Hi there!
Respond to the following questions in your discussion about the two articles that you've just finished reading.
What are some ethical issues with cloning? What is the difference between the two articles? Why would anyone want to clone? How should it be regulated if it were legal to clone others?
Respond to at least of one of your classmates.
Some ethical issues with cloning include it degrades the value of human life, scientists play God, if you grow a human only for parts it's barbarism, its murder, and it jeopardizes someone's emotions. The first article seemed to be more on the ethical issues and who uses cloning. The second seemed to be more about how to clone. People would want to clone to continue their bloodline, or just to remember a dead relative. They might also want some of the extra parts for medical uses. I have no idea how it should be regulated. There is so much uncertainty and imperfection with cloning that I can't say anything or make a decision. To be perfectly honest cloning is an ethical conundrum that I have no way of making a decision on.
ReplyDeleteThere are many ethical issues with cloning a person if the power to do it is used in the wrong ways. The idea of being a human will be devalued and changed forever. This is a huge downside with cloning, but cloning can also be used for good purposes like helping infertile couples or obtaining bone marrow to help a person with cancer. In the first article, the text is about the ethical debate about cloning and what it could be used for. The second article is more about what cloning is how it would be done. People would want to clone to bring back a dead person, have babies even it they are infertile, or grow an organ for another person. If cloning was legal, it should be allowed for purely medical uses and not just for somebody who wants to have a twin or replica of themselves.
ReplyDeleteNicolas:
ReplyDeleteI agree with everything you said. There really is no way to decide how cloning other people should be regulated. There's too much uncertainty and ethical issues clashing with medical benefits to decide. Also, cloning people would forever change the value of human life.
Some ethical issues are that many people think that cloning is degrading to human life and its natural ways. They called it unthinkable and a tunnel of madness.Cloning could be used in all the wrong ways if someone hadn't gained a full understanding of it.The first artical seemed to look at cloning at an ethical view and seemed to say cloning was outrageous and not right. The second artical looked at cloning in the perspective of people who supported it and wanted the science of cloning to progress. Someone in the article had said that he wanted to perserve some of his skin tissue before he died so he could clone himself so in a sense to him he was "immortal". But creating something identical in genetic make up and appearance would not be like creating your own personality and habits. An example the artical had given was that if you had an identical twin and one of you was shot the other wouldnt think "okay, great! atleast another part of me is living and running about when i'm dead." I really don't know how this could regulate this. There are way too many conflicts between benefits and risks.
ReplyDeletewalker:
ReplyDeleteI agree with what you said about the benefits of mediacal issues and the ethical issues. There is too much uncertainty and conflict with the too ideas.
I think that cloning is not an immoral thing to do ... in some cases. Yes, if you want to clone your mom because she's dying it's a selfless cause... mostly. But cloning should be legal only for body parts like organs. It's not considered murder if your saving a life is it? No, so why should cloning an organ be? It's not like a whole person was made and your taking their organ. They're just making one organ to help somebody else. Also another rarely touched-upon subject about cloning is how would the clone feel. It's basically like being adopted times ten. Plus if the child is disabled (which it most likely will be) then it might not have a desire to live. Plus I'm pretty sure mental characteristics (such as personality, loves of, interests and hobbies) all depend on the the person's history. If a person grows up in a loving home they might be a kind and caring person who loves themselves for who they are. But if that same person makes a clone, the clone might grow up being ridiculed for being disabled or a basically identical twin (trust me, identical twin jokes get really old.), and hate themselves for it.
ReplyDeleteLahari:
ReplyDeleteI agree with you that the articles gave us two different perspectives. I also agree with the twin thing (being one myself) you get tired of hearing jokes like that. Plus the being immortal part, since the clone would have a totally different personality. It's like being a twin, the personalities, hobbies, and interests of a twin or clone might be completely different than the other one, because the perspectives of life would be completely different. It's like if one person looks on life as if they have only read the "A Series of Unfortunate Events" series, and another looks at life as if it's "Clifford the Big Red Dog.".
Mainly ethical issues are the base for all cocerns with human cloning.Many say that cloning would completely degrade the value of a human being, and taking the risk of accidentally getting involved in the technical slavery associated with a clone. The first article was more concerned with the ethical isses of cloning, while the second article discussed how we would make it possible and for what kind of causes. The reasons for cloning involved with many people is having the oppurtunity to have an organ donor for emergency use,using it as an oppurtunity to have a child if a couple is completely sterile, or the less reasnoble choice of wanting to have an exact duplicate of yourself. If it were legal to clone others, it would be regulated by medical emergencies and the factor of life or death. I have reached absolutely no decision to wether people should be cloned or not simply becuase there are too many risks and the entire practice of it is so far unstable.
ReplyDeleteKethan,
ReplyDeleteI agree with you saying that cloning should only be used for medical emergencies as an organ failure, and the need for a new organ. Many people are getting the wrong idea, and thinking that you cannot simply clone an body part with cloning the human. But then again, sooner or later, something might go wrong,or some random scientist could abuse his powers and purposefully create a clone soley for the purpose of keeping it around in case of the need of an organ donor. Cases like these bring up the idea of having a technical slave and would under no circumstances be treated like the original human. You never imagne an human donating a liver to their clone can you?
An ethical issue with cloning is creating people with feelings and thoughts so that their body can be dispensed with to help other people (for example creating a clone so that someone else with a heart disease can use its healthier heart). A difference between the articles is the time that they were written. In the first article ("Where do we draw the line?", written in 1993) the concept of cloning a human has just started to flicker into the minds of scientists. They have only developed one way of cloning in which they split an embryo in two. In the second article ("Baby it's you" written in 2001) they have developed a way to create a clone of something after the original organism was born or even after it died. This difference creates two perspectives. After the second cloning method was created, a whole new set of doors was opened which brought on the idea that cloning could make you, in a sense, immortal. Which it can't. SOme people might want to clone to help infertile parents who want to have their own baby or to help a patient who needed a bone marrow transplant. I don't know how we would regulate it because so many things are still up in the air. Though, I think that people should use it primarily for medicinal uses, and not for personal purposes (bringing back a favorite pet that recently died).
ReplyDeleteHelen/Kethan- I agree with you that cloning an organ is perfectly moral. You ARE saving a life with it, and if you're just cloning the organ and not the person, no one's life is lost in the process. Also, I agree that there could be problems with this if some mad-person misused their powers with it. And your point on donating an organ to a clone makes me think about how the clones would have feelings too, and so wouldn't it be the same if we, the non-clones, were cut up so someone else could have our liver?
ReplyDeleteHelen:
ReplyDeleteWatching a human donating a liver to it's clone would be hilarious but disturbing and somewhat philosophical. This is my honest opinion. I agree with pretty much everyone.
kaly/kethan:
ReplyDeleteummmm but how are you supposed to just clone an organ? it has to come from somewhere doesnt it? so how are you supposed to grow a single organ without the rest of its parts? like you just can't grow a heart or a liver or a stomach...
There are many ethical issues with cloning would be that it would potentially degrade human life and how it is. Even though many just look at cloning and say it's good because they want to use it for personal purposes, there are many ways that it could easily be used in wrong ones if someone doesn't gain full understanding of the concept. The difference between the articles is that the first looks at the topic of cloning in more of an ethical view, and something that wouldn't be considered the right thing to do. The second article sees the subject of cloning as a broader image, showing people's perspectives on it, and how it could be used. People would want to clone for all types of purposes, some want it to duplicate what is no longer with them and others for things such as bone-marrow transplants. Since the idea is between people who think so differently, from those who support it, to those who call it "unthinkable", I don't think there's very good ways to regulate it. But hopefully as the years gradually move on, people will start to understand more about cloning and use it for good and possibly helping people and the society that we currently live it.
ReplyDeleteCloning a person just to take them apart again makes no sense morally. But just like the first article says, when profit comes into the equation, the moral problems are usually just fogotten.
ReplyDeleteLike Kaly says, the two articles were written at different times, so the persepective is very different. The first article focuses more on the potential problems of cloning humans, while the other wonders more about how to clone someone.
Cloning could help infertile couples who wanted children, or produce organs for transplants.
I feel that all of the articles look at clones as if they were just objects to take apart and use as spares, ease the pain of loss, etc. We forgot that clones are also living, breathing people. They look like us, they walk like us, they talk like us, and if they are made, I think that they should have a right to choose their own way of life, their jobs, spouses, etc, even if their lifespans are rather short compared to ours.
I don't have anything against cloning, and I think that it would be rather interesting to befriend a clone.
@Kaly, like I said earlier, why do we keep looking at clones like objects? They aren't just possesions, and they aren't just a bag of spares to be grown and picked off to sell. Plus, we forgot that to have a clone, there would have to be a human mother. Even if the child is just a clone, that clone came from that mother's womb, and I don't think she'll be very happy to give up her child to death. And have we even put the clone's feelings into the equation? How about no.
Lahari: I agree with how you about how you were unsure on how to regulate cloning since there are so many ideas and opinions on it floating around. Also, like you said if someone didn't have complete understanding about cloning then it really could be used in wrong ways. Just because someone tries to clone themselves with same appearances and DNA "would not be like creating your own personality and habits."
ReplyDeleteAlso like Kalyan said, it really should be used more for medical usage rather than personal uses. I also agree that the two articles are very different because of the fact that they show two different perspectives on cloning.
I think an ethical issue would be that it degrades the whole idea of a human life? i mean if scientists can just mess around with lives, life wont seem as important if you can just create a clone. The first arcticle was bringing up all these ideas about how it is not good (which im saying isnt a wrong or right idea) and about how inhuman it would be to do it. The second arcticle really just focused on how we would be able to clone people, and if they would have to be living, dead, a baby, a kid, and adult etc. It really looked at the perspectives of others.
ReplyDeleteNicolas: I agree with what your talking about when you said that you really had no answer to whether you think that cloning is righ or wrong. I really think that it all depends on whether or not you look at the picture from different standpoints. If your kid was dying of cancer and he needed a bone marrow transplant, then maybe i would clone him to get the marrow. But, others may look at that idea and say that it is completley unethical because you are hurting and innocent life.
ReplyDeleteI think that cloning is by itself, immoral, and very contradictory to life as we know it. As stated in the article, cloning is not directly applicable to immortality itself, but is definitely a way to "continue" a person's lifeline. Along with religious and political issues, cloning in the future will be regarded with a variety of point of views. I think that the first article is more of a debate about ethical issues that might show up due to cloning, while the second article is more based on how cloning is executed. As described in both articles, people would want to clone for many reasons: to "resurrect" a loved one, replace organs, to have a self image of oneself; whatever it is, everyone has their motives. I think that due to the high instability of cloning in the future, it should only be allowed to those who can afford it; which will obviously be at a very high price.
ReplyDelete@Walker: I agree that there are way too many uncertainties to cloning, and it's probably better left untouched. Unless we need to fight the aliens. Then we can send our clones. ex dee
Some people think that cloning will result into cloning factories where they sell babies. People also believe cloning human beings is inhumane and wrong. The same people agree that cloning humans will lead to total chaos and cruelty. Scientists would want to clone people to have spare parts (kidneys, colons, etc.)Other people may want to clone to replace a loved animal or person that was close to them. All they are doing is creating someone who happens to look EXACTLY like that loved one, but they will act some what different than that specific person. If cloning was legal, I think there should be restrictions, like how many people you can clone to prevent overpopulation. I think they should have a license so crazy people won't start doing stupid and cruel things with the newly made clones. The difference between the two articles is that the 2nd one is pushing toward how cloning is a good thing and will help families, who have had their children die, go through the pain easier by making another child. The first article is more or less about how cloning will have its faults and strengths. Also, the second article is about how people are going to use the babies and the affect it will have on the world and the first is about how to make the babies.
ReplyDeleteBasically the stuff I want to say is similar to stuff the others are saying. Ethical issues with cloning include how it kills many embryos because it is barely successful, how the cloners “Play God,” how a single parent will have to be chosen to be cloned out of a couple, how some of the things that happen to them and how they react to things are already known to the parents and they probably would want to control the kid’s life a lot, and many more. Another ethical problem is that a human being can’t be replaced, but the articles keep bringing up cloning a dead person, which makes it seem that life is like a computer where, if it breaks, it can just be replaced by a similar one. This is definitely not true and the parents can’t really love the child if they want to replace them. They might have to choose between which child to clone and they should never have to choose favorites with their children. Making a clone just for their organs and other things to be transplanted is definitely wrong. It ends up either being murder, torture, or both to the clone. In the first article, cloning seems to be a little bit supported some of the time, though it still explores both sides. It focuses a lot on ethics. It is also very long. The second article supports it less then it goes against it, has less quotes, is shorter, and focuses on not only ethics but also the process of cloning. The first article talks more about cloning from adult cells whilst the other talks about cloning embryos more. Some people want to clone so they can have healthy organisms to transplant. Others want to replace somebody that they miss. If cloning stays legal, there should be a fine on it. Government should not fund it. It could be only allowed in certain circumstances. No matter what, it should be regulated in some way. Things could go really wrong with cloning.
ReplyDelete@Nicolas: I agree with your response to the first given question, why it is ethically wrong. However, even though the second did mention how to clone, or the method of cloning, it didn’t exactly focus on it. It said it for a short time. Even though that is still a difference between the two, I wouldn’t say it was more about that than ethics. I agree with your response to the third question, and agree that “There is so much uncertainty and imperfection with cloning…” Good response!
p.s. the last question said "How should it be regulated if it were legal to clone others?" Isn't it not outlawed yet? So technically, it still is legal currently.
I agree with Helen on how creating clones would ruin the value of a human being. Also, that I'm in the middle. Cloning would be cool, but kinda weird and disturbing. And that people could totally mess up what clones were supposed to be, making them as slaves or something...OR being abusive.
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteI don’t support cloning at the time because there isn’t enough technology right now to do a safe cloning of humans. If or when scientists research enough to make cloning completely successful I might support it. But there will always be ethical issues with cloning and the only reason cloning is necessary is an organ transplant of to relieve someone’s emotional pain. The only way to overcome these issues is to find a way to isolate an organ to grow without the rest of the body or some other method that doesn’t include the hurting of another human’s life. In the future cloning could be a major problem because this technology could be used in labs across the world and would be impossible to regulate. Without regulations problems may occur and the new generation of clones may be defective. On the over hand cloning happens in nature so it can’t be classified as unethical. This is an interesting field in science and I hope the mysteries of cloning will be solved.
ReplyDelete1. Many people have religious and ethical objections, others believe it will lead to a dystopian society where people are engineered to all be the same, others think cloned people will have physical disabilities. One of these articles was written about eight years earlier than the other, so the more recent one has more details on the progress of cloning research and moral or legal debates. The two main reasons people would want to clone are to replace dead loved ones and to create genetically identical body parts.They also want to clone embryos for artificial fertilization. People who desire it for the first reason, are too influenced by misconceptions and science fiction about cloning- all they can get from cloning is an embryo for a baby with the same genetic makeup as their lost loved one. They will be a completely different person who just looks like your lost child- you might as well just have another child naturally. Regarding the second reason, these articles don't really touch on the fact that we have made a lot of progress in growing genetically identical, functioning organs without cloning an entire person. As for the third reason, I think we are too overpopulated as it is. There are also too many children with no families. If someone wants children and can't have them on their own, they should adopt them. Even people who are fertile should consider adopting rather than having their own child.I don't believe issues of society and faith should hinder science; I just believe that cloning is unnecessary.
ReplyDeleteAs far as ethical issues, all people have different personalities and interests. But everyone needs to be loved for who they are, not for just some experiment. How would you feel if you were just used and then thrown away. If cloning gets out of hand then I'm sure some idiot would want to clone him/herself just to see what would happen. After a while they'd get bored and mistreat their newly created "human". In the future if cloning is ever a proposition then the government should limit it to just medical issues. Personal situations shouldn't be allowed. If someone died, it was meant to happen. So let it happen. Don't dwell on the past. Everyone should understand that if cloning is the only way to get an organ transplant, then let it happen! The articles differ with the first one discussing ethical issues, and the second one talking about possibilities and causes for cloning.
ReplyDeleteA major ethical issue about cloning is that it degrades the life of a human and its natural ways. The first article seemed to focus more on ethical issues and the second seemed to focus on how a clone is made. Somebody might want to clone to bring back loved ones, or some maniac might use it in a negative way for like world domination or something. To regulate cloning there should probably be a limit to it and be asked WHAT it is they are cloning so it won't harm the world.
ReplyDelete@ Helen-i agree about how cloning brings down the value of a human being
@kalyan-i agree that cloning should be used for medical and health issues as to personal usage.
Zach: I agree that a human life is worth more than what cloning makes it out to be. It seems that yes people do think of lives as computers so if it breaks they can just create another one. You made me think about what I just posted. I change my mind and agree with what you said about organ transplant. It can be considered murder. And that is definitely an ethical issue.
ReplyDeleteI think some ethical issues are that some people think that life is to sacred to just create without using science and an experiment. Also when people are cloned just for body parts is awful because just because they are clones does not mean that they don't have feelings. They are still humans.The difference between the articles is that something had not before been cloned in one article and the other cloning was well under way. People would want to clone purely for the fact that it is a curiosity.It should probably be regulated when people clone people way to often. Lahari I agree with the way you said that the articles give two different perspectives to cloning
ReplyDeleteCloning is a very broad topic to start off with. The first article describes many ethical problems that people confront. I think the main one is that human life isn't as important when clones will come into the world. The second article describes how cloning is done.
ReplyDeleteMy opinion is that cloning isn't wrong but may cause tensions in the beginning. Like Gordon said, cloning should be put at a very high price at first. But later, it should be increased or decreased depending on the number of people cooperating with it. I wouldn't mind one person reborn since the actual is dead because cloning isn't only like the movies where one thousand or so of the same people want to take over the world. So, cloning should happen (if people ever get it to work) but there should be certain limits placed on everything that is related to it.
Savannah: I wouldn't say cloning would be considered murder. It will just be a new end of technology. When televisions first came out, many people used to say that people would get bored looking at a wooden box all the time. But look where TVs have reached today. Same with organ transplants. No one thought it was correct to get working organs from another's body. Did that not ever raise an ethical issue?
ReplyDeleteI think some ethical problems with cloning are that people think life is too valuable to create people by scientific means and for their entire life just to be a scientific experiment. I mean, the clone is going to want to live out their life just like any other normal person. I believe that cloning to use for medical reasons would be considered murder. Killing someone against their will to save someone else? I don't think so. The clone is not a slave the the person they got their DNA from, and they shouldn't be. Using clones for medical reasons is not ethically right or in that case, right in anyway. It is murder whether you like it or not. Humans are not science experiments, and I hope they will never be. Cloning would make human life less valuable. As for cloning to bring back a loved one, they might look just a like, but their personalities will be completely different. The first article talks about cloning from adult cells whereas the second talks more about taking DNA from embryos. The first one seems to side a little more with cloning whereas the second seems to go away from it. People would want to clone to bring back loved ones or for medical reasons. If it were legalized, it should be very expensive and be used for very very extreme cases. Like Zach said, it shouldn't be run by the government.
ReplyDelete@Keerti's comment on Savannah: I think cloning for medical uses would be murder. It has nothing to do with technology, but rather human live as a valuable. Humans aren't something that can be grown the same again and again. Each life is valuable and it should be treated that way.
@audrey: I completely agree. If you are unable to have a child and you would go to cloning for the answer, you could just get a child that already exists and needs a home. That would be a better option seeing that there are so many orphan children.
sorry about going on and on...I just feel really strong about this topic.
I think the biggest ethical problem with cloning is the fact that it degrades the value of human life. People could possibly become expendable because they could have many clones to replace them. There is also some religious problems with cloning. Some people feel scientists are playing god by making people and that upsets them.
ReplyDelete@Anna's comment to audreys comment: There are actually ways for people who cannot have children naturally to give birth. The process is known as in vitro fertilisation. This is what octomom did.
I think that there are many issues with cloning because i kind of think that its unnatural and like what Chris said it is like a science experiment. It will also make life "easy".You could possibly never die and to die is apart of life.You're suppose to die, If we did clone people then we would be in control and probably clone everything. If there are too many of one thing then the food cycle gets off balanced.
ReplyDeleteAlso i totally agree with Risigan about how if we have many of one thing then it makes it less valuable.
ReplyDeleteSome ethical issues with cloning are that it could degrade human life, and the Catholic church thinks it is evil because they say it is “playing God.” Cloning can also be used in the wrong ways. There is no reason to clone your mother, that’s just pointless. And it would be horrible if you cloned someone to harvest their organs, like in dystopian science fiction books. The earlier article is more about the ethical debate about cloning, and the second one gives more info about actually how to clone and why people would want to. Cloning could “bring back” a dead child, or it could allow infertile couples or homosexual couples to have babies. I don’t know how it should be regulated if it were legal, because the whole issue is so complicated, tricky, and delicate.
ReplyDelete@ Risigan: I agree with what you said about people becoming expendable because you would always have lots of clones. That could be a big problem if cloning became that big. But i don't understand how cloning humans is that much different from cloning animals like sheep and cows.
ReplyDeleteCloning is a weird subject. Both of the articles are quite similar, but in the first it focuses more on ethics and methods of cloning while the second is more about how cloning could be used. Lots of people are concerned with the ethics of cloning. No one should play God or how using clones for transplants is murder and how clones could leve lives too. I for one think that full human cloning is no good. Clones are more suseptable to disease and age very quickly. even if the clone should lead a life it would be very hard to do so. However the topic of growing orgons came up in class today and i like that idea, if we grew only orgons, no one would worry about the ethics behind it, plus when a transplant is necessary, there are no more waits because your organ is right there. Like I said i dont like the idea of cloning so there would be a strict regulation if there was. Only grow a clone if it is of the upmost importance. Growing clones just for fun is just too creepy
ReplyDeleteI argree with risagins cament about having to much of somthing lowers the value
ReplyDelete