If you think the number of lawyers in this country is excessive now, wait to see the number explode if cloning becomes routine.

All this is starting to make me think of The Truman Show.

I hadnt thought of that although that is interesting. Owning a human. Would it really be a human? Where are the boundries? Would there be reclassification of people?

My head hurts just thinking about all the areas in American life this would alter. Fairly solid trends and beliefs would have to change.

On the other hand, I don't think it will be stoppable once the procedure is mastered.

But the gov't will try. Poindexter will require random DNA samples to put in your file along with everything else.



:eek:

C'mon slang...you like conspiracy theories too. Let's see now...

The US government has actually been cloning since the mid 1930s, underground at the University of Chicago. However, the government grew alarmed when Dolly was created. After the debacle in Florida in 2000, the US government hired a close relative of Katherine Harris to pose as a French cult representative to tout a cloned human.

Okay...your turn.

That wouldn't happen. They'd be given the same rights as everybody else. All human citizens get basic rights. Why wouldn't it be a human?

Somehow i don't think you can or would be able to 'own' a person, but the way companies can own genes does worry me greatly. It's really murky, on one hand companies should be able to profit from their research, on the other hand it's not like they made the gene, is it? It stops other people working with it in some ways.

That's the thing, though, isn't it? They're not entitled to profit, even though they seem to think they are.

If they do the research, should they not be allowed to profit from it? Otherwise what is the incentive for any company to do any research? And lets face it, public funding for research is as rare as hens teeth, not matter what you think of it.

Of course they should be allowed to profit. But they think their right to profit is so inherently important that they should get to step on other people's rights. In this case, their right to profit is so important that they're suffocating all genetic research except their own.

Hmm.. now that I read that again, I don't know why I worded that that way. I ended up saying something that I didn't even intend to say!

This is the thing, how do you draw that boundry.

This is one of the most beautiful posts I've ever read on the Cellar. So simple... so concise... so easy to do.

Hubris Boy casts a baleful gaze in the direction of ... certain other inhabitants of this forum.**

Some people could benefit from this example.

**Interesting to note that Hubris Boy intentionally omitted the honorific "Dwellar" when referring to these people.

My completely unscientific position is that the companies that design the babies wil try to control them in some way, and it will lead to a cycle of social unrest.

That, or some guy will try to put political positions into the mix, and we won't need liberal education or media anymore. :)

*Note*: I think I've watched too many bad sci-fi movies.

You said it my young Aussie friend.
Here is an interesting (I think) exhibition created to spur civic discussion about contemporary biology. It includes our old pal Eduardo Kac. The transgenic stuff is interesting, and to imagine a transgenic being that is partially human. Would or could it be our equal or superior? A new speciesism to replace racism?

Yes, I've always tried to strive for conciseness in my posts, for the following two reasons:

• If you ramble on and on and say too much, people will forget your point.
  <blockquote>This is a very real danger. Remember, folks, most people have a very short memory when it comes to reading things. Try to say things in the shortest way possible, without undermining your clarity.</blockquote>
• <i>Saying too much will leave you open to an attack during a debate.</i>
  <blockquote>Don't give your opponent any more ammunition. Ask leading questions and get them to be the one than babbles on and on. Eventually they'll say something really stupid that they didn't think through, and then BA-BOOM! Ha ha! You pounce on them! Feeding time! You see, everyone is bound to say something stupid eventually. It's just a matter of time. Like death and taxes. Don't let yourself be next.
  </blockquote>

Ani Difranco may have said it best in her song, "Anticipate":
<blockquote>we don't say everything that we could
so that we can say later
oh, you misunderstood
i hold my cards up
close to my chest
i say what i have to
and i hold back the rest
</blockquote>

Mwahahahah..