Persuasive Essay On Human Cloning

Kyle Yenulevich
Lecturer: John McDonough
ENGL 101-037
11/24/14
Essay 4: Final

Life: Should it be formed in a lab? Most of the American society sees human cloning as only science fiction, but what they don’t know is how close to reality it actually is. With the technology that is available today, it does not seem crazy that human cloning could happen within my own lifetime. Cloning could have a very beneficial effect to our world, possibly one that we can’t even fathom because the idea of human cloning is so complicated. After completing my research, I have concluded that human cloning should not continue to be researched given the current conditions of our society. Cloning should not be allowed because society would not be able to handle
the responsibility. There are countless pros and cons for each side of the argument, some of which I will describe here along with laws that have been passed to either help or hurt this research. In the article, “The Arrival of Human Cloning” Wesley J. Smith states that people against cloning should be aware of “phony bans” that appear to be against human cloning research, but actually help it.
In 2007 Senators Dianne Feinstein and Orrin Hatch wrote the Human Cloning Ban and Stem Cell Protection Bill. This bill would have legalized human cloning because in the bill they purposely wrote the wrong definition of human cloning so that the real definition would still be legal to research.
President Bush was another contributor to the phony bans. He placed minor restrictions on the funding of embryonic stem cell research by the National Institutes of Health, but was actually funding them hundreds of millions of dollars.
Since the time of the Dickey-Wicker Amendment, federal money cannot be used for research that creates embryos then destroys them. President Obama found a way around this by stating that private companies pay for the destruction of embryos while as the federal government pays for research on the stem cell lines. The only catch is that the embryos have to be leftovers from in vitro fertilization.
Smith states that since the Dickey-Wicker Amendment is not permanent, and must be passed every year, that opponents of human cloning will soon try to make this amendment permanent and put a halt on all research. He also points out that eggs are in short supply and hard to come by so women can now sell their eggs to research facilities. The process of obtaining the eggs is dangerous and could harm the female donor. Another point he makes is that the majority of the eggs donated to research have poor embryos, so now the marketability of the female ovaries will skyrocket. Researchers will now only accept the best embryos, so the egg hunt is now on. Smith best described the current situation when he states, “The fact that human beings can be cloned is a scientific triumph, but it is also an ethical earthquake. Because these experiments offer the potential to advance scientific knowledge, they will tempt us—always for “the best” reasons—to set aside our convictions about the intrinsic dignity of all human life”. The government would have to undergo a process of slowly introducing the idea of cloning to the public for a long period of time so the idea of human cloning would not seem as radical as it does today. Once the public is okay with the idea then human cloning should be researched and legal to perform.
The pros of human cloning can seem very convincing, but leave you with the question “Is the world really ready for all this?” David King of Human Genetics Alert stated that, "Scientists have finally delivered the baby that would-be human cloners have been waiting for: a method for reliably creating cloned human embryos," but later goes on to say that "It is imperative we create an international ban on human cloning before any more research like this takes place. It is irresponsible in the extreme to have published this." He was talking about a breakthrough that happened which allowed scientists to create an embryotic stem cell line with only two human cells. Embryotic stem cells are the first step in the cloning process. When Dolly the sheep was cloned in 1996 and revealed to the public in 1997, a mass hysteria of the prospect of multiple Saddam Husseins being created in a lab in the Middle East arose. That is another example of the people on Earth not being ready to handle this new concept. In the article, “Cloning”, written by Robin McKie she quotes Professor Colin Blakemore of Oxford University with the question, “Under what circumstances would we tolerate the creation of a human clone?” This is a moral question that there is no real answer to. Most of the evidence about this topic points to human cloning being a real possibility and having great scientific effects on the entire world. In the same article, Professor John Harris of Manchester University’s Institute for science is quoted for stating, “If you take a healthy adult 's DNA and use it to create a new person – by cloning – you are essentially using a tried and tested genome, one that has worked well for several decades for the donor. By contrast, a child born naturally has an 8% chance of succumbing to a serious genetic abnormality because of the random selection of their DNA. You can avoid that with a clone”. Other pros of human cloning include: eliminating defective genes to produce healthy humans, faster recovery from traumatic injury, Lesbian and gay couples can have children with 100% their genetics, eliminating infertility, saving endangered animal species, and a single parent wanting a child and not wanting a gamete donor. Harris later goes on to say in the article that “If a couple find they are carriers of harmful, possibly fatal recessive genetic illnesses, there is a one in four chance they will produce a child who will die of that condition. That is a big risk. An alternative would be to clone one of the parents. If you did that, then you would know you were producing a child who would be unaffected by that illness in later life.” Present day, the way that “human cloning” works is that the nucleus from an egg cells is removed and the nucleus from a skin cell is inserted. The nucleus is fused to the new cell and it begins to divide. After a few days the growth is halted and stem cells form. If you treat these stem cells with different chemicals, they can form into specialized cells that make up: the heart, brain, pancreas, and other organs. These cells combine to form tissue which can be used on the original donor of the skin cell. The opposite side of this argument is less evidence and facts and more of how clones and the use of human cloning, can affect the world and the ethics of our society.
Human cloning could greatly decrease the gene pool of the world. It would also reduce the sense of individuality in the world with clones of other people running around. One of the few fact-based cons of human cloning is that the clones could potentially age faster and have premature health issues or even death. As of today cloning, in general, has a 95% failure rate so the practice has a lot of room for improvement, but also a lot of room to mess up. “Designer Babies” are babies that you can choose what traits they have given the traits of the two parents. This technology would be possible if human cloning was possible. The value of life in the areas that cloning is popular in would decrease because if you do not like how your child looks, acts or anything else you can just pick out a new
one! Another side of this argument comes from the hypothetical clone’s side; Clones would be looked down upon in public. They would become the new minority. During the first generation of the clone children, they will be bullied in school. If the parents of a non-cloned child do not agree with human cloning, they could tell the child to stay away from the clone because they are “different”. The social structure of America would not know what category to place the clones in. The cities in the United States are very densely populated; If this technology is mastered the ability to produce “new” clones would be equivalent to the ford production line in the 20’s. The United States, for example, could become overpopulated very quickly so laws would be have to made so the clone industry can not mass produce people. People, clones specifically, will lose their sense of self and become an object rather than a human. If the production of clones per year is increasing steadily over time, then it could potentially put an end to the evolution of the human race. “Survival of the fittest” will now become even more prevalent in the world (although in a contradictory way than Darwin thought). The best genes would be attributed to the clone and thus again eliminates individuality.
In conclusion, I believe that human cloning should not be allowed, at least during my lifetime.
A great point that helps to prove this point is, “Under what circumstances would we tolerate the creation of a human clone?” (McKie) The answer to this question is that we wouldn’t. I do not believe the world is ready for the radical changes that would occur, and the evidence from the articles helps to prove the thesis because the cons outweigh and contradict the pros. The quote that best describes the topic in general, “The fact that human beings can be cloned is a scientific triumph, but it is also an ethical earthquake” (Smith). Until the world is ready for cloning, that quote will best show how the majority feel about the
subject.
Works Cited
1. McKie, Robin. “Human cloning developments raise hopes for new treatments” The Guardian. May 18th, 2013. <http://www.theguardian.com/science/2013/may/18/human-cloning-heart-disease-genes>

2. Smith, Wesley. “The Arrival of Human Cloning” The Weekly Standard. May 27th, 2013. <http://www.weeklystandard.com/articles/arrival-human-cloning_724721.html?page=1>