The birth of Dolly the cloned sheep in 1997 sparked a global debate about the possibility of human cloning. Human cloning, which uses nuclear gene replacement technology to create individuals with identical genes, has medical applications but can also raise issues of human rights violations and disregard for life. Ethical opponents argue that human cloning undermines genetic independence and uniqueness, while proponents emphasize its medical benefits, such as curing cancer. How advances in human cloning technology will change the meaning and ethics of human life requires careful discussion.
In 1997, Dolly the cloned sheep was born. Her birth captured the world’s attention and marked a major milestone in biotechnology. Up until that point, it had been common knowledge that full-grown mammals could not be cloned, but this sensational event suggested that human cloning might be a reality. This led to a lot of opposition from human rights organizations. The debate surrounding the technology of “human cloning” is fierce. This stems from the nature of human cloning.
To be precise, human cloning involves the cloning of a human embryo at the stage of cell division after the fertilization of a sperm and egg, but before it develops into a fetus, in order to give birth to a human being with the same genes. The current method of human cloning is called nuclear transfer. Nuclear transfer involves removing the nucleus of a mature, unfertilized egg and replacing it with a nucleus from a specialized cell in adult or embryonic tissue. Since all of a cell’s genetic information is contained in its nucleus, the re-nucleated egg and the resulting individual are genetically identical to the organism that was the source of the transplanted nucleus, meaning that an infinite number of genetically identical individuals can be created through nuclear transfer. In principle, any person can be cloned using this method, and even the dead can be cloned, since laboratory cultures and tissue storage allow cells to outlive their source organisms.
Wilmert and his colleagues, who created Dolly the cloned sheep, found a way to reprogram the state of the DNA in a given cell, returning its differentiated state to its initial state and restoring its developmental potential, thereby reproducing the entire process of producing a mature organism. In other words, the process of somatic cell division of a cell is reversed to its pre-differentiated state, making it a primitive cell. Thus, the current research is not about creating a human being through the fertilization of a sperm and an egg, but rather through the somatic cell division of a single cell.
The field that would benefit the most from human cloning would be medicine. Currently, stem cell research is being actively conducted, and stem cells are a type of cloning. Stem cells are cells that have not yet differentiated into tissues, and they are gaining attention because they can be used to repair damaged tissues. Proponents of cloning research argue that it should be continued because of the availability of stem cells. If human cloning allows us to have an individual with the same genes as us, we can get an organ from that individual when we have a problem with a certain organ, and it can cure the disease and extend our life span.
This raises human rights issues. The movie “Island” addresses this issue, where the main characters are clones of other people and live in isolation from the outside world. The sponsors believe that their clones are merely surviving, but the clones have the same genes as their sponsors and can think and live in the same way as them. How should we ensure the human rights of cloned humans? Should we recognize them as persons? Recognizing them as persons would defeat their original purpose and prevent the original from using their organs at will.
In general, there are two main arguments against human cloning. The first is the essentialist view that human cloning is inherently bad. Proponents of this view emphasize the naturalness of sexual reproduction and argue that cloning that results in the creation of life by asexual reproduction is inherently wrong. They believe that a child born asexually would be less likely to have a sense of independence and would have a weaker bond with its parents. Mailander told the NBAC on March 13, 1997, “Our children are born with a kind of genetic independence from their parents from the beginning. They do not copy either their father or their mother. This, in turn, reminds us that we must recognize their independence and that it is our duty to prepare them for it. Although, in principle, we should not forget that children are a gift to us,” he says, emphasizing the importance of genetic uniqueness.
The second is the consequentialist view that cloning is bad because the consequences are bad. This is the most weighty moral objection to cloning, and it can be divided into two parts. The first is that cloning a human being is likely to result in physical or genetic damage to the child, and the second is that the child will suffer psychological damage due to unrealistic expectations and confusion of identity. Nevertheless, nuclear replacement technology (cell fusion) cannot be abandoned because it is the only way to understand the genetic basis of cancer, which will allow us to treat genetic diseases such as cancer.
Molecular biologist Leon Cass has argued that any attempt to clone a human being is an unethical experiment on the child to be born and carries serious risks of failure and deformity, as confirmed by animal experiments. He believes that, given the very concept of cloning, it is unlikely that a future child would choose to be cloned, even if the child is healthy. Therefore, it is not clear that human cloning is ethically justifiable, emphasizing the risks. Gregory Pence, on the other hand, counters that the argument that human cloning would be harmful is sometimes unjustified. “We’re doing very novel things to save human lives, breaking the barriers of nature, from genetically modified tomatoes to human livers grown in pigs for transplantation into human bodies, but why are we so worried about somatic cell nuclear transfer?” he asks. Pence argues that as long as high embryo loss rates are accepted in normal reproduction and in vitro fertilization, we shouldn’t set overly stringent standards for human cloning.
Human cloning technology has some notable advantages, but it also has many problems. I support the consequentialist view, and the problems with human cloning are as follows. First, there’s the aforementioned issue of human rights violations. If human cloning becomes possible, there will be a tendency to not value life. Life is a precious thing that is temporary and given to everyone equally, but if human cloning is realized, it could theoretically extend life indefinitely, which could lead to a disregard for life. Some opponents of human cloning worry that a cloned child would be treated like an object rather than a person. This could lead to objectification, as it would be perceived as “creating” a human being rather than giving birth to one.
Secondly, if biotechnology is misused, the consequences could be devastating. Cloning technology is about creating life, and if misused, it can have serious consequences. For example, if a person is involved in a crime, another individual could be created without their knowledge and falsely accused of the crime.
Third, human cloning is inseparable from genetic manipulation, and the pursuit of the perfect human being will intensify. This could exacerbate the problem of discrimination. Like racial discrimination in the past, if cloning creates individuals with superior genes, it could lead to discrimination by separating them from children with inferior genes. This can be seen as a problem related to eugenics, but it will become more serious if human cloning becomes possible, and it is an important issue that is inseparable from human cloning.
I am critical of human cloning. As we have seen, cloning technology is medically significant and has the potential to improve the quality of human life. However, this technology must be handled with great care because it is life and death. If used well, it can expand the scope of humanity, but if it goes wrong, the damage can be enormous. There are also still problems that this technology may cause. Cloning humans is an important issue that could determine the future of humanity, so it’s important to think about it carefully rather than rush to judgment.
