Wellcome to the cloning message board

[Roger Moorgate]

*** UPDATE NOVEMBER 2006 ***

Click here to submit a question on cloning, genetic engineering or stem cell research...
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This is the fourth cloning FAQ page.
The first page can be found here:
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The second page can be found here:
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The third page can be found here:
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Regards,
Roger
Admin, The Reproductive Cloning Network
www.reproductivecloning.net
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The rest of this post is part of an ongoing discussion with Agatha regarding the ethics of therapeutic cloning. The discussion started here:
cloning.proboards77.com/index.cgi?board=general&action=display&thread=1132077294&page=3#1146313103
Or perhaps it actually started back here:
cloning.proboards77.com/index.cgi?board=general&action=display&thread=1132077294&page=3#1143075209

Agatha said:

admin said:

When does life begin? Perhaps we should explain some definitions here. Of course an embryo is alive, the sperm and oocyte that combine to create the embryo are alive, the embryonic cells that generate the germ line that eventually becomes sperm and oocytes are alive, even the skin cells we scrape off our bodies in the morning as we shave are alive. Perhaps I am splitting hairs (no pun intended), but “when does life begin” is actually a non-sequitur, a logical fallacy, each life is just a continuation of life, genes pass immortally from generation to generation, life does not spontaneously generate de novo, life does not “begin”. Once we accept that the embryo is alive, as is every other living biological cell, we next have to move on to what status should society grant the human embryo and is it immoral to ALLOW the usage of embryos for potentially life-saving medical treatments or is it immoral to NOT ALLOW the usage of embryos for potentially life-saving medical treatments. We all seek the ethical path. This is the crux of the aforementioned Byrne et al paragraph:

"The scientific debate regarding therapeutic human cloning revolves around the therapeutic benefits against the ethical cost of destroying the early cloned embryo. Many allocate to the early embryo the status of an individual with fundamental human rights and consider the destruction of that embryo equivalent to murder (Shenfield et al., 2001). Several details should be considered when debating the issue. The early mammalian embryo is a ball of cells without even a rudimentary nervous system, and the division of this ball of cells into two or more parts results in two or more monozygotic twins. Thus whether this early embryo can yet be classified as an ‘‘individual’’ is questionable. Abortion legislation in most countries has already established that the rights and choices of grown adults supersede the rights of the early embryo. Most embryos (>70%) that result from natural sexual reproduction do not implant into the uterine endometrium. If each of these embryos has fundamental human rights, this would make premeditated attempts at pregnancy by natural sexual reproduction the logical equivalent of mass murder. The ethical considerations basically come down to our society’s value system. Which is of greater value, the life of an adult or child dying from a degenerative disease, or a 5-day-old embryo that is little more than a ball of cells?"
(Byrne and Gurdon (2002) Commentary on Human Cloning, Differentiation, 69;154-157)

Here I feel that your three responses all address a straw man, namely your prior assumption that I do not think an embryo is alive, which is incorrect. Regarding your question of where we should draw the line. Philosophically I'm opposed to drawing lines in ethically complex fields. I would suggest that drawing lines can be a somewhat narrow-minded potentially dangerous approach; I can give examples if you wish. Ideally, each case should be evaluated rationally based on it's pros and cons. However, pragmatically, society dictates that generalized rules and lines be drawn. So, reluctantly, scientists came up with the 14-day rule. Embryos can be used for stem cell research while they are in their pre-implantation stage where they are an undifferentiated ball of cells, without even a single differentiated body cell. No heart, no brain, no body. This would allow us to obtain stem cells from these early embryos to potentially cure or alleviate the symptoms of degenerative disease. Getting back to the question I don’t feel has yet been answered: Why do you consider it UNETHICAL to destroy embryos in attempts to save lives but consider it ETHICAL to destroy embryos in attempts to procreate?

Regards,
Roger
Admin, The Reproductive Cloning Network
www.reproductivecloning.net
Please post any new questions or comments here:
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Roger, there is a fundamental point that seems to have escaped your argument. You say that a skin cell is alive, and an embryo is alive: and then you say they are the same. You say that life is just a never-ending cycle, and does not ever simply start.

My only reply is: DNA. A skin cell is alive, but it is merely a part of the whole, one of countless cells making up the human body, sharing the DNA of the rest of the body’s cells. The only future it ever has to hope for is to be, like you said, scraped off in a morning shave. An embryo, on the other hand, from the moment of its fertilization, has its own DNA – completely unique from that of either parent, and with a much more hopeful future then that of the skin cell. Likewise, because it has separate DNA, it is not simply a continuation of its parents’ lives, as you claim, but its own separate entity.

This is a side note. I assume that you are not a Creationist, and remind you that according to Darwin’s natural selection, genes do not “pass immortally from generation to generation.”

So, since a human embryo is not just like any other cell, I see no reason to move on to considerations about what rights we ought to “grant” it.

The immortal gene is the central tenet of Neo-Darwinism (Dawkins (1976) The Selfish Gene). I should include the caveat that over extended periods of time genetic mutations will slowly change the gene and if those mutations are beneficial then they will be selected for by natural selection, mutation being the fuel for evolution. But for our limited purposes, from our perspective and due to our extremely limited time on this earth, the gene can be considered immortal. Certainly, we are almost sure to contain exact copies of specific genes from our parents, the exact identical DNA (albeit with a mutation here and there) this is the essence of my argument regarding life not beginning de novo and the immortal gene. If you are referring to the new ordering of genetic alleles in the zygote as being worthy of some special status then you must afford each sperm that status, as each sperm has also (through meiosis) received a unique array of DNA. I do not, as you suggest, claim that an embryo has no worth, only that I believe a child is of infinitely greater worth and I would never consider sacrificing that child’s life through my refusal to utilize stem cells derived from what is, when we get right down to it, an undifferentiated pliable ball of cells. And the early embryo is not necessarily a “whole” it can split into parts each of which can result in a child, this is how identical twins result. Indeed, when we biopsy a cell or two from an embryo to test for genetic diseases (prenatal genetic diagnosis) those cells had the potential, if implanted into a uterus, to develop into a child. Are you against prenatal genetic diagnosis? Just as a point of interest, thousands of embryos are discarded by IVF clinics each year. Are you also opposed to scientists trying to develop potentially life-saving stem cell based medical treatments from those embryos that are going to be discarded anyway, and if so, why?

Agatha said:

I am surprised about your response to my question about drawing the line. Philosophically, you say, you’re “opposed to drawing lines in ethically complex fields.” This is almost comical, considering that just as I am arguing the ethical reasons against embryonic research, you are arguing the ethical reasons for embryonic research. You say that it will help people. Well, logically, if you say that if one stage has no worth (embryonic), and that a further stage has enough worth to deserve help (adult), there must be some place in the middle where you have to choose between the two. You say that each case should be evaluated individually – and I understand your reasons, but I also wonder at your unabashed trust in your own judgment.

Mea Culpa, Mea Culpa, I do have unabashed trust in my own judgment. I’m rational, educated and well informed on the issue at hand, plus I’m a passionate advocate of individualism. Who’s judgment do you suggest I put my trust in, the Catholic Church? Almost comical it may be, but I stand beside my statement that drawing lines in ethically complex fields can be a somewhat narrow-minded potentially dangerous approach, and the Catholic Church in particular has an exceptionally bad history in this regard. Let us brush over the line draw under the incorrect geocentric universe, the Inquisition and the Crusades, and move on to the questionable lines the Catholic Church currently draws. The current so-called pro-life policies of the church dictates against using embryos for medical research and against using condoms in AIDS-infected sub-Saharan Africa, both lines will directly result in the miserable existence and premature death of millions of adults and children. I think I will stick to my own rational and informed judgments. I should also mention that lines do NOT have to be drawn, we can perform informed comparisons of information and decide on the ethically correct course of action without drawing some arbitrary line whereby something supposedly goes from being absolutely ethical to absolutely unethical. Each case should ideally be decided, as I mentioned before, on merit. However, as I also previously mentioned, scientists did, under pressure and somewhat reluctantly, come up with a line for embryo research, the 14-day rule:
Embryos can be used for stem cell research while they are in their pre-implantation stage where they are an undifferentiated ball of cells, without even a single differentiated body cell. No heart, no brain, no body. This would allow us to obtain stem cells from these early embryos to potentially cure or alleviate the symptoms of degenerative disease.
As an interesting aside, you claim that life begins at conception, when a sperm fertilizes an oocyte, but conception does not occur in nuclear transfer (cloning). Are clones not alive?

Agatha said:

You asked: Why do you consider it UNETHICAL to destroy embryos to save lives but consider it ETHICAL to destroy embryos in attempts to procreate?

First of all, might I ask how the <70% figure was found, because I have seen statistics much lower – as low as 15%. The vast majority of those lost are abnormal embryos which could not have developed and are screened naturally by the body. This is an early miscarriage.

Not that it is particularly important from an ethical standpoint whether the number is 70% or 15%, embryos are still destroyed in both cases, but I’d be interested to know where you got 15%? If only 15% of embryos fail to implant, then we can logically conclude that 85% of embryos do indeed implant. And, if 85% of embryos implant, why on earth does it take on average several cycles of IVF, each with multiple embryos transferred, to obtain a single pregnancy? For the record, my reference for the >70% of embryos failing to implant is: Byrne and Gurdon (2002) Commentary on Human Cloning, Differentiation, 69;154-157.

Agatha said:

I would like to point out the difference between what is intentional and unintentional. I consider it unethical to destroy human life for whatever reason; but the loss of embryos for the purpose of procreation is not destruction. It is not intentional. The destruction of an embryo for the purpose of therapeutic advancement, however, is intentional, and this is wrong. There is a difference between death and murder.

I’m having trouble grasping how you ethically distinguished between the two based on “intention”. When people attempt to procreate, their intention is to obtain a child, the embryonic destruction that accompanies this is unfortunate but certainly not their primary goal. When parent’s attempt to save their child’s life using stem cell based medical treatments, their intention is to save their child’s life, the embryonic destruction that accompanies this is unfortunate but certainly not their primary goal.

Regards,
Roger
Admin, The Reproductive Cloning Network
www.reproductivecloning.net
Please post any new questions or comments here:
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[Roger Moorgate]

nolan said:

How will children conveived through cloning [be treated] by people other than their families? My guess is there will be serious discrimination against human clones. Look how kids with HIV were treated back in the late eighties. Most people will likely be tolerant whether or not they support cloning itself--but it doesn't take many rotten apples to spoil the whole batch.

The few people I've read who have expressed opinions suggesting that clones will be less than human have been against cloning, by the way, rather than for it.

Hi Nolan, that’s an interesting question. I can not predict exactly how various people will treat children conceived by cloning, but I do not personally believe third party bigotry and discrimination should be a deciding factor on whether or not one conceives a biologically related child. Various segments of white American society are discriminatory against black and/or Latino children but very few would demand that these minority children not be born due to society’s racism. Children conceived by cloning would be morphologically indistinguishable from other children their age, so any discrimination would presumably be directed against their method of conception (somatic cell nuclear transfer). In this regard I would assume that society would progress towards accepting these children in much a similar fashion as children conceived through other forms of artificial reproduction, such as IVF, have now been larger accepted. I hope this answers your question.

Regards,
Roger
Admin, The Reproductive Cloning Network
www.reproductivecloning.net
Please post any new questions or comments here:
cloning.proboards77.com/index.cgi?board=general&action=post&thread=1150053885&page=1

[Natalie]

What are the advantages and disadvantages of repreductive cloning, theriputic cloning and natural cloning?

[George]

Natalie said:

What are the advantages and disadvantages of repreductive cloning, theriputic cloning and natural cloning?

Here's a list from the Human Cloning Foundation on the benefits of cloning:
Rejuvenation. Dr. Richard Seed, one of the leading proponents of human cloning technology, suggests that it may someday be possible to reverse the aging process because of what we learn from cloning.
Human cloning technology could be used to reverse heart attacks. Scientists believe that they may be able to treat heart attack victims by cloning their healthy heart cells and injecting them into the areas of the heart that have been damaged. Heart disease is the number one killer in the United States and several other industrialized countries.
There has been a breakthrough with human stem cells. Embryonic stem cells can be grown to produce organs or tissues to repair or replace damaged ones. Skin for burn victims, brain cells for the brain damaged, spinal cord cells for quadriplegics and paraplegics, hearts, lungs, livers, and kidneys could be produced. By combining this technology with human cloning technology it may be possible to produce needed tissue for suffering people that will be free of rejection by their immune systems. Conditions such as Alzheimer's disease, Parkinson's disease, diabetes, heart failure, degenerative joint disease, and other problems may be made curable if human cloning and its technology are not banned.
Infertility. With cloning, infertile couples could have children. Despite getting a fair amount of publicity in the news current treatments for infertility, in terms of percentages, are not very successful. One estimate is that current infertility treatments are less than 10 percent successful. Couples go through physically and emotionally painful procedures for a small chance of having children. Many couples run out of time and money without successfully having children. Human cloning could make it possible for many more infertile couples to have children than ever before possible.
Plastic, reconstructive, and cosmetic surgery. Because of human cloning and its technology the days of silicone breast implants and other cosmetic procedures that may cause immune disease should soon be over. With the new technology, instead of using materials foreign to the body for such procedures, doctors will be able to manufacture bone, fat, connective tissue, or cartilage that matches the patients tissues exactly. Anyone will able to have their appearance altered to their satisfaction without the leaking of silicone gel into their bodies or the other problems that occur with present day plastic surgery. Victims of terrible accidents that deform the face should now be able to have their features repaired with new, safer, technology. Limbs for amputees may be able to be regenerated.
Breast implants. Most people are aware of the breast implant fiasco in which hundreds of thousands of women received silicone breast implants for cosmetic reasons. Many came to believe that the implants were making them ill with diseases of their immune systems. With human cloning and its technology breast augmentation and other forms of cosmetic surgery could be done with implants that would not be any different from the person's normal tissues.
Defective genes. The average person carries 8 defective genes inside them. These defective genes allow people to become sick when they would otherwise remain healthy. With human cloning and its technology it may be possible to ensure that we no longer suffer because of our defective genes.
Down's syndrome. Those women at high risk for Down's syndrome can avoid that risk by cloning.
Tay-Sachs disease. This is an autosomal recessive genetic disorder could be prevented by using cloning to ensure that a child does not express the gene for the disorder
liver failure. We may be able to clone livers for liver transplants
kidney failure. We may be able to clone kidneys for kidney transplants
leukemia. We should be able to clone the bone marrow for children and adults suffering from leukemia. This is expected to be one of the first benefits to come from cloning technology.
cancer. We may learn how to switch cells on and off through cloning and thus be able to cure cancer. Scientists still do not know exactly how cells differentiate into specific kinds of tissue, nor to they understand why cancerous cells lose their differentiation. Cloning, at long last, may be the key to understanding differentiation and cancer.
cystic fibrosis. We may be able to produce effective genetic therapy against cystic fibrosis. Ian Wilmut and colleagues are already working on this problem.
spinal cord injury. We may learn to grow nerves or the spinal cord back again when they are injured. Quadriplegics might be able to get out of their wheelchairs and walk again. Christopher Reeves, the man who played Superman, might be able to walk again.
testing for genetic disease. Cloning technology can be used to test for and perhaps cure genetic diseases.

[chasity]

why is there debate about the science of cloning

[George Waite]

chasity said:

why is there debate about the science of cloning

I think I answer that question on my site
www.reproductivecloning.net/freehosting/waite/

[sara]

what is reproductive cloning and how is it done?

[saima]

Reproductive cloning is a technology used to generate an animal that has the same nuclear DNA as another currently or previously existing animal. Dolly the sheep, was created by reproductive cloning technology. In a process called "somatic cell nuclear transfer" (SCNT), scientists transfer genetic material from the nucleus of a donor adult cell to an egg whose nucleus, and thus its genetic material, has been removed. The reconstructed egg containing the DNA from a donor cell must be treated with chemicals or electric current in order to stimulate cell division. Once the cloned embryo reaches a suitable stage, it is transferred to the uterus of a female host where it continues to develop until birth.

[DJN]

What is the disadvantage of conning?is conning good or bad?


If you got answer email me at [e-mail]

[George]

DJN said:

What is the disadvantage of conning?is conning good or bad? If you got answer email me at [e-mail]

Reproductive cloning disadvantage: children produced through reproductive cloning may have developmental defects.

Reproductive cloning advantage: allows infertile couples to conceive a biologically related child.

Therapeutic cloning disadvantage: many human eggs are required to produce cloned human embryos and the cloned human embryos must be destroyed to produce the therapeutically useful cloned embryonic stem cells.

Therapeutic cloning advantage: the cloned stem cells will not be rejected by the patients immune system and may allow us to save the lives of people dying from various degenerative diseases.

[AcEgEnE]

Without any debate:
Life begins at G2M
The point of conception marks the commencement of diploid life
Never heard about it
then you are part of the confused majority
check out [e-mail]

[julie]

What are the benefits of human cloning

[hin socheat]

1. :)what are the advantages and disadvantages of human cloning ?
2. can u show me the statistic of human cloning?
3. is it safe enough to clone human ?

[hin socheat]

1. what are the advantages and disadvantages of human cloning?
2. can u show me the statistic of human cloning?-how many defective clones, how many sucessful clones, and how many clones help in medical breakthrough?
3. is it safe enough to clone human being?

[mike]

how do u clone