Cloning

• Supporters of cloning say: Cloning has countless possible benefits; for example, the process known as therapeutic cloning could help develop genetically rejection-proof organs for medical transplantation into the sick, while livestock cloning could improve the quality and quantity of meat and dairy products.
  

• Critics of cloning say: Therapeutic cloning involves creating and destroying human embryos, which is an immoral and unacceptable abuse of scientific power. Cloning animals is an inefficient, unnecessary process which typically produces defective animals. Polling data show that most.

Ever since Scottish scientists announced in 1997 that they had successfully produced a cloned sheep--the first mammal ever cloned from adult cells--people everywhere have become fascinated by the idea of cloning.

In the mid-20th century, scientists discovered that a person's genetic makeup is entirely contained within a nucleic acid found in the nucleus of each of that person's cells. That acid is called deoxyribonucleic acid, or, more commonly, DNA.

In therapeutic cloning, researchers use a person's DNA to create an embryonic clone of that person. Researchers then extract so-called stem cells from that embryo, which can be used to create organs. Because the organs match the DNA donor's actual genetic makeup, they can be transplanted into that person's body without the risk of the organ being rejected.

Therapeutic cloning, however, remains highly theoretical--indeed, no scientist has as yet successfully harvested stem cells from a cloned human embryo.

Many critics oppose cloning because they argue that human life at any stage--even the embryonic stage--is precious, and should not be destroyed simply for the advancement of science.

Although many people are skeptical of food derived from cloned animals, supporters say that people have no reason to fear such food.

Critics call therapeutic cloning immoral because embryos are created and then destroyed in the process of developing stem cells for largely experimental purposes. "A decent society doesn't build the foundations of its biomedical science on the creation and destruction of human embryos," says William Hurlbut, an ethicist at Stanford University in California who is also a member of the President's Council on Bioethics.

Would you eat meat or drink milk that came from the offspring of a cloned cow? Why or why not?

If you could clone a dead pet, would you do it? Why or why not? Do you think that a commercial business that sold clones of pets would be moral or immoral?

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"British Scientists Propose Human-Animal Hybrid Cloning." FOXNews.com, March 27, 2007, www.foxnews.com.

Doerflinger, Richard. "Cloning Chaos." National Review Online, December 13, 2005, www.nationalreview.com.

Glauber, Bill. "Emotions, Science Collide in Cloning." Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, April 18, 2007, www.jsonline.com.

Kahn, Michael. "Large Scale Animal Cloning Unlikely: Scientists." Reuters, July 10, 2007, www.reuters.com.

Lamb, Gregory. "How Cloning Stacks Up." Christian Science Monitor, July 13, 2006, www.csmonitor.com.

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Park, Alice. "The Perils of Cloning." Time, July 10, 2006, 56.

Saletan, William. "Cloned Bull." Slate, January 6, 2007, www.slate.com.

"Stem Cell Research: S. Korean Scientist's Research Discredited." Facts On File World News Digest, December 31, 2005, p. 924.