CLONING
HISTORY
Human somatic cell nuclear transfer, otherwise known (somewhat inaccurately) as creating an embryo by “cloning,” involves1:
The starvation and subsequent implantation of DNA from specialized, non-sexual cells of one organism (e.g., cells specialized to make that organism’s hair or milk) into an egg whose DNA nucleus has been removed.A clone’s DNA is exactly the same as that of the original organism.
- The resulting egg and nucleus are shocked or chemically treated so that the egg begins to behave as though fertilization has occurred, resulting in the beginning of embryonic development of a second organism containing the entire genetic code of the first organism.
- The starvation and subsequent implantation of DNA from specialized, non-sexual cells of one organism (e.g., cells specialized to make that organism’s hair or milk) into an egg whose DNA nucleus has been removed.
Key People
Mammalian cloning, through this nuclear transfer process, has resulted in the birth of hundreds of organisms to date. However, significantly more nuclear transfer generated embryos fail during pregnancy than would fail in sexual reproduction, and a substantial majority of cloned animals who have survived to birth have had some significant birth defect.
Reproduction, or perhaps more accurately, replication of an organism’s DNA identity does not normally occur in mammals, with the exception of twinning, which always results in the simultaneous birth of siblings. Only plants reproduce through replication from one generation to another. The prospect of such replication for humans has resulted in the most controversial debate about reproduction ever to be taken up in western civilization.
First Emperiments
Types
The dangers for early prospective clones are controversial and difficult to manage because
- in part, one is attempting to protect a future potential person against harms that might be inflicted by their very existence, and
- in part because societies around the world have indicated that they believe that the early cloning experiments will breach a natural barrier that is moral in character, taking humans into a realm of self-engineering that vastly exceeds any prior experiments with new reproductive technology.
- The creation of Dolly the sheep at Roslyn, Scotland labs of biotechnology company PPL Therapeutics (and not-for-profit Roslyn Institute) did not involve any of the hallmarks of what is known socially, religiously, and scientifically, as conception: the fusion of egg and sperm and the adhesion of the thus fertilized egg to the wall of the uterus.5
- The genetic and cellular material that led to Dolly indeed might not even qualify in traditional terms as an embryo, in that mammalian embryos are scientifically defined in part by how they come into being. It is quite difficult to divine “what is in the dish” where a “clone” is being created, a problem that plagues all those who would define and regulate the creation and research on embryonic progenitors of a clone.
Benefits
Laws that would prevent the birth of a first clone are difficult because they traverse complex jurisprudential ground: protecting an as-yet nonexistent life against reproductive dangers, in a western world that, in statutory and case law at least, favors reproductive autonomy.3,4
But the dangers for the first clone pale in comparison to the ethical issues that will arise should cloning succeed in producing a healthy child, and become part of the repertoire of new reproductive technologies presently offered to those with sufficient funds.
Risks
By analogy, many have speculated as to whether
Does a clone have parents, autonomy, or even a soul?
- a human clone lacks traits necessary for true independence from “parent” progenitors
- whether a clone is entitled by contrast to feel that a progenitor (genetically its monozygotic twin) is an appropriate parent
- and many in the general public in western nations identified the most important problem of cloning as whether a clone would have a soul.
Who?
Reproduction, or perhaps more accurately, replication of an organism’s DNA identity does not normally occur in mammals, with the exception of twinning, which always results in the simultaneous birth of siblings. Only plants reproduce through replication from one generation to another. The prospect of such replication for humans has resulted in the most controversial debate about reproduction ever to be taken up in western civilization.