Scientific Essay on Cloning

Scientific Essay on Cloning

Bioethical dilemmas of human cloning. Risks and virtues of a controversial scientific investigation

The debate around the risks and potentialities of human reproductive cloning is not a new issue in the field of human rights. Sciences nor in the bioethical and legal debate in this regard. As early as the 1960s and 1970s, the voices of advocates and critics of the techniques Cloning agents, such as Joshua Lederberg and Leon Krass, spoke in large-circulation newspapers to discuss what James D. Watson predicted in 1971 as "the clonal man."

But none of this stopped thirty years later, at the beginning of the 21st century, professors at Seoul National University from announcing in Science their success in obtaining human multipotent stem cells through cloning techniques (actually, nuclear transfer of somatic cells). In 2008 the scientists in charge of a project of the biotechnology Stemagen announced the creation of the first five mature human embryos using this same technique and, since then, advances in the field have not stopped growing.

Everything indicates that human cloning is an issue that continues to be on the table. So much so that the United Nations in 2021 announced the request for an international veto for all forms of human cloning, whether for reproductive or therapeutic, as a comprehensive legal measure to safeguard scientific ethics in an era of revolutionary discoveries in the matter.

Arguments around the complexity of the topic

One of the fears present when addressing the issue of cloning is that of the unpredictable consequences that genetic manipulation can bring. This implies a moral questioning about the responsibility that human beings have in relation to generations to come and the questionable right to manipulate - even with good intentions - the genetic destiny of the species.

However, cloning is not an unprecedented process in nature. Numerous animal species, vegetables and of microorganisms (bacteria, for example) employ cloning as a mechanism of asexual reproduction, especially in times of scarce resources, in which the genetic variability provided by sexual reproduction could imply a risk for the survival of the species.

It is clear, however, that such a procedure is alien to the reproductive logic of our species. In fact, the cloning of higher primates is expensive and difficult, since the protein fusiforms present in the ovule chromosomes are not found, as in the case of other species of mammals (cats, rabbits, sheep, etc.), distributed throughout the cell but are located in a very defined area of ​​the nucleus. Thus, by removing the nucleus to insert the desired genetic information, the spindle proteins that play a key role in cell division are also lost.

Human cloning, therefore, requires complex technological procedures, whose medical and industrial applications are, however, enormous. Gene cloning, for example, does not reproduce living mammals or humans, but it does reproduce specific genes that can be transplanted from one species of microorganisms or plants to another, giving rise to the development from transgenic foods, for instance.

Similarly, cloning certain species of mammals could allow us to remove them from the red list of species at risk of extinction. The experience with the cloning of the Asian guar ox in 2001, for example, produced a new individual of a practically extinct species, although it did not survive for more than a few days after its birth. The problem, in this case, is the little genetic variability that there would be in a population of animal clones, which would not guarantee the survival of the species, although it would guarantee the repetition of the same individuals over time.

Conclusions

Since 2005, many of the human therapeutic cloning activities have relied on the fact that they do not reproduce entire individuals - which is contrary to the human dignity, as the UN has established since 2005 - but instead employ nuclear transfer and other similar techniques to produce stem cells for doctors.

Reproductive cloning, that is, cloning an embryo and inserting it into a viable uterus, on the other hand, is considered immoral and alien to the reproductive logic of the species. But for how long? Who defends the interests of the species against investigations in countries that are not signatories of these agreements of the UN, such as China or many African countries in which there is not even a local legislation in the matter?

The problem of cloning, therefore, must be approached from a philosophical and legal perspective whose borders are determined by science, and this requires a more moral consideration of scientific research, often contrary to the entrepreneurial spirit that they encourage and reward the human industries. The risk, as Antony Starza-Allen states in his November 2007 article in BioNews, is not so much slowing down the advance of science how to promote the flight of these technologies and of scientists willing to experiment with them to territories outside the regulation international.

References:

• "What is a scientific essay?" on the National university of Trujillo (Peru).
• "Human cloning" in Wikipedia.
• "Cloning" in National Human Genome Research Institute.
• "Human cloning" in Center for Genetics and Society.
• "Scientific writing" in The Royal Literary Fund (United Kingdom).

What is a scientific essay?

A scientific essay It is a type of writing that addresses a scientific topic, explores it in depth and supports its findings, hypothesis and conclusions in scientific evidence, that is, in own and / or other people's research in the area. It is the main type of documents in scientific and informative publications, aimed at a specialized or general public, and whose fundamental purpose is to transmit and preserve knowledge scientific.

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