Cloning is not a good thing. We are meddlin' in things that aren't ought to be meddled in. Playing god must be fun though.

I wonder why human beings spend so much time tinkering with things that won't help mankind in any significant way. Cloning won't help us do anything, just add more population, I don't see it helping in disease research, and the only way it CAN benefit humans is by genetic mutation. Why would you want to change the human DNA form anyway? We are meant to be this way, we wouldn't have survived this far if it wasn't. What really pisses me off is that this world has been around for 4 billion years or so, dinosaurs lived in 'peace' for 250 million years or so, modern humans have been around for 100,000 years or so, in that little tiny dent of time, we have destroyed this planet. Goes to show what intelligence can do. I'm not a religious or spiritual, but in my opinion, the world is gonna be a TOTALLY different place 20 or 30 years from now. We are all due for a serious wake-up call. I just hope it is at a small cost.

P.S.: Sorry for the philisophical post.

One of me (and most ppl thinking about it)is enough. In fact in some cases, more than enough.

Boy somedays I'd like to clone 2 more of me to handle my days...
(but I wouldn't cuz then I'd need more gadgets, nah actually I might have enough for all 3 of us)

I don't agree with cloning a whole humain beeing. It's not right.

But I have nothing againt cellular cloning. That is, if you have ill cells (cancer, or other types of illenesses), the cone of your own cells could cure you. I think research in that aspect is good.

I think that cloning, along with a lot of already in use fertility treatments, is going to far.  We are messing with mother nature, and it's going to bite us sooner or later.

We have these ways of producing offspring that would never naturally happen.  That seems like messing with mother nature to me.  I know a family friend that tried for years to get pregnant.  She had about 12 miscarriages.  She went to a fertility doctor and found out that her and her husbands dna were simply not compatible.  They went through daily injections of some experimental drug along with some type of blood transfusions so that she wouldn't reject the baby.  She finally carried it to full term.  He was a very quiet and always happy baby, so they tried it again (and failed).  They were about to try again until they found out that their "quiet and always happy" baby was not developing normally.  He was soon diagnosed as being severely autistic.  There was a very valid reason why they should not have had a child.

I think that we have better things to research than cloning, like diseases that effect millions of people: MS, Lupus, AIDS, Cancer, etc. 

And, I don't believe that a clone could be like the person that it was cloned from.  What makes us "us" isn't the tissue we are made of- it's our life experiences and our views.  Identical twins are similar.  Even if they are always around each other and have pretty much the same life experiences, they will still be quite different from each other.  There is no way to "replace" somebody.

And, don't even think about raising the dead, you just end up with a "Pet cemetery" situation on your hands

Most of what we take for granted today was considered "too far" in their early time.

But, Karma, about autism, latest studies have found that very few babies are actually born autostic. If ever at all. Research found that babies somehow contract the illness. Mercury and other substances are severely thought to be one of the causes. Problem is that there is mercury in many things we subject our kids to. The regular grey fillings contains a very high proportion of mercury, so does certain vaccines we give out kids.
A dentist friend of mine have an autistic kid, and she did a lot of research on that subject, and she is appaled. There is no proof just yet, but there are hard suspicions. She also says that dentisit parents have a much higher percentage of autistic kids, and until recently they could not understand why. 

I am sure they will have a good laugh !!!

It won't take long anymore, it came really close in times like the cuba crisis and all that stuff, the US and the sovjet has 200 times overload.

10.000 years, maximum! 10,000 years ago we were still running around in clothes made of animal fur (spelling?) and now we are talking with people all over the world, using something called 'internet'

strange how things goes sometimes...

Humans have been messing with mother nature since the first time humans changed their environment in order to survive or be more comfortable. Mother nature doesn't care. The Earth doesn't care. Pollution won't hurt the earth in the long run, just the humans and whatever happens to be unlucky enough to be with us at the time. The Planet will be here in one form or another. Give Mother Nature some credit - maybe us messing up everything is what the plan was all along.



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Personally I feel that a lot of strides have been made as far as mankind goes. We as a whole human race have been destructive but we have learned to become 'aware' of our destructive ways and patch up around the seams where we can. Unfortunately...unlike Windows (hehe) there is no 'patch' for the ozone layer...(well, as of yet).

Cloning humans, on the other hand...sends shivers down my spine just to think of it. This is the ultimate violation of the natural law of the universe...and it's a dangerous endeavor to engage in. Who knows what awful situations could crop up genetically from doing something like that? And will the first cloned human be a total freak and hate the people who created him/her?

The latest genetic altering of produce has me a bit worried too. Cross a tomato with a coldwater fish and the tomato will resist freezing temps? It's one thing to make a plant hybrid from cross pollinating two "PLANTS" but to actually create a tomato with FISH DNA is rather...creepy.

KG made a valid point...messing with nature doesn't always pay off...sometimes it has much, much worse consequences in the end.

The latest genetic altering of produce has me a bit worried too. Cross a tomato with a coldwater fish and the tomato will resist freezing temps? It's one thing to make a plant hybrid from cross pollinating two "PLANTS" but to actually create a tomato with FISH DNA is rather...creepy.

I totally agree with that Shmoopy.  It's funny how we have all these "advances" in medicine and science, but yet it seems like almost everyone I talk to is either sick with something (like Lupus or some other auto immune disease) or has a family member who is sick.  Or what about the current life threatening cases of nut allergies?  A little girl in my daughter's preschool is so allergic to peanuts that just the oil on her skin could kill her.  Why do they think these problems are developing?  We put all sorts of pesticides on crops so that no bugs will get on them, we genetically engineer our crops to last longer or to produce more, and we put tons of preservatives in everything so that it will last longer.  There is no way that all those chemicals are good for you.  Think about this trend (which is really disturbing): children are hitting puberty earlier now.  Girls are not only developing at an accelerated rate, but their breasts are *much* bigger than they used to be even 10 years ago.  Why do they think that is?  Cows are given massive amounts of hormones to produce large quantities of milk.  Those hormones are still present in the milk that you buy at the store.  the dairy industry tells us that you need to drink three glasses a day....... It's messing with mother nature.   We'll all be mutants pretty soon....