It's a fear generated from too much bad science fiction. Cloned soldiers would still have to be carried to maturity by an army of mothers, and raised by an army of nannies and teachers. It would still take about two decades to come up with the first batch of useful soldiers.

Even then, getting the clones to all believe the same thing would be impossible. Knowledge can not be cloned, and knowledge heavily influences what type of person we become. To hear the way some people speak about an army of mindless clones with identical personalities, one would think that Hitler's clones would all grow up speaking German, regardless of the language spoken by those around them.

In short, there is no more reason to believe that Hitler's clones would be identical to Hitler, than in believing that Theresia would be identical to Lesley.

A dictator wanting an army would be best advised to use more traditional methods of reproduction and selective breeding, combined with traditional methods of propaganda. Granted, this will produce some soldiers that are below norm, but it will produce others that are above norm that can be used to create the next generation of even better soldiers; a benefit that cloning does not allow. Here, cloning changes nothing.

Defective Child Objections

These objections are grounded on the fact that the cloning procedure is complicated, and the adult cell being cloned is in some relevant ways different from embryonic cells. Both factors could result in the child suffering from birth defects.

This objection may have some validity if clones develop particularly severe problems, such as extreme unending pain.

However, it is also dangerous to hold too strongly to a principle that states "we may prohibit you from having biological children of your own whenever we feel that your child will fail to meet to our standards for a 'normal' child."

In fact, it is ironic that where this is given as a reason to prohibit cloning, such a prohibition would institutionalize one of the terrors which causes others to (irrationally) fear cloning. If we may prohibit the birth of clones that are 'inferior' to 'normal' children, then we should also feel free to require sterilization of individuals who would parent children considered 'defective,' forcing them to adopt and to raise as their own the 'superior' offspring of 'normal' humans.

Theresia might not be a perfect child. However, that a child may be less than perfect provides a very dangerous argument for legislating that society may prohibit the conception of that child.

Slavery and Spare Parts Objections

These objections hold that cloning should be prohibited on the grounds that clones will be treated as slaves or, worse, chopped up and sold as spare parts.

Enslaving, and chopping up people for spare parts, are both possible without cloning. Prohibiting cloning will do nothing to avoid these issues. Nor is there any reason to think that, by permitting cloning, society will suddenly feel an irresistible impulse to vote for the NAZI party or repeal the 13th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. In short, there is no causal relationship between allowing cloning and allowing these types of abuses. We can have the former without the latter.

In fact, legalized cloning, recognizing that individuals are not to require that others live according to their standards, would be a step away from, not toward, the totalitarian abuses asserted in these types of arguments.

If people were really interested in creating people to be used as spare parts, they could be doing this today with our present technology. Granted, a clone would be a better match for a recipient than a person conceived from a sperm and egg. Still, traditional offspring are good enough for practical purposes, and could already be contributing their organs to organ farms.

And if people were really interested in having a group of less intelligent slaves, then, as with the army of super soldiers, this is already possible using selective breeding. And we will still need the mothers who are willing to carry these children to term. Cloning adds an expensive and unnecessary step to the process; thus it does not, in fact, introduce any new problems or concerns.

I have no fear that Theresia will fall into such a fate; and where there is a society ruled by people unconcerned with the wrongness of these moral crimes. And where the leaders of a country are less concerned with the wrongness of these moral crimes, people born of normal births are in just as much danger as clones. Cloning adds nothing, and subtracts nothing, from the risk.

Though the acceptance of some of the reasons given here for a prohibition on cloning provides a very real danger.

Selfishness Objections

In discussing this issue, a lot of people assert that Lesley and I are selfish for wanting Theresia, particularly since so many children are waiting to be adopted.

In this, we are just as selfish than the hundreds of millions of people each year who plan a pregnancy. They, too, are 'ignoring' the plight of adoptable children in favor of passing along their genes to the next generation. And if having one's own child under these circumstances is to be considered a crime, then that crime should apply to all who have children of their own, not just those who would have their own children through cloning.

And so I challenge those who raise this objection to first go to their parents and tell them, "Mom, dad, you should have been required to adopt rather than bring me into this world." Those who would not do this simply can be dismissed as being insincere in their criticism of us.

The same objection applies to those who assert that there are already too many people coming into the world, and we do not need another way to have children. If this were a valid objection, then all further research into infertility treatments; to only outlaw cloning for this reason would be arbitrary. And a fair law would have to limit the freedoms of everybody who plans to have a child of their own, not just those who would plan to have a child by cloning. Continue...