Cloning: Nature or Nurture

[Swan]

Nothing to do with any article just a subject I've been thinking about. Lets get rid of the fact that cloning humans hasn't happened and may never happen. Imagine that it is possible.

Do you believe that it would be possible to recreate someone exactly? Considering the fact that the new person would have to be risen from birth.


I believe that you couldn't recreate someone on account that alot of who somebody is is what has happened to them throughout the years. What has molded them into the person they are today.


What are your thoughts?

[Typhoid]

In theory, you can make a clone, yes. But they wont grow up the same, obviously not, because both subjects would have undergone different experiences. But just because the clone went through different mental experiences and challanges as the original person, that doesn't make him/her less of a clone.

[Swan]

In theory, you can make a clone, yes. But they wont grow up the same, obviously not, because both subjects would have undergone different experiences. But just because the clone went through different mental experiences and challanges as the original person, that doesn't make him/her less of a clone.
But when you think about it though, wouldn't that stop them from being a clone? If they have a different personality, then they are essentially a different person, aside from looks.

[Typhoid]

But when you think about it though, wouldn't that stop them from being a clone? If they have a different personality, then they are essentially a different person, aside from looks.


Clone refers to DNA structure (I believe) and the way you are raised doesnt change your DNA unless you live in Chernobyl.

[Swan]

Clone refers to DNA structure (I believe) and the way you are raised doesnt change your DNA unless you live in Chernobyl.
True, but not everybody is going to check DNA structure. To the average person they will just think it is a doppleganger.

[Fox 6]

Its not just looks that makes a clone, its the exact same genetic make up. So whatever natural process the original goes through the clone will develop that too, ie : cancer, baldness, near sighted.

[Typhoid]

True, but not everybody is going to check DNA structure. To the average person they will just think it is a doppleganger.


That doesnt matter.


The fact is, the person would still be a clone.


One could be the pope, one could be the anti-christ, but one could still be a close of the other.

[Dylflon]

Clone refers to DNA structure (I believe) and the way you are raised doesnt change your DNA unless you live in Chernobyl.

+ imaginary rep



BTW, I agree with Typhoid.

A clone is an exact duplicate of someone's genetic structure.

Experience and personality have nothing to do with this.

[Typhoid]

+ Life rep from Dylan himself?



I feel so honoured.


Hey, hey Dylan.


Me, You, Starbucks man, one day next week.

[Professor S]

I recommend that everyone who is interested sees these two movies:

Bladerunner and Boys from Brazil

[Xantar]

Bladerunner is a great movie, but isn't it actually about robots rather than clones? Now I understand that they were produced by some biological process supposedly and had DNA and everything, but I thought the central question of the movie was about the nature of humanity and life. If it was made by human hands, is it alive? The story it was based on was called Do Robots Dream of Electric Sheep?

Anyway, exactly recreating someone isn't going to be possible unless the laws of physics are wrong. It is well known that identical twins separated at birth, who are literally natural clones of each other, will turn out with different personalities. They don't even turn out the same when they are living in the same household, and that's because they don't have the exact same conversations with the same people or the exact same injuries at the exact same times or see the exact same events...and all that stuff is uncontrollable by humans.

Well ok, maybe they'd both turn out the same if you put them both in a blank cell and fed them the same stimuli through a TV or something. But aside from the ethical problems with that, you'd also end up with two very boring clones.

[GameMaster]

Hmm... I think in the future, memories and other treasures in the brain will be able to be transferred to other brains. In the future we will be able to make perfect clones. Personality, memories, and all!

[The Germanator]

Anyway, exactly recreating someone isn't going to be possible unless the laws of physics are wrong. It is well known that identical twins separated at birth, who are literally natural clones of each other, will turn out with different personalities. They don't even turn out the same when they are living in the same household, and that's because they don't have the exact same conversations with the same people or the exact same injuries at the exact same times or see the exact same events...and all that stuff is uncontrollable by humans.

Well ok, maybe they'd both turn out the same if you put them both in a blank cell and fed them the same stimuli through a TV or something. But aside from the ethical problems with that, you'd also end up with two very boring clones.

I've heard some interesting stories though about identical twins separated at birth that both end up having identical jobs and similar lifestyles decades down the line. Of course this isn't the same as having the "same" life exactly, but it's something to think about.

[Professor S]

Bladerunner is a great movie, but isn't it actually about robots rather than clones? Now I understand that they were produced by some biological process supposedly and had DNA and everything, but I thought the central question of the movie was about the nature of humanity and life. If it was made by human hands, is it alive? The story it was based on was called Do Robots Dream of Electric Sheep?


I think it was Andriods not Robots , but that doesn't really matter, and in my mind the same themes are evident in the cloning debate. If we engineer as human from existing DNA, does that nake them less human? What are his rights? What if we are actually able to create a human from scratch? What will their rights be? What will he be? If we make changes in their intelligence and appearance, can we use them as slaves or track them in their careers and place ceiling based on their gene manipulation?

Beyond Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? by Philip K. Dick I also recommend Brave New World by Aldous Huxley, and it was actually made into a half-decent movie a few years ago.

Boys from Brazil is a great yarn about Nazi's in 1970's Brazil who clone hundreds of little Hitlers and then attempt to control their development from afar to create a new Adolph in both nature and nurture. It stars Lawrence Oivier as an old Nazi hunter and Gregory Peck in a frightening portrayal of Dr, Joseph Mengele.

[Dylflon]

Ooh. I'm quite interested in seeing Boys From Brazil now.

[Bube]

Its not just looks that makes a clone, its the exact same genetic make up. So whatever natural process the original goes through the clone will develop that too, ie : cancer, baldness, near sighted.
I don't agree with that. Yes, those are in the genes, but it depends on what you do that gets them activated. You could have a potential of cancer, but it won't happen on it's own.

[Fox 6]

Bladerunner is a good movie.

[Professor S]

Ooh. I'm quite interested in seeing Boys From Brazil now.

Its a really good movie, and the ending is absolutely chilling. Gregory Peck's performances in this and Moby Dick have convinced me that he's one of the most underrated actors of all time.

[Acebot44]

Its a really good movie, and the ending is absolutely chilling. Gregory Peck's performances in this and Moby Dick have convinced me that he's one of the most underrated actors of all time.


Yeah, and thats not even including "To Kill A Mockingbird"

[Neo]

Some of the similarities between separated twins are shocking. I heard about this two guys that each imported the same brand of toothpaste from Sweden.

But suppose a "super scientist" had a map of your brain and knew the locations of all your neurons and the presence and degree of all electrochemical memory encodings. Suppose he then reproduced you exactly. Your clone would, for all intents and purposes, be you. If the two of you were placed in a dark room and spun around when they open the door there would be no way to tell which one is the original you. Neither would you, for that matter. Since you both have the same memories and experiences you would both think you were the original.

How would you like to be told that you are a clone and must find your own way in life while the original goes back to his family... your family?

And what about spiritual considerations? If you have a soul then would it not get confused as to which body to inhabit/link up with? It wouldn't make a difference if the two of you are exact copies. But if only one of you gets a soul, what does the other one get? Nothing? Would you act any differently without a soul? Science would say no. You still have the same moral control center of the brain that your doppleganger has. Even your sense of a higher presence if dependent on the degree of development of a certain portion of your brain. The more developed that part of a person's brain is the more likely they are to be religious or to have a sense of something greater than themselves. Interesting, isn't it - that our sense of spirituality may be hard-wired. Must provide a survival advantage.

True it would be practically impossible to create a perfect copy of yourself, but is it really physically impossible? Yes quantum mechanics tells us we cannot know both the location and velocity of a particle at the same time but I would think these effects would be negligible on a macro scale. You yourself are a combination of constantly changing materials anyway.

Quantum teleportation is a real area of research which involves transporting the state of a particle from place to another. I'm not convinced it could work on a larger scale, but if it did then we would have an easy way of reproducing anything exactly.

[jeepnut]

Personally, I don't see how it benefits us to be able to clone people aside from the ability to say "Hey, look what we can do." It brings up more problems ethically and politically than it is worth. I personally think we should just drop the whole thing.