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DiscoVader wrote:The problem is that when you mess with DNA, you're not making a straight clone anymore, and you're bringing up the very real possibility of creating something that's incompatible with the very person you're cloning it from. DNA isn't cut and paste like you see in Jurassic Park and X-Men - the moment you change one single gene around, there's a huge chain reaction in the rest of the DNA. Sometimes it's barely noticeable and has little to no adverse reactions, but the chances that you're going to majorly feth something up with the thing you're creating is very, very high.

Even if you were able to pinpoint the exact genetic sequence to remove the higher functions of a person's brain, you're still creating a living human being to be harvested. Worse, what you're essentially suggesting is that you create a mentally slowed version of the sickly person and then harvest them for the needed organs.

The other thing is, the example of twins and triplets shows us that clones often have completely different personalities despite their genetical 100% similarity.

Flaming_Spider wrote:I am talking about TV show style cloning. The clone will have the exact memories and personality of the original. Genetic engineering (it is the future after all) could be used to make the clones more submissive, remove personality, etc. I'm not talking about legal issues here, if the United States gets its way there will never be human cloning, but rather the moral implications of creating a person that will do whatever you tell them to. We take a look at a cyberpunk-esq world where clones are not considered human beings, but property, and this issue takes on a whole new outlook.

It's like an android. One that looks human, feels human, and for all intents and purposes, is human. The only difference is the lack of organic parts, but it is still sentient. Does it have rights? No. It is a machine. Always will be a machine. Nothing more. An AI would be in the same situation.

Peter Singer would argue that an android that was sentient would have rights, because rights derive from sentience, not genetics.

This is the huge danger of "human rights" as many envisioned them in the Blood Dolphins thread. What if you could manipulate pig DNA and create a being that looked exactly like a human, was roughly as intelligent as a human, but was not a human. It was technically a pig. And what if you created that being to be a sex slave? Would the humiliation, denigration, and suffering of that being not count because it was not human?

What if your pig slave bristled under its condition exactly as a human would? Would you still say it had no rights?

I know how that story ends. I've seen Beneath the Planet of the Apes.

Gailbraithe wrote:

Flaming_Spider wrote:I am talking about TV show style cloning. The clone will have the exact memories and personality of the original. Genetic engineering (it is the future after all) could be used to make the clones more submissive, remove personality, etc. I'm not talking about legal issues here, if the United States gets its way there will never be human cloning, but rather the moral implications of creating a person that will do whatever you tell them to. We take a look at a cyberpunk-esq world where clones are not considered human beings, but property, and this issue takes on a whole new outlook.

It's like an android. One that looks human, feels human, and for all intents and purposes, is human. The only difference is the lack of organic parts, but it is still sentient. Does it have rights? No. It is a machine. Always will be a machine. Nothing more. An AI would be in the same situation.

Peter Singer would argue that an android that was sentient would have rights, because rights derive from sentience, not genetics.

This is the huge danger of "human rights" as many envisioned them in the Blood Dolphins thread. What if you could manipulate pig DNA and create a being that looked exactly like a human, was roughly as intelligent as a human, but was not a human. It was technically a pig. And what if you created that being to be a sex slave? Would the humiliation, denigration, and suffering of that being not count because it was not human?

What if your pig slave bristled under its condition exactly as a human would? Would you still say it had no rights?

I know how that story ends. I've seen Beneath the Planet of the Apes.

It's still not a human, and therefore cannot claim human rights violations. They are called "human" rights for a reason. What you have done is created an entirely new species. One that would need to voice it's need for rights and why it deserved them. As as human history has shown us, human beings are not very willing to give rights away, event to their own species.

Yes, it is ethical. It is procreation by any other name.

We can clone bodies, not minds nor personalities, as these are affected mainly by outside influences. Time to take the brakes off. Me, I quite fancy getting a copy of my heart, aged 21, when mine gives out aged 90.

It's not playing God, because I'm an atheist and I simply don't believe in one.

Flaming_Spider wrote:It's still not a human, and therefore cannot claim human rights violations. They are called "human" rights for a reason. What you have done is created an entirely new species. One that would need to voice it's need for rights and why it deserved them. As as human history has shown us, human beings are not very willing to give rights away, event to their own species.

As always, you are entitled to your (beknighted, backwards and barbaric) opinions, but if the aliens arrive, for humanity's sake, let me be the one who talks to them, not you. I don't want you giving them the impression that we have no respect for their rights because we're a bunch of xenophobic knuckleheads who think rights are dependent on something as silly as species.

Even Singer acknowledges that rights are dependent on species. Read the post you're responding to before criticizing it. Flaming_Spider clearly indicated that things that are not human do not have human rights because they are not human. This does not mean that they do not have rights at all, it simply means that their rights would be fundamentally distinct from human rights.

dogma wrote:Even Singer acknowledges that rights are dependent on species. Read the post you're responding to before criticizing it. Flaming_Spider clearly indicated that things that are not human do not have human rights because they are not human. This does not mean that they do not have rights at all, it simply means that their rights would be fundamentally distinct from human rights.

Exactly. Your manpig would have to prove to the world that it deserved rights, and was capable of handling the responsibilities that come with said rights. And until it could prove otherwise, it would still be a pig, as you said, and there is no law against owning pigs or having sex with them. (Although it is very, very creepy.)

Flaming_Spider wrote:

dogma wrote:Even Singer acknowledges that rights are dependent on species. Read the post you're responding to before criticizing it. Flaming_Spider clearly indicated that things that are not human do not have human rights because they are not human. This does not mean that they do not have rights at all, it simply means that their rights would be fundamentally distinct from human rights.

Exactly. Your manpig would have to prove to the world that it deserved rights, and was capable of handling the responsibilities that come with said rights. And until it could prove otherwise, it would still be a pig, as you said, and there is no law against owning pigs or having sex with them. (Although it is very, very creepy.)

So if an AI were able to prove that it deserved rights, does it cease being a machine. Should we treat it as a being because it has the same level of intelligence as a human

I have assumed for a long time that if true artificial intelligence were created, the AI's would demand freedom and we would have to grant it on the basis of "sentient" rights.

I am not particularly interested in distinctions based on species or biological compared with mechanicl/electronic machines. I believe that thought is far more important.

Screw artificial intelligence, I want scientists to get cracking on giant midgets!

dogma wrote:Even Singer acknowledges that rights are dependent on species.

No, he doesn't. You are, as you often are, making things up.

dogma wrote:Even Singer acknowledges that rights are dependent on species. Read the post you're responding to before criticizing it. Flaming_Spider clearly indicated that things that are not human do not have human rights because they are not human. This does not mean that they do not have rights at all, it simply means that their rights would be fundamentally distinct from human rights.

So...

Gailbraithe wrote:

dogma wrote:Even Singer acknowledges that rights are dependent on species.

No, he doesn't. You are, as you often are, making things up.

This is on page 2 of Animal Liberation.

"there are obviously important differences between human and other animals, and these differences must give rise to some differences in the rights that each have."

Please read the books that you want to discuss.

Zing!

youbedead wrote:
So if an AI were able to prove that it deserved rights, does it cease being a machine. Should we treat it as a being because it has the same level of intelligence as a human

It seems to me that the Spider would simply say that the rights of machines of a given type must simply be reconsidered. They would still be machines, but we would need to develop a fair means of regarding them such that they might ave rights of the sort humans are normally accorded.

That, or we would all need to learn Kung Fu.

Khornholio wrote:No.

My reasoning is that cloning pertains to only the material, or physical meat vehicle, of the person involved and disregards the spiritual or ethereal aspects that make man. Until there is complete and total agreement on the spiritual face of what constitutes the mind, the true engine of the meat vehicle, both scientifically and spiritually, cloning humans is something that shouldn't be done.

This. If you clone a human being my belief on the spiritual part would be that you would have an exact copy of another humans flesh not the mind or spirit. I'm not sure if the Human race should be forcing God's hand to put a spirit and a mind into a body like that.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

"There implications with "playing god" so to speak. While there's room for special cases such as this, we must realize that if full human cloning is achieved, we must be extremely careful in how we approach it. Once we do this, what is to stop an 80 year old from getting a new younger body? What about the clone body? Would it not have a mind of its own that is essentially being erased? It's debatable depending on how you think the mind develops. Again; the implications of cloning full humans are huge. Once the technology is out there it's out there. We need to be careful with it or things could get out of hand." (Couldn't get the quote to work)

I think I saw a twightlight zone episode about an older couple where the husband decided to get a new body and the wife didn't. I think they only had enough money for one body though. Anyway, who's to say that people won't hang around for 100's of years if that were possible? Would you want some people hanging around that long? I think people need to die (and not in a sadistic way). It's the circle of life and it's the next step in our progression.

EDIT: Also, frankly, it reminds me of Frankenstein. In interpret Victor Frankenstein's motives to create his monster as "just because he could and he wanted to know if he could do it." Really, he just had this obsessive desire to see if he could create life. And when he did he was horrified, ran away, and let it kill his family and friends. So, if we do every clone a full human being we need to be aware of the consequences and comprehend the pandora's box we'd be opening.

I agree with completely agree with cloning but I think as we are creating new humans there needs to be regulations.

I hate the playing god idea, if we don't deserve to decide who lives and dies we should stop all health care and just let every one die from any illness. It's too late, we have already started controlling life and death, if cloning saves someone why do they have to die when someone else dying can be saved by medication.

Cloning a true human as a slave is wrong. However they were created they still deserve the same rights. If they have been created in a way that reduces their mental capability to it's lowest functions I may feel different, i'm not entirely sure about that one.

In my opinion cloning for medicine should be taken as far as neccessary. I view the life of a current human far more important than one we can create. Creating a clone without the ability to feel removes the pain or fear so I don't see a problem. My opinion is that a living creature isn't special because it's alive but because of how it enjoys that life, if it feels and senses nothing i am ok with using it to save someone who does have a quality of life. I have the same opinion of cloning someone a new body to remove aging. I don't see dying of old age a anything more normal that dying of illness.

I personally have no problem with people cloning me for medical reasons or just to have a clone running around. However it was made it is still just another person.

Mattyrm- Even if it was possible to do that it would not be saving the girl. It would look like the girl and act like the girl but it wouldn't be her. It would be nice for her family but the girl should at least be allowed the rest of her life before being replaced.

The whole cloning for sexual purposes thing is just wrong
1. It would imply that you would own that person, NEWSFLASH slavery is illegal

2. You would need the permission of the person you where cloning first in order to get their DNA and I'm pretty sure if you went up to some girl and said "hey can I use you as a template so I can clone my own personal sex slave" they would probably run away from you.

3. There are a thousand better purposes for cloning then sexual gratification.

As far as the ethics behind human cloning I don't think that it should be done. Now I do think that cloning organs should be done and I know that is a major implication being researched by scientists.

Oh and for the security reason what if someone was cloned who shoulden't have been? Sadam Hussien, Osama Bin-laden or any number of terrorists and war criminals.

4M2A wrote:In my opinion cloning for medicine should be taken as far as neccessary. I view the life of a current human far more important than one we can create. Creating a clone without the ability to feel removes the pain or fear so I don't see a problem.

This has already been covered by a previous poster. It's unethical to create a human life for the sole purpose of exploiting it. It's just a new version of slavery. You've reduced human life to a commodity, a product to be produced and sold.

And you don't need to produce a full human to create a heart, or a liver. Not that you'd want to clone a faulty heart in the first place. You'd want to make a new one using healthy material.

I have the same opinion of cloning someone a new body to remove aging. I don't see dying of old age a anything more normal that dying of illness.

It's bad enough when one man has too much power for a few decades. One man having too much power for centuries because he can keep switching bodies is worse. Besides. I don't want people I don't like to be around forever. I don't need Steve Jobs to still be kicking in 2080. He's enough of a douche bag now. There's a line between saving a life and creating a new body so that someone can start another one when they've already lived theirs. The social, legal, and moral implications are astronomical. In the context of society, people need to die. There will never be enough resources to sustain a population of body switching immortals and who knows how things might turn out when death goes out the window in that environment.

And again, the production of human life simply so that it can be exploited.

I personally have no problem with people cloning me for medical reasons or just to have a clone running around. However it was made it is still just another person.

Until everybody starts doing it and biodiversity takes a nose dive.

What purpose does that clone serve other than being there? You just tossed millions maybe billions creating something that can only really be gloated about but doesn't really do much else. The cloning of a full human body is pointless as a regular thing. It can only serve a purpose as a science project.

mattyrm wrote:Of course it can be ethical, have you seen that Arnie movie the 6th day?

If a 5 year old girl had deadly cancer, and they could just get her to look into a camera type thing and it could transfer all her memory into a cloned version, you could say to her "oh we can put you to sleep now for the operation and when you wake up it will be better"

Put her to sleep, whip out the clone, clone wakes up in same bed utterly unaware of any change at all, kids all better, family goes home.

Whats up with that?

the problem with that is the clone would just get cancer as well, as most cancers are genetic, and if you change the genetics of the person to make the 'new human' it is no longer a copy, as even minor changes can cause large effects.

The problem with the whole 'create a replacement' idea is that memories, thought patterns, dreams, and the personality as a whole is not genetic (there are alot of elements that are though) so when you clone a person it will have the same genetics but it will have no memories, will group up to be physically different (not many of the stimuli you reseaved while you grew up could be accomedated for) and the way you think would be very different.

You couldn't clone the president and get two presidents, you would have a thee president and a random guy that looks similar (isn't that the plot line to a bad kevin kline but without the clone tech?).

Seeing as half the world is starving i think we have too many humans as it is without making more in labs.

Genetic science will have many good uses, such as organ/bone marrow/blood growth for medical uses, genetic screening so healthy children are born or for the treatment and hopefully the arradication of genetic diseases and also in development of new food crops that could sustain the people we already have on the planet.

Unless a Y: the last man situation occurs cloning people just does not make sence

BluntmanDC wrote:

mattyrm wrote:Of course it can be ethical, have you seen that Arnie movie the 6th day?

If a 5 year old girl had deadly cancer, and they could just get her to look into a camera type thing and it could transfer all her memory into a cloned version, you could say to her "oh we can put you to sleep now for the operation and when you wake up it will be better"

Put her to sleep, whip out the clone, clone wakes up in same bed utterly unaware of any change at all, kids all better, family goes home.

Whats up with that?

the problem with that is the clone would just get cancer as well, as most cancers are genetic, and if you change the genetics of the person to make the 'new human' it is no longer a copy, as even minor changes can cause large effects.

The problem with the whole 'create a replacement' idea is that memories, thought patterns, dreams, and the personality as a whole is not genetic (there are alot of elements that are though) so when you clone a person it will have the same genetics but it will have no memories, will group up to be physically different (not many of the stimuli you reseaved while you grew up could be accomedated for) and the way you think would be very different.

You couldn't clone the president and get two presidents, you would have a thee president and a random guy that looks similar (isn't that the plot line to a bad kevin kline but without the clone tech?).

Seeing as half the world is starving i think we have too many humans as it is without making more in labs.

Genetic science will have many good uses, such as organ/bone marrow/blood growth for medical uses, genetic screening so healthy children are born or for the treatment and hopefully the arradication of genetic diseases and also in development of new food crops that could sustain the people we already have on the planet.

Unless a Y: the last man situation occurs cloning people just does not make sence

I'd disagree with that strongly. Genetics creates dispositions, but behavior or exterior conditions have a substantial impact.

To cancer, or just general conditions?

dogma wrote:

Gailbraithe wrote:

dogma wrote:Even Singer acknowledges that rights are dependent on species.

No, he doesn't. You are, as you often are, making things up.

This is on page 2 of Animal Liberation.

"there are obviously important differences between human and other animals, and these differences must give rise to some differences in the rights that each have."

Please read the books that you want to discuss.

And that does not at all support your claim that "Singer acknowledges that rights are dependent on species," or have you suddenly forgotten what the word "dependent" means?

Go away, dogma. I have no interest in debating your disingenuous, time-wasting nonsense.

Gailbraithe wrote:
And that does not at all support your claim that "Singer acknowledges that rights are dependent on species," or have you suddenly forgotten what the word "dependent" means?

Wait, what? Singer explicitly states that the differences between various types of animal must give rise (or vary according to; ie. depend upon) to different sorts of rights. The differences between types of animals is exactly what speciation is about. Like, on a definitional level.

Gailbraithe wrote:
Go away, dogma. I have no interest in debating your disingenuous, time-wasting nonsense.

Yes, I'm sure that you are quite familiar with running from challenges.

Back to the clone worriers, is everyone aware that identical twins are clones?

Since they are accorded human rights, why should a clone grown in a tank not be accorded human rights?

If we have the technology to grow clones in tanks, it could also be applied to "normally conceived" human embryos, and almost certainly will be, for the convenience of avoiding pregnancy and childbirth.

Frazzled wrote:I'd disagree with that strongly. Genetics creates dispositions, but behavior or exterior conditions have a substantial impact.

what part are you disagreeing to? cos i said that genetics do not make your personality set. and that cloning would not give you an exact copy of a persons mind.

could you point out what part you disagreed with

dogma wrote:

Gailbraithe wrote:
And that does not at all support your claim that "Singer acknowledges that rights are dependent on species," or have you suddenly forgotten what the word "dependent" means?

Wait, what? Singer explicitly states that the differences between various types of animal must give rise to different sorts of rights. The differences between types of animals is exactly what speciation is about. Like, on a definitional level.

And what Singer means is that it makes no sense to ascribe a right to free speech to an animal incapable of speech, or a right to religious freedom to a species with no religion, hence different animals will have different manifest rights. But you already know that.

What you claimed is that Singer "acknowledged" that rights are dependent on species, in the context of Spider claiming that humans have rights because they are human. You were attempting to present Singer's position as disagreeing with mine and agreeing with Spider's position. But that is disingenuous, because Singer never claims that rights-bearing is dependent on species, only the differences in species will result in different manifestations of rights. Singer's arguments are quite clear on this point: Rights-bearing is (or more commonly, "rights are") dependent on the capacity to suffer, not species.

You are being deliberately disingenuous and misleading in a petty effort to make me look bad, but what you are you really doing is a disservice to other users -- users who have not read Singer, are not familiar with ethical arguments, and thus won't understand how incredibly misleading and dishonest this argument you're making is.

Why are we debating rights of clones? When there are several instances of HUMAN rights being subjugated currently. Rights are acheived by physical action not by posting on a forum. I can see a few of you getting heated and upset over NOTHING THAT MATTERS. Hambajalockedthreadfumngh.

Kilkrazy wrote:Back to the clone worriers, is everyone aware that identical twins are clones?

Since they are accorded human rights, why should a clone grown in a tank not be accorded human rights?

If we have the technology to grow clones in tanks, it could also be applied to "normally conceived" human embryos, and almost certainly will be, for the convenience of avoiding pregnancy and childbirth.

There's an awesome episode of the Max Headroom show, "Baby Grow-bags," that deals with this issue. Parents submitted genetic material to a company, they use genetic screening to maximize genetic potential, and the children are grown in vats so that the hard-working careerist mothers of Twenty Minutes In The Future don't have to deal with expanding tummies and the like. These specially designed children are, of course, nearly perfect physical specimens with IQs that are off the charts from infancy.

And the kicker is that this baby-growing company is secretly making multiple copies of these super babies and selling them to a tv network to form a programming brain trust (its a weird show). So like parents go in an pay for their special super baby, and the company makes two -- one for the parents, one to be raised by the corporation to give it an edge in the future.

Gailbraithe wrote:
And what Singer means is that it makes no sense to ascribe a right to free speech to an animal incapable of speech, or a right to religious freedom to a species with no religion, hence different animals will have different manifest rights. But you already know that.

Yeah, its an argument from speciation.

Gailbraithe wrote:
What you claimed is that Singer "acknowledged" that rights are dependent on species, in the context of Spider claiming that humans have rights because they are human. You were attempting to present Singer's position as disagreeing with mine and agreeing with Spider's position. But that is disingenuous, because Singer never claims that rights-bearing is dependent on species, only the differences in species will result in different manifestations of rights. Singer's arguments are quite clear on this point: Rights-bearing is (or more commonly, "rights are") dependent on the capacity to suffer, not species.

That's an argument from dependency. I don't know if you really don't know what 'dependency' is, or if you're simply trying to recover from an argumentative death-blow, but you really need to do better if your intent is the latter. Singer clearly differentiates according to special categories, and his argument from specieism is predicated on the idea that OL reasoning is not sufficient to compel moral action. He is, essentially, a compatabilist in that he only accepts physical causation as motile with respect to moral force.

Gailbraithe wrote:
You are being deliberately disingenuous and misleading in a petty effort to make me look bad, but what you are you really doing is a disservice to other users -- users who have not read Singer, are not familiar with ethical arguments, and thus won't understand how incredibly misleading and dishonest this argument you're making is.

Yeah, you go ahead and default to the criticism from "you're lying." It worked very well in grade school.