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Cloning of Humans: Will it be Ethical? Should it be Done?

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It was recently announced by a team of scientists at the Roslin Institute near Edinburgh, Scotland, that for the first time an adult mammal has been successfully cloned by anyone. The procedure is simple enough that it would be easy for a human being now to be cloned. This means that the genetic material from a person could be easily obtained and inserted into an ovum from which the genetic material has been removed and that ovum now would behave like a fertilized egg and could develop, when implanted into a womb, into a person with the exact genetic makeup of the person from which the material was obtained--a clone. No fertilization by a male with different genetic makeup would be necessary. The issues are whether such cloning of humans should be allowed and if so, what are the biologic and ethical implications of such cloning.

Here is the question:

Now that it is possible to easily clone mammals, should cloning of human beings be allowed? What are the ethical concerns involved in making that decision either for or against cloning?

Moderator's note: Because of the large number of responses to this topic creating a large file and in order to reduce the download time, I have divided the responses into two pages. The older responses are on this page. Please click HERE to read the most recent responses.

The genie is out of the bottle. Forget about whether we should or shouldn't--that's now history in view of recent scientific advances. We cannot unlearn anything. The focus, therefore, MUST be on regulations, parameters, licenses, etc. As a student (first year, U. of Chicago) it pains me to say this, but only the government can direct the future of research and work in this field. Humans WILL be cloned. Let's hope it's for the childless couples, and not for those whose opinions of themselves are so lofty as to seek immortality through artificial genetic propogation.

Finally--although this is hardly scientific--I think a clone is a sad thing (individual?). The fact that the impetus for his/her creation is most likely conceit or some flawed societal concept of perfection will label the resultant person(?) as an appendage, footnote, or afterthought to the human parade. We can only hope that sensitivity is brought to bear in future determinations along these lines.

If you want to respond (please) my email address is hpschlos@midway.uchicago.edu

Thanks for reading this opinion.

Cloning humans is absolutely wrong. It should never be done under any circumstances. Creating another just for their body is wrong. Creating someone because you want a child is different. That could possible be justified. But for now I wouldn't try to clone no humans because of the risk in all of it.

Dr Mo, I am a physcian trained in the US now practising back home in Hong Kong. Just founded the Hong Kong Bioethics Association with a group of interdisciplinary friends. A supplementary thought to the already rich discussion on whether to clone human or not: Question - if we were to clone Romeo and Juliet and get them acquainted, will they fall in love again, and will the same tragedy happened again? Unlikely. The psychological burden of being a cloned person is not repetition (identical twins live happily), but being an identical person with a time lag, i.e. knowing that someone with the same genetic make up (parent or previous life?) has lived on this planet before, has struggled, made mistakes, remorsed, sinned... The psychological burden is enormous.

Derrick K. S. Au

This is in response to the debate on cloning. I wonder if anyone has a strong reason why human cloning is wrong. The decision that it is wrong because if God wanted us to clone then we would have been made that way seems to be the most common. But to them I say ask yourself if surgery is acceptable using the same reasoning. Is a heart transplant ethical? The only difference between us now and clones is the number of biological parents you have. 1 and you are a clone. 2 and you're not. I believe that in human clones, is the answer to the nurture vs. nature debate. Cloning would reduce improbability in testing. I don't see how some people find cloning to be the end of life as we know it and I fail to see how making someone with Einstein's genetic makeup will make them have the same love of physics. I guess that trial and error is the only way we will ever truly know.

You should never clone a human. Man is not god.

Yes, I do believe it is ethical and people shouldn't be afraid of it being done. First of all, clones are born as BABIES...not fully grown! He wouldn't even have the same finger-prints. Finger prints are congenital which is why identical twins (who have exacly the same genes) do not share finger prints. They are human beings and laws would apply to them just as any other present day human born of any other reproductive process would. That would be like saying all those people born from artificial insemination could be murdered for their organs or any other bizarre thing. The clone would be just another child except you already know its genetic makeup.

I don't think that our society is ready to handle people being cloned. Many issues haven't even been thought of yet. Like what will it do to our fingerprints? Obviusly if somebody has the same makeup as you they will have the same fingerprints too. So if one of them commits a crime, there is no way of telling which one did it. If cloning is allowed, then people will start making the "perfect human." If God wanted us to be perfect, then he would have made us that way from the get-go. Also these people can't just give their organs & blood, like people think that they will. These people will have feelings, just like the rest of us. They are not going to be some kind of robotic person here to give you any body part that you need or want. Another question arouses to my mind. Won't these people have rights, just like everyone else? Of course they will. They will be human beings and will have rights & privileges too. There are some very serious questions that haven't even been asked yet, so before they go and clone a human, they better think this whole thing through. Or better yet, DON'T DO IT!

Dr MO. I am strongly against cloning of another human being. Though I know it will happen, and we can't change that. We, as a people can not help our selves, what will we do when we all have a clone. Do they remember one of the worst human beings off all time, 'Hitler'. His main focus was to try and make the perfect human being. God help us if he had the power of cloning then. As all scientists say, it wont be for wrong or to harm, but to improve and make better. This world is full of sick people, who will distort the, "purpose", cloning will have and make, and have the power to do things never yet even concieved of. As an example, the government said, that social security number would be issued for only one purpose, which was a basic purpose that people agreed with, but now, it is used for hundreds of purposes, but in the beginning, only one. same as cloning, it is developed to help a dying person, oh how wonderful that is and sounds, but wait until it falls into the wrong hands, and is used in time of war, or to take over and become a communistic society, as we are soon becoming. they do not know what they are dealing with, they think a new break through, no, just another sign of the, IN Times, the last days. what a wondrful new way man has thought of to destroy it self. We can not fix our current problems, over population, racism, our judicial system. This would incorporate so many new laws for every problem, which we cant fix already. Every man has taken a gift and abused it, why is man so blind and so deaf, they keep trying to build and invent, when they already have everything they need, but greed is what man feeds on. It shames me how God must be down, and saying what fools, they dont even know, and even if they did, they sure wouldnt listen. JRT

I don't think that humans should be cloned. The clone would not get any respect and how would you like it if you were only born to get body parts or replace someone else? The clone would be the humans slave, but it might not want to be a slave. Also, how would it feel to accidentaly run into the EXACT same person as you? Same looks, same personality, same everything. What if the parent decided not to tell the daughter/son that they were cloned at birth? That would really suck. Thank you for your time.

I hear a lot of people talking about if we cloned a human, we would be able to obtain body parts and blood and such from him or her. These people need to think that this cloned person will have feeling, a brain, emotions, likes and dislikes and other things that a normal human would have. Some people think that these cloned people's only purpose in their life would be to donate their parts. Do you really think that this cloned person would be willing to sacrifice his/her own life or organs, just for another person? I don't think so.

Doctor. I think we should ask ourselves what the purpose of cloning is? What outcome are we looking for? Are we cloning just because we can without thinking through the consequences of its outcome? Many technological advances have brought great consequences to the human race. Somehow I think our ethics, values and moral judgements are clouded by such technological advances such as cloning. We rush right into our own curiosities without thinking about the consequences of the impact this might have on humanity as a whole. Cloning is another way science uses technology to de-value the human race. Does successful cloning mean improved cloning so that we wipe out disease, live forever, develop clone cultures, develop domination through clone worlds vs non-clone worlds? How far can we go with this? When do say enough is enough? When do say "no" to technological advances that have no purpose? Jmf

I feel strongly that we should not be cloning humans. God made each of us special and unique. God may have given us the technology to clone humans, but that doesn't mean that he wants us to. We have an endless supply of medical technology that is capable of saving lives or improving the quality of life. Cloning does not serve either purpose.

Brenda Chamberlain ChamB19@aol.com

Dr. Mo - I am currently doing my freshman term paper on the ethics of cloning, and feel I have some good insight. If we were to start cloning people, what role would they play in society? Would they be treated as an underclass of scientific acheivements? The answer yes, drawing from society's treatment of minorities in genearl. If society cannot resist discriminating against gays or blacks, how can it possibly restrain from doing so to clones? Now, granted, clones are not as easy to spot as blacks, but are gays? Cloning brings with it ethical questions which our society is not yet ready to grapple with. For instance, if a woman cloned herself in order to have a child, would it be her sister or her daughter? Would she have custody or would her parents? If she was married, would her husband have custody? (Andrews, Lori. "Is His Clone Bill Gates or Bill Gates Jr.?". _The National Law Journal_. 24 March 1997: A23). America can't even solve divorce custody nor discrimination, do we need cloning thrown into the mix to complicate things?

Thanks for having a page that will be very helpful for me... Alan Weissman University of Delaware

I know most people think that kid's opinions are not worth a whole lot but I am 13 and I have a really good comment. Cloning is going to happen whether we want it or not. I think that Mankind cannot turn down such an challenge. Curiosity will overcome us and we'd be better of helping the geneticists to create a safe expirimenting enviroment rather than fighting with them. I hope you will consider my advice.

Doctor Mo, First of all I must commend you on your site, I was browsing the net looking for information that I could include in my report on cloning in school. When starting this project, I was astonished by how much information is already comprised about a subject that is very new to me. I must say, though I was intimidated, by page after page of opinionated articles staring at me, as I read more I became intrigued, and my own questions and opinions began to swell in my head, i.e. a major argument is that if there is no problem identical twins living and being made up of the same genetic structure, then there should be no problem with cloning. To this I must bring up the point that a twin from birth is already attached to each other after spending 3/4 of a year in a womb, the twin grow up, used to each other and dependent on each other, with a lifetime of love and experiences. A clone on the other hand enters life full grown with no experiences and only instincts and a mold that the original has set for him that he feels that he must follow, A cuter version of Frankenstein of Baby Hewy if you will. The child, which it is a child, has nothing to go from, and with its parents already having it life planned out for them and with a mold for it to follow, basically going to a Xerox machine and asking for a reduction. And say that the copy doesn't live up to what the parents expectations then, it becomes a let down to them just for living and feeling unloved. What of the original for that matter then, will it feel like wasn't good enough so it needed a clone. OR are they going to feel like there going to have to be in direct conflict with each other. Only trial and error can answer these question. Then you have to ask yourself, is it a child of god or a child of science. It completely changes the idea of a family before the mother was the person who took her egg with its nucleic information in it and carried it in her womb now that is no longer the case, the father before was the person giving half the chromosomes, no its a all or nothing thing. So what family will the child have? Then I thought what use is there for men now? Any Woman can go out now and have her self cloned, but for a man he has to find a egg and rent a womb or find somebody very generous to have a clone. Then there's security, any time we go to the dentist or doctor we leave more enough information for a clone to be made of us by some psychotic who likes a quality in us and wants to clone it. People could go around cloning professional athletes for their abilities , or a woman who couldn't get with who she wanted could make her own date, but then most qualities come about from talent which relates back to the clone entering the world inexperienced. It's all just too much for me doc, I still a small child trying to understand a still expanding topic, I can't find reasons to justify it, I still feel that the greatest miracle two people can do is to bring a life into this world that is theirs, and that if they don't give it all their love, and everything they can then its the greatest crime of all, and to me under these circumstances I cannot morally justify creating a clone.

The cloning of humans should not be allowed. Presently we as a human race have concerns with the already growing population of people in the world. It is a problem that does not need to be perpetuated by cloning.

ETHICS!?! What would be the use of extra "clones". Farmers do not like the cloning of animals because of the threat of a disease destroying the whole herd. The cloning of humans takes away the evolution process that has kept us alive. If it weren't for evolution throughout time, every species would have died out when the first disease struck. It creates a one class race, does this remind you of anyone!?! How about HITLER!!!!!

Humans should not be cloned. Who decides which people are valuable enough to clone and who isn't worth it. Cloning of animals is one thing but humans is something entirely different.

It seems as if there is a mass hysteria gripping most people about the issue of cloning. Just as the "official" social ethic was (many years ago) that the sun and the stars revolved around the earth and anyone who dared to challenge that assumption was heretical, insane or possessed of the devil, there seems to be a similar hysteria surrounding the issue of cloning, to the point of trying to prevent people from looking at the issue. My personal position is that this issue, and many other so-called "controversial" issues, should be looked at in greater depth and THEN rationally discussed. After years of rapid advancement in knowledge in scientific, philosophical, and other fields perhaps the only thing that is really clear is that we don't know everything yet.

While there is much fervor over the potential abuse to our religious and social sensibilities to be caused by cloning of people and animals, there is a lot of non-potential and actual abuse to people, animals, and the environment occurring on a global scale daily. It really seems as if the concern about cloning is misplaced.

I think that the question, as it stands now is no longer valid. Should cloning be done? I don't really think that there is any way back, now that it's here. Yes, cloning may seem unethical and dangerous, but it is a needed and powerful thing. Is humanity ready for such advance in science? -- is a whole different question. Cloning is like a wild Beast, that is soon going to be a ubiquitous procedure. But can it be tamed?

The fact that science has achieved the ability to clone humans is astounding. The problem is, do we know exactly what we are doing? We have found a simple procedure to clone any organism, but it is only simple at best. I Believe that if science is to pursue cloning a human, it should first understand the exact science of genetics. There are many great possibilities in genetics, but cloning a human isn't one of them. If science could decode our genes, the medicinal possibilties of curing any terminal illness become unlimited. We must understand what genes are capable of before we do anything with cloning. As for the ethical argument against cloning, I really don't see what all the fuss is about. Christians argue that cloning is an act against nature and therefore an act against God. Cloning is in no way an act against nature. It is instead an attempt to work with nature by using it's own method of creating life. If this argument is not convincing enough, then I must ask, what are identical twins? Are they not genetically exact replicas of each other, one organism split into two separate beings? Twins are simply natures way of cloning. Organized religion believes that the act of cloning is an act of creation, and therefore an act of God harnessed and abused by man. In all my experiences with organized religion I have found their conservative mentalities to impede the progress of science and man. To religion, any threat to the stories in the bible is a threat to mankind. Organized religion's reaction to Charles Darwin's theory of evolution is just one of many examples through out history of religion condemning the progress of science and man. Religion has served as a source of answers to the unknown for nearly the entire history of mankind, but as science accumulates knowledge at faster and faster rates, the need for religion to give explanations will disappear. It is the morals and values of religion that will be their true savior, and will be the only answers needed for society.

The debate over cloning humans will be argued for a long time, and it should be until humanity is confidant it has acheived the knowledge it needs to understand the entire science of genetics. The search for knowledge should never be impeded by any person or group, but to clone a human for no other reason than to be the first person to do it is etically wrong. It is easy to stand on the shoulders of others who did the work and use that knowledge without any true understanding of what your doing. We must understand how something works and why it works before we ever apply that knowledge.

Doctor Mo: I am writing in response to the discussion on cloning human beings. It startles me that people are so busy arguing the ethics of this case that they are neglecting the simple genetic problem. I think that it can be universally agreed that with time, due to environmental factors, any living organism accumulates mutations in its genome. Since most DNA appears to be "nonsense", many mutations go unnoticed. However, every now and then a mutation is realized. Cancer is a prime example. Anyone who has ever heard of the p53 gene can attest to a mutation's power in this regard. So, if on a daily basis humans potentially encounter carcinogens along with other mutagens, would it be fair to clone an adult? I say emphatically NO NO NO!!! Doing so would give the cloned individual an unneccessary head start on disaster. Let's say a 25 year old grad student is cloned. His clone would have 25 years worth of random mutations before it was even born. Now how ethical is that? It is like the movie "Multiplicity". Each successive clone would become progressively more imperfect. Except in real life it's not so funny. Therefore, cloning a human being should never, ever be attempted. Not now, not in the future. It is simply playing with disaster, end of story.

Daniel B. Osuch Biology Undergraduate Univ. of Massachusetts Amherst Class of 2000

I don't think that cloning should be allowed but wouldn't it help if we had someone to give us organs or blood if we ever got hurt.

The subject of cloning humans is irrelavent. If we do not have enough respect for human life to, number one, view humans as another animal,number two, allow abortion, number three, allow murderers to escape just penalty for what they do, and number four, simply live to strengthen our families, how can we expect that this new technology will be used in any other way than to further the selfish interests of those who control it?

First, I must say that the format of this page is quite simple but effective. All kinds of people getting together and tossing around a tough issue. Without this kind of communication, education isn't possible, and without learning (by any means possible), understanding is very hard to achieve. However, I must note that in order for the proper understanding to be formed, the proper facts must first be laid down. Understanding can be built from there. What is laid down as fact will influence what kind of understanding is built.

With that said, I must say that although impressed by the ethical discussions on this page, I was disturbed to see a comment ina few locations (the abstract and the actual ethical questioned posed, as well as in the responses) implying that the process of cloning mammals and humans can be achieved "easily". I would argue that this is not the case. And although the discussion of human cloning is pertinent, our society is a long way from mainstream cloning of any organism.

I refer to you an article in SCIENCE, Vol. 275, p. 1415 (3/7/97) entitled "Will Dolly Send in the Clones?". I found this to be a very well written article which explains the recent developments in Scotland. The procedure is as you describe on your page, but it has been labeled "quite inefficient". In fact, Dolly was the single positive outcome from 277 attempts. That is a success rate of 0.4% or 4 in 1000. With odds like that, a procedure cannot be considered "easy". In addition, there were questions about the udder cells used in the procedure. DNA in adult cells is thought to be "irreversibly altered" in comparison to DNA within embryonic cells. The article states, "Presumably, because of chemical changes and structural modifications, those genomes [the udder cells] were supposed not to be 'totipotent', that is, capable of supporting the development of all the different cell types needed to build an animal." Similar studies in mouse have failed for this reason. But it apparently worked in this case. The team of researchers sought to mimic embryonic DNA by "reprogramming" adult DNA during the fusion of the egg and the adult DNA. Was the DNA that Dolly resulted from successfully "reprogrammed"? Richard Schultz, who focuses on gene expression in early development at UPENN, explained that "We don't really know" how the initial programming works, so to go one step further and "RE-program" adult DNA is even harder to understand.

The article goes on to explain the possibilty that the developmental biology of a human is sufficiently different from that of a sheep that there is a chance that human cloning would be much more difficult. In sheep the new DNA "takes over" (meaning its genes begin to be expressed) at the eight-cell stage. For mice this takes place at the two cell stage. Humans fall right in the middle with DNA expression coming at the four-cell stage. Each cell division allows a period of time in which "reprogramming" could be occurring. The article states: "Those replications, and the several days it takes for them to occur, may be the reason nuclear transfer works in sheep but not very well in mice." Schultz adds, "Maybe in rodents there's just not enough time [for reprogramming]." It is then possible that the four-cell stage (humans) is too early also.

There is yet another complication. The population of cells that were taken from the udder "are normally capable of developing into lactating tissue. Wilmut and his colleagues acknowledge that the collection of cells may have included a stem cell- an undifferentiated progenitor cell of many different tissue cells [much like an embryonic cell]- which has a higher developmental potential than an ordinary epithelial cell from the mammary gland [these are what they called "adult"]." They were quoted as saying, "The udder cells are a mixed population, and we don't know which are able to be totipotent." The point is, the 1 in 277 tries that worked could have been the result of young DNA (not embryonic, but almost) rather than "adult" DNA. If that is found to be the case, then this whole scientific finding will be less significant.

There are far too many unanswered questions to say that this process has been worked out to the point that it is "easy". In addition to the points above, there are other things to be considered in the developmental processes across species. In addition to the time where the DNA "takes over" there are differences in the implantation into the uterus and placental development. "These differences could make nuclear transfer from adult cells harder, if not impossible in animals other than cows or sheep."

This breakthrough is far from perfected. There are going to be many years in between this "small" success (I do not intend to diminish their accomplishment, but the bigger things are still to come) and cloning of anything on a large scale. And from there, moving to human beings is going to take even longer.

By all means continue the debate about the ethical nature of cloning humans because it will be possible someday. But be confident in the fact that the process is not easy and is not going to happen tomorrow. Your understanding of this issue should be based on the fact that this is not an immediate threat and thus society will have plenty of time to stay with the scientists, ensuring that proper ethical standards are being realized.

Thanks for listening.

Mike Earley, Grad Student in Molecular Biology

Would cloning disrupt the life cycle? If everybody could live longer then won't there be more people on the earth at one time, would this effect the way that we live?

The subject of cloning raises many issues to me. Morally, it stirs something up in my mind, as well as spiritually. I do not believe that alot of people have truly stepped back to look at the whole picture. It seems as if scientists, high on advancement, kept going and going to prove a goal achievable. Now they have proved it and don't know what to do with it because they were so pre-occupied with whether they could that it only now becomes a question of whether they should. Of course it could be considered morally correct to use cloning in aid for a few things...but then, would it also be morally correct to take it one step further...and then one more. It seems to me that there is a line that we must decide to cross, or not to. Should we decide to, in my opinion, it had better be for an extremely good reason!

I would like to propose an ethical spin to the issue of cloning and its affects on spirituallity. It seems that those who have faith in various known world religions are those who are most avidly opposed to cloning. It is almost as if they are afraid of a "Tower of Babbel" incident. i.e. They believe cloning is creating and thus humans are acting God-like. I think for this reason that cloning humans is threatening to many peoples religious faith and that is why it is so widely opposed. This is unfortunate since open mindedness and carful informed experimentation and research are a necessity to mans survival. Organized religion seems only to hold back progress. The ethical implications are often based on a religious value system when this cloning issue is disscussed. This Limits the value of the ethical disscussion.

Shanan Campanaro

I do not think cloning should be allowed. This would change a lot about how we think of human existance. There is an individuality that we all have that would be lost with cloning. What would be the purpose of cloning? As you already mentioned, using them for experiments would ethically unjust, as they are still human beings, with rights like all of us. If people are cloned for their attributes, in an effort to create a more perfect race, aren't we sinking to the level of the Nazi's, trying to create a perfect Aryan race? If there is no other reason to clone than just to do it, why do it? We know we could if for some reason we needed to someday, so I think it would be better to just leave it at that.

Stephanie Rust, OUCN student

I am somehow in favor and somehow in disagreement about this subject. As everyone knows, everyone has a different view of the world and have different tastes, etc. If now, another "thing" of the same kind of onebody, I don't think that he or she will continue his/her life as it used to be, as there is a duplicate on him. Maybe somebodies actions are know by his clone, or may be the original one is not as competetive as his clone or even worse, being mistaken by your own friends. Also, what about the clone himself? It is a also a life being, and may suffer for being another people clone, may have some phisicological problems like depression. How is he going to face the society? Also, if one family or even one small town were composed only by some people and his clones, it may be very confusing and will certantly origin a lot of problems. But I am also in its favor. For exemple somebody have born blick, using this tecnology it is not difficult to replicate a healthy pair of eyes for him. Or somebody who has got a injurie. It may also possible to cure cancer or other sicks. But will it have any side effects or the clones will adapt the eviroment when they were born? David. Age 14

PS You may find a lot of errors as my mother laanguage isn't english and I am not very good at English.

No, I don't think it would be at all right to clone an entire, living human being. However, if it would be possible to grow just a part of the human body, not the whole thing, and not with a functioning brain, for organ use, that would probably be more acceptable to the public.

My entire discussion will be limited to the matter of cloning of human adult cells, not the sort of emryonic cloning--which has long been done in animals--that might be done to address human fertility problems and which poses an entirely different type of ethical problem.

Many people have made the assertion that the technology to clone humans is inevitable and thus it is naive to suppose it can be banned. The point is not whether we can stop all human cloning activities, no more than we can stop all snuff-pornographers (those who make pornography by killing their subjects), but whether society should condone the practice by allowing it.

The assertion that cloning was developed by human society, which was in turn developed by natural evolution, supposedly making cloning an extension of evolution and so something that should not be banned, is an argument so full of logical fallacies that they cannot all be handled here. However, the problem can be summed with this consideration: By the same logic, evolution, by developing society, also developed nuclear weapons. So would it be a natural extension of evolution for us to employ those weapons and demolish life on earth? Similarly for this pistol in my hand: Evolution "developed" it--so should I shoot and kill the person across the room? In other words, it absolutely does not follow that if we develop a technology, evolution "intends" for us to use or to somehow further its own ends through our deployment of it. Society has the discretion to regulate its technological developments as it sees fit--in fact, it already does so: There already it place plenty of limits on science and technology. We do not allow many kinds of experiments on humans subjects. We do not allow humans to be grown on farms for their meat--though the technology to do so is perfectly feasible. The horrors of Germany in the 1930's and 40's show we do not condone the diversion of humans into work and death camps nor allow their parts to be used for, say, lamp shades, though the technology to do so is available to anyone who so desires, and it could be argued that evolution put it in our hands and so we should use it.

Note, though, that the use of human cloning would not further any of evolution's aims as they has unfolded in the last few hundred million years: Sexual reproduction, or the recombination of genes from one generation to the next, allows such rapid reassembly of genetic possibilities that the next generation has the potential to adapt to a rapidly changing environment. With sexual reproduction, the extremely rapid progression of changes that led to the vertebral then the mammalian revolutions, and thence the extremely rapid growth of the human cerebral cortex that gave rise to society and language the arts and sciences, were all possible. Asexual reproduction suffices for very primitive organisms, such as bacteria or ameobas or certain generations of aphids. To condone human cloning would be to put a STOP to evolution, not further it. It is not to the benefit of society--nor of future generations. You might argue that future generations have a right to the genetic diversity allowable by sexual reproduction; to begin genetically bottlenecking future generations with a constrained set of genes holds all likelihood of only harming them. (One branch of contemporary philosohy is dedicated to the question of the rights of future generations, such as whether they have a right to an unpolluted planet.) There will always be a shifting environment in the earth and society--in fact, society will only grow more complex and likely only increase selection pressure and thus the need for genetic diversity--so future generations will always need the highest amount of genetic combinations possible, which cloning will only work against. But to allow cloning for one person would only open the possibility of allowing it for another--and you reach such a slippery slope problem that vast numbers could be doing the practice and you could quickly compromise future generations' genetic diversity.

(The analogy of human cloning with twins is specious, because natural twining is not a question of reproduction from generation to the next, but only of shared genes within this generation; besides, it poses no ethical problem, because it is not a question of what we allow memebers of society to do with technology.)

Other problems in cloning adult cells include the possible degeneration that the cells undergo from having divided many, many times throughout the person's life, which degeneration would be exacerbared over several generations of cloning until the offspring would soon be completely unviable--and there can be no ethical argument allowing such a scenario. Germ cells--sperm and eggs--are made to help prevent such degeneration. Once recombined with the other half-complement of genes from the other parent, degenerations are almost all masked. Also, the practice of human cloning for the sake of trying to replicate a successful adult--say, an Einstein or Mozart--confuses the genotype with the phenotype, and more important, overlooks the vast or perhaps sine qua non role of the environment. (Put a fresh-born Einstein in an Antarctic cave with no humans around, and see if he grows up to devise the Special Theory of Relativity. [Not to speak of the fact that such an experiment--and most that would have to be done to determine the roles of most genes and their pleiotropies, are immoral by current standards.])

A ban on cloning, along with our effort to stop pollution and the ruination of the environment, would show that society has the interest of keeping life, human society, and the planet a place that is optimally fit for the survival of future generations.

Many people have brought up the fact that cloning, as it has reached in the level with the Scottish sheep, theoretically makes it possible to clone only females--say, women--and not reproduce the males. Despite the fact that such a practice would stop evolution and constrain the species to the set of genes now existing--not to speak of the discontinuity society would have with the rest of life, causing the children to be alienated from all other life when they ask why there are boy and girl cats and dogs and monkeys and frogs but no boy humans--another technology might overtake such use of cloning before it could be enacted. Because the embroyo's genes dictate the growth of the placenta--the womb is merely a convenient place for the embryo to be implanted and grow--the embryo does not need a womb to grow and can grow in any warm, nutritious, sufficiently spacious wet spot in a human, such as the fatty lining of the stomach. It may be possible to grow ova in cell culture, insert genes into these ova, and implant them into the fatty lining of a male. Once the embryo has grown nine months, it can be taken out by cesarean. (See the work of John Money at Johns Hopkins on this matter.) So, technology could make women as unnecessary as other technology could make men unnecessary. Other possibilities would include growing the embryo in a completey artificial environment, making neither sex necessary. Perhaps those people who do not like men or women or sexual relationships period would be glad for such a development. They might also consider that perhaps sufficient developments of robots might make biochemical, organismal, carbon-based humans unnecessary. We might start considering what do we want out of these technologies, and what do we want to retain of what nature as given us over its generous and wise 3.9 billion years or so of evolution. Believe it or not, nature still may be wiser than me and all my fellow, agnostic science-types combined.

I think that are a great deal of benefits in the future of cloning human beings. Imagine the many uses of this new technology. I am currently writing a paper in "law/ethics and cloning." I am presently looking for as much information as possible on the ethics of cloning, and am hoping to receive a response, so that I may get some professional opinions on the subject. Please respond.

I am writing in response to the subject of human cloning. I feel that it would be wrong to permit human clones of any kind. If human cloning were to be legal there would be no boundries. I admit that this could be very usefull in treatment of many dieases and infertility, but would the beneficence outweigh the harm. There are to many questions that would have to been answered to determine the ethics of human cloning. How long would the embryo survive? What tests or procedures would the embryo or person have to go through? Would there ever be a final stopping point? What would been done with a clone gone bad? These are just factual questions that need to be answered. What about the spiritual questions? Did God intend for man to make men? If these clones were human would they have souls? There are to many ethical and spritual considerations to allow cloning.

Jennifer Ward

I am soon writing an essay on the ethics of cloning. Before I actually found information on the Internet, I was against cloning, 'just because its wrong'. Now I think there is nothing wrong with it. Peoples whole arguments were "because its bad", or "it just isn't right". The only thing that MIGHT happen would be eugenics, Hitler-like people passing laws that only this one person could be cloned. Or, a mechanical woumb, where kinds are grown in pods. But, really, if you think about it, this would never happen. I have a pages after pages of GOOD arguments, but, I bet you have more important things to do!

Russell Palmer (age 12)

Hello, I am doing a science project on the issue of cloning and have become interested. I am responding to your question "Now that it is possible to easily clone mammals, should cloning of human beings be allowed?" I do not think that doing this would be right or ethical. I agree with you about people being cloned for organ donation. I think it is wrong as well. But I really disagree with it all together. We are special beings that were created by God. I don't think that anyone but God should be tampering with cloning. Also, if humans were cloned imagine what the world would be like? The world would be filled with souless beings and if a mass disease spread across the world that affected clones, they would all be dead. I agree with the President's statement about non-federal funding of the project, but I think it is happening behind all of their backs!

Well thank you for your time! JK

I think this is a very bad thing. God did not intend for us to all look alike. I realize that environment makes a differnece as to how people behave, but who wants another Hitler? It really scares me to think that someone could possess this much power.

Personally I find the possibility of cloning humans very disturbing. I think we are beginning to take technology to far. By cloning human beings are we not, in essence, "playing God?" As it is with such things as organ transplants, life support systems, and euthanasia, many people already believe that the medical profession is "playing God." Besides that, the cloning of humans would open the door to criminals who would abuse the good that could come from the cloning. By this I am also referring to procedures like in vitro fertilization, were there has been cases where doctors have sold the ova of one patient to another without consent. Couldn't a similar situation arise with the cloning of human beings? I think, at least for now, "the making of people" should be left up to The Almighty.

DoktorMo, I have read some of the entries on human cloning and I feel I have to respond to a few of the other opinions that have been stated. For some reason people seem to believe that cloning will be able to give us "ultimate fighting machines". It seems that people are worried about some type of clone superiority. From a study of evolution, it seems that sexual vs. asexual (ie cloning) reproduction favors sexual reproduction. Sexual reproduction gives us the ability to substantially alter the makeup of the genetic pool in only a few generations. A society that reproduces asexually would be at a distinct disadvantage, having little or no way to compensate for aquired mutation. An investigation into any society with a limited genetic source will show this to be true. For instance, certain sections of the Jewish population have an extremely high incidence of genetic problems. This is because of a limited gene pool.

Furthermore, the idea of creating clone soldiers is unethical. Do people believe that these clones will be any less human than the rest of us? Perhaps the person cloned will be genetically predisposed to join the military forces. This still doesn't mean that we can send them off into war and kill them. They're not "just a clone." Can I say of twins that one is the real twin and the other is just a clone? Isn't each twin an individual? Sure they look the same, but each of them has his own personality.

Finally the idea of creating an ideal society through controlling reproduction is not a new one. The eugenics movement thought that by promoting reproduction among fitter families and sterilizing the most unfit, a better society could be achieved. Please don't reject a new technology because it can be used to achieve unethical purposes. It is more worthwhile to argue against the same unethical causes that have always existed than to proclaim that a new "advance" is really the downfall of all humanity.

Chris camaro@wpi.edu

There are a number of issues that have to be clarified in order to have a reasonably intelligent discussion of cloning. First, and perhaps foremost, one must recognize what the end result of cloning is. Second, one must differentiate between cloning of an embryo and cloning of a person older than an embryo. Third, as with other medical technology, cloning does not have to be available to everyone. Perhaps, as with chemotherapy, cloning might be beneficial to a subpopulation of people.

What is the end result of cloning a human? Another human. Except for sharing the genetic makeup of another person, the `clone' would be unique. The life experiences of the donor could never be matched so the clone could not be a replica. Physical expression of the genetic material might even be expressed differently. This is not a way to live forever. Just as an identical twin does not live through their sibling, a donor cannot live through their clone. Once the donor dies, the donor is dead. In what way would the donor benefit from having a clone? Perhaps the clone could provide tissue to a cancer patient. But as society has chosen not to force identical twins to donate tissue, we could not force a clone to do this.

Is their a difference between cloning an embryo and cloning an adult? Well, cloning an embryo is the same thing that occurs in nature when identical twins or triplets are conceived. In this case, the clone does not have the chance of being raised by its genetic grandchildren. The clone of an adult, however, could be raised by its twin, children, or grandchildren. But, in such a case, would the clone rather that they were never born? Probably not. How many people do you know wish they weren't born. Probably none, if any. A clone of an adult would still have parents (perhaps not biological) and people that cared. If cloning of adults occurred, then one might be concerned that it would diminish genetic variability and the human race would perish. Society has already altered selection by consequences. For better or worse, whatever happens was selected because society is a result of selection by consequences, just as its technologies are too. For better or worse, we care for those that are unable to care for themselves. We take resources away from those that are able to care for themselves to do this. We also help people reproduce that would not be able to on their own. We cure cancer in children so that they are able to live into adulthood to have children of their own. Is this unethical?

It is extremely naive to think that it is possible to enforce a ban on technology as simple as cloning. Cloning does not require anything that doesn't already exist in a laboratory. Someone will do it, it's just a matter of when. Perhaps, it's already been done.

When we hear the term "radiation" most of us think of negative connotations. However, radiation has helped a subpopulation of people with certain types of cancer. Perhaps, cloning might do the same and just as radiation treatment is not offered to everyone, perhaps cloning could be offered to a subpopulation of people. For example, consider the cloning of an embryo. How is this really different than any of the other assisted reproductive technologies (ART) used? With ART, we inject weak sperm into an egg, we can retrieve 20 eggs from a women for fertilization, we freeze embryos for later pregnancies...and so on. Perhaps you might consider a case in which a women starts menopause when she is 30 years old before having a child. Why did this happen? Let's say she had a large portion of her ovarian tissue removed in surgery as a teenager and was told not to worry, that she had plenty of time to have children. On top of this, her fallopian tubes are damaged from the surgery so she needs in vitro fertilization (costs $3000-10,000 for each attempt which is not covered by medical insurance). She starts menopause at 30 years of age because she does not have as many eggs left (not because she has run out of eggs) but she has the same proportion of viable eggs as other women her age. Her problem is that the fertility drugs (hormones which cost about $2500 each month) only help her get one egg each month. After fertilizing the egg, the doctor transfers it back to her uterus. Another problem she has is that the odds of the embryo implanting and resulting in a pregnancy are only about 15-20% each month (even for a healthy women trying to conceive naturally). Why couldn't she have the one embryo cloned into two or three embryos so that her chances of becoming pregnant are increased to 45-60%? Chances are that only one of the embryos will implant but if more than one did, even better for her! Perhaps others would not celebrate her experience but I would bet that she, her husband and children would be eternally grateful that medicine was able to help them in this way. Men with low sperm count have intracytoplasmic sperm injection (ICSI) available so that they can use sperm that would not penetrate the egg on its own. They have the option to try this along with the options of pursing adoption or using donor sperm. Why can't a women with low egg count have an option to increase her odds of having a biological child in addition to the options of adoption and using donor egg?

There is no one answer to the question of whether cloning is ethical. It's always a matter of perspective. As with atomic energy, it is my hope that people will see past the destructive possiblities of cloning to see that their are wonderful possibilities that may come for all technologies.

I have read all of the discussions and agree with most of them. I believe cloning of humans is unethical. A human being is made by God and no one else. God intended on man and woman to sexual reproduce and bring life to this world. Technology has found a way to bypass what God gave to us. Everybody is unique in their own way and has their own thoughts and dreams. Scientists have made many new inventions through the years, some have been great while others have slowly been distroying this world. I believe cloning will be one that slowly distroys this world. What if the military decides to use this idea to make the perfect fighting machine? If this happened then everybody would be fighting each other. If clones were used just for vital organs then it would be like saying they really are not humans and we can raise them for what ever we need. There are many unethical issues that could be talked about that just deal with cloning. If God intended on us being able to clone ourselves then he would have just made us all identical with the same thoughts and dreams.

DoktorMo, I read your observations on this question on the bioethics home page and I would have to agree that this may not be a big ethical dilemma unless the clone was developed for organ transplant or some other as yet unknown medical technology that disregarded its inherent humanity. I do find this a peculiar question because of peoples reaction to it. The development of this technology is necessary for the continuation of medical technology, Parts of the process will be immediatley applicable for the pharmecutical industry, for example. The other oddity is the concern for this proto-human. I find this comical considering some of the apparent lack of interest in the curent humans that we have on the planet. But from an ethical standpoint I believe this to be nessecary work that would fall under medicine's duty to do good. We are obligated to follow the course of this technology. I believe that it is for time to dictate the ramifications for its use.

Thank you, Tim Coker RN

I have read the responses and discussions. I feel God allows us these medical advances yet because we have a free will there is a responsibility that comes with this will. It is my opinion in the case of genetic engineering to prevent life threatening diseases I am for cloning. If it were my intention to live forever to keep myself always propagating I am against cloning. The question that arises for me is at what point does a soul come in. I believe we have a soul. I am not sure each clone would have a soul. Would that clone be a zombie? Just because I am cloned, the clone would not be exactly like me. The clone could be a product of another environment. In closing my nagging thought is would there be a soul for the human clone?

***

I think the biggest consideration to be made concerning cloning of humans is the quality and value of human life. If by cloning we have the capability to create "perfect" beings, what will become of those "not so perfect"? And in progressing toward perfectness, will we not all become just alike and lose the uniqueness of various races, cultures, etc. I can see the value to science and medicine of having the capability to grow vital organs, especially since the waiting lists for organ transplants are never-ending. However, misuse of this kind of technology is a scary thought. If cloning of humans is going to be allowed, much thought needs to go into how we as a society are going to regulate technological advancement. With the present environment and economy we also need to consider how prolonging lives and decreasing mortality rates would impact the world we live in. This technology has the potential to increase the global population which could, in turn, decrease resources available and increase world hunger.

***

We live in a society where knowledge of the unknown is fiercely sought. However when and how do we know that we have gone too far? In my opinion, we have reached that level. I applaud those involved in making the cloning process a success. I am also as very intrigued by the idea. However, the ramifications of cloning is far greater than we can possibly see at this point in time. The most wonderful aspect of our lives is our individuality in our actions and thoughts. Will a certain race be wiped out? Will only the strongest and youngest survive world of cloning? And what will we as a nation tell the future "clones." Have we forgot that as humans, they WILL have emotions as well? Our society is already filled with great diversity and judgment about different thoughts and ideas. How will we compromise about who or what will be cloned? Will there be a federal regulation? And most important of all, will we know as a society when to stop or when we have forfeited or values for technology? Cloning can definitely save lives and solve much of our problems concerning scarce resources. However, will money and politics play a part in whose lives are saved? Furthermore, the discussion of cloning for a transplant is highly unethical. How can we play God and then decide to kill an innocent human being for the sake of saving a life of the "original clone?" Before we begin a mass production of "clones," we need to examine where we want to go with this new technology and where our values lie.

It is my opinion that human cloning is taking technology too far. The cycle of life is in a very delicate balance. By extending the length of our lives we only compound current problems, such world hunger and overcrowding. Nature has survived successfully for many years without our technological assistance, and it should stay that way. Interfering in matters we know little about could only end in catastrophy. Did we not learn anything by Hitler's search for perfection?

Personally, I think that cloning humans is quite reasonable. I'd support anyone's attempt to do so. With gene therapy progressing, the future looks great for scientists and medicine. For example, if say I were dying (I'm not, currently), I'd want to live on. A clone could be created free from whatever fatal illness I had, and organs could be donated as soon as possible...cryogenics might be necessary for the wait for the organs to grow and mature.

To many, this sounds barbaric and sacreligious, but science has never been a religion-supporting field. With transplant advances, someday our brains and cortexes could be implanted in better bodies, and we could effectively become imortal! What's so wrong with that? I'm not a spiritual person, so to me, after death is nothing. My life is no where near complete. If I was to go even 20 years from now, I'd want to be "reborn" into an identical body.

Hubert Reeves, a great french scientist and philosopher, once came to my faculty and said:

I am me because you are you.

What makes me unique is that you are different from me. Lets keep our differences; diversity, whether it be genetic or intellectual, is the wealth of mankind.

Cloning is an amazing realization. It proves that mankind can do great things. It should give us confidence that we have the possibility to come up with other,better solutions to solve our problems.

Is man so well adapted to his environment to allow himself to come back to asexual reproduction?

Technology can be great- it allows me today to talk about cloning with DIFFERENT people from around the world!!!

Twins don't share the same soul? or do they??

after human rights and animal rights, clone rights???

In consideration of human diversity and the increased life-span already made possible through medical intervention, one must also consider the further impact that cloning would have on the human population. If a society of "perfect" individuals could be cloned and raised, the adults within it would tend to be healthier and live longer( assuming that they manage to collectively withstand infectious disease/parasites etc). What would be the impact of this on the environment, on economics (prolonging the amount of time after retirement that individuals are dependent upon the working generation), on population demographics? Furthermore one must consider the value of human life. When one can choose and specify the exact characteristics of offspring, would this not create a homogeneous population in which individuals who are "imperfect" in any way are discarded from the gene pool - for example females or children with physical anomalies? On the other hand, environment plays a very important role in determining characteristics of individuals, for example the heritability of traits in twins separated at birth demonstrates that genetically identical individuals display a range of characteristics. Another question: Who is going to be responsible for regulating use of the new technology? Is it going to be the researchers interested in expanding the frontiers of human knowledge, economic demand or the long-term future of humans worldwide which will dictate the course of human cloning? What about natural selection? Would this even exist anymore and what would be the ramifications of this? An even more interesting question: would men even be necessary if human embryos could be cloned and implanted? The irrelevance of sperm to the whole process of the propagation of human life changes the basis of our existence. Who can possibly model or even conjecture the ramifications of this type of techinology? However, reproductive capacity tends to be a sphere of life which is dominated by male influence so this would probably never be a plausible scenario. There are so many interesting questions, which may or may not be answered in our on-going quest for technological advancement, and economic expedience.

Dear Sir, I am a polytechnic student doing a diploma in Biotechnology in Singapore and the prevalence of genetic cloning is just coincidental to what my report is on. In my opinion, being a Moslem, it is against our religion to "play" God-creating a human life. Apart from that, if God has "given us the power to have sex" to have children, why are we forsaking this ability to do so? I just think that this is such a waste as this is the time, conventionally, human life is made and what are we doing now-creating human in the laboratory...what fun is there...just the anticipation of waiting for the "baby" to grow. Anyway, what more can we expect in the future since gene cloning is prevalent now??

Why can't we just leave things to nature rather than meddling with it and in the end...catastrophic results! I am totally against gene cloning for it can be used for therapeutic purposes...but why create human clone when you have one already?? Don't you think it's a bit too much?? Why must we act like God when we are not??

Consider the cloning for military purposes. If we clones humans who were specifically "programmed" for war/military duties. In this scenario we would not have to worry about our loved ones off at war. On the other hand, would this lead us to declare war more freely? To put an interesting twist to this debate, here is an FYI for anyone interested: Toward the end of the semester, I am planning to (in conjunction w/my biomedical ethics professor) conduct a campus-wide survey on cloning. We will attempt to find out the following, "If we could all create our ideal child, mate, etc. would we all be identical?"

Yes cloning of humans is a good idea because if we are ever going to get anywhere else in the field of medicine and other related topics we have to discard what we believe is ethical and what is not. We live in a world with so many possibilities that we have to let technology resume and not get in the way. Someday cloning might and probably will solve some of the bigest mysterys of the human species. The more technolgy the better!

This issue is obviously not one that can be decided upon in a matter of minutes. But I personally believe that although cloning can be used to save many lives, it seems like it would actually result in the deaths of many people. Take the scenario of creating a utopia without disease and retardation and just the perfect place. In order to accomplish this, you would have to clone whatever was the "perfect person" with the "pefect traits" and let everyone else die off. We would then have a world of people who are exactly the same with the same genes. Isn't this the opposite of what you would want? I mean part of what makes the world great right now is the amazing amount of diversity we have. The entire population might die off if we all had the same genes. Maybe the mentally retarded person or the person missing certain proteins would be resistant to some disease that would kill off everyone else. This idea seems rather far-fetched but if we look at any war, especially World War II, anyone can take over a population and turn them against all "unperfect" people. I hope this all makes sense and everyone who reads this realizes the traumas that could occur with this new possibility of cloning.

I suppose for people who don't believe that God is and always has been in charge of creation whether human, animal(and I make that distincton, deliberately), and mineral, cloning would seem a natural progression in the "evolutionary" chain. But I hesitate to think, if God is, and if He is the creator of all things, aren't we playing at being God. When you think of how perfectly the earth moves on it's axis and we have seasons so we don't get bored with too much heat or too much cold each year. And there are many other aspects one could speak of in the beauty of creation. I think God has given scientists intelligence for the purpose of improving life and solving diseases. I suppose it would solve diseases if everything was just plastic and imitation. However, if we try to think we are better than our Maker, if you like that term, then maybe we could end up like the Archangel Lucifer, who with his followers thought he was better than God and was cast out of heaven in the first place! Thanks and I would love to continue the discussion.

I envision a future world that would be the result of accepted cloning in America. Every person would very quickly patent their own DNA. In our capitalistic society a person could sell and buy that patent. That way any person with enough money could rase a clone of any person they chose to buy.

What good could possibly come from cloning humans? I understand that the process might save someones life, as in an organ or bone marrow transplant. Then might the clone inherit the very same disease that they were born to cure? or at least be as susceptable as their parent. And how would a person feel, knowing that they were not an individual, but an exact copy of their parent? How would you feel?

Can two persons share the same soul?

I feel that cloning is ethical because it can someday lead to the cloning of vital organs that are failing and need to be replaced. With an excact duplicate of the organ the body won't reject it.

Consider the sernario:

A married couple has a child. The child is genetically fine with no observable abnormalities. When the child is, say 7 months old, some type of trauma kill the unsuspecting child. There is ample time before the child is laid to rest to take a small tissue sample for DNA purposes. The parents really loved "Timmy" and were very attached to him. The parents are totally shaken, as can be expected, and they are given the possibility to have another child just like Timmy. Should this be a possibility for them. I can see problems that are inherit to this situation. If I was to buy a brand new china set, and I know that the tea cups are more likely to fall and get broken then i will buy extra tea cups. If one breaks, I know in the back of my mind that another can be easily taken out of the substitute storage, and therefore I do not care as much about the tea cups, as say the saucers which can not be replaced as easy. Does it not follow that, if a couple knows that a child can be exactly replaced, then each individual child will not have the preciousness and the individual uniqueness that humans should. This would most likely lead to even more apathy that is already present for the youth of the world. On other point, would be that the second child would always be the replacement for "Timmy". The victimization psychologists would be able to have a hay-day with that one. Or even if children knew that they were not precious anymore because they could be replaced any time; imagine the "clone complexes" that would be created. This explosive topic must be studied and discussed around every dinner table around the globe!!! This cannot be a administration decision as it will undoubtably effect every human being in this world.

nicholas noce noce@hawaii.edu molecular bio undergrad UH

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