Scientific and Ethical Implications of Human and Animal Cloning

Abstract

Cloning is an old paradigm with new ethical issues that society is confronting today and will do so tomorrow. In this publication, cloning has been reviewed from the perspective of its broad implications on research, agriculture, pets, sports animals and humans. Reflection of legal status shows a picture of cloning applications that is not only inevitable but expected to change human species forever. Weighing advantages vs disadvantages of either the reproductive cloning or therapeutic one sums up into unnatural acts, changing the diversity of society and risks of exploitation. Modern biotechnology can only clone the genomes, not the individuals. Cultural inheritance comes from the development and adaptation of individuality generation after generation. The biological inheritance may be copied but the cultural inheritance cannot be duplicated. Human cloning infringes upon the principles of individual freedom, identity, and autonomy. Here, the current impacts of cloning are elaborated in comparison to the past and predicting what could happen tomorrow. In any scenario, public discussion and involvement of society must be preceded by making or amending laws and regulations. Risk assessment, enforcing justice and altered explanation of ‘words’ and ‘definitions might be the next stance for bioethicists and lawyers shortly. However, scientists and the regulatory authorities are of the view that the way IVF and animal cloning have been gradually accepted, the fourteen days blastocyst cultivation has been justified, one day the human cloning will also get the approval of a common man. As science will advance, the ethicist and theologists would come up with a favorable argument too, maybe three decades from now. In the present publication, the issue of cloning in general with a focus on human cloning, in particular, is discussed understandably by everyone interested in cloning and its impacts on society.