Is Animal Cloning Good or Bad?

[TheGuru]

Send in the Clones

Quite unexpectedly, the boundaries of cloning have exploded before humanity's very eyes. Little do people realize that the green light has been stale for quite some time. It was, in essence, an accident waiting to happen. Cloning humans was too unfathomable for anyone to take the right precautions. Now like a mad man, society is trying to press a red light that cannot be pushed. It is clearly evident what the next step is. Scientists needed only the technique that could clone a mammal from an adult cell. Humans are not exempt from this breakthrough. Once something so "impossible" is considered possible, there are no boundaries. In the area of biology, even the law cannot restrict the inevitable. Fortunately, we are now heading the right direction and taking the precautions to ensure that the cloning of humans will be as scarce and as innocuous as possible.

What makes the cloning of humans so frightening is not what science fiction movies portray. There will not be hundreds of Hitlers running around, or hundreds of anyone for that matter. A soul cannot be duplicated, no matter how hard man tries. When a clone is produced of another human being, it is only their identical twin. Like any pair of identical twins, clones will have the same DNA, but different personalities, intelligence, talents, and many other qualities that make an individual distinct. (Kluger). The difference is that the cloned individual would not be the natural product of two individuals, but the artificial product of one. The "identical twin" could be born an infinite number of years after the original. Remarkably, an individual's mother could also be their twin. Parents would want to clone for a variety of reasons with infertility, the replacement of a child who is deceased, and a remedy for a fatally sick child being just a few of them. Though many of these reasons may sound favorable, the psychological damage to the clone from being artificially produced from a test tube and society's cheapening view of life make any attempt to clone unjustified. Worst of all, it would teach parents to think of their kids as products-something they could order from a catalog(McGuire). There are boundaries to what humans can and should do. It is time we recognize it.

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Unlike the prospects of human cloning, the prospects of animal cloning are endless, and scientists are extremely excited. For an endangered species like the Giant Panda, it may mean the difference between existence and oblivion. Though scientists plan to clone certain animals solely for the sake of biodiversity, one of cloning's most important functions, they will be more involved with genetically engineering them, a breakthrough that became more accessible through the technique of cloning. Most people are not aware that plants have been genetically engineered for years to produce some of our best crops. Now a completely different ball game, with much more complicated rules and an entirely different species of players, has opened up. The benefits are endless; the dangers, minute.

One of the largest areas that will be affected by the possibility of animal cloning is animal research. If the animals used in experiments are exactly the same physiologically, the experiments are much easier to control. Fewer animals will be needed for experimentation, with better results. Though some scientists believe that animals are more susceptible to disease if they are part of herds with genetically identical genes, cells are also capable of being genetically engineered to root out diseases that the donor animal may have carried.

Cloning is also exciting in terms of animal agriculture-in the quality of what animals produce naturally, and what they can artificially produce to cure some of the most serious diseases (Friend). A cow's milk, a sheep's wool, and a pig's meat are only a few of the countless quality upgrades that any animal useful to humans would experience. Though these improvements are anything but trifling, they are nothing compared to what animals can artificially produce to effect the medical community in astounding ways.

One of the most immediate advantages of animal cloning will be in the area of pharmaceutical production. Cheap and plentiful bioengineered drugs that are made from human proteins will most likely be the first practical application . The ability to clone will allow scientists to genetically engineer animals for a particular protein, and then mass produce them. The animals carrying the proteins would secrete the proteins in their milk or blood to be harvested and then purified for use. Drugs made from these proteins today are extremely scarce and not affordable. Since they have been the only available answer for inherited disorders such as hemophilia, cystic fibrosis and emphysema, it has been a discouraging battle for those suffering with these diseases.

Though less certain but equally as exciting, the same technique used in cloning might be able to be used to reproduce much-needed organs, skin for burn victims, and various life-saving drugs. It will also give the world deep insights into spinal chords, heart muscle, brain tissue that won't regenerate after injury, and cancer cells that multiply uncontrollably. Scientists predict that possibilities for humans because of animal cloning are infinite, and they cannot wait to get started. (Info taken from here)

What do you think? And Why?