HUMAN CLONING

Is it Ethically Permissible to Clone Human Beings?

Is it Ethically Permissible to Clone Human Beings?

It is human cloning that fuels the most intense debate. Although there is little opposition to cloning individual human cells, tissues, or organs, cloning the human being as a whole is much more controversial. Human embryos have been cloned to harvest embryonic stem cells (cells that can divide to form any type of bodily cell), and in theory a cloned embryo could be implanted in a mother who gives birth to a clone (Caplan, 2006). Cloning to harvest embryonic stem cells is controversial because the embryo is destroyed in the process, and those who believe the embryo is a person believe that such destruction is unjustified killing. Proponents deny that the embryo is a person.

Advocates of cloning to produce a complete human being have claimed a variety of reasons a person would want someone cloned. These include parents cloning a dead child or infertile couples cloning a child genetically related to one of the parents. Defenders of cloning for such reasons often appeal to personal autonomy and reproductive rights (Eaton, 2007). They argue that these rights should be respected, even in a case in which a parent wishes to clone a dead child, not realizing that the child born would be a younger identical twin of the dead child, with its own individual personality. Opponents argue against cloning for a number of reasons. First, they argue that human cloning amounts to unauthorized experimentation on human subjects who cannot give permission for research. In addition, they point out safety concerns; more than 90% of cloning attempts fail, and cloned animals often have severe deformities such as organs too large for their bodies. Human clones may suffer similar deformities. Other criticisms include a concern about cloning involving humans becoming manufactured objects, leading to the devaluation of human reproduction and human life (Klotzko, 2007).

Controversy over cloning has led to attempts to ban human cloning in the United States and elsewhere. But proponents of cloning argue that opponents do not distinguish mainstream cloning research, involving cloning human tissues, organs, and embryos for uses such as harvesting stem cells, and extreme research involving the implantation of a human embryo into a woman so that she could give birth to a clone.

Much of this controversy is not directly related to human cloning, but also to developments that might arise from it. There ...