But the growing current and future effort is to do SCNT (somatic cell nuclear transfer) and conceive living human embryonic individual organisms from which to derive stem cells (body parts) as a means to treat the infirmities of others.
I said it several times, and I will say it again: somatic cell nuclear transfer is a dead end technology. One reason: cancer cells are dangerous because they have lost their growth controls. Embryonic or fetal stem cells removed from the context of the intact organism also have no growth controls. Many genes that are not active in the mature organism are active in both the embryonic/fetal stem cells and cancer cells. Ask yourself: will even the most ardent pro-partial-birth-abortion advocate want an injection of embryonic/fetal stem cells for that "miracle cure" if they know that there is a good chance they will develop cancer as a result? Another reason: no attempt to create an embryo by somatic cell transfer in non-human primates so far has been successful. It will likely never be successful. Even Dolly the sheep resulted only after hundreds of attempts. There is no reason to think the technique will ever become routine. Another reason: the expense. Scientific research is expensive. Scientists also have to work within budgets. Why waste the time and money when there are other more productive and promising avenues of research?
Since you are so knowledgable, yet you diminish (and at points try to deride) the looming cloning trend, I'd say there is quite some effort by you to mischaracterize the actual current situation, re cloning.
Of course I'm trying to diminish the concern over this "looming trend." There is no rational reason to believe it will go anywhere. I don't think people should spend a lot of time worrying about non-problems. (I also didn't take the Y2K crisis seriously, and I was right on that, too.) I'm not trying to mischaracterize anything: I'm presenting the reality as it exists within the scientific community. What you see in the popular media is a gross distortion of the reality. You know the media as well as I do (if you didn't, you wouldn't frequent FreeRepublic); the media distorts science just as grossly as they distort everything else.
You continue to refer to the past use of cloning at the DNA splicing level,
Not past, but current and extremely common.
as if the current efforts to do somatic cell nuclear transfer into an enucleated human ovum is a passing phase.
It is a passing phase. See above. The reality is, it is a curiosity worth a lot of discussion, but it isn't being done. I doubt that even that company you mentioned is actually carrying out such research; they are a bunch of publicity and money seekers with little scientific justification for what they propose. They are taking the start-up company route because they can't get funding through any of the normal channels.
You want an amoral environment in which to continue pressing the exploitation of individual human life.
Wrong. You have completely mischaracterized what I said. I don't think you'll get very far in trying to get "therapeutic" or "reproductive cloning" banned if your only arguments against it are moral. Honestly, do you think Kate Michaelman will take a stand against such practices because YOU say they are immoral? I have pointed out, over and over, some of the scientific problems and dangers re: "therapeutic cloning" (and I haven't even BEGUN on "reproductive cloning"); why do you think I would make such an effort to sway people against the practice on a scientific basis if I were FOR it? Does it not occur to you that if I supported the practice, I wouldn't bother mentioning the problems/dangers, and instead would be hyping all of the supposed miracle cures waiting just around the corner? The reason that I pursue the scientific argument rather than the moral is that I haven't seen any proof that purely moral arguments convince anyone who doesn't share the same code of morality. Some people think genetic engineering (an aspect of DNA cloning) is immoral, but it hasn't stopped and isn't likely to, because the scientific case against it has not been made.
And yes, the more people know the facts, re taking the nuclear material from a donor cell and injecting it into the enucleated ovum to conceive a duplicate alive individual human organism from which to cannibalize body parts (stem cells), the more likely people are to oppose such a brave new amoral world.
Although this practice (embryo creation) is unlikely to occur for the reasons I already pointed out, I've decided to stir things up a bit and let you in on a little secret. Aldous Huxley's Brave New World is technically possible right now. People can and do make "designer" mice right now. (I myself have designed a mouse; it has not been made yet.) Why isn't this in the news? Why no controversy? Oh, yeah--no one has advocated doing this to people.
You got my particular attention when you chided me that you were considering IVF. Since you don't consider the embryos the technicians will conceive from your ova in a dish to be individual human lives in need of life support, upon what do you think rests the objections I have raised?
Actually, I didn't say I don't consider them individuals, or that I don't think of them as human, or that I think they are not alive. They are, all three. What I said is that I don't think they have souls yet, and thus, do not merit the same level of consideration as an embryo that has a brain, a soul, the ability to feel, etc. (When does brain tissue appear? Around 3, 4, 5 weeks?) I'm not for the wholesale destruction of such pre-implantation embryos, but the idea of them spending eternity living in a liquid nitrogen tank doesn't upset me.
BTW, see what I mean about trying to convince someone on the basis of a moral argument when they don't share your exact morals? (Sorry, I couldn't help myself.)
What the sceintists want to do is grow tissues and organs from embryonic stem cells (acquired via SCNT cloning), THEN implant the resulting rejection-free tissues to treat disease or injury. That is precisely what scientists are seeking to perfect currently. Perhaps you are not. Good for you. Others are hellbent to do the science (SCNT) and exploit the cloned embryos.
Why are there not numerous funded private companies doing the start up right now? Because it is not yet clear whether our elected representatives will ban this heinous exploitation of human life thus 'blowing away' the start up funding (which, as you are aware, is substantial risk of capital).