentation. The bottom line: Today she . . . . Continue Reading »

Robert Klein, the primary mover behind Proposition 71, made a big mistake by becoming the head of the California Center for Regenerative Medicine. Now, he is in growing political trouble. The Center is beset with problems, including lawsuits and a distinct tendency toward arrogance and hubris. Now, . . . . Continue Reading »

The media is touting Gonzales v Oregon as some huge victory for assisted suicide. It is a victory for that agenda, I admit, but not a big one. As I noted yesterday, the ruling was quite narrow and all of the puffing and spinning in the world won’t change that. Besides, I don’t see people . . . . Continue Reading »

I have been warning anyone who will listen, that the intellectual foundation is being laid to create a constitutional right to conduct scientific research. A new book, Illegal Beings, is touted by its publisher as advocating something akin to that approach. Specifically, the book argues that there . . . . Continue Reading »