Welcome to Cloning Therapies. Human cloning is the creation of a genetically identical copy of a human, human cell, or human tissue. The ethics of cloning is an extremely controversial issue. The term is generally used to refer to artificial human cloning; human clones in the form of identical twins are commonplace, with their cloning occurring during the natural process of reproduction.
There are two commonly discussed types of human cloning: therapeutic cloning and reproductive cloning. Therapeutic cloning involves cloning cells from an adult for use in medicine and is an active area of research, while reproductive cloning would involve making cloned humans. Such reproductive cloning has not been performed and is illegal in many countries. 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.
Doctors Panayiotis Zavos and Severino Antinori claim they are ready to embark on the greatest human experiment of our age. They say they will attempt to clone a human being before the year is out. Most people think the objections to this are ethical – human cloning would create many moral dilemmas. There is another question that few ever ask: is the science actually ready yet for cloning healthy humans? Horizon follows the latest research, which has led many scientists to believe that Zavos and Antinori’s plans to clone the first human could end in tragedy. The programme also meets couples like Matthew and Desirée Racquer (above) who think cloning offers them the only way to raise a child who is truly their own. For decades, cloning remained within the realms of science fiction. The idea that instead of combining a sperm and an egg, a new human could be made from a single cell taken from an adult, seemed completely absurd. But that all changed in February 1997, when the Roslin Institute (right) introduced the world to Dolly the sheep – the first animal cloned from an adult. Ever since Dolly, scientists have been continuing to experiment with cloning animals. So far, they have succeeded in cloning sheep, cattle, pigs, goats and mice, fuelling the belief that humans could be next. An unreliable procedure But even Dolly’s creator, Professor Ian Wilmut, is concerned that beneath the veneer of success lies a disturbing reality. Most cloning attempts on animals so far have …
For many years a debate about the various issues pertaining to human cloning has been going on around the world. The debate is mostly centered on social, moral and ethical issues. In this article we look at human cloning from a spiritual perspective.
Spiritual research into human cloning
A seeker of SSRF having advanced sixth sense or extrasensory perception (ESP) did spiritual research into human cloning and has received divine knowledge about human cloning in the form of a comparative study between a human clone generated from a single cell and a human being generated from the fusion of a sperm and ovum.
This comparison was across some key parameters and the accuracy of this knowledge has been verified by His Holiness Dr. Athavale, a Saint of the highest order with highly advanced sixth sense and the founder of Spiritual Science Research Foundation Inc.
Comparison between a human clone and a human born by fertilization of sperm and ovum
The following is a summary of the key findings.
The physical capacity of the individual to adjust to the environment – A cloned human has 30% of adjastment capacity whereas a normal human has 50% capacity. An individual with 100% capacity (as seen in the spiritually evolved) would be completely unfazed by any extremes or fluctuations in the environment and would deal with it in a completely balanced manner. Capacity to procreate – A cloned human has 30% capacity whereas a normal human has 50% ability to procreate (having in mind that an average person today is able to give 10 offspring if no contraceptive is taken). Birth due to willful action / willful action – The birth of a human clone is 100% willful action and the birth of normal human is due to destiny One’s wish / God’s wish – Clone takes birth due to our own wish whereas a normal human is born with God’s wish and thus this type of birth is aligned with the Divine Law. Quality of first generation human clone – Quality of first generation human clone is 30% and quality of first generation normal human was 70%. The highest quality of spiritually evolved human being is 100%. Quality of fifth generation human clone – Due to various reasons the quality of human clone in fifth generation would be 0% as it keeps on deteriorating with every consecutive birth. Completing the give and take account- Unlike the spiritually evolved, a normal human being is born with one of the basic purpose of completing and nullifying the give and take account. The present era and the soroundings are 70% conducive for a normal human to complete his give and take but for a human clone it is 30% as the birth is not as per the Divine Law. (For a spiritually evolved, any time is 100% conducive as they are born by Their own wish with a specific Divine Mission and do not have any give and take accounts to nullify.) Likelihood of distress form distressing energies – For human clones the likelihood is 50% and for normal human it is 30%. There is a higher likelihood of possession by a ghost right at the time of conception which is less in the case of a normal person.
Key background points:
In the present times the mode spiritual level of an average person in society across the world is 20%. (if on a scale of 0-100%, 0% would be innanimate objects and 100% a God realised Soul) All references to ‘average person’ or ‘Human from fertilized ovum’ in this article refers to a spiritually average person, i.e. a person having a spiritual level close to 20%. This spiritually average person could well be a billionaire, a head of state or a celebrity from show business.
Summary
Whatever benefits we may possibly hope to derive from human cloning at the physical and mental level, it would be pertinent to carefully consider the spiritual repercussions. Unless we do this we will be doing humanity at large a massive disservice.
Sean M. Clarke has been studying and practicing Spirituality with the Spiritual Science Research Foundation (SSRF) over the past 9 years. An MBA graduate from Monash-Mt Eliza Business School, Australia. Sean gave up his regular career as a Strategy and Business Analyst in the technology sector to help co-ordinate dissemination of SSRF research material as a full-time volunteer.
Cloning is considered the great medical breakthrough of our age. As the definition says clones are copies of another human’s look or what he/she likes to eat, but a person’s whole personality is based on the experiences in his/her life and there is no method of cloning that can replace the personality. There are also medical disadvantages in human cloning, which make the benefits less effective. It was first thought that stem cells could only be harvested from embryos, but today’s researchers are finding that any human cell can be manipulated to replace any tissue of the body.
Health risks from mutation of genes – an abnormal baby would be a nightmare come true. The technique is extremely risky right now. A particular worry is the possibility that the genetic material used from the adult will continue to age so that the genes in a newborn baby clone could be – say – 30 years old or more on the day of birth. Many attempts at animal cloning produced disfigured monsters with severe abnormalities. So that would mean creating cloned embryos, implanting them and destroying (presumably) those that look imperfect as they grow in the womb.
One of the manor Disadvantages of cloning is that there is a continuous debate relating to the ethical issue of cloning. The concept of cloning is hurting a lot of human sentiments ans human believes. There is a lot of controversy regarding whether cloning is ethical or not. at the present time the controversy is storming the world and took a great shape. The whole world seems ti get divided in the issues relating to cloning. The Christianity as well as Judaism do not support the destruction of embryo or the creation of human being artificially.
Cloning has always been a subject whose thoughts both fascinates and frightens the world. On February 27, 1997, a stunning announcement appeared in the British journal Nature that rocked the scientific world: for the first time ever recorded, a mammal- a lamb named Dolly had been successfully cloned from an adult cell. Coinciding with this shocking proclamation, scientist reported the successful cloning of a rhesus monkey, a primate whose reproduction and development is almost identical to man.
Potential Benefits of Cloning
Cloning Animals.-Cloning animals would serve many useful purposes and will be the focus of a major biotechnology industry. The immediate driving force at Roslin was to develop more efficient transgenic animals-animals which have been altered by the addition of genes of other species, such as humans. Current methods, which rely on microinjection of the desired DNA into the nucleus of an egg, are both unreliable and inefficient. If foreign DNA, such as a human gene, could be introduced into cell lines in culture, cells expressing the human genes could then be the source of donor nuclei for cloning. All offspring would then express the desired human gene.
Much current attention is now focused on altering the genes of cows or sheep so that they will produce large amounts of pharmaceutically important proteins in their milk, such as insulin or factor VIII to treat hemophilia. Indeed, it is this application which generated the Wilmut study-the desire to make a transgenic sheep that would include human insulin in its milk, thus providing an efficient source of that substance. There is also interest in producing pigs whose genes have been altered to produce a component of the human immune system’s regulatory proteins. This would make pig organs more suitable for human transplantation.
Dolly the Sheep became an instant celebrity in 1996 when UK scientists (quite literally) created the world’s first clone of a mammal using an adult cell. As controversial as Dolly’s creation was her early death in 2003.
The international press was abuzz: Does cloning violate scientific ethics? Is it right to produce a genetic copy that is evidently inferior till you hit the right one?
Dolly’s stuffed remains may have been relegated to the Royal Museum at Edinburgh, but the debates she started brought the issue of cloning a little too close to home: making genetic carbon copies of human beings.
Cloning Outlawed?
In 2005, the UN General Assembly (in a vote of 84 to 34) appealed to its member nations to ban any type of human cloning. Cloning is defined as the process of creating an exact replica of an organism, cell, or gene. The UN stated that human cloning is ‘incompatible with human dignity’ and goes against protecting human life.
Dozens of nations the world over have enacted laws that ban any type of human cloning. France, Germany, Switzerland, Norway, and Canada all have cloning embargoes in place.
But a couple of months after the UN General Assembly released its stand, South Korean scientists reportedly cloned 11 sick people and then killed their cloned embryos.
What about the US? Well, the Human Cloning Prohibition Act, which Congress passed again in 2003 (it was first passed in 2001), is still sitting in the Senate. The Act bans, among other things, cloning human embryos.
After years of debate, a rival bill, which allows human embryo cloning but bans cloned embryos from being used to initiate pregnancy, was overwhelmingly voted down, 231 to 174. It seems that the Act is once more destined for endless debates in the Senate (which has its own version of the bill) just as it suffered in the House.
The only distinct similarity between the Senate and House versions of the Anti-cloning Act is the penalty: A maximum prison term of 10 years and a maximum fine of $1 million.
So, pending a law, is human cloning outlawed in the US because the UN says so?
Human cloning experiments are going through rough sailing not because of the UN directive (the US doesn’t exactly bow to the UN on its internal policies), but because the sitting President is dead set against it.
Cloning – What Americans Think…
It is President Bush’s firm stand that human life should never be extinguished or exploited to profit another. The American public agrees with him.
In a recent Gallup poll, over 60% were against human embryo cloning as opposed to around 30% that approved. What’s more, the anti-cloning percentage dramatically went up when it was explained that the embryos would be destroyed during research.
So cloning as a crime is a likely reality if a bill gets through within this President’s term. If it continues to sit in the Senate into the next administration, who knows what may happen.
3 Little Known Facts About Cloning
If cloning as a crime is ever submitted for voting in your state, here are a few facts you must consider.
1. Biotechnology Industry Organization has been aggressively pushing for state laws that allow cloned humans to grow past the fetal stage even until birth. The purpose: To harvest tissues for transplanting – so long as they aren’t kept alive after the newborn phase.
2. A number of biotechnologists are currently developing animal clones way past embryo stage. They then harvest animal parts and develop artificial-womb technologies.
3. Anti Cloning doesn’t always mean Anti Stem Cell research. Taking stem cells from adult tissues or umbilical cords isn’t ethically controversial since it doesn’t entail killing human embryos. This kind of stem cell research has repeatedly produced promising results in fighting diseases. Furthermore, many anti-cloning advocates (including legislators) are either afflicted with degenerative diseases or have family members that are.
