Slashdot Mirror
Dentist Wants To Clone John Lennon Using DNA Extracted From Lennon's Tooth
dryriver writes "People fantasizing about a Beatles comeback tour might yet see their dream come true, all thanks to Dr. Michael Zuk. This dentist is the proud owner of one of John Lennon's teeth, and hopes to use it to clone the musician. By the looks of it, Dr. Michael Zuk came in possession of the tooth in 2011. At that time, he purchased the molar at an auction organized in the United Kingdom, and paid about $30,000 (€22,424) for it. According to The Inquisitr, the dentist is now working alongside scientists in the United States, who are helping him figure out a way to extract DNA from the tooth without damaging it in the process. This DNA would serve to bring back John Lennon. Apparently, Dr. Michael Zuk hopes that his project will snowball into a scientific and pop-cultural revolution. 'To potentially say I had a small part in bringing back one of Rock's greatest stars would be mind-blowing. I am nervous and excited at the possibility that we will be able to fully sequence John Lennon's DNA, very soon I hope,' the dentist reportedly commented on the importance of his work."
... cloned from a little piece ... oOooo OOOO ooooOOooo...
It seems like most people don't understand what cloning is. They think that they will get John Lennon, but actually they will get a baby that looks exactly like John Lennon but doesn't have his personality or memories, or any learned talents for that matter.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
I presume this dentist guy wants the kid to become a rockstar like his father clone but quite honestly, just because you're a clone, it doesn't guarantee any remarkable skills. Good luck kid, because this dentist is obviously mad and you're in for a hell of a lot of expectations in your life.
Even if this were possible, why should that new life be forced to play guitar for this nutcase? Maybe clone Lennon has other ambitions. Maybe work for 3 years on the moon... Clone rights people!
First they clone Lennon. Then they clone Stallon. Soon enough, they've cloned Hittlor.
Dr. Alan Grant: [finding egg shells] Oh my God. Do you know what this is? This is a Beatle egg. The pop stars are breeding.
Tim: But Grandpa said all the Beatles were men.
Dr. Alan Grant: Lady Gaga DNA.
Lex: What's that?
Dr. Alan Grant: Well, on the tour, the film said they used Lady Gaga's DNA to fill in the gene sequence gaps. They mutated the Beatle genetic code and blended it with that of a crazy bitch who dresses like a homeless person having a fit in a garbage can, but comes up with incredibly catchy melodies. Now, Lady Gaga has been known to spontaneously change sex from male to female depending on which angle she gets photographed from. Malcolm was right. Look...
[we see a trail of baby Beatle footprints]
Dr. Alan Grant: Life found a way.
which is totally what she said
'Bringing a person back' by cloning then is like 'restoring' your destroyed HDD by reinstalling the operating system on a new one. Unless someone happened to take a disk image of Lennon's brain prior to his death, then all you'll end up with is a completely different person who might look a bit like Lennon.
John Lennon 2.0 will keep his surrogate parents up all night, then turn to alcohol to "deal" with his fame, flunk out of school and find inspiration in the works of Kid Rock, because fuck you.
Not really going to toss my hat into the ring as to whether I believe this is good or bad, but I'm curious how we are going to wind up dealing with the legal ramifications of reviving the ancient dead (in this case we're talking about decades, but humor me).
Should people have a legal right to say they never, ever want to be revived, no matter how much time has passed?
(I can't even begin to imagine the holy wars it's going to ignite when people start suggesting that we try to revive Jesus, assuming we can ever find any DNA we presume to be his)
Oh, Please, may I have one with a dwarf gene implanted so I can have my very own John Lennon Mini-Me?
So this dentist is now has intellectual property-rights on Lennon's DNA? Is it even up to him to decide whether a human being should be cloned or not? Is it even up to any other human to decide such things?
And most importantly: with such blatant disregard for the human aspect of this entire endeavour, and such lack of medical knowledge on cloning (i.e. him expecting to 'breed' a fully adult John Lennon, complete with musical abilities) how the hell did this guy get a dentist-certification?!
Indeed, it would be an interesting experiment in nature vs nurture. I would suspect that you would get some aspects of his personality, but not others.
However, artists draw strongly from their cultural background, that would certainly be very different so even if his musical talent is genetic his music would be very different. That's irrelevant though, it would be extremely cruel to clone an individual with such high expectations - especially one likely to be surrounded by media all his life.
null
You would think the Lennon estate would have copyright over the DNA, or does this law need writing yet...
He clones Lennon, he'll get a guy that looks like him and has the same innate talents.
What he won't get is the kid who grew up where he did, the kid who grew up with another kid names Paul, the kid who went to Germany for year with his best friend Paul, and George and Ringo, and the kid that had all those experiences in post-war England, the 50s and the 60s that made John Lennon the icon he was.
Genetics express themselves based on environment, too. A John Lennon growing up in 21st century England is going to be a different person; albeit with very similar characteristics.
> Dr. Michael Zuk.
Let's have a vote. Is this guy
A) A complete fucking moron
B) A self-publicising scam artist?
Personally, I can't see any third option.
At first I thought cloning a human at would be extremely cruel because of what happened to Dolly the sheep, but then I used teh Googlz and found that scientist have subsequently cloned Rhesus monkeys with success. So now I only think it would be totally reckless to clone a human, given how limited our understanding of its long-term consequences are.
[Sir Garlon] is the marvellest knight that is now living, for he destroyeth many good knights, for he goeth invisible.
Whiskey Tango Foxtrot?!?
Imagine reincarnation
It's easy if you try
Only one tooth is needed
No one ever needs to die...
"Damn it, I hate Slashdot on April Fools day"...
Then I realized it was October. I think I have 4/1 PTSD.
.........growing up as the clone of a dead celebrity?
The scope for pushy parenting could take on a very disturbing new dimension. I'd hate to be that child.
Pretty sure john lennon would frown on copying people...
Fine, do beta testing on pop-stars. And when technology is proven and tested then clone Einstein.
#
#\ @ ? Colonize Mars
#
As many have pointed out, to have even a remote chance of a John Lennon clone being anything like the original, you would have to recreate his upbringing like they did in The Boys from Brazil with (Godwin alert!) the Hitler clones. That includes finding a crazy Japanese lady to tear the cloned Beatles apart again.
So we've pretty well established that this would (a) not produce another John Lennon in any meaningful way and (b) be a pretty shitty thing to do to an innocent baby but I'm not hearing much about the technical feasibility of this.
- I know we can raise cloned sheep and mice and dogs and cats and cattle to birth and maturity, an I know that cloning a small number of human cells is possible, but but where are we on actually bringing a cloned human to full term? What's the state of the art? Is anyone openly researching this stuff? Is it even legal?
- Also, cloning so far tends to be done with "ideal" donor genetic material taken directly from a fresh, living being under lab conditions. Recovering useful material from a manky old tooth that's been gathering dust for decades is surely going to present significant challenges all of its own. What is the state of the art concerning turning crappy old salvaged scrapyard-DNA into working reproductive cells?
Cue lawsuit from Yoko in 3,2,1
let it be
People fantasizing about a Beatles comeback tour might yet see their dream come true
Only if they're morons and don't understand that cloning isn't miraculous resurrection of an individual.
there is no reason why the same technological advances could not be used to resurrect rock legends.
*facepalm*
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
... cloned from a little piece ... oOooo OOOO ooooOOooo...
This exact comment has already been posted. Try to be more original...
"I possess the DNA of Leonard Nimoy! Do you realize what this means? All I need is a healthy ovum and I could grow my own Leonard Nimoy!"
Science advances one funeral at a time- Max Planck
The world does NOT need another woman beating junkie! and if you clone Yoko too, that is just some End Times right there! Yoko Ono is not a human being, she is a hybrid fire alarm/cactus doing its best to impersonate a Japanese grandmother!
He is the egg man.
All I want is the tooth.
(apologies)
If I were a dentist, I would clone myself from a tooth
To obtain a complete sequence suitable for cloning you would need a DNA sample that was obtained from living tissue and either processed immediately or suitably frozen in the interim. DNA starts to degrade pretty quickly. That's why nobody is going to clone Lennon or any mammoths any time soon. Regarding the mammoths: yes, they've been fozen but they're discovered as the ice thaws (by which time the damage has been done).
soylentnews.org
Come on your a dentist, so we all know that you have at least some education. People aren't who they are just because of their DNA, their environment, life experiences, traumas, positive events, and education are just some of the many factors that create who we are. We are so unique as individuals it would be impossible to recreate someones life in a way that would allow a clone to be the same as the source. It is insulting for someone to believe that with a little bit of DNA they could bring someone back from the dead. I like to think that what makes us who we are is a little more magical and hard to quantify then the scientific process of cloning. Are world is mostly facts that can be studied and understood, even explained, but there is that small part that will always remain a mystery. To me this is the best of both worlds, scientific and spiritual.
Get one! This is not April 1st!
FYI, nobody will own the rights to this person and what they may or may not produce...except he himself.
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
Obsessive fans! All you need is a bit of fingernail, or some skin under your fingernail, maybe a quick scratch, and you can have your very own "insert obsession name here".
I think it would be hilarious if they did this, and the baby came out black, or Asian. Or female. (Or Yoko Ono!) In fact, maybe this is just an extreme case of buyer's remorse. The dentist is feeling like an idiot for paying $30k for a tooth that supposedly came from John Lennon. Now instead of feeling like a sucker, he can rationalize that it was an investment. Maybe he can even write it off on his taxes.
Bigger than Jesus indeed.
According to the dentist: "All we are saying, is give teeth a chance"
Will the clone still enjoy John's favourite chocolate beverage?
systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
There's a small probability that the clone will grown with the same surroundings and turn into a musician.
all morality aside: everyone wants to know if a cloned john lennon would be as talented of a songwriter when he grew up. Is talent like that learned, or something you're born with?
They used a walrus egg, man.
I'll get me coat.
.
Prisencolinensinainciusol. Ol Rait!
I mean society is fundamentally stupid so the moment you announce this it's instant controversy.
Just do it, and in 20 years when a new John Lennon emerges in the music scene you can tell people to shut the fuck up and enjoy the music.
I haven't thought of anything clever to put here, but then again most of you haven't either.
With little pink dots and a skirt and a poky little mustache. I want to name it Yoko. And ride it all the time.
Dammit Jim!
I'm a doctor not a DNA cloner! If you want to clone Spock, you had better find a "Genesis Planet".
I only look human.
My mother is a halfling and my dad is an ogre, so that makes me an Ogreling
Wouldn't cloning Lenin be more interesting?
love is just extroverted narcissism
OMG, if this works, maybe Tupac really will come back.
I'd buy John Merrick's remains, ooh those crazy elephant bones...
There simply aren't enough drugs around to re-create the Beatles "talent" these days.
There is no music - home taping killed it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1d-aWMQuoS4 :P
I mean, look at the difference in interests and abilities of millions of clones, er, twins, triplets, etc. And the clone won't, of course, have even *vaguely* the same background - parentage, location and environment growing up, friends, etc.
If he does it, I see a "great" career... as a John Lennon imitator.
mark
who is the actual owner of the tooth? As a part of Lennon, surely it belongs to his estate?
Yoko Ono could be the surrogate!
I mean as long as they don't use frog dna and keep it on a secluded island it should be all fine... just like Jurassic park was.... :P
Finally, we can have a real life Clone High!
here's a hypothetical: say you do succeed and are able to clone from a tooth. are both clone and original a "same" thing? which one is better? are they completely different so that they share nothing in common other then their dna? what's the purpose of doing it other than to say "yes, it is possible"? if a famous person who is alive clones himself - does he become less famous? is the clone worthless? does clone's importance jump a level once the original no longer exist, without any effort on his part?
the beatles reunion will unlikely be the same: the memories, the experiences... everything would be missing. it would be nothing more then smoke and mirrors, just like that 2PAC performance (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F_eT0sQZuXM). no magic, just technology. and , of course, not the same thing.
Imagine you're a douche bag
It's easy if you try.
No cells to grow us.
Just self-promoting guys...
For all intensive purposes, "whom" is no longer a word. That begs the question, "who cares"?
Assuming this absurd plan has any chance of succeeding (which is a stretch), all they would end up with is a body Yoko Ono wouldn't mind bedding, with some guy she doesn't know inside.
I say we make a Ghola. It's quite simple:
1. Clone John from the tooths DNA.
2. Let him grow to desired age.
3. Awake his original memories by making him endure a terrible psychological trauma. Showing him a current pic of Yoko might do the trick.
A person is much more than their DNA. This new version will grow up in a different world and be a different person.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Upon further inspection, it would appear that this "tooth" is actually a walrus tusk.
In Soviet Russia, dot slashes YOU!
This looks roughly unethical. There is no law against such Pygmalion's practice in the US?
It'd be just like starting ova.
So, here's my prediction of how this would come out if they could cone him: John Lennon II would be born and immediately have people constantly watching him. He'd be famous from inception. People would immediately know his vocal capabilities if the cloning process was really that accurate. Throughout his life, he'd be told that he was going to be a great singer and he'd hear all of the stories of himself in a previous lifetime, hear the music, etc. By the time it came that he was old enough, he'd have had voice lessons, learned musical theory, had inspiring artists being to play with him. Then, he'd rebel and tell them all to hell and then take up an illustrious career as a software engineer, vowing to never sing for anyone. Lots of money and hope would have been wasted. Dreams shattered.
I think ultimately people tend to and need to rebel against what their parents want them to be and can see no difference here.