The Pros And Cons Of Human Cloning

"Cloning represents a very clear, powerful, and immediate example in which we are in danger of turning procreation into manufacture," said Leon Kass, who is an American educator. Kass remains solid on his opposition to cloning, and it is quite difficult to find many who truly oppose him or the position against cloning. Richard Dawkins, an English ethologist, evolutionary biologist and author states "Cloning may be good and it may be bad. Probably it's a bit of both. The question must not be greeted with reflex hysteria but decided quietly, soberly and on its own merits. We need less emotion and more thought." When the word clone or cloning resonates in a person's ear, their first response is often one of disgust or uneasiness. However, what

Six years after the landmark, 1958 experiment, John Gurdon performed an experiment that achieved a nuclear transfer from a differentiated cell. Meaning that cells from a fully developed animal could be used for cloning. Then in 1975 the first mammalian embryo was created (rabbit), in 1984 the first mammal was created (sheep), in 1987 the first transfer from embryonic cells was completed (cow), in 1996 the first transfer from laboratory cells occurred (cultured sheep cells), also in 1996 was Dolly: the first mammal created by somatic cell nuclear transfer (sheep), in 1997 the first primate was created from an embryonic cell (rhesus monkey), also in 1997 was the first successful transfer from genetically engineered laboratory cells (sheep), and in 1998 - 1999 more mammals were cloned from somatic cells (mice, cows, goats). All these cell transfers were possible purely because of the process of nuclear transfer. At the turn of the century, more interesting experiments began to take place, once again, all thanks to nuclear transfer, or as I will now call it, NT. In 2001 endangered animals were cloned by somatic cell NT (gaur and mouflon) and in 2007 primate embryonic stem cells were created by somatic cell NT (rhesus monkey) (University of

The internet loves to provide blog after blog of the future potentials of cloning, but the most interesting (and somewhat realistic) ones are much harder to come by. In an article on Futurism titled "Cloning: Tomorrow's Future, the author(s) outline several potential future applications. Firstly, they believe that resurrection of extinct species is possible. This claim is quite interesting as scientists are already exploring the possibility of cloning and bringing mammoths back to life. Unfortunately, mammoths went extinct at the end of the last ice age, but there is potential to create them again because scientists have pieced together the genomes of four different mammoths over the past few years (Live Science). What was anticipated as being a major application in the far future is already becoming a potential reality. Furthermore, the article discusses the possibility of human immortality, a solution for world hunger, and terminating degenerative diseases. Another article by Nell Boyce discusses the ultimate possibility of full human cloning and provides a case in support of the