MORE ON HUMAN CLONING.....
15th May 2003
A correspondent wrote to me on the subject of human cloning (presumably expecting me to offer an atheistic reaction). My answers - subsequently edited somewhat - are given below interspersed with the questions. My thanks are due to the questioner for giving me the opportunity to say a few things which seem to me to be of some possible interest to others.
Q.1 What are your views on cloning?
A.1 First a few general comments which can be found in an early issue of a monthly website of mine - ATHEIST THOUGHT. This site has been running for some years its latest edition is No. 82. The following URL is of the earler piece of mine particular piece on human cloning": Click Here
I would add to what I wrote then by saying that what sort of a person one is depends upon at least five things - genetic predispositions, environment, the support of one's fellows, the support one offers to one's fellows and one's response to the evidently chance events of life. One's genetic makeup can be said to write one's agenda - and to make significant omissions from that agenda. The decisions that one takes on the given items of genetic business - decisions influenced hugely by the other factors I have mentioned already - are one's own and one has to take responsibility for those decisions.
Looking back over my 78 years I can see many occasions when a one in a million chance has been followed up and has led to outcomes quite different from what would otherwise have been the case. Genetics is not all and genetic identity does not alone make us what we are. To that extent the problem of human cloning should lead to us think less frantically than many commentators seem to claim is required. Cloning need not, probably does not, make 'carbon copies' of people.
Q.2 What do you believe are the possible outcomes of such technologies coming into today's society?
A.2 There is almost an infinity of possible outcomes - as there is to any act of human reproduction natural or otherwise. We human beings are notoriously unsuccessful in our attempts to predict the future, Aldous Huxley and George Orwell are cases in point. The worlds they portray, while horribly similar to what we now inhabit in spectacularly selective ways, are also hugely misleading..
Q.3 In your view, to what extent would you say human cloning is a reality?
A.3 I doubt that human cloning is yet a reality but it is probably coming.
Q.4 Should we halt the research on cloning animals because it might lead to human cloning?
A.4 Research cannot be halted in any area in which finance can give impetus to the natural human urge to innovate. Finance is under only the most tenuous democratic control.
Q.5 Do you think the allegations from Clonaid about the birth of the "first human clone", Eve born December 26th 2002, has any truth to it?
A 5 The fact that the claimants are people of very deviant religious opinions ...... their leader claims to have gone to some planet or other and to have had lunch with Buddha, Jesus and The Prophet and they also claim that humans are the descendants of extra-terrestrial 'persons' ...... gives these claimants a severe credibility problem. I would need a lot of persuading to do other than dismiss their claims - although, of course, I may be incorrect in this.
Q.6 a. From your point of view, how would human cloning affect the structure of a family?
A 6 a "the family' is generally well able to cope with identical twins and exotic adoptees. Cloning, per se, seems to present no special problem if taken - like alcohol - in due moderation.
Q 6b And what type of culture would the clone belong?
A 6b Cultures vary and to import cloning into one culture may have very different effects from introducing into another culture. Short answer - I don't know and daren't guess but I suppose the products of cloning would be subject to the considerations that I have outlined in my introductory remarks.
Q.7 Would human cloning change what it means to be human?
A.7 If I could define "what it means to be human" then I could attempt an answer. Look at my website URL and link to the relevant issue listed in the home page for some discussion of personhood. This is to be found via Click Here
Q.8 What do you think of the US scientist, Dr. Richard Seed, who wants to set up the first human clone clinic in Chicago?
A. 8 Not a lot! But I am no expert and he should not be ignored. He'd better look out for the 'pro-life' terrorists who intimidate and murder law-abiding abortionists.
Q.9 Scientists believe that the technique used to create the headless frogs could be adapted to grow human organs, such as hearts, kidneys, liver and pancreases in an embryonic sac living in an artificial womb. What are your views on this?
A.9 Sceptical! People always point to the positive value of knowledge as though it were indubitable. I have just submitted an article to 'Humanism Scotland' in which I explore the idea of dangerous knowledge. I quote the article in full as follows - but you may choose simply to skip it.
Very few educated people take the Genesis story literally and among the symbolic interpretations there are almost as many views of it as there are commentators. But I ask myself is there not something in the image of Forbidden Fruit of The Tree of Knowledge? Most us are pretty sure that knowledge of good and evil is knowledge that it is possible to have (or at least to seek) and humanists, of all people, should be assiduous in their seeking of it. Recognising that the 'done thing' is not identical with the 'right thing' is fundamental to any defensible view of ethics even though, for most people most of the time, the done thing is very often the same as the right thing.
I was struck very much the other day by a direct quotation from James Watson (of DNA fame) to the effect that knowledge is always preferable to ignorance. This comes down to saying that there is no such thing as knowledge that we would be the better off without. I question this assertion and I wonder whether any readers might care to add to, or subtract from, my brief list of instances of possibly blissful ignorance.
My thesis is that there can be, and indeed is, knowledge of a kind that is almost certain to corrupt human life.
Possible Examples of Corrupting Knowledge include:
ACTUAL ..... is the knowledge of psychology that empowers advertisers, propagandists, preachers and promoters generally to manipulate opinion, to subvert what should properly be informed choice. The appropriate psychological technique can make people feel sure that they want or need, or believe something that, in fact, they do not. Brainwashing techniques based on psychological knowhow are used routinely to indoctrinate vulnerable people.
Fashion is a medium in which such manipulation is rife - as parents of young children soon learn when their offspring feel compelled to emulate the mini-Joneses. Designer clothes are often de rigeur even among primary school pupils and such clothes are often absurdly expensive.
'Spin' - which used to be called sophistry - is a basic tool of the contemporary politician and, informed by rather serious knowledge of psychology, spin is potent indeed.
POTENTIAL ...... the elucidation of the human genome and the possibility of genetic engineering of humans that goes with it are potentially hugely corrupting levers of power. The deliberate breeding of people genetically disposed to obey, and the concomitant breeding of people genetically disposed to enforce obedience, spell disaster for democracy - such as it is- and disaster for the larger human dignity that is needed to underpin it.
Another potential for knowledge that we would best not to have is the knowledge of how to make pain-intensifying drugs - what you might call anti-anaesthetics. Think of the power Big Brother would have if his victims could be drugged in such a way that a very ordinary pain could be magnified a hundredfold - a mere slap being felt as a fearful beating. Think of the torture (leaving no tell-tale marks) that could be used to extract confessions from, say, people vaguely accused of terrorism. Suppose that the only antidote to such a drug would be an injection of an appropriate counter-medicine. The very act of injection would itself be - ex hypothesi - excruciatingly painful.
'Always' and 'never' are useful words in ordinary conversation even though they are over-used to confer deceptive certainty upon matters of genuine uncertainty. In serious philosophical discourse we must be extremely wary of these words. In each case a single counter-example makes 'always' and 'never' simply elements of false assertion.
Knowledge is not always preferable to ignorance. But knowledge is generally worth pursuing because there are many well attested instances of particular bits of knowledge being preferable to ignorance.
Knowledge therefore is only very often (but not "always") preferable to ignorance. Knowledge confers power and, notoriously, "Power corrupts ....". The Genesis story is pretty well off limits for most humanists but Lord Acton's famous dictum seems to me to be ever relevant ...."and absolute power corrupts absolutely".
"Elementary my dear Watson!" ...
Q.10 There are rumours that supermodels could one day have a completely new human cloning career, by selling their cells from their bodies to make human clones. What are your views on this and do you think this may lead to an abuse of human cloning technology?
A.10 Supermodels, dictators and celebrities generally are simply people - the considerations outlined in my introduction apply to them as much as to the rest of us. Genetic composition is not everything. but, undoubtedly what you are envisaging would be an abuse of technology.
Q.11 Human cloning can also be used for therapeutic purposes, however, would you say it is morally acceptable to create a new human being merely as a means to an end - even a life saving one?
A.11 Morally unacceptable!
Q.12 Have you heard about the death of Dolly the sheep? If so, do you think the death of Dolly had something to do with the fact that it was cloned?
A. 12 I know that Dolly has died but it would require a formidably complex set of controlled experiments with cloned sheep and conventionally reproduced sheep to answer a question such as 'did cloning contribute to her death?
Q.13 How do you think it would be possible to control cloning effectively?
A.13 Perhaps by some such means as those used to deal with the problems of artificial human insemination and the like. In a word a 'quango'.
Q.14 Do you think there should be any boundaries on private financial banking? Please explain your answer.
A.14 Boundaries first have to be defined - tentatively - and then we have to consider whether those boundaries are enforceable. I am very sceptical about both these matters. Definition is difficult and enforecement is practically impossible.
Q.15 Human cloning already seems to have made a controversial stir in the UK and USA. Do you believe cloning could be used globally for military purposes?
A.15. So long as people are prepared to make war and, in particular, how the appalling use of child-soldiers goes on, then cloning for military purposes seems to be needless from the militarists' point of view.. We already have ready means of moving people to kill, maim and bereave one another - in the hardline versions of the world's major religions and ideologies and in runaway nationalism. Mass rape as a weapon of war is now standard practice in some conflicts. Who needs cloning to make war any more horrible than it is?
Q.16 Do you think cloning could lead to dictators and or terrorists mass-producing their own culture?
A 16 Cloning takes as many years to produce an adult person as does the traditional homely method of reproduction. Why should dictators - who are generally short-lived in their dictatorial careers - be bothered with cloning when propaganda and 'patriotism' are ready here and now? Nationalism and militant religions and other ideologies give sufficient leverage to those intent upon war of various sorts.
Q.17 What ethical guidelines do you think their should be in order to control the research on human cloning?
A.17 None based on any religious dogma but perhaps some based on sober estimation of likely consequences in particular cases. A pretty weak answer, I admit!
Q.18 There has been many objections and strong beliefs that cloning is intervening with nature, thus playing God. Do you agree or disagree with this belief? Please elaborate on answer.
A.18 Intervening in nature is itself natural to us humans. The questions are .... what interventions, for what purpose and controlled by whom?
I think that the phrase "playing god' is one of the silliest that is in common use. From an atheist standpoint there is no perceived god to 'play' and from a theist standpoint it is possible (and quite common in some circles) to see 'the hand of God' in anything and everything.
To give a crazy example which illustrates the way some people think on matters that are not crazy ..... if I offer you a cup of coffee then the obvious things are that I am being hospitable and you are perhaps being appreciative but it is open to anyone to say, and to believe, that "it is the will of God that K be offered coffee and that E is His chosen instrument". They might easily think that it is the Work of the Devil that I be his instrument in making such an offer. We have had a minister here who once attributed a near accident to his son as the devil's work that had gone wrong - from the devil's point of view,
People, it seems to me, invent gods to lean on and sometimes to complain of or to be puzzled by. Why not see this hypothetical offer of a cup of coffee only as a strictly simple human interaction?
If God can do anything then it follows that anything we decide to do can be construed as 'playing god'. The use of this phrase, therefore, gets us precisely nowhere.
Subsequently I sent a note to my questioner as follow:
Suppose that the relevant procedures are adopted to clone me (ES1). The product (ES2) will be genetically identical with me (by definition) but some eighty years younger than ES1.
He will grow up in world that will be significantly different from that in which I have lived since 1924 and he will be subject to different pressures, different temptations, different opportunities etc etc.
If ES2 is thought of as identical to ES1 then all that has happened to ES1 is quite without significance for ES2. Do we really believe that to be the case?
If we do believe that ..... then the significance of cloning is something that we will over estimate massively.
That is why I think that the question of human cloning - important though it is - is less sensationally important than commentators seem to take it to be.
E.S.