[onoway]

Spare parts, anyone?
Since we have already had Dolly the sheep presented to us, can it be long before we have people manufactured out of someone's old skin?
All the stories I have seen have lauded this as a breakthrough which puts an end to the ethical questions of using human embryos...this may be true, but doesn't it raise a whole host of new ones?
This is not to suggest I am anti the research at all. I just thought it was interesting to see how fast people leaped to the conclusion that the only question worthy of note was resolved.

[helene_t]

First: I see no reason to relate reproductive cloning to therapeutic cloning. The silly speculations about the production of zombies to be used as living spare part reservoirs aside, they are completely distinct issues.

Very few medics support reproductive cloning. I think it's fair to say that human reproductive cloning is a red herring. This might change in the far future but that's a somewhat useless prediction since everything might change in the far future.

FWIW I don't have any principal issues with reproductive cloning but I fail to imagine uses of the (hypothetical) technology that would have an attractive cost/benefit ratio. In any case the technology, as it is applied to non-human mammals at present, is not safe enough to be applied to humans.

As for therapeutic cloning it's not clear to me what the difference is versus growth of tissues for donation - we already let graft skin grow in the host patient, is that cloning? No sane person would be against that although it could be argued that there is a substantial risk of transmitting diseases through donor tissue so the use should be avoided when there is a safer alternative.

As for cloning for scientific purposes I'm all for it.

As for agricultural cloning I'm worried that it will reduce genetic diversity, thereby reducing the potential for future breeding projects and also making agricultural plants and animals more susceptible to epidemics. I have heard some rumors that the latter is already a problem in some areas (Californian orange trees was the example I thought).

[onoway]

I wasn't particularly referring to the production of zombies for the harvesting of parts, although I think it is optimistic to think that something of the sort would not occur should the technology allow. A group from Quebec (Canada) claimed a few years ago to have successfully cloned a human but was unwilling (unable?) to produce proof. They also claimed to have only the highest of motives in trying to do so, such as replacing an only child who died and so forth.

Since a short while ago the papers announced that some scientists see no reason for people not to live to 200 in the foreseeable future they had best get busy as most of us would not be very happy without at least some parts replaced long before half way there.

I was more interested in the idea that IF this research eventually leads to being able to replace virtually anything in the body, as it seems it should, then what changes would happen to social systems. If there is no physical reason for death beyond getting squashed by a loaded cement truck or some such, then what shape would society take. Imho there are quite drastic implications and it seems odd that none of the questions which arise immediately seem to be considered important.

Random thoughts...do scientist try to develop replaceable brains for people who have, for example, inoperable and malignant brain tumors? Would the replacement brains have their own thoughts or would they be the "blank slate"that people years ago considered newborn children to be?

It feels too late to consider some of the questions that have already arisen out of the engineering that has gone on in agriculture (such as the loss of diversity) and the lack of challenge there will perhaps come back to haunt us (or our grandkids). It isn't to put a stop to research that I think questions need to be considered. It just seems sometimes that actions need to be considered within a larger context so as to plan for the effects they will have. This doesn't seem to be happening, everyone is just euphoric about the good things they will be able to do.

I don't buy the idea that none of this will be possible/probable. Imagine trying to explain to your great great great grandparents about space shuttles, cell phones, computers (and heart transplants ) etc.

[blackshoe]

http://en.wikipedia....ki/Organlegging