Cloning

Cloning. It looks as if the variant of manipulating nature based on the idea of multiplying human beings is coming within the reach of modern science quickly.

Today's scientists have already been able to clone a sheep. The living result is Dolly: a normal ewe, alive and kicking, she's just an exact copy of her celldonor. When more of less the same technique would be used on humans, that would mean the solution of many problems.

Infertile and gay couples could have a baby by having themselves cloned. Serious diseases like Alzheimer and Parkinson could be cured by transplanting unaffected cells (donated by an embryo that is a clone of the patient himself) into the brain. Donor organs would no longer have to come from outsiders, but could be produced with stemcells (cells that carry the potency to develop into any part of the human body) from the copy of the patient. This process prevents the organ from being rejected by the patient's body, because it is built out of the same tissue. So what's all the fuss about?

In order to create a kidney for instance, first a complete embryo (a clone of the patient) has to be 'produced' in order to donate the kidney cells. After the embryo has fulfilled its task, it will be aborted. But even 'producing' the embryo by cloning already raises a lot of problems. If cloning is practiced on humans in order to provide children it will cause huge infant mortality. When cloned children grow up they'll probably have to face an identity crisis, because they'll exactly resemble one of their parents. Another disadvantage of cloning is that it can easily be used for a lot of questionable aims, like in the book 'The Boys from Brazil'.

My opinion. I admit cloning human beings to grow spare organs is a very tempting idea. On the other hand aborting your own clone sounds awful. I'm absolutely not against 'normal' abortion, but in relation to cloning I feel it's somehow wrong. In fact you're exploiting your own child to save your life. So when science ever comes that far, it has to be determined which side puts more weight in the scales.

I immediately reject the thought of cloning humans when this is meant to enable childless couples to have a baby. These couples will have to accept they'll never have their own son or daughter, however cruel that may sound.