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Making fun of born-again Christians is like hunting dairy cows with a high powered rifle and scope.-- P. J. O'Rourke

December 28, 2002

Cloning…

Matt Drudge had a recent story referring to the recent claims of a successful human clone being born under the tagline “DID THIS WOMAN CHANGE THE COURSE OF MANKIND FOREVER?”
Now, I usually like Drudge, but he seems to have joined in with the general hysteria surrounding human cloning. From the little that I know about cloning, I am highly skeptical that a successful human clone is technically possible at the point, but even if this feat has been accomplished, I see nothing wrong or immoral about the practice.
First of all, the classic argument against cloning, that messing with reproduction “goes against God’s will” is completely bogus. If we take this argument to its natural conclusion, then ANY human manipulation of genes is immoral. But we are in effect participating in genetic manipulation when we choose one mate over another, or breed a certain variety of a crop over another, or choose to have kids or not. Simply by favoring blondes over brunettes, or mates of a certain race, we are in fact engaging in genetic manipulation - and if man was made in God’s image, than that image is certainly a moving target. Even if you aren’t an atheist, excluding human manipulation of us and our environment, leaves us with little choice, but to sit in whatever mud hole we were born with, and rot to death - which, incidentally, is exactly what some environmentalists would like to see us do.
Another argument against cloning is that it will lead to birth defects and shortened lifespans. Perhaps so, but so will so does smoking, consuming alcohol and bad diets while pregnant - and mothers are not legally liable for in those cases. Perhaps, if cloning was inherently detrimental to a fetus - for example as random radiation exposure might be, there might be a case for banning it, but in fact, it promises incredible advances in preventing genetic disease and perhaps even improving on the fragile condition to which we have involved. Sure, some people might mess up their kid’s genes, but then stupid people have kids all the time - more than their fair share even, and no one tries to pass a law against that.

Posted by David at December 28, 2002 12:16 PM | TrackBack

Comments

if we’re going to rot to death anyway, we might as well try and save our souls in the process.

Posted by: jenn at October 29, 2003 05:38 PM

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