What's Wrong With Cloning?

MHGinTN ^ | 1/31/2003 | MHGinTN

[MHGinTN]

The President called for a ban on cloning in his State of the Union Address. So, what's wrong with cloning?

Every individual life is a continuum hallmarked by growth and development. We are invited, through the media, to differentiate reproductive cloning from therapeutic cloning, but both conceive a cloned individual human being, in vitro. Scientists seeking to exploit therapeutic cloning would have us believe that, because their goal doesn't include life support to the birth stage, their 'form' of cloning is okay. Far from it; it's a worse application of the technology. Therapeutic cloning seeks to conceive 'designer' individual human beings, give them life support either in a growth medium or a woman's body, then kill and harvest from these individuals the target tissues for which the cloned being was conceived.

It is important to realize that an embryo IS an individual human being: goals of cloning scientists bear witness to the hidden truth that they are conceiving a unique human being, whether for reproductive or therapeutic aims. Giving tacit acceptance to a proven lie --that the embryo is not an individual human life-- is bad enough, we’ve done this for more than thirty years, but to embrace cannibalism founded on such a lie is far more degenerate.

Tacit acceptance for manipulating individual human life has lead from in vitro fertilization to partial birth infanticide, proving the bankruptcy of continuing moderate acceptance. We are now staring at cannibalism in the name of whatever you care to call it. Even an embryo no bigger than a grain of sugar is an individual human life. Is it acceptable to kill that individual for their body parts? If you think that it is, at least know that it is cannibalism.

[Shethink13]

No nerve and brain development mean a Blastocyst is not a person yet. At 7 weeks they can feel pleasure and pain so after that point im willing to consider them a person. Not before.

Why do you guys ALWAYS change the wording from "life" to "person"? Is it an attempt to assuage a guilty conscience? The comment is "human life begins at conception", not "personhood begins at conception".

Just a side note - but for the sake of argument I will use your terminology.

So, you have pinpointed the exact time that a "blastocyst" turns into a "person", right? You know this for absolute fact, correct? No ifs, ands or buts. So, 48 days, 23 hours and 59 seconds after conception it's just a ball of cells and miraculously one second later the "personhood fairy" comes down from the sky and grants that this ball of cells is now a life.

Do you not understand the absurdity of your argument?

[weikel]

Of course there is a gradual boot up period. But in blastoclyst stage the nervous boot up has even started.

[Junior]

Of course, if you reared him right, the clone might turn into a passable human being...

[MHGinTN]

So, to what species did the individual human life belong prior to this magical point when individual human begins by your assertion?

[weikel]

To the non sentient tissue form of life.

[GSWarrior]

Equal Rights For Clones Now
Clones March on City Hall
Hate Crimes Against Clones Skyrocket

Hmmmm........

[MHGinTN]

Wow, that sounds series. Got cheese?

[MHGinTN]

That's not a species. Try again ...

[weikel]

Well thats what it is.

[exile]

I agree whole heartedly. I've never had a problem with cloning. Most people I've spoken to reject it on religious grounds or because it's "creepy." But think about it, taking organs from corpses and implanting them in living people sounds creepy, but it's done all the time. As for creating life, don't doctors already do it with fertility treatments and soforth? I really think this is overblown.

[MHGinTN]

Actually, the human conceptus is in the species of humans, not some other species then suddenly upon arriving at a specific cellular accumulation, instantly into the human species. In logical flow, species designation comes first, then ages of a member of the species, based on form and function.

[Askel5]

Can one cell house two souls? Yes.

I'll definitely go get the body of his comments and post them to this thread.

I believe you are incorrect on this point, however. Only when the cell has divided into two distinct bodies are there two souls present.

Duo sunt in homine refers ONLY to each man's having a soul ... as reflected in his having two sources of knowledge: ratio (which he shares with lesser creatures) as well as intellectus, that fragment ofi spiritual light by which he has recourse to an intuitive knowledge of truth.

[GSWarrior]

I'm something of a layman about this subject, as are most of us, but I guess I fall into the "it's creepy" side of the issue.

Are clones to be granted the same rights as womb-ers?

[MHGinTN]

How will we find out, but through experiment? Theory is nice, but someone's gotta get in the lab and do it to find out... Let the research perfect the cloning process with higher 'other' mammals, to the extent that a clone may be conceived, implanted, and born, as a singlet embryo (with no toss outs of failed embryos) and I wouldn't picket the clone techs. But therapeutic cloning has a quite different object; this use of cloning seeks to conceive individual human life, give it life support for a while until tissues differentiate to the desired age, then kill and harvest the cloned individual human. That's cannibalism. I'm not accepting cannibalism for my nation without a good fight.

[MHGinTN]

My mentor. ... Askel, both twons had their origin in the original single cell of fecundation. The way I use soul is different from the way I use spirit. To me, soulis the behavior mechanism. As such, two behavior mechanisms could be housed in one body ... but I don't want to take this into religious realms, if possible, because there is so much that needs debating from the scientific perspective, to raise awareness as our nation faces the prospects of human cloning. Only when the science is clearly understood can we expect to make informed judgement regarding the issues of cloning.

[cpforlife.org]

MHGinTN my friend,

At a recent pro-life meeting a medical expert was speaking of cloning. As I understood him, he said that we are each quite different genetically now than we were at conception, 1-year old, 10 years ago, etc. He went on to explain technical problems because of this. I am out of my element in this field, but want to learn. Could you shed some light on this?

He did also say that human cloning (not parts--but of persons) is always wrong, just as abortion is always wrong; because God (and only God) Is the true Author and Lord of Life. When we try to be God, BIG problems always happen. And with this I whole-heartedly and enthusiastically agree!

[cpforlife.org]

weikel

From the moment of your conception you were a PERSON with potential not a potential person (just as today). If you are a Christian, please read the first chapter of Luke (verses 26-38) and ask yourself: Just when did the Second Person of the Trinity become a human being; implantation, when His Heart started beating (18-25 days), viability, or when Mary conceived Him?

[weikel]

No I was an undiffrentiated blastoclyst for a few weeks after conception. No self awareness etc.

[jennyp]

Actually, the human conceptus is in the species of humans, not some other species then suddenly upon arriving at a specific cellular accumulation, instantly into the human species. In logical flow, species designation comes first, then ages of a member of the species, based on form and function.

I see your point, but so what? If I remove a cell from my body, it's a human cell. So...?

An embryo is a human embryo. But it's still just an embryo! Likewise a person whose brain has stopped functioning for the last time is a human cadaver. But the human person doesn't exist anymore.

[ChuxsterS]

What's wrong with human cloning?

Spiritual concerns aside, there's a very simple ethical reason why humans should not be cloned, at least for now. Cloning is an infant technology. Dolly the sheep was cloned a mere 5 years ago. Dolly, 5 years old, shows signs of premature aging and severe arthritis, which may well owe to genetic defects. Other animal clones have exhibited problems as well.

Now, the modern-day Dr. Mengele's of the world are in a rush to experiment with human cloning. Either they're too stupid to realize the ethical dimension of what they're doing, or too sick to care, but the result of their experiment is a human being who may live a short, miserable life with incurable illnesses.

Until we've gotten to the point where we have thorough understanding of animal cloning, we shouldn't even think of cloning humans.