[OT] Claim of first clone birth

[Mark]

Somewhere in the back of people's minds will always be the notion that for cloning to come into vogue, and replace the old fashion method of procreation, it'll have to become a safer way to produce an offspring. If that is to happen, there will also have to be the idea that when it does, convention acts of procreation will likely take place under conditions that will no longer produce offspring. The natural assumption, since conventional methods have certain obvious benefits, will be that trying to achieve such an outcome can only mean a decline in conventional means. I doubt we'll move toward that day without a good portion of the population dragging their feet...if not kicking and screaming.

 

[ColonelHardisson]

Besides all that, trying to replace conventional means of procreation is to try to get rid of one of the great pleasures of life. It's like the way futurists back in the early days of scifi seemed to fixate on how eating would be reduced down to ingesting pills with all the necessary nutrients (and I don't mean just for astronauts). I mean, why not just have all the pleasure centers of the brain excised and get it over with? Obviously that notion fell by the wayside in the face of logic and the human experience. I guess some fringe groups might get the hankerin' to eliminate such sources of pleasure, but the vast majority of humans would reject the notion out of hand.

 

[Mark]

Yup. Despite the occasional outcry to try and rebuff the instinctionual nature of the human animal, I find it hard to believe that we as a species would readily attempt to breed out or deny ourselves that which makes us who we are.

 

[Lizard]

One thing that worries me is that if cloning is in the hands of a fringe of society, they might decide that we no longer have need for a naughty little thing called SEX and take action appropriately. Imagine living in a society where you NEVER got to see even a picture of a member of the opposite gender. There are people in the world who are nutty enough to think this is good!

Since this has been possible since the mid-1970s via in-vitro fertilization, and no one has advocated it, I think you're grasping at straws. Also, the same whack-jobs who hate sex ALSO hate cloning, because it's science, and thus, scary.

Does anyone on this forum but me understand that cloning does not mean 'growing fully formed adults in a vat in a week'? Because most of the "Ooooo....scary!" responses seem to hinge on the idea cloning is somehow more efficient than two minutes of squishy noises+nine months of hard labor+eighteen years of torment -- which it isn't.

 

[Lizard]

A change in fundamental human paradigms is evident; you can't have something as momentous as stable human cloning appear and not expect massive societal changes.

Please explain to me precisely how cloning is any more 'momentous' than in-vitro fertilization. Everyone is acting like this is an incredible revolution -- and it isn't.

When you start talking about stable genetic manipulation -- I engineer a trait in my offspring which PASSES TO HIS OFFSPRING, and spreads through the population normally from then on -- then, you're talking momentous. That is where the moral issues and debate really come into play. But cloning? Yawn.

Cloning will be used for saving endangered species, creating herds of high-quality cattle, and giving rich people something new to waste their money on, until about the 100th clone when it all becomes passe. It won't change society. (Proof: Everyone says it will. The real society-changing inventions sneak up on you. Find someone who cared about the transistor in 1948 or the modem in 1964.)

 

[megamania]

Folks- I read only the first 15-20 messages and I couldn't take it any more. I don't consider myself religious or rightous but this is W-R-O-N-G. I thought there were international laws against this kind of crap. There is a difference between Role-playing a gawd and trying to be one.


'nuff said. I won't return to this message for the rest of tonight.

 

[PA]

Cloning will be used for saving endangered species, creating herds of high-quality cattle, and giving rich people something new to waste their money on, until about the 100th clone when it all becomes passe. It won't change society.

It will, when we become able to clone body parts, which is still far off in the future. When we can clone skin to heal burnt people, or hearts, whatever. For the moment, though, we can clone a single cell or a whole organism. Nothing in-between.

Cloning skin shouldn't be too hard. (Everything being relative!) Next, blood maybe, and bone marrow. Cloning a heart, on the other hand, or a liver, or another such organ... Well, we'll see. But not tomorrow!

And as for those who want to transfer their brain into a new body to gain immortality... Bad luck: your brain gets old, just like the rest of your body. So it will die, in time. Now, being young until the end could be nice... but here again, that's not for tomorrow. Even if we become able (how??) to grow bodies WITHOUT a brain, so we don't kill human beings, to transplant a brain... is in itself a very complex problem. Remember: we are still unable to repair a severed connection brain<>nervous system.

 

[DWARF]

When creating Dolly the cloned sheep, out of 300 attempts, only 3 of the eggs made it to the 16-cell stage. This means that the cloning process is so imprecise that only 1% of the eggs are viable through 4 cell divisions. So the chances that the cells that do make it past this point are "perfect" is? Quite low.

The result, any clone babies will, for some time, come out with significant problems. Sad they're playing with human lives when the mechanisms of the science are barely capable of doing it.

 

[Alzrius]

Is it sad that they're playing with human lives to try and advance what science can do? Maybe. Is it necessary? I think so.

Great advances in science have rarely ever been clean, and are almost always controversial. It was, what, a hundred years ago, that doctors were paying shady individuals to unearth corpses so they could desecrate them to learn about how the body worked. Today, thats probably the best thing that ever happened for medical science. This is no different.

Are the Raelians premature in their attempts to clone a human (assuming they arent lying)? Probably. The quality of human life is a very important issue for everyone. Creating a child knowing that the odds are around 99% that some form of freakish defects will occur, and will likely lead to death, is irresponsible. Does this mean cloning itself should be banned? Not at all I think. Cloning is still in its infancy (no pun intended), but eventually it can give us great things. They've already been mentioned here: growing back endangered animals, creating enough plant material and animals for slaughter that world hunger can be pushed back, even to grow replacement body parts. None of these things are going to be around tomorrow, and maybe not even within our lifetime, but eventually, they will come about. But only if the science of cloning is allowed to be explored.

Will cloning eventually lead to immortality? Well...thats probably a question thats too far ahead to see. The best I see is that it'll be like in "The Sixth Day" where people who die in accidents can be brought back. Beyond that, I don't see it ever becoming inexpensive enough, or accepted enough, for any sigificant majority of the population to keep putting their minds into younger bodies. Any good novel about immortality mentions that eventually people get sick of it, and want to die, and I think that would hold true here also. But its too far away to tell at this point. Crystal-ball gazing is pointless.

In short, cloning is just another science, one that needs to be carefully looked at, monitored, and utilized to its greatest function. What the Raelians are doing may be clumsy, irresponsible, and possibly even dishonest, but in their own way they too are just trying to push the envelope forward.

 

[Erik Mona]

I'm thrilled by this news. Don't care if it's a hoax or not. Love that the baby's name is Eve. Love that it's all tied into some weird religious/alien cult. Love that the world is more interesting today than it was yesterday.

It's going to happen, eventually, whether the US or science ethicists or religious figures want it to happen or not. Better for it to be tied to a cult that has a theme park called UFOland than to some stingy scientific university.

Here's to you, Rael!

--Erik