Recreation US plans to ban Cloning of Humans.

Cloning could truly help people.
I believe that human cloning should be used for medical reasons, but only when absolutley necisary and all other options have failed.
But at the same time, creating new lives for the puprose of another just doesn't seem right 2 me.
But then again, it's not like the government (or anyone else with authority) would even thing of listening 2 me!

 

bleh. I am wafffling like Clinton here. Mord had a good point, but then I just don't see how a clone could hope to have a normal childhood. That just wouldn't be fair.

Sure, some, or even most, would. Still, that doesn't justify those that don't. I know people now don't always have it good, but why add to it..

So, for the moment, I'm back to not liking it. We'll see what tomorrow brings.

 

millions of people are on waiting lists, dying of dezeeses, and if cloning came around, then that would be solved.
and if the cloned people have no family, put them up for adoption or something. or chop them up and give the organs out. (i have dibs on the brain)
and wats so wrong with parents choosing how a kid looks? that dont matter, like, who would care? my eye colours natural, yours is not. woopy doo)
in other words, i think cloning is OK. OK. OK.
religious people can belive wat they want, but this is the real world,people. deal with it.

 

wait a sec...

Can they actually clone organs from a person's DNA without using stem cells from another person?

Until this happens I'm not really sure if the whole organ thing will work out. I learned in biology a while ago that the immune system would reject a foreign organ that does not have the same genetic flags as that person. So, if they grew a new organ using stem cells which have a different genetic flag then that organ would be rejected... So, overall if the body rejects it does that mean that it's not meant to be? or should scientists keep on working on this, yet they'll probably run into more problems... (maybe humans are just not meant to tweak around with such a grand design.)

 

For the babies in the womb...It's a part of nature that some people are ill or defective. I think I'd say that this would be ok IF the child would suffer. I would fix only that which would really hurt or is a serious threat to the child's life.

i agree with the cloning of organs as well, but i don't think it should be used to make whole people. There's enough humans being made through the natural process as it is. Why needlessly create what already exists?

 

Re: wait a sec...

I think you misinterpreted... think of it as two games using the Quake 3 engine.

Do they have the same mood/play style? No.
Do they have the same graphics (appearance)? Not necessarily.

Do they have the same underlying code running the whole thing? Yes. You could move a mod over to another with little trouble.

 

This seems to be an ongoing issue. I've talked about this many times with friends, in school, etc.

No one really knows what's going on with cloning but the people who are doing it themselves (creating the clones). I mean, we read things in the news about how far along they are getting, and we hear rumours, etc. But, there could be projects going on out there that we can't even fathom. I agree with DrunkLeprachaun on this one, saying that if they DID perfect it, we'd eventually end up with disaster. There may be good in the human race, but as of late, there seems to be more evil. What we would start out trying to make good, would eventually end up bad because some jerk decides he wants to use the technology for the wrong things. Don't get me wrong, I believe in the 'power of good' and all that in the human race, but...we'll never all be unanimous on a certain subject, and there ARE people out there who are just plain evil. That's all there is to it.

 

Personally I believe no technology is inherently evil, only people can be evil.

Just think. A hammer can be used to help build a home, or help repair a boat. But just make it a bit bigger, maybe make the ending a little pointy, and BAM! You got a war-hammer. And yes, they exist.

Consider airplanes. They can transport people to go see their relatives, or they can transport bombs to blow up cities. Is it the planes fault??? No! Its the persons!

And before anyone says 'explosives are never good!' what about clearing out a hazardous part of a mine? Or demolishing a building in a hazard zone?

And guns make hunting much easier, along with *defending*. Using them offensively, *thats* where they become evil.

Is cloning evil? Only when its misused, and even then its only evil if it fits in your view of what is evil.

 

Neph, that's what I was getting at. I didn't mean that the technology was evil, but that people can be. It can be produced, by man for a good reason, to help mankind, etc....but we can also flip it around to hurt people, and that's what I think would happen with cloning.

 

Re: Re: wait a sec...

Neph, a human body is much more complicated and advanced than a Quake game. I found the source that I need before to back me up :

"The immune response protects the body from potentially harmful substances (antigens) such as microorganisms, toxins, and cancer cells. The immune system distinguishes "self" from "foreign" by reacting to proteins on the surfaces of cells. It reacts against substances it recognizes as foreign (antigens). The presence of foreign blood or tissue in the body triggers an immune response that can result in blood transfusion reactions and transplant rejection when antibodies are formed against foreign antigens on the transplanted or transfused material. Before transplant, tissue is "typed" according to the antigens it contains (Histocompatibility antigens).

No two people (except identical twins) have identical tissue antigens. Therefore, in the absence of immunosuppressive drugs, organ and tissue transplantation would almost always causes an immune response against the foreign tissue (rejection), which would result in destruction of the transplant. Though tissue typing ensures that the organ or tissue is as similar as possible to the tissues of the recipient, unless the donor is an identical twin, no match is perfect and the possibility of organ/tissue rejection remains. Immunosuppressive therapy is used to prevent organ rejection, "(http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/ency/article/000815.htm).

But I think that there may be a way to supress the immune system to allow the organs to be used, and there may be a way in development to mask these foreign organs. I'm just saying that if it saves lives then it's a good thing, but if it destroys a life (ie. a fetus to harvest his/her stem cells when it may not even work,) then it isn't that great in my opinion.

And the whole clones being used for evil thing, I think that the human race is advancing technologically but not as wisely as we would all like... so this technology could cause preoblems unless we use it wisely, ya know?

 

Re: Re: Re: wait a sec...

Twins.

Same DNA.

Hmm.

Two games with the same source code? Suddenly what I was saying becomes more clear.

A clone is, for all intents and purposes, an identical twin. Same DNA code, same chromosomes, same blood type. The only real differences will be attitude and appearance.

 

Im all for cloning, it helps science alot.. and by the way- its the exact same thing as having a twin

 

Before I start, recommended reading with more explanations and the demystification of cloning:

Tom Hyman's "Jupiter's Daughter"
Robert A. Heinlein's "Time Enough For Love"

I think that everybody's who's posted here has some very good points. I mean, hey, let's go, c'mon, we could cure cancer!
It's a great idea in theory. But, what happens with the people who have this done before it's been perfected? Developping cloning will probably cause more trouble than the cloning itself.

Then, there's the moral issues. If we play at God, will we be punished for it? Even if you don't believe in a higher power, what happens if things go terribly wrong? What happens if in the process, we create soulless shells?

I'm all for cloning just the organs needed, because that will save lives without taking life away. Another thing, if we can correct extreme problems in the womb, that would be a good thing. What if a child was going to be still-born, simply because they didn't produce the right blood globine from birth?

If we perfected cloning, would it really be right to live forever? It would probably be a luxury only the rich could enjoy, and the world would soon be overpopulated into oblivion! We're already growing at an exponential rate!

As for when we do perfect cloning, there are millions of stories where clones are second class citizens, or even where people who aren't cloned become second class citizens.

Yeah, I had more to say, but you're probably sick of reading this by now.

 

Is it really right to be able to talk to people millions of miles away? Is it really right to be able to fly? Is it really right to be able to make the dark light? We can do all of these things, none of which any God ever intended us to do. Besides, I'd rather have cloning than nuclear weapons around... Why do we never hear 'God Never Wanted Us To Have Nukes', yet we do hear 'God Hates Cloning'?

And re: overpopulation, what if the overpopulation is what finally pushes enough money into space travel to make it affordable, and workable? Far fetched, but hey, our space program could use the boost

Personally, I doubt overpopulation due to cloning will ever be an issue, there's no financial gain to cloning full humans, so it will never catch on (And no, no government will ever allow cloned slave labor, so that won't be a motivational factor).

- Ark

 

I totally agree with Meaikoh_Takashi
Haven't you guys ever seen Jurassic Park III? The scientists tryed to play god with the dinosours and they over powered their creators and whent wild. I'm not saying the cloners would do this, but, who knows, it could happen. And, like someone, said earlier, there is no point in it. Why clone a baby when you can just "make" one. And if they do clone someone, thier mind doesn't go too so they don't live forever.

I am against cloning.
(except the stem cell, organ cloning stuff.)

 

I see your point, Ark. After all, we've never let morals stop science before! (j/k)

It's true, there is all this fuss about cloning, but nuclear war probably is a bigger threat. Given the choice between being overpopulated by Britney Spears and exploding, I'd probably pick exploding...but considering that even the most sadistic of people wouldn't clone Miz Spears, I think we'll do fine.

In any case, it would be interesting to see the results if we ever perfected it, but would that be a reason to clone? Because it's interesting? Darn, I'm contradicting myself again ^___^x

--The Devil's Advocate

 

Right, so. Firstly, Meaikoh suggested a couple of books about cloning, I'd reccomend Aldus Huxley's "Brave New World."
Now...

Nnnot quite. People turn out differently depending on how they were concieved, as well as their conditions when in the womb. The way identical twins would be similar would be different to the way that clones would be similar, I believe.

Not quite true. Countries have growth curves. Less developed countires have greater population increases(for various reasons), while more developed countries show very little growth(I believe japan's birth rate is actualy dropping below it's death rate). Seeing as the people in the third or second world would clearly not be able to afford this, by the time cloning is developed far enough to actualy create a person, there might actualy be room, even demand for clones to keep populations up.

 

I can't believe I forgot to suggest Brave New World, great book, ya?

I'm not especially for or against cloning. So long as my vegetables don't have eyes & ears (no puns about about potatoes or corn intended!)...okay, fine they can't have mouths, I insist on that!

There are pros and cons to it like in anything else. I'm glad we could bring this up as a topic.

I guess what I'm really hoping is that cloning doesn't get out of hand. If I can't send my kids outside to play one day because the dinos might get them, I'm going to be pretty p.o'ed.

I've yet to find a book on basic (really basic!) genetics, so here I stand.