Human Cloning

1. Human Cloning

2. Introduction • Human cloning is the creation of a genetically identical human being, human cell or human tissue.

3. Cloning • Cloning produces cells that are genetically similar to each other (have the same DNA). • This prevents an organ (or cells) made through cloning from being rejected.

4. Types of Cloning • There are two types of cloning: • Therapeutic cloning is the use of (stem) cells for medicinal or research purposes. • Reproductive cloning would be using (stem) cells to create cloned humans.

5. Types of Cloning

6. Therapeutic Cloning • Nucleus of an egg cell is replaced with the nucleus of a body cell. • Egg cell is stimulated with electricity. • Embryo grows. • Embryo stem cells are collected and used to treat the donor.

7. Problems with Therapeutic Cloning • Therapeutic cloning creates embryos and then destroys them for stem cells, which is morally wrong to some.

8. Reproductive Cloning • Nucleus of an egg cell is replaced with the nucleus of a body cell. • Egg cell is stimulated with electricity. • Embryo is put into a uterus and allowed to grow and be born. • The baby is an exact genetic copy of the donor!

9. Problems with Reproductive Cloning • Reproductive cloning is deemed morally wrong because it is creating a human life just to be a walking organ donor for the person after whom they were created.

10. Human Cloning • Human cloning has sparked debate within the scientific community since the 1960s. • Lots of movies have been made concerning the ethics of human cloning (Sleeper, The Boys from Brazil, Multiplicity…).

11. Pro-Reproductive Cloning • Severino Antinori and Panos Zavos hope to create a fertility treatment that allows parents who are both infertile to have children with at least some of their DNA in their offspring. • Some scientists, including Dr. Richard Seed, suggest that human cloning might prevent the human aging process. • In Aubrey de Gray's proposed SENS (Strategies for Engineered Negligible Senescence), one of the considered options to repair the cell depletion related to cellular senescence is to grow replacement tissues from stem cells harvested from a cloned embryo.

12. Anti-Reproductive Cloning • Opponents of human cloning argue that the process will likely lead to severely disabled children. • Bioethicist Thomas Murray of the Hastings Centre argues that "it is absolutely inevitable that groups are going to try to clone a human being. But they are going to create a lot of dead and dying babies along the way.” • Due to the difficulty of cloning any living animal, it is likely that there would be a great number of failures in the creation of a living human clone, such as clones without viable immune systems or other gross genetic failures.

13. More Cloning? • A third type of cloning called replacement cloning is a theoretical possibility, and would be a combination of therapeutic and reproductive cloning. • Replacement cloning would entail the replacement of an extensively damaged, failed, or failing body through cloning followed by whole or partial brain transplant. • Never been attempted… that we know of.