[Flipside]

Personally, I would support a temporary cessation on attempts to create a whole, sentient human being.

Not for religious reasons, but for the simple fact that there are still aspect of what happens as the Clone ages that we still don't quite grasp. I think until we have more idea of what we are doing, it would be unfair in the extreme to create a human being who may be cursed to a short or painful life as a laboratory rat.
I also think we need to look a lot further into the Human rights and other implications of Full Human Cloning, if for no other reason to make sure there is nothing like the confusions there have been over Gay rights etc.

[Rictor]

And the another reason to oppose full human cloning is that there is already too many of us as it is. If we need more people, the process isn't very hard and is in fact quite fun. So there's no real need for clones.

[.::Tin Can::.]

I hear that Rictor. I hear that....

[vyper]

You two want some privacy?

[q]a ban on reproductive cloning should be a given and should be pursued as soon as possible?[/q]

Again, wording is important here. If you say, cloning an embryo before implantation to make sure a woman undergoing IVF can have another crack at it if the current one fails - I'd allow that. If you're talking about cloning a human being sheerly for the sake of having another human being like that other one (i.e. on a whim) then no, that isn't very ethical (but again, this is only something the state should meddle with to a degree. The biggest scientific breakthroughs in history have been painful)

[Mongoose]

Well, seeing as how I don't approve of cloning under any circumstances, that question is really meaningless to me.

[Shrike]

My take on the whole matter of genetic engineering is catgirls will make the human female obselete.  

[aldo_14]

Originally posted by Rictor
Hmm, lets see.

Cloning bits of flesh, which can not be called human in any way, to help people with serious dieseses. Yeah, thats terrible.

Even if they are embryos, and you really want to call them human, then they are humans that are not self-aware, while those who will be helped are self-aware.

IIRC one of the primary reasons this ban was chucked was that it was too broad - the UN members would almost certainly accept a ban on the cloning of adult humans (i.e. the 'cloned Hitler' type scenario), but not on cloning used for medical benefit.

Imagine this (as a far-future case); in a few decades time, what if you could clone organs for transplant?  Imagine how many lives that would save......

[vyper]

[q]Well, seeing as how I don't approve of cloning under any circumstances, that question is really meaningless to me.[/q]

Let me give you diabetes or give a relative a neurological disease and then tell me that...

[Knight Templar]

Originally posted by Ace
If I was the Catholic church, it'd have made the phrasing for their proposal a little more specific so it can't be warped by people:

New sentient beings will not be created through cloning.

Because cloning a few human cells for a liver transplant could be construed as "human life." But the above statement makes a nice blanket statement to ban creating new humans via clones and monkeying around with trying to make whole new humanoid species.

Amen.

[Mongoose]

Ace, to the Church, there's no difference between that embryo and an adult human being.  Both are equally and irrevocably human.

Rictor, whether self-aware or not, both forms of life are human, and thus the Church's writings are the way they are.  There's no warping going on:  the Church does not agree with cloning under any circumstances.

Vyper, I would not take an innocent human life to save my own.  Nor would I pursue an unrestrained field of study, as too many scientists seem all to eager to do nowadays.  If I did have diabetes, I would live with it, as millions of people do every day.  If a relative had a neurological disorder, I would pray for them and do whatever I could to support them, but I would still not resort to killing embryos.

[Flipside]

Actually Mongoose, theres no real difference between a Human liver and a Pigs liver, that is why pig liver is used to test liver treatments, science actually does avoid using humans where possible

So to say something is 'human' life when it's simply an advancement on the life posessed by, for example, celery (which shares 40% of our DNA) is murky water

[Taristin]

Hahaha... Celery is our genetic ancestor! It's the missing link!

[aldo_14]

The laws of the Church should not have any baring on the laws of humanity.  After all, if we followed that principle, even blood transfusions would be outlawed (objected to by Jehovas Witnesses IIRC).  As would eating pork.

If you feel that you object that much to stem cell research, etc, then simply refuse to accept any treatment developed from said research.  That way your slate will be clean.

[Bobboau]

OK

I want once and for all someone to explain to me how a single cell is a full human life.

[aldo_14]

Originally posted by Bobboau
OK

I want once and for all someone to explain to me how a single cell is a full human life.

Because God said so in the Bible.

Well, sort of.  I mean, he might have said it.  But they didn't know what a cell was back then, so he didn't actually mention it.  But if they had knew then, he probably would have said it was.  

Well, maybe not God himself, but that bloke who read a book by a bloke who knew a bloke who was 'big-up with Jesus', said that had he thought of it, he'd probably say it.  He thought.

[Rictor]

Mongoose: yeah, but we can't let religion run our lives, especially those of us who are not Catholic or religious at all.  What the Church says is, with all due respect, meaningless in this situation.

[Taristin]

Mongoose, why is Human life more sacred than any other creature's life? Didn't your God create all of them, too?

[vyper]

[q]If I did have diabetes, I would live with it, as millions of people do every day.[/q]

Don't try and lecture me on what people do with it every ****ing day - I am one of those people and believe me it's a lot more complicated than saying - "Oh it's treatable, live with it".  

Your religious ideology could very well shorten my lifespan, destroy my standard of living once I get past middle age and very probably result in my children developing it (or not, no one is quite sure on that one.... maybe a little research could answer that one eh?).

You are what's wrong with humanity. You and all the people like you that see something new and different and react with overpowering fear. Who are so afraid of a proverbial little bloody nose once in a while that they cower under their bible, or Koran, et al.

If you saw a child dying in the street from hunger you'd want to feed that child and the church you follow probably _does_. If you saw a child dying in a hospital bed from a genetic disorder of some sort, you'd want to save them  - but you would be willing to let the child suffer for some arrogant sociopathic self-worthlessness that requires you to be told how to do everything by a book so badly translated several times that it's probably like a comic book compared to the original manuscripts.

Don't talk to me about "living with it". Don't stand there and tell me your God wants people to suffer, just because you can't see past your own crucifix.

[Bobboau]

yes, well we're God's 'specal' creature

[Annihilation]

I don't understand how the churches came to think about cells without a nervous system being human. Well, technically they are human, but they are just a bunch of few cells at this stage. You can't say that a fragment of a liver of a person is another person even knowing that with enough scientific development (think some centuries ahead) that still living fragment can be turned into another fully person, a clone. When an embryo are developed enough to feel pain and another stimuli that's all right, it is a person.

If these old beliefs that aren't even in the bible (there is nothing there about embryos and clones) were laws we won't even know about the existence of cells because it was prohibited to make researches on humans and corpses.