Thread: Why is cloning "profoundly wrong"?

Originally Posted by hoglahoo

Hmm, interesting...

Probably should have been a tad more careful there.
That embryo, in the right circumstances and environment, could become a human. There are a number of reasons (besides what I assume is the interesting one)why the embryo would not eventually become a human.

Originally Posted by singlewedge

Twins have there own separate identities, memories, likes, dislikes, they are two DIFFERENT people with a lot in common.

But they are still clones of each other. So what is your point? A clone is a clone.



Scott

Originally Posted by singlewedge

When one says the word clone, or offers up cloning waht generally comes to mind is AN EXACT COPY of yourself. A person that has the same memories, the same likes and dislikes..

not medically possibly now, nor it is likely going to be in the next 100 years. however, they can take some dna from adult me, implant it in an embyro and using a surrogate mother, "grow" a brand new baby me.

it won't be an adult, it won't have any memories or anything. it's a newborn. the only thing it has in common with me is that it will look like i did at the same age, assuming a certain commonality of environment.

or, if you have an embryo already, take some dna and make more. then you have artificially created twins (or triplets or whatever).

that's what is possible now.

Originally Posted by honedright

But they are still clones of each other. So what is your point? A clone is a clone.



Scott

Point is that in my example that they are two DIFFERENT people. Whereas a clone is AN EXACT COPY.

A clone that is a baby as JockeyS states is, in my mind, nothing more than a twin. It will be a DIFFERENT person with different likes and dislikes etc, etc.

Originally Posted by singlewedge

Point is that in my example that they are two DIFFERENT people. Whereas a clone is AN EXACT COPY.

A clone that is a baby as JockeyS states is, in my mind, nothing more than a twin. It will be a DIFFERENT person with different likes and dislikes etc, etc.

Monozygotic twins (identical twins) are genetically exact copies of each other (same genotype and phenotype). They are still two different people, but have the potential to have all of the same likes, dislikes, etc depending on outside influences. If you think in terms of nature vs nurture, they both have the exact same nature, but may have similar or different nurture influences affecting who they eventually become. In order to have the exact same memories, etc would require doing or forcing something unethical, in my opinion, upon one or both individuals.

But I don't really think that this science fiction scenerio is the issue at hand concerning cloning.



Scott

OK...

A clone in my example is an exact copy with the same life experiences, likes, dislikes, friends, memories, etc..
The clone would remember the time that little Timmy Brown pantsed you at the school play when you were two and feel the shame and embarrassment.

A twin would remember the event as an outsider but and would empathize with your shame and embarrassment but would not feel it or remember it that vividly or in the same way.

Originally Posted by smokelaw1

Because a clone is a human being (I think we might have had this conversation before), and I do not believe an embryo is.
I'm with Jockeys here. A human is a human, no matter how it is born/comes to be. An embryo is a clump of cells that could, given certain circumstances, and assuming nothing goes wrong, someday become a human.

So, why not then simply create a clone of whomever needs medical help, but then you can stop that clone's development at whatever pre-determined (or rather yet to be determined) point in gestation before it actually gains rights as a human being? Perform a legal abortion and harvest your brandy-new people-parts.

I mean, embryonic stem cells belong to who knows what kind of people, why not be sure of the stem cells, or spare body parts, you will be recieving will be a good genetic match, right?

Originally Posted by singlewedge

OK...

A clone in my example is an exact copy with the same life experiences, likes, dislikes, friends, memories, etc..
The clone would remember the time that little Timmy Brown pantsed you at the school play when you were two and feel the shame and embarrassment.

A twin would remember the event as an outsider but and would empathize with your shame and embarrassment but would not feel it or remember it that vividly or in the same way.

That is purely science fiction.

Jockeys has a better idea of the possible reality in my understanding of it.

Originally Posted by singlewedge

OK...

A clone in my example is an exact copy with the same life experiences, likes, dislikes, friends, memories, etc..

Clone is strictly a genetic term. What you are suggesting is purely science fiction.



Scott

Originally Posted by xman

Not too many. Japan was about ready to surrender to Russia, but we couldn't have that now could we?X

What's your source for that? This quote refers to "A World At Arms" by Weinberg:
"Weinberg demolishes claims that the Japanese were themselves desperately trying to exit the war in the summer of 1945. The messages the Tokyo government sent to its embassies in Moscow and elsewhere were so naive that its own envoys cabled back to urge a greater sense of realism."
Additionally, it was expected that even if we successfully invaded and occupied Japan, the Japanese army on the mainland would continue fighting.