Sell your blood, your body, your eggs?

$10,000.

That's what a policy board in New York has set as the price for a woman's eggs, extracted for purposes of stem cell research.

Now before you start marching, pitchforks in hand, women are already being paid for their eggs, when given for fertility purposes. (Picture from the Center for Genetics and Society.) Why not set a price for scientific purposes?

Because women will be exploited, say critics. Because it puts a price on life.

But we already have a price on life, respond scientists. We even have prices on human eggs. And attempts to get women to volunteer their eggs for science have proven unsuccessful.

So, given a choice between dignity and science, which will it be?

This post was originally published on Smartplanet.com