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Illegal Beings: Human Clones
Re: Is Cloning Unnatural?
SC ( 11/06/2003, 03:17:17 )The site from which the quoted article was taken also has an article which discusses the potential applications of adult stem cells, one of which has been to strengthen a failing heart. The potential exists to introduce healthier cells into a failing organ and prevent a transplant (and therefore the growth of entire "spare part people") from becoming necessary in the first place.The questions answered in the article are for people who have probably heard cloning from mass media sources such as sensational news stories and science fiction movies, which can be aimed to scare the audience more than to inform them. Advances in the use of stem cells are also occurring quickly enought that it's difficult for the movies to keep up.As I read it, the quote you refer to mentions that consciousness does not reside solely in any one cell, any one collection of cells, or even an entire single organ, perhaps not even the brain. It depends upon an entire system of interdependent parts. Creating virtually all of that entire system might entail the inadvertent creation of some form of consciousness we can't recognize.An adult human body, even a theoretical one without a few important cells or organs, has almost all the interdependent parts that make up the system; an embryo can make those parts, but hasn't done so yet. Cloning, by somatic cell nuclear transfer at least, works by making a cell young again, so that it starts to act as an embryo. Millions of our cells have the capacity to start dividing again and create parts of ourselves or a new individual. That means that anything we do to destroy even one of our cells destroys a potential human being: skinning a knee, burning a hand, spitting, taking a left turn instead of a right one, anything that involves not just losing cells, but choosing one course of action over another. However, when we are injured or choose one experience over another, we destroy potential versions of ourselves, not actual conscious ones. The death of one cell does not entail the death of consciousnes, just as the creation of one cell does not entail the creation of consciousness, because consciousness does not reside in one cell.Consciousness, however, does depend on having enough cells that are young enough and working together to renew the whole system and keep it running. One part of the system might be maintained; certainly a few cells can be, but maintaining the whole thing is far more difficult.In other words, preserving the life of a few cells is not the same as preserving consciousness. By the same token, preventing consciousness from developing is not the same thing as destroying life. In fact, the less a cell has become part of a greater consciousness, the longer it tends to live. Cells with the potential to develop into conscious human beings, but which have not yet done so, can not be destroyed by aging in the same way as the typical cells in a mature person, and are called "immortal" by researchers. One aim of cloning and stem cell research is to find a way for life and consciousness to coexist longer.
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