Human Cloning - Should it be done?

An aspect that is looked upon as a benefit is the procuring of spare organs by means of cloning individuals. This is appalling. It is an act of utmost selfishness that for the sake of providing an organ of a diseased patient, another should be obtained by the process of cloning, and should be robbed of its identity of a human being by taking away his organs. Our society has grave objections to murder, but we somehow don’t seem to mind producing thousands of identical individuals for the sake of their organs. Yet many medical ethicists and philosophers argue that because the unborn have not developed certain higher brain functions, human foetuses and embryos are not full-fledged persons with rights. Thus, if cloning is perfected, it is possible ethicists would approve the use of adult DNA to produce clones with stunted mental function that would provide body parts for their parent/twins. Unlike automobiles, blenders and computers, human beings are not commodities. We are more than the sum total of our parts.

There is also grave contravention of human sanctity and dignity under the guise of therapeutic cloning. This type of cloning involves using the DNA material of a person to produce an embryo, which is then planted into a womb and allowed to mature till the time it reaches the stage of cell differentiation, where the cells get divided according to function as blood cells, neurons, muscle cells, etc. Once the stage is reached, the stem cells can be extracted and grown in the laboratory. Now, if a person is suffering from Parkinson’s disease, his defective neurons could be replaced by those obtained from his clone, and since the DNA material is the same, there can be no question of rejection of the new cells. The researchers in this field distance themselves from cloning babies. However, the embryo from which these stem cells were taken will never grow to be a human being. is killed in the process.

The process of cloning Dolly the sheep involved an egg from an ewe, and a cell from another ewe. At no stage of the experiment was there the need of the sperm of a ram. If the technique were perfected in humans, there would be no need for males at all in the process of reproduction. They would be rendered useless and could be done away with. Now we wouldn’t want that, would we?

Some people have expressed concern about the effects that cloning would have on relationships. For example, a child born from an adult DNA cloning from his father would be, in effect, a delayed twin of one of his parents. That has never happened before and may lead to emotional difficulties.

Some scientists believe that because of the knowledge obtained by studying the aspect of cloning, it may be possible someday to reverse the ageing process. The direct consequence of this would be ecological disbalance. Population explosion would cause irreparable environmental disbalance.

There are also certain religious objections to cloning. It is proclaimed that the child born from the process of cloning will have no soul. An individual is incorporated with a soul when the sperm goes into the egg. But here since there is no sperm involved in reproduction, the child is born soulless. The speculation on this issue is endless, as the soul is an immeasurable entity.

It must also be kept in mind that the technique of human cloning unless perfected may not deliver all that is promised as accurately as claimed. Flaws in procedure may cause loss of varying extents initially, which may be enough to make the high parties think in retrospect.