"During the next 35 years," Peter Singer wrote last year, "the traditional view of the sanctity of human life will collapse under pressure from scientific, technological, and demographic developments.

* "During the next 35 years," Peter Singer wrote last year, "the traditional view of the sanctity of human life will collapse under pressure from scientific, technological, and demographic developments. By 2040, it may be that only a rump of hardcore, know-nothing religious fundamentalists will defend the view that every human life, from conception to death, is sacrosanct. In retrospect, 2005 may be seen as the year in which that position became untenable." The chief reason for this collapse? "The South Korean breakthrough" in cloning human embryos to produce stem cells. In Newsweek, Jonathan Alter wrote that "the brilliant scientific breakthrough in South Korea" would expose the "perverse" position of "Bush bitter-enders and the pope" on cloning. Whoops. It has now come out that Hwang Woo-Suk not only obtained the eggs he used unethically, but faked the results. There was no breakthrough in cloning in 2005. And his previous breakthrough, in 2004, was faked too. Newsweek now quotes a scientist as saying that the fraud is a "blessing in disguise," as money will go to better researchers. Advocates of federal subsidies for the research say that the hoax is an argument for the subsidies: They will keep American scientists--who, it is posited, are much more trustworthy than foreigners--in the game. No word from Alter or Singer. If this story is a blessing, it is only because it means an industry in the creation and destruction of human beings for research is not yet upon us.