Cloning License for Dolly's Doc

Rollie Hawk writes "Ian Wilmut, leader of Dolly the sheep's team and Professor at the Roslin Institute in Edinburgh, has been given the green light by the British government's Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority to start further cloning research. As a matter of fact, he is now a licensed human cloner. The license has a duration of one year and is the second of its kind given by Britain, the first country to officially sanction human cloning research. Research will be focusing on motor neurone disease (MND). The team hopes to perform cell nuclear replacement on the skin cells of MND victims in order to create stem cells, the jack-of-all-trades of the cell family and the supposed magic bullets for ailments ranging from Alzheimer's to paralysis.

Comments

Is this a good idea AT THIS TIME?

[beh]

I am not sure, whether this is really such a grand idea -- yes, genetics
and cloning hold enormous potential, but I think with the current
knowledge of this subject there should be a moratorium on actual
experiments (especially on human cells) until we learn more of the
background of the whole thing - and especially, until we have some form
of agreement on ethical standards about what we want to achieve and how
far we are willing to go.

(Note: this is not the "we should leave this to god argument" -- simply
because I am agnostic. But somehow I think before we start "playing
god", we should at least get to know whatever we can on a theoretical
level, before we go about practical experiments on it and decide what
should be allowed and what should be off limits... )

Re:Is this a good idea AT THIS TIME?

[lederhosen]

>...but I think with the current
>knowledge of this subject...

How can we gain knowledge if we don't do research?

Re:Is this a good idea AT THIS TIME?

[nuclear305]

" I am not sure, whether this is really such a grand idea -- yes, genetics
and cloning hold enormous potential, but I think with the current
knowledge of this subject there should be a moratorium on actual
experiments (especially on human cells) until we learn more of the
background of the whole thing - and especially, until we have some form
of agreement on ethical standards about what we want to achieve and how
far we are willing to go."

Ok, well the most obvious argument is "How do we learn without doing research?" We already know the "theoretical level" ...which is why people want to pursue research to begin with.

That aside, who decides on the ethical standards? Who decides when we've learned enough "background" to proceed with experiments? Historically speaking there is no way...there will always be people that disagree and there will always be those who think we should put something off until we have a better understanding.

Re:Is this a good idea AT THIS TIME?

[Datasage]

How do we know if a thoery is valid if we are not allowed to test it? Expirments are a part of the scientifc process, without them, all your theories are just hypothesis.

Re:Is this a good idea AT THIS TIME?

[lumpenprole]

I don't know. Why don't you ask those people with motor neuron disease he's trying to find a treatment for how they feel about the ethical implications.

Re:Is this a good idea AT THIS TIME?

[Daniel Dvorkin]

ethical standards about what we want to achieve and how far we are willing to go

It is ethical to engage in research which may heal people suffering from horrible diseases. It is unethical to throw up roadblocks to such research based on vague fears about Things Man Was Not Meant To Know.

Any questions?

Re:Is this a good idea AT THIS TIME?

[lederhosen]

I have big problem with people fiddle around with genetics. But you do have to think about what is good and what is bad. I have *no* problem whatsoever with
cloning though I have serious problem with modifying genes that are inherited.

Go ahead and clone cells for cancer treatment, and deseases, but wait with messing with genes that will
be left for all comming generations (at least untill we really know what we are doing.

Sadly, it seams to be the other way around, mix genes of fish with potatoes, modify corn etc, things that *may* cause severe problems in the
future people seams to accept. But when you
*clone* something, everyone screams, think about our children, when it is realy totaly harmless

Re:Is this a good idea AT THIS TIME?

[tgibbs]

Ever heard of "theoretical" research?

Strangely, astronomy is a science, though we've never created a supernova of ourselves, or travelled for a lightyear to get a feel for the distance.

I think there is a lot that can simply be learnt by studying and observing and THEN we can start thinking about how to change things.

We've been studying and observing for decades. The research is really at a point where it is impossible to carry it appreciably further without experimental results to test the theories, which we finally have the technology to do. There's really no reason to imagine that at some future time we'd be in a better position to decide how to do these experiments. At some point, you just have to try it and see if it works.

Re:Is this a good idea AT THIS TIME?

[UWC]

Science is based on observation. With astronomy, there's a limit to our abilities to observe, and we stay at the edge of that, stretching it with probes, new telescopes, etc. With cloning research, there's an increased ability to observe certain processes in what some apparently consider acceptable ways. Do you deny that if we actually could travel interstellar distances, we would? These scientists feel that it's within their ethical limits to be doing the experiments they are doing. Whether that fits with some universal standard of ethics I don't know, but I don't think that most of them are doing this just because they can. They want to learn from it, like the astronomers using revolutionary equipment to gain more knowledge about their own field of study. This isn't an endorsement of the cloning stuff, and I don't know where I would draw the line, either, but I don't think the comparison to astronomy is particularly valid, as astronomy is limited by the means of observation.

Re:Is this a good idea AT THIS TIME?

[tgibbs]

But first you have to decide the ethical standards for doing the tests, which seems to have been long overlooked.

I disagree. People have been thinking about the ethical standards for a long time. All relevant issues have been extensively debated. I haven't heard anybody with anything new to say on the topic for many years. Since there are no plans for creating organisms with a functioning nervous system capable of suffering, the experiments clearly meet established standards of scientific ethics. And the basic manipulations of human embryos in vitro have long been carried out for in vitro fertilization, so we have already decided as a society that this sort of manipulation is ethically acceptable.

Of course there are some people with religious objections to this, just as there are some people with religious objections to eating beef or pork. They will at some point have to decide whether their personal ethics permit them to take advantage of the benefits of this research.

Re:Is this a good idea AT THIS TIME?

[Xyanth]

I say let 'em do the cloning. We would probably be ages ahead of ourselves if it weren't for all of the people and lobbying groups against advancing science and technology in various fields. Weather manipulation, underwater climate control, cross-breeding of plants, unharmful pesticides, new forms of energy generators... You name it, there's a group of individuals somewhere trying to fight it. Even political and economical concepts get that same treatment. At the rate it's going, America will be far behind all of the other countries due to the fact that American opinions matter too much. Even the really stupid opinions. Freedom of speech is nice sometimes, but it's very often one of our own handicaps.

Re:Is this a good idea AT THIS TIME?

[Swamii]

Good point, I concede that it isn't the same. I still wonder whether a public forum, where the public is mostly uninformed and politically motivated, is a good place to consider the question.

Re:Is this a good idea AT THIS TIME?

[metlin]

> but I don't think that most of them are
> doing this just because they can.

And even if they *did* do it just because they can, what's wrong with that?

Atleast it's something that has potential benefits to humanity.

Artists have "artistic liberty" to go ahead and do any damn thing they want and call it art. Why not scientists, too?

Even morals are relative - and where the lines are drawn is largely contingent upon one's upbringing and culture, rather than some universal moral code.

In the end, it is progress for humanity. That's what counts.

Re:Is this a good idea AT THIS TIME?

[Gauchito]

vague fears about Things Man Was Not Meant To Know.

That's not the reason people object to this kind of research. The main question in this whole argument is the one that neither side can agree on: at what point do we start being a living human being, and the killing of that human being becomes murder? At conception or some arbitrary point later (e.g., brain is fully formed, a neuron grows, all fingers are there, etc.)? Every other point in this discussion stems from that one question, for which there seems to be no objective answer, because we don't have a clear, unanimous idea of what it actually means to be human.

Re:Is this a good idea AT THIS TIME?

[Omestes]

This is to say that you beleive that some concrete ethical standard can be developed. I doubt that this is the case, especailly in todays "intellectual" climate (especially in the US).

What we have is science vs. religion. Science coming from a rational direction. Religion screaming "God doesn't like it!" Same as in all the big ticket ethical questions, such as abortion. Compromise is impossible, both sides are fixed and dogmatic, even if their might be a silent minority with median views.

Science seems to lack some of the possible humanistic issues, while religion fails to take in account that some people really don't give a rats ass what their interpretation of their mythology tells them. I think the atheistic side might be capable of compromise, while the religious will never. Sadly the religious side is in control in the US.

I think what is needed is to censor the religious people. Only allow logical/scientific arguements, and resort to real ethiks, being that all issues are inevitable, and pointless to ban.

I personally can't only think of a handful of pragmatic ethical considerations against any form of cloning, and a plethera of positive humanistic benefits.

On the down side we have the fact that only the wealthy could afford genetic treatments. The unforseen effects of germ line therapies, and the fact that decendants have no choice. The trite sci-fi full human cloning, which would go under my first condition. And then the whole fetus issue, which is pretty much mute in a world without souls.

Perhaps banning certain aspects might be in the best interest, but not the full genetic horse.

Re:Is this a good idea AT THIS TIME?

[PakProtector]

The problem is not so simple as science vs. religion. The problem is science vs. certain religions.

The modern world is based on several thousand years of patriarchal society. Particularly with Christianity, where in the bible it specifically says that the Christian god, Yahweh (Iehovah) created man in his image, and then made man from woman, and then made woman subservient to man.

In religions where the chief diety is Male, the Male God is seen as the source of all life, and since God is a male, man must naturally be closer to perfection than woman. Man was believed to be the source of all life -- look at what the ancient greeks and romans and other societies thought about the roles of men and women in procreation -- consider how deeply ingrained into our society the metaphor of 'sowing wild oats' and similiar other seed metaphors are. In the Biblical Christian view of the world, man was solely responsible for the act of procreation: His 'seeds' were put in to the woman, who served as the 'soil' in which they grew. Woman was seen as providing nothing more than a good enviroment for the 'seed' to develop. Remember that the many of the first people to exampine male spermatozoa under microscope reported seeing homonculi -- minature, fully formed men. This view of the world, where men were sole creators of life, is what our modern world view is based in. The reason abortion is so abominable to so many Christians is not the fact that 'God' says it is wrong -- God says it is wrong because in a world view where man has sole creative power, something like abortion takes power away from the man, devaluing his role in the process of the creation of new life. Hell hath no fury like a man devalued.

Take as an example of this fact the 'Angry White Male,' who is Angry that men said to women, 'Sure, you can compete with us, but on our terms,' and lo and behold suddenly a good deal of those men are finding themselves displaced socially and economically by women. For the past several thousand years the male's role was as sole provider for the family. Our culture (atleast America -- the only culture I am able to give an opinion on, as it is the only one I know well enough to do so) is based upon several thousand years of the male role being defined as provider and protector, and now that role is being displaced because, when men forced women to compete on "men's" terms, it was suddenly foudn that women were not so helpless, stupid, or defenseless as had long been held.

These 'angry white males' are angry because their traditional societial safe-houses, first politics, then the 'masculine' job-force, and now the right to control reproduction, are slowly being chipped away at.

As society becomes closer to equality between the sexes, the men who are most insecure about their place in life will fight harder and harder. Many men find themselves asking, "What exactly is it that I do?" Men have no definate answer for this sort of question. Male identity is a precarious thing. It is almost impossible to shake the Female identity so throughly, because there is always a response to the question. "I can have children." Men have no definate roll, and they make up for their inability to do something by saying that women may not do something else.

Such as dress in a certain way. Or own things. Or have a job. Or have control over their own bodies.

And I forgot where I was going with this.

But mod me up, please?

Re:Is this a good idea AT THIS TIME?

[tgibbs]

Not out in the open. Unfortunately, I think our present news system prevents a priori the possibility of open, public debates. The closest you get are shouting matches, or just summaries which completely miss the major points made by both sides.

I've read and heard extensive debate on the ethics of this issue, from politicians and private citizens to professional ethicists. And I'm not privy to any secret, private debates. Everything has been out in the open. In this single, very public, forum, it has been debated dozens of times.

welcome

[kevinx]

I certainly welcome our new cloned human overlords..
as long as they all look like the olsen twins.

Re:welcome

[Jakhel]

how rude

Clones in the news again?

[Anonymous Coward]

Isn't this story a dupe?

So.....

[Meostro]

The license has a duration of one year and is the second of its kind given by Britain, the first country to officially sanction human cloning research.

So who got the first one?

Re:So.....

[Dr Caleb]

So who got the first one?

Some guy who looks just like him.

Re:So.....

[jacob_jackson]

Last August, a team of scientists from Newcastle University in northern England was granted a license to clone human embryos to develop new treatments for diabetes and degenerative diseases such as Alzheimer's and Parkinson's (http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=hea lthNews&storyID=7569803&pageNumber=1)

Clone rights

[Spoonito]

Clones are people two.

10 print "clones are people" $d
20 let $d = pun
30 gosub hilarity

License to copy

[saddino]

As a matter of fact, he is now a licensed human cloner.

Something tells me he wouldn't have a problem creating a fake ID if he really needed one.

Re:Thank you Bush!

[TheMeuge]

As much as the parent can be considered a troll, he/she is right. The pressure of religious ethics of the right wing Christians, along with this administration's spite towards science, will result in rapid elimination of the slim lead that the US has been maintaining in medical and basic research.

Not human cloning.

[Anonymous Coward]

He has a license to clone human embreyos, not clone humans which would be an entirely different matter. The purpose being so he/his team can study diseases which effect motor neurons, by growing them from cloned embreyos using the material from a sufferor of motor neuron disease.

Re:Not human cloning.

[Anonymous Coward]

so human embryos do not grow to become humans?

Are you living on this planet or another one?

Oh noooo!!!

[ryanvm]

Oh crap! This is England's first step in building a clone army to conquer the world. I've had visions of this army and their teeth look like this.

What the US does well is...

[doublem]

We're better at starting wars we can't finish.

And condemning things to Hell.

Oh! And getting fat. We have more fat than the rest of the world combined.

Re:What the US does well is...

[johnnyb]

And giving the rest of the world a taste of freedom.

Re:should I write a novel?

[eyeye]

are you a clone of CrazyJim0 ?

copyright issues?

[de1orean]

the RIAA is watching these developments closely.

Re:should I write a novel?

[doublem]

Been Done

Of course, the movie is only intersting if you see the MST3K version.

Re:Genetic material question

[InternationalCow]

The egg contains mitochondria, and, indeed, some motor neuron diseases are indirectly linked to mitochondrial dysfunction. If bad mitochondria cause the disease, problem solved, as the mitochondria are not from the person with MND. However, most motor neuron diseases that we know of and are connected to mitochondrial dysfunction are actually caused by problems in nuclear genes - case in point being amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (aka Lou Gehrig's disease), which is related to mutations in superoxide dismutase. The dysfunctioning of this protein in turn affects mitochondrial function leading to increased apoptosis, etc.. Apart from that, tackling degenerative disease using stem cells is probably not going to work in many cases - many of those diseases may not be caused by cell-autonomous processes, which means that whatever is killing the motor neurons is going to kill the stem cells as well. Stem cells may however be very useful for repopulating purposes, if we can get them to differentiate in the right way in the right place.

Re:Certainty

[jackelfish]

They are not creating embryos, they are attempting to create pluripotent cells, from skin cells, in an attempt to replace malfunctioning neurons. There is not an entire organism involved here as they are not using gametes (eggs or sperm) in these experiments. This is where the term "cloning" becomes confused, in that many people think it always refers to the duplication of a whole organism (such as Dolly) where it simply means to insert foreign DNA into a cell.

Re:Certainty

[jackelfish]

Let me correct myself. It seems that in this case they will be actually inserting the DNA into an unfertilized egg in an attempt to study the development of the disease. That said, many of these diseases also have an autoimmune aspect that can be triggered later on in development and as with any science there are numerous factors that can not be controlled for. Therefore we have to take the results at face value and not read too much into them, as is quite often the case.

Just a friendly reminder

[bluefoxlucid]

The poster is referring to embreyonic stem cells, which still haven't been proven to be any useful. I still say more adult stem cell research is needed, especially since I've heard things about experimental methods to cure Type1 diabetese using adult stem cells, and things about people pushing states (Mass. in particular) to fund embreyonic stem cell research to try and cure diabetese.

Point is, of course, that I'm bitterly opposed to embreyonic research for the pure and simple reason that it's going nowhere while adult stem cell research is over 100 diseases and thousands of successful treatments into its life cycle, and holds all the same potentials. Both flavors have been getting something like 300 million greenbacks per year from NIH.

Re:Just a friendly reminder

[arkhan_jg]

You are aware that new embryonic stem cell lines in the US cannot be researched by any organisation receiving federal funding right? (which is virtually all of them in this field)

Since the existing lines are contaminated embryonic stem cell research has slowed badly in the US.

Embyronic stem cells are far simpler to manipulate than adult stem cells into the type of cells you want, but effective research into them has slowed to a trickle in many countries, including the US, because of religious and political reasons, not scientific ones.

Also, adult stem cells theoretically age faster than embryonic ones. That's not to say adult cells aren't useful; they're easier to create without culturing and have many useful applications that embryonic cells may not be suitable for.

In the end, one is a hammer, the other is a screwdriver. Since the US government has effectively outlawed screwdrivers, it's not surprising that more uses have been found for hammers.

Personally, I'm glad my government is funding investigation into both types of stem cells, rather than letting uninformed moral police dictate science.

Re:Thank you Bush!

[dsanfte]

It's politically risky for private US firms to dabble in embryonic stem cell research and theraputic cloning. That's why they're abstaining, not because the results wouldn't be profitable.

Re:Thank you Bush!

[meringuoid]

Don't worry...we can always rely on our skilled manufacturing wor....oh. Umm..what is it we do better than everyone else again?

Music, movies, microcode, high-speed pizza delivery. Now, come on, this is pretty basic stuff from your introductory-level geek courses...

Not human cloning. Worse.

[zippthorne]

so.. if an embryo starts to become too much like a human is he obligated to kill it?

The problem i have with theraputic cloning is that it's exactly the kind of cloning we shouldn't allow, being the microscopic (or in a particularly ghoulish world, full-size) equilvalent of having a baby to harvest its heart.

I really don't understand why people opposed to reproductive cloning on some kind of moral argument can turn around and support theraputic cloning. I mean, so what if people want to have vanity babies that are nearly copies of themselves?

I'd be pissed.

[Mao]

I don't care what ethical/philosophical arguments anyone employs regarding cloning.

I for one would be pissed if I realized that I am the cloned version of someone else.

(It's probably impossible to create an EXACT clone; but still, I'd kick my original's ass, for he would likely be older than I am, and I enjoy beating up old people. Ok that last part was a joke.)

Better questions at this time

[Doc Ruby]

It's happening. A better question, and actually germane to this story itself, is "will licensing cloning researchers help control abuses of the industry?". It's probably more effective than merely banning the abuses, or banning the practice altogether. It gives an outlet and encouragement to the very attractive cloning practices that are very clearly use of the technique, and not abuse. But I'd bet that Bill Gates has several clones growing somewhere - he knows they only get them right by version 3.0.

Not so fast Einstein

[KarmaBlackballed]

But when you *clone* something, everyone screams, think about our children, when it is really totally harmless

I don't have any answers, but feel compelled to point out that so far cloning is not known to be harmless. Specifically, as far as I know all cloned mammals have a cell age equivalent to that of the cell donor. The cell age is measured by the length of the cell telemers. (When the telemers become too short, the cell dies. Telemers get shorter with every cell division.)

you can extend telomeres

[nounderscores]

using telomerase - it's an enzyme discovered by accident in cancer research. Cancer cells express it atopically and have infinite lifespans (killing you). Telomerase is supposed to be active in the cells that give rise to your sperm and egg to keep them forever young.

BINGO!!!

[the_skywise]

"And then the whole fetus issue, which is pretty much mute in a world without souls."

Ergo, fetuses don't have souls so killing them for medical experimentation isn't a problem.

Yeah, that's a real "humanistic" attitude right there.

It's not a "God doesn't like it argument" Your statement right there is a perfect example as to why people have ethical problems about the whole issue.

Soylent Green anyone? I mean, c'mon it's only dead human flesh... It's not like you're eating someone's soul!