Group A S02W07 - Clone your dead pet

Read and discuss:

http://www.alphr.com/bioscience/1008666/barbara-streisand-dogs-cloned-pets?_mout=1&utm_campaign=alphr_newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_source=newsletter

Scientists today talk a lot about cloning. Animal cloning is a controversial topic.
Woosuck Hwang  cloned the the first dog in 2005. It was a beagle named Snuppy. He was perfectly healthy and died 13 days after his 10th birthday party.
In fact, I think that is not bad because the ability to clone animals could make many pet owners happy. Moreover I think that progress in animal cloning could help scientists to create new cloning technics to support medicine. Organs like livers could be cloned to be provided to sick people.
If cloning could have some benefits in the future, it could be regulate by ethical laws. As a lot of people I would worry about human cloning. In fact this kind of practices could have an impact on society at health and moral levels. First of all, the lack of experience on this science domain could create very risky situations. It could lead to study about improving humans genetically and discrimination too.

Hello !! I think cloning humans, animals, vegetables or everything else you want is a bad thing! It's not natural at all... If we accept animal cloning today maybe we will accept human cloning tomorrow? I think it is a very serious subject and very dangerous. Many drifts can happen faster than we think. I think we need to focus on more important things (for example the research for diseases, medicine...) rather than wanting to clone an animal. Cloning could be a good thing, if it's used wisely ! See you tomorrow

Hi,

I think it's pretty stupid and it's not a good thing. It's not because you are cloning your animal that it will be the same, I mean yeah maybe physically but not personaly !!
And I think as well that there are so many animals who are waiting to be adopted !!!

It's scary...

It isn't humane. Animals have emotions, they know what they like and don't like. If you had a pet and it died of old age, then you would just make a new one, but death is natural, it is part of what happens. You can't keep an animal forever.

In my opinion, animals shouldn't be cloned. This type of scientific research can be misused and abused. There are rules and regulations in the United States but outside of our borders there is no control. Additionally, advancements and refining the cloning of animals will ultimately lead to the cloning of individuals. Cloning animals is the engine of the runaway train that will ultimately lead to consequences that can be construed as immoral and unethical.

What are the Consequences ? = As science tinkers with genetics, there will undoubtedly be unacceptable mutations. As the cloned animals enter the food chain, who knows what affects genetic manipulations might have on the people who consume the meat from these animals ?

I don't have a very fixed opinion on this issue but for me to clone an animal doesn't matter. However I'm totally against cloning a human, it would be very strange, it would feel like being in a virtual world, with robots.

Animals don't have the same consciousness as humans, they wouldn't be affected by having been cloned, to be the clone of another animal ... although I think we should focus on nature! and stop having control of everything!

Personally, I have a cat soooo cute and I know I will never find that same cat later, as cute and nice! with these expressions of faces! I very much regret that he didn't have offspring! 18 years old it's to late!

But I agree with Gwenaelle about the dangers of the food chain!

And I think that cloning leads to genetic manipulation and therefore animals may be malformed in the future!

OH MY GOD ! That's the bad idea ever !
I think it isn't ethic for several reasons :

First, as the article said and more precisely as John Fishwick (the president of the British Veterinary Association) said : it's not the same animal, it's only the DNA which is put in the donor egg cells, but the animals haven't the same appearances or behaviour, they have different personalities so they have different lifes and experiences so I don't see where is the aim.

Otherwise, (and I had thought before to read), I think it's more important and smart to adopt a pet who really need a new home to live a good and joyful life with a family who love him...

To conclude, I will take a sentence full of truths which I have seen in the article : "Losing a much-loved pet is very distressing, and we understand that people can find it hard to let go of an animal who meant so much to them, but cloning is not the answer".

Okay, hi everybody, think about running out of food. Making clones would at least save us from starvation. The fact that a dead animal was cloned is here to discuss. I would never do that, because the clone will die to and i will be alone, again, so no point. Let's also think about markets that could possibly open : you pay Something like $1000 to clone an animal and you add like $2000 for that dog or cat, or an ants colony ! There will always be people to make other people pay for Something, this is what is making the world going - I will not buy such clone - this will be my answer as the clandestine of this group

hi,
I do not think that's a good thing, because every animal is unique. In addition it can bring risks, and you can clone everything and anything else. After a star is willing to pay so much money for it, she does what she wants but this money could be useful for other problems in the world more important than a dog.
we should start by trying to protect endangered species and stay instead of spending money on cloning research.

Hi !

I agree with Virginie, I do not think cloning is a good thing. Indeed, even if the loss of a pet can be very painful, cloning will not replace it.  Because as it is said in the article, the pet will have the same genes, but it will not be the same as the lost animal. Because each pet is unique.

It can also pose ethical problems of cloning animals. because the latter is more likely to develop diseases. In my opinion, cloning is a selfish act, because the owners only wish to make up for the loss of an animal, without thinking of the well being of this one.

And it is legitimate to wonder if the question of cloning could ever arise for humans? If science is able to clone pets it can just as well do it for the human being.

I agree with Virginie, research should instead focus on things that are more intelligent and thoughtful than cloning, especially at the medical level. I am really scared by the world which we live. I think that every living being is unique and although I can understand that some people may have a very special relationship with their pets, cloning isn't a good alternative to keep them with them. I have already lost animals and unfortunately it's life, it's hard but we must accept that they leave. Death is part of life and we must not hang on at all costs. We are made to reproduce ourselves and reproduction is a much more natural way to save some of the soul of your animals, there is a 50% chance that it looks like it. I really find cloning ridiculous and dangerous, it's a big ethical problem...

Hello, I studied the clonage during my psychologie course. Indeed, I had neuroscience. It's like biology. I have learned so many things and it permit me to think about some aspect of the clonage that I never considered.

As you know, clonage is the production of a new "individual" thanks to a core from an other individual. So from this point of view, and the act of Barbara Streisand. Clonage can be useful to rehabilitate endangered species. So maybe his dog is a rare specie of dog, so she just want to save the futur of this specie.

In humans, we can distinguish 2 kinds of clonages :

1. The reproductive one : permit to create a new individual (it's forbidden and we cannot do that), so the problem is solved
2. The therapeutical one : who permit to create organs. Moreover, when a people receive a transplantation, we can clone some cells to avoid the organ reject.

PS : We can clone animals because we just create new life

Hi everyone,

I'm not really sure that cloning his dead animal is a very good idea. As well as clone any human... Because,it's life to die, and even if the pain is enormous when a person we loved dies, we must say that life is done that way.
If everybody start cloning a person or animal we love, then we are eternal and that's not how the cycle of life is done.
So I'm not really agree with animal's or human's cloning.

Hi,
Like Vicent said, It's important to know there are different types of cloning, (National Human Genome Research Institute):

- Gene cloning to create copies of genes or just segments of DNA. (it's when a we cut the gene and replaces regions of it with new material WITHOUT changed it genetically

- Reproductive cloning to duplicate the whole animal. (it's when we remove a mature somatic cell from an organism and we transfer an other DNA into an egg cell to have the SAME genetical material "same genetic makeup" like B. Streisand's pet or Dolly the sheep)

- Therapeutic cloning to create cells, tissues in order to repair or replace damaged tissues. (it was used in experiments to understanding diseases and developing new treatments n research).

On the one hand, cloning could be interesting in a therapetical view, on the other hand it could be very dangerous in reproductive cloning.

To conclude, my question is : What is the real interest to clone his dead pet like B. Streisand ?
I don't understand in fact....

I found a very interesting article about arguments for and against human cloning research by Patrick Dixon.
https://www.globalchange.com/clonech.htm