Why not clone humans, we are cloning animals?

Question

Also if it is unethical to clone humans, WHY test on animals (such as cows)?

Answer 1

If we assume that a human clone has all of the rights
and responsibilities of a person whose genes were
derived in a normal fashion (and that's a big if), I only
see two problems:

1: It allows people to reproduce that under other
circumstances couldn't, thereby NOT selecting
out genes that aren't good at perpetuating the
species. The same can be said about glasses,
insulin and beer. The long term genetic result
of this will inevitably be that we end up with
a species that has great difficulty breeding without
technological assistance, but we're so far down
that road, I'm not sure that I'd use THIS as the
reason to stop.

2: This process artificially increases certain
gene combinations based on ... one's access
to the appropriate medical care. That is, you
can imagine a rich guy cloning himself a hundred
thousand times - if he had the money to make
sure the kids got good care, love, etc, I don't
see the issue as an ethical one to the individual
children, but rather the effect of having such
a large chunk of identical genes may cause
problems with the species and/or increase
the likelihood in the future that incestuous
couplings happen unintentionally.

I think the terror of cloning comes down to:

1: People assuming the existance of a soul and
not understanding what effect cloning might
have on that.

2: People not following the first assumption, that a
clone would have all of the rights and responsibilities
of a non-clone. That is, many people believe that
we will get to the point where we are bringing
entire lives into being just to harvest organs, etc.

I really have no problem with people bringing clones
into this world purely as a source of parts, as long as
they don't bring the brain along for the ride. I have
no problem taking my own DNA, putting it into a petri
dish, developing a full sized human, and removing its
heart to replace mine ... AS LONG AS IT IS WHOLLY
INCAPABLE OF INTELLECT.

As soon as it is capable of even the tiniest bit of
intellect, it falls into the assumption of full rights and
responsibilities of a non-clone.

I fully expect this opinion to be greeted as obscenely
progressive, but I would be very interested if people
have a real refutation to it that doesn't involve
hebe jebes or souls.

Answer 2

The major ethical dilemma raised by cloning is that it isn't always successful and often results in the destruction of human embryos, which is considered destroying human life by a lot of people. In their eyes it's murder, which doesn't go down too well.

Also, the cloning process is a long way from being perfected. The resulting fetuses could be severely deformed, have long-term health problems or shortened lifespans. (or so was the case in a lot of the earlier animal trials)

Besides from the health dangers of cloning, the social problems of having a new breed of human would be complex.

edit: socially, animal lives aren't valued as much as human lives, therefore it's seen as acceptable to test on them. this probably varies from culture to culture, but in the western world - where most of the money is - animal testing is the status quo.

Answer 3

Cloning humans brings up too many questions we are not ready to answer. Would a clone be a person with equal rights? Etc.

Humans and animals are NOT the same. That is why you can test on animals and not humans.

Answer 4

This is so that humans do not sacrifice the life of other humans for the sake of science, as humans are created apart from other animals.

Answer 5

because those scientists havent found ways to clone humans yet they dont have that kind of technology. for your 2nd question, probably because they believe animals are less superior to humans and they don't give a damn because they'll reproduce or some reason like that.

Answer 6

I don't think we should clone anything. Once we start messing with nature, the results could be catastrophic.

Answer 7

We don't need a duplicate of any of us.