Human Cloning Outline

RESEARCH PAPER

Human Cloning

Thesis and Outline

Thesis: Human cloning is unethical because it diminishes the value of human life in more than one way. This is done when parents would want to “replace” a dead child or when human embryos are destroyed after stem cells have been extracted, and when a clone has been created for the sole reason to create “spare parts”.

Outline:

I. Description of Cloning

A. Therapeutic Cloning

B. Reproductive Cloning

II. Objections Against Cloning

A. Spare Parts

B. Replacements

C. Legality

III. Ethical Views

A. Duty Ethics

B. Non-maleficence

C. Autonomy

“DOLLY THE SHEEP IS CLONED.” This was the headline from BBC News in February 1997. This was big news all over the world. Dolly was the first mammal

Cloning is defined as producing a cell or organism with eh same nuclear genome as another cell or organism. Cloning is also described as different processes that can be used to produce genetically identical copies of a biological entity. The copied material would be referred to as the clone. A child produced by cloning would be the genetic duplicate of an existing person. Cloning is asexual reproduction therefore the child that has been cloned would not be the parent’s son or daughter, but a new form of a human being.

Types of Cloning There are two types of human cloning that are commonly discussed, therapeutic and reproductive cloning. There is a third type of cloning that is called replacement cloning. Replacement cloning is a theoretical possibility that combine therapeutic and reproductive cloning together. Therapeutic cloning is designed for disease. This is when a cloned embryo is created for the purpose of producing stem cells with the same DNA as the donor cell. This will be beneficial to be used to develop treatments for different diseases. Although therapeutic cloning has the potential of helping the treatment of diseases it does require that the embryos are destroyed in the test tube, therefore creating an argument opposing the collection of embryonic stem

Many people are alarmed by reproductive cloning. There are different reasons why people are opposed to this. Some of this feeling comes from Hollywood and how cloning is portrayed in the movies, some are opposed because of religious beliefs, and others are opposed based on a variety of moral reasons. Reproductive cloning, the most controversial of all, intent is to create a baby that is genetically identical to another person. According to an article from Bio Centre reproductive cloning is defined as follows: In reproductive cloning the entire genetic code (except for the mitochondrial DNA) is reproduced from a single body cell of an adult individual. The most common cloning technique is somatic cell nuclear transfer (SCNT). The procedure is as follows:

• The nucleus is removed from an egg leaving the cytoplasm and mitochondria (cellular components derived from the