"Foreign" Fetal Tissue

the Sibbie

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Half a century ago, when the amazing mechanism of the human immune system was first being uncovered, Nobel prize-winning biologist Sir Peter Medawar made a significant comment. He declared that the survival of the genetically different child within a mother’s womb contradicted the immunological laws that were thwarting their attempts at tissue transplantation. The immune system normally detects the presence of any “foreign” tissue in the body and it immediately sets up a defence against it (primarily what is now called the “killer T cell” mechanism).

This caused early experiments in organ transplantation to fail—the recipient’s immune system attacked and rejected the donor’s “foreign” organ tissue. So why doesn’t the mother’s womb detect the presence of the “foreign” tissue of the developing embryo and try to attack and reject it?

We now know that it does! And this is the cause of many miscarriages. Recent research has shown that the developing child puts up a very specific defence against the killer T cell attack. And as long as the defence mechanism works properly, the pregnancy will proceed to full term. However, when the defence mechanism fails, miscarriage results.
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How amazing are the functions and mechanisms of the human body?!
 

Stratnerd

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How amazing are the functions and mechanisms of the human body?!

Pretty amazing but not when it doesn't work:

"However, when the defence mechanism fails, miscarriage results."

Then it sucks :( ; but these are traits of animals not just humans.
 
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Itzpapalotl

New member
In the apes (naturally including humans) one of the ways the placenta evades the immune system is by using a co-opted viral called syncytin. Unfortunately this protein is occasionally recognised as foreign (because of it's viral origin) and an immune response is launched which may be the cause of multiple sclerosis.

Also if you want to reduce the chance of immune rejection oral sex may be the anwer:

"Correlation between oral sex and a low incidence of preeclampsia: a role for soluble HLA in seminal fluid? Journal of Reproductive Immunology 46 (2000) 155–166"
 

Stratnerd

New member
because similar designs can be done by different people and different designs can be done by the same designer so the design of two object could have been done by one or two designers or, in the case of replicating systems with genetic info, common descent.

so design doesn't indicate anything unless you know some rules about designing and God that I don't know.
 

Clete

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Originally posted by Stratnerd

because similar designs can be done by different people and different designs can be done by the same designer so the design of two object could have been done by one or two designers or, in the case of replicating systems with genetic info, common descent.

so design doesn't indicate anything unless you know some rules about designing and God that I don't know.

I didn't say anything about God, you inferred that intuitively. :think:
The point is that whether it was via evolution or via God, one way or the other systems of such incredible complexity and similarity must have a common designer.
And yes design does indicate at least the presence of one sort of designer or another. If that design is intelligent then that design, by necessity, indicates an intelligent designer because the creation cannot be greater than its creator, an effect cannot be greater than its cause.
Assuming for the sake of argument that there is no God and keeping the first law of thermodynamics in view, how would you account for intelligence, or can you at all?
You know what? My granting you the first law of thermodynamics is too generous! If God doesn't exist, and I mean by God, the God of the Bible, how would you account for the existence of science itself?

Resting in Him,
Clete
 

Lovejoy

Active member
Originally posted by Itzpapalotl

In the apes (naturally including humans) one of the ways the placenta evades the immune system is by using a co-opted viral called syncytin. Unfortunately this protein is occasionally recognised as foreign (because of it's viral origin) and an immune response is launched which may be the cause of multiple sclerosis.

Also if you want to reduce the chance of immune rejection oral sex may be the anwer:

"Correlation between oral sex and a low incidence of preeclampsia: a role for soluble HLA in seminal fluid? Journal of Reproductive Immunology 46 (2000) 155–166"

Syncytin is a glucoprotein coded for by HERV-3 (which is viral in orgin, as the name implies). All it does all for the fusion of cytotrophoblast (as a cell-to-cell mediator) cells so that they differentiate into the multinuclear syncytiotrophoblast. The syncytiotrophblast itself is what eventually allows for the immuno-resistant trophoblastic epithelium of the placenta. How it gains its immune privileges is a bit of a mystery, but it involves beta interferon, steroids, and the odd lack of certain of the major histocompatability genes in the trophoblast layer. That means that the neutral immune state swings both ways. There may be a separate HERV that helps with immunosuppresion, but I don't think that anyone as named HERV-3 as the suspect, and if they have, it is still very hypothetical. Even the role of syncytin in MS is very, very tentative.
 

Lovejoy

Active member
Re: "Foreign" Fetal Tissue

Originally posted by the Sibbie

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How amazing are the functions and mechanisms of the human body?!

Quite interesting! Evidence of this behavior has been around for awhile. The placenta puts out quite an array of defences (up to and including a completely separate circulatory system, the use of interferon, and quite a few antiinflammatory type chemicals). Many of the defences are only now coming to light, and quite of few of them will eventually be used to fight cancer, as the mechanisms are similar. Of course, that will be abortion advocates next argument. A fetus is just like a cancer.

I hate to say it, as this sort of science is wonderful, but it will never change anyones mind about issues like abortion. We all know what it takes to really change a persons mind...





JESUS!
 

Mr Jack

New member
Common design indicates a common designer.

Why should we consider this to be so in nature, when it is so clearly not so among objects we know to be designed? (Cups, clothes, televisions, computers, cars, to name a few - you can find all sorts of common designs between examples from completely seperate creators).
 

Clete

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Originally posted by Mr Jack

Why should we consider this to be so in nature, when it is so clearly not so among objects we know to be designed? (Cups, clothes, televisions, computers, cars, to name a few - you can find all sorts of common designs between examples from completely separate creators).

It's in the details that your argument falls apart. Of course simple single piece creations can be copied very easily but all mugs can be held in a hand for example and so all mugs have been created by beings with hands, the point being that the creation tells you something about its creator. This is especially true when you start to talk about very complex creations. We know for example that the Soviet Union did not design a lot of the electronics that they used in some of there technologies because needless parts that were intentionally introduced into the design by the U.S. engineers who created it in the first place where very faithfully copied because those who were making the copies didn't understand the science behind the design in the first place and so didn't know what if anything wasn't necessary. Thus in complex creations you can look at the details and know that the same individual designed that creation.
In regards to biological systems you have mind boggling complexity that is shared in common with all living organisms, it simply isn't possible for there to be multiple designers.

Resting in Him,
Clete
 

the Sibbie

New member
To add to what Clete said, think about all the singers and music composers. If you are really familiar with one song sung by Mariah Carey, I'm willing to bet that you can identify other songs sung by her without ever hearing her other songs before. Same goes with music written by a certain composer.
 

satalien

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Banned
Originally posted by Clete Pfeiffer

I didn't say anything about God, you inferred that intuitively. :think:
The point is that whether it was via evolution or via God, one way or the other systems of such incredible complexity and similarity must have a common designer.
And yes design does indicate at least the presence of one sort of designer or another. If that design is intelligent then that design, by necessity, indicates an intelligent designer because the creation cannot be greater than its creator, an effect cannot be greater than its cause.
Assuming for the sake of argument that there is no God and keeping the first law of thermodynamics in view, how would you account for intelligence, or can you at all?
You know what? My granting you the first law of thermodynamics is too generous! If God doesn't exist, and I mean by God, the God of the Bible, how would you account for the existence of science itself?

Resting in Him,
Clete

How do you account for the existence of God without God having a designer as well?
 

Chileice

New member
Originally posted by Mr Jack

Why should we consider this to be so in nature, when it is so clearly not so among objects we know to be designed? (Cups, clothes, televisions, computers, cars, to name a few - you can find all sorts of common designs between examples from completely seperate creators).

Sure, I can make a cup and you can make a cup. But if we both make cups without seeing each other's design, we will design different kinds of cups, and a trained eye will know the difference. Thomas Cole, Frederic Church and Albert Bierstadt and Thomas Moran all are famous painters from the 1800s. All of them formed part of a school of painting called "The Hudson River School". They all painted landscapes and often painted New England landscapes, at that. However, a trained eye can tell who the artist was by merely looking at the painting. Each had his own style although Church intentionally borrowed from Cole. Bierstadt and Moran were influenced by the other two. Yet, in the end, the designer is evident to those who know art.

I can tell a Albert Sisley from Eugene Boudin from Claude Monet from Edgar Degas. They are all French impressionist painters. But if you mix up their paintings and show them to me one by one, I guarantee I will know which one belongs to whom, no matter what subject they painted. And there are many people much more knowlegable than I am about French Impressionists. Nevertheless, the common designer argument is a rather strong one, because our intelligence will not come up with the same thing twice. Sure we can get pretty darn close if we are TRYING to copy. There are forgers who could fake me out. But what "forger" is out there in the universe trying to fake us out by creating fakes of the originals?
 

Clete

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Originally posted by satalien

How do you account for the existence of God without God having a designer as well?

This is a very interesting question. It's inane, but very interesting nonetheless.
I say that this inane question is interesting because it does, in a convoluted sort of way, get us to where I have been trying to get to and that is to ask the following question, "How do we know what design is in the first place?"
It boils down to two basic options...
(1) The Biblical worldview in which God is the creator of all things and the foundation upon which abstract concepts such as logic, design, science and the like are based and validated.
(2) The Materialistic worldview, which I suggest to you, is totally without a logical leg to stand on. It is truly a blind faith founded upon nothing whatsoever.

I can know what design is in the first place because I have a Biblical worldview, which gives be a solid ground upon which to stand. You on the other hand, assuming that you do not hold a Biblical worldview, cannot even explain to me how you know design when you see it, or for matter, you don't even have any way of verifying that you do in fact see it at all.
To show you what I mean, allow me to ask you a question.

How do you come to know anything about the world around you? Is it the scientific method, psychic ability, logic, osmosis or what? This is not a trick question by the way; I'm not trying to trap you or play silly games. If you really want to know the answer to the question you asked, or more precisely, why it's an inane question then you need to first understand why you cannot know what you think you know based upon your own worldview.

Resting in Him,
Clete
 
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