So What’s So Bad About Human Cloning? Andrew Latus Jan. 22, 2003

An Important Distinction Therapeutic Cloning vs. Reproductive Cloning Therapeutic = producing a clone as a source of material for experiment and/or treatment Some moral issues differ depending on the type of cloning being discussed Main focus will be on reproductive cloning

Six Issues 1. 'It's unnatural.' 2. The moral status of clones 3. The motivation of the person being cloned 4. Risks to the clone 5. Who will the parent be? 6. Does cloning someone inherently disrespect the clone? 1, 2, 3 & 6 are also relevant to therapeutic cloning

1. Unnaturalness Or … ‘cloning is playing god.’ Or … ‘cloning is inconsistent with human dignity” “… some practices … are simply unacceptable, because they're not consistent with human dignity, such as cloning a person and creating animal-human hybrids. Those are unacceptable, because they're just not consistent with human dignity." (Alan Rock, May 3, 2001) In other words, there’s just something wrong with cloning, no matter how it’s carried out.

2. The Moral Status of Clones Would clones be people like you and me? Would they have souls? Some claim that human cloning will involve the creation of a 'new slave class'. For therapeutic cloning: at what point does the clone become morally important?

3. The Motivation of the Person Being Cloned Some claim that to want to clone yourself is to have a morally bad motivation. Perhaps it's unacceptably vain. Perhaps it involves seeing a clone as a means to an end, not as an entity that is valuable in and of itself

4. Risks to the Clone A clone might suffer physical, psychological, or social harm. Physical: Many reports of cloned animals being less healthy than the original Psychological: Growing up knowing yourself to be a genetic copy of someone may have a psychological cost Social: A stigma might attach to being known to be a clone

5. Who will the parent be? Both a legal and a moral question Would the clone be a child or a sibling of the person cloned (or neither)? The category of parent has both biological and social elements

6. Does cloning someone inherently disrespect the clone? Also relevant to the motivation of the person being cloned A central ethical idea: a person should be treated not as a means to an end, but as an end in him/herself Will clones always (or almost always) be created as a means to some end? E.g., reproducing a loved one, a great leader, an athlete, producing a source for a transplant