cloning humans!?!?!?!?!

[daywalker]

how many people think this is a bad thing?

i can understand cloning for a number of reasons.stem cell research,organ growth(no not that organ! degenerates!!!)skin grafts and other possibilities that i havent even thought of yet.but to completely clone a human,in my opinion,is wrong.

if you want a child adopt if necessary but dont create an exact duplicate of yourself!where is the fun in that.plus there are the posibilities of defects.(high posibilities)

that is as far as im going with it untill i have done more research but i believe you all will hear more from me on this issue.please tell me what you feel on this issue

[Diva]

The idea of being able to create life terrifies me. What about personality traits? The possibilities for abuse and sinister creation are endless.

As far as creating organs... I know the heart ache of watching someone die as they wait for an appropriate match. Imagine not having to wait for someone to die so that another may live. We had a patient with liver disease that recieved a liver transplant... only to find that the organ was cancerous.

As science finds more and more ways to preserve life we are tampering with the delicate balance of nature. Are we truly prepared to accept the consequences of our actions?

[Sterling]

There are definitely some serious ethical questions surrounding cloning humans. However, I don't think we need to panic just yet - every expert opinion I've read on the recent claims seems to suggest that it's a hoax. It certainly has all the hallmarks of one; serious scientists publish their results in peer reviewed journals, they don't announce them at press conferences.

[Diva]

The problem is that they are trying it now. When we hear about it is after the fact. They are already doing this with animals. Serious scientists publish their finished work in journals.

[Sterling]

Serious scientists also publish preliminary results, and many stages of intermediate research. They also get their funding from either big pharm companies (who wouldn't do this research because of the impending PR disaster), or from research grants that are open to public scrutiny. If mainstream scientists were doing it, we'd know about it.

[daywalker]

sterling there are so many things in this world that we dont know about! as for this they could have kept it hidden for the simple reason that most countries have bans on human cloning in some form or another.

fear of terroristic threats,death threats for the mother and child,or the fact that noone would touch the issue with a ten foot pole,let alone back it because of the volatile nature of the beast.

as for us knowing about it, the public is given the information that the government wants us to have.we dont always get the whole story.we get the weeded out,made for television version of the facts.

take desert storm for instance.the first shots in the storm were fired at u.s. soldiers in early aug. and sept. of 91 right?

my brother was spec ops. and was shot down with an entire ranger co. in mid june of his 21st. year. it was called a training excersise.( i learned alot after he came home)all the things we saw on espn and cnn all the videos of the bombs dropping,supposedly only a few hours old,was bullshit!

as hard as it is to swallow,we are only given the facts that they want us to have.

believe none of what you hear and only half of what you see.

THE MEN IN BLACK ARE REAL!!!SO IS BIG FOOT!!HE IS LIVING IN A LOVE NEST WITH ELVIS,JIMMY HOFFA,AND THE LINDBERG BABY!!!
(BELIEVE ME I HAVE PICTURES!!!!!!!)

DON'T MAKE ME SIC MY FLYING MONKEYS ON YA'LL!!!!!!HAHAHAHAHAHA

[daywalker]

sorry everyone i had a rough day at work!!but im all better now.

i think

[Sterling]

Tin foil hat straightened out again?

I'm sure that governments do have secret programs which the public are not told about. However, we're not talking about governments. We're talking about a religious cult that claims to have cloned a human. I think it's a hoax, and so does most of the mainstream scientific community.

[daywalker]

Tin foil hat?? Man thats the old model! I am sitting in a pyramid made out of copper pipes with little tin foil seagulls hanging from it.

As for the hoax part of all this, it probably is, I was just deliberating on the messed up subject matter. But if it did indeed happen don't you think that the government would have stepped in to play some kind of part in it.

At least tryed to get the research info or tryed to keep it under wraps to use for their own devious needs.

So be it!!! If anyone can find more subject matter on it or any bizarre subject matter mail me the link I'm kinda into the strange and unexplained. Y'all have a Happy New Year! Sleep late and try not to wake up the drunks next door. Signed..... The drunk next door!

[Sterling]

For what? When governments fund secret projects, I imagine that they are secret because they are either (a) military or national security in nature, or (b) things that are necessary but would panic the public if they talked about them all the time.

I'm not sure I see where cloning fits either bill. There are medical applications to cloning technology, but I'm not sure what military applications there would be.

[Andie]

Originally posted by Sterling
I'm not sure I see where cloning fits either bill. There are medical applications to cloning technology, but I'm not sure what military applications there would be.

Medical and Military are like twins walking hand in hand.
Imagine the battlefield where a lost arm can be replaced, and where you can get reinforcements constantly because the soldiers are grown with the right genes, and trained as mindless fighters not questioning orders and not fearing to die, since they do not know what is to live.
That would be every Generals dream and every privates nightmare..

[Sterling]

Yeah, but how would you keep a project like that secret? And would there really be any advantage? I don't think there's really a serious military application for cloning whole people.

As I say, the medical applications seem like the only useful ones. Obviously medical advances are used by the military, but there's no reason to keep that kind of research secret. Most of the major advances in medicine happen at civilian research hospitals, not secret government labs. It's just more cost-effective to let the private sector do your research for you.

[Andie]

I agree with you and the cloned soldier part. But im sure there are alot of interest from the military when it comes to regenerate or replace lost limbs..

And most advances probably start in civilian labs, but whenever there is a use for it in the military secret i have no doubt it transfers into maximum security labs where few know whats going on. We have those labs here, and you have them there.

[Sterling]

How would you grow a replacement limb in isolation? Even if you could, how long would it take? Surely not fast enough to be useful? Unless you're suggesting a scenario as suggested in the book Spares (good read), where rich people have clones made of their children, and kept for spare parts. I think that's pretty paranoid.

Plus, even if that was possible, why restrict it to the military? I think such a technique would be used in civilian medicine first. Just like heart transplants and brain surgery.

I'm sure there are secret government research programs. I just don't think human cloning is one of them.

[Andie]

I have seen scientists grow a human ear on the back of a mouse in very little time..So in the near future im sure they will know how to solve that..
And history shows that soldier has the first tag on medical things like that. Just look at antidotes, cures for biological weapons etc..

[Princess]

Originally posted by Sterling
Unless you're suggesting a scenario as suggested in the book Spares (good read), where rich people have clones made of their children, and kept for spare parts.



now.. what if the cloned humans actually have a soul?

[Diva]

Originally posted by Princess



now.. what if the cloned humans actually have a soul?

Let the fun begin....

[WhatIsOne]

May have already happened. This is one of countless articles about it. Apparently this company announced they were working on something called cloneaid in 2001. Now they apparently helped create a clone.

http://www.cnn.com/2002/HEALTH/12/29/human.cloning.ap/index.html

[Arguile]

The problem with the idea of cloned human beings is an unsolved conundrum that's existed since the days of Plato and Aristotle.

What determines the way someone is? Is it their genes, or their environment?

Scientists who have cloned animals have very rarely produced successful duplicants of the controlled portion of the experiment. As a matter of fact, Dolly, the cloned sheep? She was the only successful clone out of ten. The others were black sheep, grey sheep, every possible variant except for a duplicate.

I'm not a scientist, and I'm not a zoologist, but I can tell you right now, that we're years upon years upon years away from "clone armies" and "spare parts". Stem cell research is still in its infancy, much more so than cloning.

And about the souls, if you want to be technical, since the clones are meant to be EXACT duplicates in every detail, who's to say they don't share souls?

[daywalker]

now we are talking about souls?

first of all science and religion dont and shouldnt mix.we are looking at facts and hard evidence her not beliefs and hearsay.but if you believe in souls and auras and all that then i dont think they could share souls because the clones would have a different life force.plus you cant share a soul.its impossible(if you believe in that sort of thing)

some things people shouldnt mix politics,religion,science and nascar.

[Mick]

"i can understand cloning for a number of reasons.stem cell research,organ growth(no not that organ! degenerates!!!)skin grafts ".

I am not sure, I don't think stem cell is the same as cloning. Using laboritory cells for research is not the same as creating life. I think we need to understand the scientific value of utilization of the cellular structures that man needs to understand disease and the elimination of such.

At what point do we, as a civilised world, decide to work for positive health, education. and a common goal?

A clone? No way! When do you look at yourself and decide to harvest organs?

It won't happen as long as men decide, oops, as long as people decide what is right.

As long as people decide that my way of life is cool, then life will be great.

When you tell me, women must were burkas, men must not shave, Van Halen is not to be heard. I have to express my disgust!

Rambling here, but, I like the face of a woman, I will sprout whiskers as I please, and, Eddie Van Halen used to be with that Bertinelli girl. (I wish she would stop calling me when she is drunk)
and I lost track of this whole cloning thing.

You must leave me alone, my sons George, George, George, George, and George are helping me sell my grille that you can get at Kmart.

No clones, just good sons. Ask my son George.

[WhatIsOne]

Arguile... clones are more different than you might think. The first cloned cat had different fur coloration than its um... original. Identical twins share the same DNA but it doesn't mean they share a soul. I know 3 different pairs of identical twins in fact.
1. They aren't quite identical. It takes a lot of practice to distinguish between their faces though if they don't have different hair styles.
2. They're personalities have some sililarities butsome identical twins are quite different.

[WhatIsOne]

Originally posted by Mick
I am not sure, I don't think stem cell is the same as cloning. Using laboritory cells for research is not the same as creating life. I think we need to understand the scientific value of utilization of the cellular structures that man needs to understand disease and the elimination of such.

Stem cells are harvested from human embryos and I believe they are now mostly harvested from cloned human embryos or something like that.


Originally posted by Mick

A clone? No way! When do you look at yourself and decide to harvest organs?

You don't grow a mature clone to harvest organs. Part of the reason embryonic stem cells are so highly sought after because they can be most readily changed into other tissues. In fact scientists are improving techniques of just cloning specific tissues at a rapid pace. I think I heard once that a human liver was grown in a laboratory. If that's possible many lives may be saved.

[Noctornus]

For the record, this supposed 'clone' was created by a company called Clonaid, a company supported by a religious sect calling themselves 'Raeliens.' The basis of the Raelien religion(cult) being that life on earth was created by aliens who planted life on earth through cloning. Clonaid and the Ralien religion claim to be completely seperate sometimes, and in bed at others, it's odd, really.

Now Clonaid is refusing to allow DNA testing of the 'clone baby' and refuse to disclose it's whereabouts...

CNN Atricle (http://www.cnn.com/2003/HEALTH/01/03/clone.claims/)

Personally, I think they're a bunch of whacko's, but that's just me...

-Noctornus

[WhatIsOne]

The baby's "parents" had agreed to a DNA test but later backed out upon hearing that there may be legal complications if the baby is a clone. The Raeliens are whackos and it does bring me some doubt as to their claims but they may have still made a clone baby. Perhaps it takes whackos to do something like that.

[Jake]

I hope that the government intercedes. If they cloned a child, then someone needs to monitor it's health problems and make sure that there's nothing wrong with it.

As much as it saddens me to think of the life of this child, the alternative is just as iffy. Isn't is against the law to clone humans?

[GLADIATOR]

Originally posted by Jake
I hope that the government intercedes. If they cloned a child, then someone needs to monitor it's health problems and make sure that there's nothing wrong with it.

As much as it saddens me to think of the life of this child, the alternative is just as iffy. Isn't is against the law to clone humans?

Well I doubt these people cloned anything, but I would add that throughout history, all manner of significant scientific, technological and medical developments have taken place, because of society's thirst for new knowledge, and its willingness to take the leap and apply that knowledge. In the vast majority of cases, this has been for the human good. People live longer, healthier and better lives, taking for granted things that would have been considered impossible 100 years ago.

But things are not perfect, and our nervousness about taking such leaps today does not spring from any notion that they are. It comes from an unfounded suspicion that we will use new science and technology to destroy the planet, and ourselves. As though anybody - even a peculiar American sect - has the interest, or the ability, to do that.

If and when a human baby is cloned, there will clearly be a need for a debate about scientific standards, ethics, and regulation. But the fact that a rumour of a human clone generates more excitement about a worldwide ban than it does about the science behind cloning indicates that today's society is less interested in moving forward than it is in holding back. Nobody wants a Brave New World - but who wants a society scared into stasis by mere possibilities?

[Diva]

If they are claiming to have cloned a human then I certainly would want someone to step in and verify whether they did it and regulate what they are doing. This is human lives that are being tampered with.

[GLADIATOR]

Originally posted by Diva
If they are claiming to have cloned a human then I certainly would want someone to step in and verify whether they did it and regulate what they are doing. This is human lives that are being tampered with.

Diva; A company linked to a bizarre American sect, which allegedly believes that humans are created by aliens, has announced to the world that it has cloned a baby, nicknamed Eve - and the world has worked itself into a frenzy of disbelief and condemnation, with many calling for a worldwide ban on the cloning of humans.

Officially, the jury is still out on whether the company, Clonaid, really has managed to clone a baby. Given that the sect believes that humans were originally cloned by aliens from outer space, it seems highly likely that they would claim to clone a baby, and deeply implausible that they have actually done so. The scientific community is sceptical about whether such reproductive cloning of humans is even possible at the moment, and the consensus seems to be that, given the likelihood of deformities and other problems, it would not be a good idea. I'm with the scientists on this one - after all, they are the ones who know.

I really, really doubt they cloned even 'Dolly' the sheep let a lone a human.

[SysLord]

I think cloning is technically possible - not without dangers - but the whole Clonaid thing is one giant scam yet another off-the-rockers sect.