[lit-ideas] Re: Cloning is Moral
- From: Judy Evans <judithevans001@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Wed, 25 May 2005 17:18:25 +0100
Whatever he thinks, there are anti-abortion US people flying for
treatment to a country that uses aborted fetuses for medical purposes
(the ones I've seen interviewed are OK people in that they are very
honest about it and they don't actually campaign against abortion);
and soon, they'll be flying here...
-- we are behind South Korea but hope to catch up soon.
**Reproductive** cloning is illegal here and research is strictly
regulated but that doesn't put us at a research disadvantage re
medical treatment, it seems; that isn't why we're behind the Koreans.
Selective IVF is legal in certain cases -- some people are unhappy about
this -- basically cases where a new child can save the life of an existing
one, by being a bone marrow donor, but that's a common law precedent
matter.
Judy
Wednesday, May 25, 2005, 4:12:38 PM, Eternitytime1@xxxxxxx wrote:
Eac> In llight of hearning that Brian does not believe in governmental
Eac> intervention in terms of taxes or health care, I wonder at his viewpoint
in the matter
Eac> of stem cell research and cloning.
Eac> As one who has been dealing with a Representative in my area who has tried
Eac> to keep the whole biotechnology world from progressing as well as being
aware
Eac> of what some of the 'good' that can happen in that realm...I wonder what
he
Eac> thinks...
Eac> Just curious,
Eac> Marlena
Eac> See this paragraph of the following (in particular):
Eac> At stake with reproductive cloning is not only whether you can conceive a
Eac> child who shares your genetic makeup, but whether you have the right to
improve
Eac> the genetic makeup of your children: to prevent them from getting genetic
Eac> diseases, to prolong their lifespan or to improve their physical
appearance.
Eac> You should have such rights just as you have the right to vaccinate your
Eac> children or to fit them with braces.
Eac> _http://www.mensnewsdaily.com/archive/c-e/epstein/2005/epstein052305.htm_
Eac> (http://www.mensnewsdaily.com/archive/c-e/epstein/2005/epstein052305.htm)
Eac> Cloning Is Moral
Eac> May 23, 2005
Eac> by Alex Epstein
Eac> In a major breakthrough for medical progress, scientists from South Korea
Eac> have created a highly efficient method for cloning human embryos and
extracting
Eac> stem cells--a feat that makes life-saving embryonic stem-cell treatments
Eac> that much closer to reality. Instead of taking this thrilling news as an
Eac> opportunity to celebrate cloning, politicians and
Eac> intellectuals are once again
Eac> calling for bans. Some seek to ban all cloning, while others oppose "only"
Eac> reproductive cloning. Although each group claims the moral high ground,
both
Eac> positions are profoundly immoral. Any attempt to ban human cloning
technology should
Eac> be rejected permanently, because cloning--therapeutic and reproductive--is
Eac> morally good.
Eac> Consider first therapeutic cloning, which opponents perversely condemn as
Eac> "antilife." Senator Sam Brownback, who has sponsored a Congressional ban
on all
Eac> cloning, says therapeutic cloning is "creating human life to destroy [it]."
Eac> President Bush calls it "growing human beings for spare body parts."
Eac> In fact, therapeutic cloning is a highly pro-life technology, since cloned
Eac> embryos can be used to extract medically potent embryonic stem cells. A
cloned
Eac> embryo is created by inserting the nucleus of a human body cell into a
Eac> denucleated egg, which is then induced to divide until it reaches the
embryo
Eac> stage. These embryos are not human beings, but microscopic bits of
protoplasm the
Eac> width of a human hair. They have the potential to grow into human beings,
but
Eac> actual human beings are the ones dying for lack of this technology. The
Eac> embryonic stem cells extracted from a cloned embryo can become any other
type of
Eac> human cell. In the future, they may be used to develop pancreatic cells
for
Eac> curing diabetes, cardiac muscle cells for curing heart disease, brain
cells
Eac> for curing Alzheimer's--or even entire new organs for transplantation.
"There's
Eac> not an area of medicine that this technology will not potentially impact,"
Eac> says Nobel laureate Harold Varmus.
Eac> Opponents of therapeutic cloning know all this, but are unmoved. This is
Eac> because their fundamental objection is not that therapeutic cloning is
antilife,
Eac> but that it entails "playing God"--i.e., remaking nature to serve human
Eac> purposes. "[Human cloning] would be taking a major step into making man
himself
Eac> simply another one of the man-made things," says Leon Kass, chairman of the
Eac> President's Council on Bioethics. "Human nature becomes merely the last
part of
Eac> nature to succumb to the technological project, which turns all of nature
Eac> into raw material at human disposal." Columnist Armstrong Williams
condemns all
Eac> cloning as "human egotism, or the desire to exert our will over every
aspect
Eac> of our surroundings," and cautions: "We're not God."
Eac> The one truth in the anticloning position is that cloning does represent
"the
Eac> desire to exert our will over every aspect of our surroundings." But such
a
Eac> desire is not immoral--it is a mark of virtue. Using technology to alter
Eac> nature is a requirement of human life. It is what brought man from the
cave to
Eac> civilization. Where would we be without the men who "exerted their will"
over
Eac> their surroundings and constructed the first hut, cottage, and skyscraper?
Eac> Every advance in human history is part of "the
Eac> technological project," and has
Eac> made man's life longer, healthier, and happier. These advances are
produced by
Eac> those who hold the premise that suffering and disease are a curse, not to
be
Eac> humbly accepted as "God's will," but to be fought proudly with all the
power
Eac> of man's rational mind.
Eac> The same virtue applies to reproductive cloning--which, despite the
Eac> ridiculous, horror-movie scenarios conjured up by its
Eac> opponents, would simply result
Eac> in time-separated twins just as human as anyone else. Once it becomes
safe,
Eac> reproductive cloning will have legitimate uses for infertile couples and
for
Eac> preventing the transmission of genetic diseases. Even more important, it is
Eac> significant as an early form of a tremendous value: genetic engineering,
which
Eac> most anticloners object to because as such it entails "playing God" with
the
Eac> genetic makeup of one's child. At stake with reproductive cloning is not
only
Eac> whether you can conceive a child who shares your genetic makeup, but
whether
Eac> you have the right to improve the genetic makeup of your children: to
prevent
Eac> them from getting genetic diseases, to prolong their lifespan or to
improve
Eac> their physical appearance. You should have such rights just as you have
the
Eac> right to vaccinate your children or to fit them with braces.
Eac> The mentalities that denounce cloning and "playing God" have consistently
Eac> opposed technological progress, especially in medicine. They objected to
Eac> anesthesia, smallpox inoculations, contraception, heart transplants, in
vitro
Eac> fertilization--on the grounds that these innovations were "unnatural" and
contrary
Eac> to God's will. To let them cripple biotechnological progress by banning
Eac> cloning would be a moral abomination.
Eac> _Alex Epstein_
Eac> (mailto:reaction@xxxxxxxxxxx?subject=Epstein%20on%20Social%20Security)
Eac> ------------------------------------------------------------------
Eac> To change your Lit-Ideas settings (subscribe/unsub, vacation on/off,
Eac> digest on/off), visit www.andreas.com/faq-lit-ideas.html
--
mailto:judithevans001@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
------------------------------------------------------------------
To change your Lit-Ideas settings (subscribe/unsub, vacation on/off,
digest on/off), visit www.andreas.com/faq-lit-ideas.html
Other related posts:
