Human Cloning Argumentative Essay Example For Students

Human Cloning Argumentative Essay Imagine it is the year 2008. As you pick up yourdaily issue of the New York Times, you begin toread some of the interesting articles on the frontpage. The top story of the paper reads, GermanyWins All Gold Medals at the Olympic Games: IsCloning in Competitive Events Fair? Otherinteresting articles reported on the front pageinclude: Rock Star Stacy Levesque and LoversNuclear Transplanted Child is Born and FormerPresident George Bushs Cloned Heart TransplantA Success. These articles are examples of howmuch of an influence cloning can be in the future. Although these articles would have seemedscience fiction several years ago, the idea ofcloning became a reality in 1997. On February 27,1997, it was reported that scientist produced thefirst clone of an adult sheep, attracting internationalattention and raising questions of whether cloningshould take place. Within days, the public calledfor ethics inquires and new laws to ban cloning. The potential effects of cloning are unimaginable. What would life be like with women who are ableto give birth to themselves, cloned humans whoare used for spare parts, and genetically superiorcloned humans? Based on the positive advancesof cloning versus the negative effects, one mustask his/herself whether cloning humans should bebanned entirely. According to the American Heritage CollegeDictionary, cloning is to reproduce or propagateasexually. This definition means that cloningenables the creation of offspring without anysexual action or sexual contact. There are severalmethods for cloning: separating the embryo andmaking twins with the same genetic make-up,taking a cell from a fertilized ovum when the cellbegins to split and replace it in another femalesovum, or nuclear transplantation. In the 10 March1998 issue of Time, J. Madeleine Nash explainsone example of how a clone of an adult ewe isborn from nuclear transplantation. First, a cell istaken from the udder of an adult ewe and placedin a culture with very low concentrations ofnutrients. As the cells starve, they stop dividingand switch off their active genes, and go intohibernation. An unfertilized egg is then taken fromanother adult ewe and the eggs nucleus, alongwith its DNA, is sucked out, leaving an empty eggcell that still has the cellular machinery to producean e mbryo. The empty egg and the culture ofstarved cells are then placed next to each other. Then an electronic pulse causes the egg and thecells to fuse together and a second burst is givento jump-start the cell division. Six days later, theembryo is implanted in the uterus of another ewe. The result of this process will be the birth of ababy sheep, having identical genes as the firstsheep from which the cells were extracted fromthe udder. Although scientist understand howcloning is possible and what the cloning methodsare, exactly how the adult DNA changes onceinside the egg still remains a question. Whichevermethod is used to create a clone, the outcomeremains the same cloning is duplicating an exactcopy of another life form. The term cloning was first introduced in 1903 byHerbert John Webber as a new horticultural termand was first applied to manmade populations ofcultivated plants. In the early 1980s, scientistsdeveloped a procedure called nuclear transfer thatenabled scientists to replace the DNA-containingnucleus of an egg cell with a nucleus from anothercell. At Allegheny University of the HealthSciences, scientists raised a crop of tadpoles fromthe red blood cells of adult frogs; however, thisexperiment failed when the tadpoles died halfwaythrough metamorphosi s. Last year in the 27February issue of Nature, Mr. Wilmut and hiscolleagues at the Roslin Institute in Edinburgh,Scotland successfully created a clone of an adultewe and named her Dolly. Dolly was born bytaking genetic material from cells in the mammaryglands of a 6 year-old ewe and putting theacquired cells into an unfertilized ovum. Out of277 tries, researchers eventually produced only 29embryos that survived longer than 6 days, of these29, all died before birth except Dolly. Since Dollywas born, scientists have made additionaladvances in cloning, and now harbor the conceptof cloning humans. Voltaire Candide EssayKontorovich pointed this out in his NationalReview article by stating, It is necessary forspecies to respond to environmental changes sothat the human species can evolve. Althoughscientist would be able to create geneticallysuperior humans at the moment, in the long runhumans may become less diverse and unable toadapt to changing climates or other changes intheir environment. Also, many supporters of theban on cloning are worried that cloning couldreplace the average human with geneticallysuperior clones, thus making the human raceobsolete. If Adolf Hitler would have had todayscloning technology he might have been able toclone an army of genetically superior clones andhave taken over the world. Today, if a scientist,who is capable of cloning humans, joins terroristorganizations and clones a massive army ofmilitary Generals, these organizations couldsucceed where Hitler failed. To begin my research to answer my thesis, Ivisited the United States Military AcademyLibrary and looked through reference books toget facts about human cloning and its possibleeffects of society. My next step was to lookthrough scientific magazines to find publishedarticles concerning cloning. These articlesprovided much information about cloning and theprocess of cloning. To find as much information asI could, I searched through articles on the libraryscatalog online, through scientific magazines, andeven though magazines on microfilm. When I feltthat I understood the facts concerning cloning, Ibegan to look through general magazines, articleson the Internet, and Internet web pages. Thesearticles provided mostly opinions of thecontroversial issue of cloning and I was able tounderstand how different people viewed the issueof cloning and why they felt the way they did. After I gathered all of my information fromphotocopying articles and taking notes, Iorganized my information to match my outline andbegan writing my research paper. Cloning has become a very important issue that isaffecting our world. What would the world be likewith a superior race, such as the hypotheticalGerman Olympic teams of 2008 or with armies ofcloned humans conquering every continent onEarth? Even if cloning is limited to medicalresearch, there will always be scientists who willfind ways to use cloning to their own personalbenefit. Consequently, even if cloning is limited tomedical research, there is still the risk of cloninghumans. We simply cannot play God and createlife because it is morally wrong and sinful, andmost importantly, dangerous. The only answer tothe cloning issue is to sacrifice the medical andbiological gains of cloning and put an absolute banon all cloning. SourcesHansen, Kristin. Bauer Says Human Cloning Should BeBanned. Family Research Council, 29 January1998, accessed 4 November 1998. Available from http://www.frc.org/press/012998c.htmlKarnad, Anand, Sergio Salazar, and Nikhil Patel. Cloning to Produce Recombinant DNA. In MagillsSurvey of Science, 2nd ed. Magill 505-511. Pasadena:Salem Press, 1991. Kontorovich, E. V. Clone Wars: Asexual Revolution.National Review, 9 March 1998, accessed 4 November 1998. Available from http://www.nationalreview.com/09mar98/kontorovich030998.htmlMasood, Ehsan. Cloning Technique Reveals LegalLoophole. Nature, 27 February 1998, 757. Nash, J. Madeline. The Age of Cloning. Time, 10March 1998, 62-65. Pennisi, Elizabeth and Nigel Williams. Will Dolly Sendin the Cones? Science, 7 March 1997,1415-1416. Stearn, William T. Clone. In The Encyclopedia ofBiological Sciences, 2nd ed. Taylor, Todd. Xenotransplantation. Cloning,November 1997, accessed 6 November 1998. Availablefrom http://sites.unc.edu/daniel/11fall97/finals11/brianne/cloning.htmlTravis, J. Ewe Again? Cloning From Adult DNA.Science News, 1 March 1997, 132. Wilmut, I., A. E. Schnieke, J. McWhir, A.J. Kind, and K. H. S. Campbell. Viable offspring derived fromfetal and adult mammalian cells. Nature, 27 February1998, 810-813.