Gollum and scientists....not really connected though.

I was reading The Hobbit a couple weeks age and had an intresting thought about Gollum durning the riddle game. I have no evidence for this being true or intentional on the part of Tolkien. But I noticed the spelling of Gollum and what it actually was. In mythology a gollum was a creature that was made of mud, slime, or some other lower creature (frogs for example) that do not have a will of thier own. The realization that I came to was that Gollum was one of these creatures. When he took posetion of the ring he ceased to have a will of his own. He in fact ceased to be Smeagel, but became totally subject to the will of the ring. He no longer was one of the river people, but became a creation of the ring and subject to his will. In the taming of Smeagel we see the battle between two distinct creatures, one meak and innocent being Smeagel who longed for his freedom. The other creature is viscious and treatorous, Gollum. Gollum had become as the ring is, a cricle closed upon itself and empty in the middle.

But the short note concerning scientists is simply this: science must be guided by the true, the good and beautiful. The guide posts for all morality. There are limits to scientfic research, which it seems many present day scientists have forgotten or were never taught. The first is stay within the bounds of the truth of what things are and respect the dignity of the human person. The second is work for the good of all man kind. The best example of science getting away from moral teachings is cloning and embrionic stem cell research. The two are closly linked together. Both cease to respect the truth and dignity of the human person, by making them into tools to be used for the so called betterment of man. The one problem with claiming that the betterment of man is the reason is that embrionic stem cell research has shown no progress. There have been no medical cures from this research. Where adult stem cell reserach that does not involve the distruction of millions of babies per experiment has shown progress and has saved many lives by healing organs. The issue between the two is not cures it is money. There are billions of dollars in corporate grants given each year for embrionic research. Often this is by people who support Planned ParentHood and are funding the culture of death in our society. Perhaps my two topics are not seperate and scientists have become gollums to money, rather than scientists.