Embryonic state

Anyone with children knows what that first year brings. Learning to crawl. Gingerly standing up. Trying to walk. The same goes for tackling the ethics issues of California's fledgling, embryonic stem cell venture.

Nearly a year after voters authorized a $3 billion investment for stem cell research in this state, the committee formed to sort out the ethical and medical details have only taken baby steps.

"Not a whole lot has been done," acknowledged Ted Peters, a Lutheran theologian and bioethicist from the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley who serves on the Scientific and Medical Accountability Standards Working Group.

"I am happy with the working group," said Peters, who is putting together a book about stem cell ethics. "It's just slow. That's not a criticism. It's just slow."

Under Proposition 71, approved last November by 59 percent of the voters, the standards working group is made up of ethicists, patient advocates and scientists.

The group is one of three advisory panels who make recommendations about various issues to the Independent Citizens' Oversight Committee, the governing board for the California Institute...