Cloning is the reproduction of mammals and humans without the joint help of males and females. Cloning is a process of carbon-copying or Xeroxing because it’s theoretically possible to recreate an entire animal or human from a single cell.
The clue for the possibility of cloning has been received from asexual reproduction in plants. This has been built into these plants by the creator. During cell division (mitosis) in humans a mistake can occur with the cell completely separated from each other. These cells can grow up to form identical twins. The separation is also asexual and so is a form of cloning. But to mimic these in a laboratory is different. Only certain types of cloning are available in nature hence indicating a boundary for cloning. God says in Genesis that living creatures should reproduce after their kind. Scriptures also indicate these boundaries when it restricts the type of mixing of certain plants and animals as well as sexual relationships between humans and animals which are forbidden. Scriptures does not forbid because they are impossible, but because they are improper morally or technically, or in both ways.
Cloning is possible because each cell of a living organism contains all the information necessary to develop and nurture an entire organism. This information is stored in the DNA found in the chromosomes which are in the nucleus of the cell. All cells contain the same number of chromosomes except the reproductive cells which have half. When the two mixed during sexual reproduction, they make up the complete number of chromosomes necessary for the organism. Even though cloning is possible there are restrictions; even in plants a certain maturity is required. Twins in humans also need a certain favourable condition.
Cloning is only difficult in those plants and animals with no capacity of doing so. In reptiles which undergo asexual reproduction cloning is possible but still difficult. In humans when the cells attain a certain maturity they start specialising (eg. Skin cells, blood cells, etc) and therefore set the other information not necessary into a dormant state; and so skin cells would only multiply skin cells, though they have all the chromosomes. This is what makes cloning in mammals difficult. This specialisation is a barrier kept by the creator in all kinds of organisms. But this barrier has been overcome in some mammals.
The History of Cloning
Cloning is the outcome of reproductive technology which started in the last century by Walter Heape. He transferred an embryo into the uterus of an animal other than its natural mother in 1890 while cloning became popularised in 1932. In 1930 Walter’s approach was used by scientists to commercialise animal breeding; by fertilising ova in glassware and implanting in surrogate animals. This eventually led to “Test Tube Babies” born by surrogate women.
Cloning the same animals was more difficult as Robert Briggs and Thomas King only successfully developed full frogs from tadpole cells in 1952. Several developments came up and plant cloning became a commercial success while animal cloning could not succeed in mammals and other higher organisms. Many scientists secretly kept trying to clone humans. In the nineties many scientists could clone mammals from a single-celled fertilised egg which is allowed to be bi-cellular, then separate them and allow again to multiply to two, and then divide again. So many offsprings were produced from a single fertilised cell just like the twin phenomena. There were still limits on the maximum number of clones from a fertilised egg.
The greatest problem with cloning of mammals by using non reproductive cells was that of specialisation since useless information in specialised cells go to a dormant state and the cell can not remember. Dr. Ian Wilmut of Roslin Institute in Scotland succeeded to “wake up” the sleeping genes, by forcing all the genes in the cell to “sleep” and then allowed to start the process of life in order to “wake up” all the genes. He took cells from the udder of a six-year old pregnant sheep and kept them in salt solution. Almost all of the genes went to a state of “sleep”. He then removed the nucleus from unfertilised ova from another sheep, and then fused each “sleeping” cell with the nucleus-less ovum. The atmosphere of the ovum woke up the sleeping genes and the combination started behaving like an embryo, which was implanted into a third sheep. A sheep named Dolly was born from this after gestation period. Dolly the first mammal to be successfully cloned had just one parent since the other two only gave support not contributing to the genes in Dolly.
As the news of Dolly was on the media, another came that Dr. Don Wolf of Oregon in USA successfully cloned two monkeys. Though scientists are very secretive about their work it is not hard to say that work on human cloning has been going on in secret and illegally. Though scholars all over the world cry against it and the hints of the American president on banning cloning, none might stop cloning as history shows that people continue to make illegal research. For example Wilmut had over Rs 25 000 000 for his research from government. The government of his country announced withdrawal of financial support but the intrigue is that this would be done 14 months after his announcements about the success of cloning. He would certainly use the 14 months for further developments, perhaps things would change after the cut off date. That’s how people are cheated by the scientific community.
The Uses of Cloning
We can only guess the ways in which cloning can be used or might be exploited since it is a very recent breakthrough, and mindful of the fact that scientists are aware of the possible resistance from society. The first use would be to improve animal varieties as the breeders look forward for larger production as high breed embryos are divided many times to produce more. The process is lengthy and has a limit. Cloning would be commercially profitable for breeders as there will be no upper limit upon the number of offsprings that can be produced from a single source.
Cloning could be used to make consumer products from cloned embryos such as tissues from embryos which are used in treating physical disorders and sicknesses. Eg. Brain cells of an embryo used in treating degenerative diseases. Another example is the bone-marrow transplant. People suggest that companies could “grow” human clones to a certain level to extract brain cells and marrow not thinking about moral and ethics as they see the human child just as a chicken in the poultry farm. In developing countries some people mix ground up flesh of aborted babies in some of their most powerful and expensive cosmetic products. Some people also consume aborted babies as food. If cloning is accepted then these practices will become open and widely practiced and for any purpose whatsoever.
Transplantation of body organs has had increasing success these days and the demand for these organs has increased. Traditionally, organs are taken only from accidental deaths with the concern of the dead person’s relative. This high demand and the profit thereof have lead hospitals to look for alternative sources of fresh organ donation. One of these is from babies aborted alive; or those born with incomplete brain. Many doctors argue that we should look at these babies from utilitarian point of view. This is not wide spread because of the opposition from religious and intellectual community. So many are suggesting that cloning should be done, having a cultivator who “grows” the clones to meet the demand for transplantation.
With the grip of monopolistic businesses and criminals over consumer market coupled with decreasing moral commitment in scientific and medical professions one can not tell the direction in which these would lead. We already know of cases where medical doctors and criminals have joined in removing healthy organs from healthy victims which are sold for transplantation in organ black-markets. Saddam Hussein was said to have created several look-alikes of himself, then how much would cloning add to criminality? As history shows criminal and aberrant use of cloning would outweigh good uses.
Implications of Cloning
Though not all the consequences can be predicted, a lot can be done on the basis of available facts. Cloning will be a difficult problem to parents, mates, doctors, lawmakers and ethicists to deal with the needs of clones. Genes are closely related to aging and so would behave accordingly even if placed in a cell of a fresh ovum. Science is unable to reverse the effects of aging on genes since the process of aging recorded in genes is not yet known. So a cloned human (or animal) would have the physical age (age at birth), the genetic age (equivalent to the age of the person donating the genes), and the actual age. So the clone would have conflicts between two internal clocks as the genetic age would be different from the physical age. The physical clock makes the person appear young while the genetic clock functions at the age at which the genes were extracted from the adult. The conflict between the two ages gives the actual age; which will be a complex factor due to this unusual and dangerous conflict.
Because there’s synchronisation between the numerous biological clocks in the body as the child is conceived through the sexual process, a clone will lack this synchronisation since the genes are not resetted to one starting point. This complex system with non-synchronisation of body clocks would put the clone and his family in trouble. Imagine an eight year old child manifesting the sexual desires of a 28-year old adult; or a twenty year old with a slowed down sexual desire like a sixty year old person. Disaster is built into the outcome of cloning.
Normal intelligence is acquired if the physical and mental growths of a person go together in a proper balance. The person is mentally handicapped if the physical is faster than mental and he is physically retarded if the mental growth is faster. Cloning builds into the clone the possibility of physical or mental retardation or even both; and these cannot be corrected overnight; and so this will lead to serious psychological problems.
Many bodily disorders and diseases are related to old age as some are caused by bacteria or viruses or might be genetic. eg; memory and muscular coordination; which do not surprise old persons would not be the same for a young person. Because cloning restarts the stopped clock without taking it from the beginning, the process of aging is built in the clone and this would be disastrous.
With the numerous conflicting clocks, the clone will have difficulties relating with others or adjusting. He might physically look like a baby but radically different from others of his age. At marriage he would have severe restrictions about the partners to choose and a wrong choice can lead to serious genetic disorders in the offsprings.
The spiritual standing of the clones will be peculiar as people have already declared from pulpits that they would not have souls and so will just be like animals. We assume that he or she would have a soul; then the person will face tough spiritual situation when many leaders in the Christian community are not willing to accept; and so many believers will be influenced and the consequence on the clone is beyond imagination. The question of whether the clone needs the gospel arises if the person does not have a soul; hence evangelisation of the clone will suffer. Some churches would refuse them and they would have no scientific or logical proof to show that they are not soulless. A person without mother or father (clone) would have it difficult to convince bureaucrats that he is a normal part of the society. They’ll have similar problems at marriage in some parts of the world where family background is considered vital. It will also be difficult to check if they are related by blood or not during marriage and in addition there’s no test yet on whether clones can give birth to normal children through their union. It will also be difficult to say if the marriage between clones with the same surrogate mother would be harmful or not. This will bring problems to the church as the clones of the same parents raised up in different homes might want to get married. It is just like non-identical twins trying to get married.
Ethical problems arise if we assume that the clone is a real human, with a soul, and is a person in the image of God. How much liberty can scientists and reproductive technicians take with this life; as hundreds or thousands of embryos would be destroyed before a single successful clone is produced? In cloning Dolly (easy as it was an animal other than human) 276 uni-cellular life created perished before they could get a single clone. What more of cloning humans which is more difficult? Even the most reckless sexual union can beget life and that’s man’s limit. He has no right to destroy it because it is made in the image of God. They are not inanimate things that can be destroyed as we please. This will not be temporal and is not only at developmental stages because history shows that the simpler test tube fertilisation has much destruction of embryos before a single one is implanted. What more of the complex and unnatural process of cloning? There would be deliberate destruction even after perfection just as in test-tube fertilisation where some embryos are destroyed because the donors forgot about them, or they die, leaving the embryos orphans. Others default on payment and because of lack of funds to maintain the embryos, they are destroyed. Other problems would arise just as in test-tube fertilisation. Eg. A surrogate mother who carried the embryo for a couple whose wife had problems with her uterus refused to give away the child and went to court. Another case arose where a couple was assured that the sperm donor for their child had the same colour, social background and physique like the husband. But when the child was born to this white couple, they realised that the child was black. This was some mix up in the labelling or distribution of sperms; but they embarrassingly had to explain to their friends and relatives; worse of all to raise the child in a family and social atmosphere. Cloning will face more difficulties as people or companies in need of cells from sportsmen, intellectual giants, wrestlers or even beauty queens might not have it difficult in getting them even through stealing during medical checkups or artificially contrived situation. Who shall then regulate the banks for cloning as per ethical and unethical uses and the type of people to buy. What if a country is ruled by an autocrat who has no value for the law? It is terrible to play with sanctified things for which humans are warned not to play with; as human life, which is in the image of God.
Eschatological view shows that major scientific breakthrough brings us closer to fulfilment of end-time prophecies. The TV and internet fulfilled the prophecy in Revelation that all people on earth saw the dead bodies of two end-time witnesses; as with internet and satellite-based broadcasting, instant information all over the world is now a reality. The Mystery Babylon in Revelation is presented as a woman doing transaction in all kinds of goods as in Greek it says transaction of “bodies” and “souls”. Slave traders do it in small quantity but as commercial establishments are interested in using human cloning, they will cultivate and sell people. Mystery Babylon would do it. The society might raise up resistance but history shows that no long enough this breaks down. The Christian theologians, ethicists, and communicators have to pay attention to this not to encourage such practices by their neglect, apathy, or silence. As Mordecai cautioned Esther, each one should use the occasion properly for the sake of righteousness. God is in control, but he does not excuse or overlook those who neglect their human duties. Neither the Christians nor the religious people are ready to face the consequences of this new development.
