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So What’s So Bad About Human Cloning?

So What’s So Bad About Human Cloning?. Andrew Latus Jan. 22, 2003. An Important Distinction. Therapeutic Cloning vs. Reproductive Cloning Therapeutic = producing a clone as a source of material for experiment and/or treatment

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So What’s So Bad About Human Cloning?

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  1. So What’s So Bad About Human Cloning? Andrew Latus Jan. 22, 2003

  2. An Important Distinction • Therapeutic Cloning vs. Reproductive Cloning • Therapeutic = producing a clone as a source of material for experiment and/or treatment • Some moral issues differ depending on the type of cloning being discussed • Main focus will be on reproductive cloning

  3. Six Issues • 1. 'It's unnatural.' • 2. The moral status of clones • 3. The motivation of the person being cloned • 4. Risks to the clone • 5. Who will the parent be? • 6. Does cloning someone inherently disrespect the clone? • 1, 2, 3 & 6 are also relevant to therapeutic cloning

  4. 1. Unnaturalness • Or … ‘cloning is playing god.’ • Or … ‘cloning is inconsistent with human dignity” • “… some practices … are simply unacceptable, because they're not consistent with human dignity, such as cloning a person and creating animal-human hybrids. Those are unacceptable, because they're just not consistent with human dignity." (Alan Rock, May 3, 2001) • In other words, there’s just something wrong with cloning, no matter how it’s carried out.

  5. 2. The Moral Status of Clones • Would clones be people like you and me? • Would they have souls? • Some claim that human cloning will involve the creation of a 'new slave class'. • For therapeutic cloning: at what point does the clone become morally important?

  6. 3. The Motivation of the Person Being Cloned • Some claim that to want to clone yourself is to have a morally bad motivation. • Perhaps it's unacceptably vain. • Perhaps it involves seeing a clone as a means to an end, not as an entity that is valuable in and of itself

  7. 4. Risks to the Clone • A clone might suffer physical,psychological, or social harm. • Physical: Many reports of cloned animals being less healthy than the original • Psychological: Growing up knowing yourself to be a genetic copy of someone may have a psychological cost • Social: A stigma might attach to being known to be a clone

  8. 5. Who will the parent be? • Both a legal and a moral question • Would the clone be a child or a sibling of the person cloned (or neither)? • The category of parent has both biological and social elements

  9. 6. Does cloning someone inherently disrespect the clone? • Also relevant to the motivation of the person being cloned • A central ethical idea: a person should be treated not as a means to an end, but as an end in him/herself • Will clones always (or almost always) be created as a means to some end? • E.g., reproducing a loved one, a great leader, an athlete, producing a source for a transplant

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