In article <dr4cmvook8bu46k1fr4aqvsah2k2gm10g7@4ax.com>, David Patrick says...

On Mon, 15 Sep 2003 06:33:17 GMT, Sir Arthur C. B. E. Wholeflaffers
A.S.A. <nospam@newsranger.com> wrote:

My Father is a Clone//ETs plotting to overthrow the human race!

Well, at least you credited ...

And credit is what I deserve.  One day when the final chapter
of the human race is written (most likely by me!), debunkers
so-called skeptics and noisy negativists, like yourself,
will be but a minor footnote.  

If you bothered to use the one brain-cell you had
left, you might have learned something, but no,
it is way too late for useful idiots like you!!

Now move along, debunker, the sandbox
is wide open.  Kind of like Wider-Sham open,
but another story!!

Irreplaceable Ewe--Business Before Science

On February 22, the cloning of mammals stopped being science fiction and became
science.  The newspapers that day reported that Dr. Ian Wilmut, an embryologist
in Edinburgh, had cloned a sheep named Dolly.  Before we consider the wider
ramifications of this accomplishment, let us note two things.  One is the order
of events.  First, Dr. Wilmut patented the procedure, then he announced his
achievement to the press and then his paper appeared in the British journal
"Nature", informing other scientists about the details of what he had done.
Business before science.

The other is that Dolly is NOT a true copy, or clone, of the original ewe.
True, Dolly has the same DNA (or genes) in the nucleus of her cells.  But,
although embryologists have a way of forgetting it, an egg is not an empty bag
containing nothing but a nucleus, transplanted or not.  Eggs also contain
structural and metabolic equipment, including a complement of extranuclear DNA
specific to that individual.  The second ewe did not contribute her nucleus, but
she did contribute the rest of the contents of her egg.  The reconstituted egg
was then gestated in the uterus of yet another ewe.  Dolly is, indeed, a nuclear
DNA clone, but there is more to life than DNA, even for sheep.

In the analogous human experiment, the donor of the nucleus and the "cloned"
baby would be related less closely than so-called identical twins, because such
twins develop from the same egg and are gestated simultaneously by the same
woman.  And anyone familiar with identical twins knows that while more similar
than other siblings, they are far from carbon copies.  This new technology
raises serious political and social concerns, but these concerns do not arise
from the fact that we can now copy ourselves over and over.  We cannot, cloning
humans is scientifically bogus.  But even bogus science can have political
consequences.

What interests Dr. Wilmut and other genetic engineers is that the new process
should enable them to replicate mammals whose DNA has been engineered to produce
pharmaceuticals and perhaps even organs for human use, so that they become
lucrative living factories.

As might be expected, Dr. Wilmut accompanied his announcement with the statement
that he would find it "offensive" to use the technology on humans, but that
offers little reassurance that people won't try.  Last week it was sheep, this
week monkeys.  Who's next?  The publicity generated by Dolly offers the
opportunity to face in earnest the social and political issues raised by genetic
engineering.  For too long, biotechnology has been portrayed as the new frontier
that will rescue the economy.  But in whose interest?  The biotechnology
industry is highly robotized, not labor intensive.  It can realize profits for
the rich but not remedy our economic problems.

Do we really want to manufacture animals on the assembly line and look on them
not as live organisms but as relatively cheap factories that can yield
profitable products?  Generate people for spare parts?  Achieve personal
immortality?  A  baby is and always will be a person in her or his own right,
not a commodity or a substitute for someone else.  

President Clinton has responded by banning use of federal funds for cloning
humans, requesting voluntary restraint from the private sector and activating a
bioethics panel. Those may be first steps.  But decisions that affect our basic
relationships with one another and the rest of nature must not be left to a
handful of carefully selected scientists, bioethicists, lawyers and clergy.
Anyone can predict from such a panel what recommendations will be forthcoming.

Clearly, reproductive technologies must not be driven by market forces and need
to be regulated.  But in a democracy, deliberations about social and political
concerns of this magnitude must not happen behind closed door.  We need town
meetings, public hearings, forums where people can become informed about the
antisocial implications of these technologies and discuss how best to rein them
in.  Recommendations of expert panels and Congressional action should grow from
such activities, not pre-empt them. 

If we are afraid of another Nazi empire trying to clone a master race (whether
or not it's scientifically feasible), we must destroy the political possibility
that such an empire could arise.  We can regulate and legislate the details.
The fundamentals have to be part of our shared values about the kind of society
which we want to live.


By Ruth Hubbard, a professor emerita of biology at Harvard University, is a
board member of the Council for Responsible Genetics.  From the Nation Magainze;
March 24, 1997