Americans today tend to believe that cloning would become a big part of our society in the future, but in the discussion of cloning, there have been many controversies, for instance, the cloning of livestock for food and the business of cloning pets. While there might be some beneficial issue for cloning such as the medical research and medical advances, people tend to take advantage of everything that might bring money. Scientific research in the field of cloning should be used for the benefit of humanity and shouldn’t be conducted for the profit.
Since the first cloning success story of Dolly the Sheep, many people thought that cloning could now be used to their advantage. In the articles “Here Kitty-Kitty-Kitty-Kitty” by Carolyn Said, Lou Hawthorne said that “we would have to be dumb not to see a business there” He suggests to turn cloning into a for profit venture that would benefit his company. By focusing on the business of cloning Hawthorne overlook the deeper problem that cloning might bring in the long run. It’s could have a negative effect on how we view life and values. In the article “Here Kitty-Kitty-Kitty-Kitty”, Jeremy Rifkin said that “cloning undermines the sacred and the intrinsic value of what a unique life is all about in the world.” This will affect the individualism of humankind, people will have different views on life and death because once a pet dies and we decide to clone it will become easy to accept the “clone pet” as the original pet even though both pets are identical they are both different individual beings.
If the mass production of cloning livestock becomes a reality, as a human society we will become too dependent on factory made food, which means less organic food choices and becoming dependent on the cloning corporations. Several businesses support the idea of creating a cloning marketing because it will mean more money for them. In the articles of “Science: The Clone Factory” by Charles Clover and Clive Cookson stated that Chinese biotech Companies “aspire to be world leaders in some of the most advanced and controversial biotech” because they would like to be the top company to use biotech technology. The scientific communities of other countries have concerns because they see cloning as a lower standard of ethic. Many groups oppose the idea because they consider it to be inhuman and ethically wrong. They believe that cloning is a way for humans to play God and they will not support the cloning of meat because of ethical issues.
While the cloning business isn’t well accept they are plenty of eager consumers who are willing to spend thousands of dollars to clone their beloved pet for no other reasons than their own selfish wishes and wants. The company Genetic Saving & Clone promise to clone five cats for $50,000, which Hawthorne reported “that a quarter of the 60 million pet-owning households would consider cloning their furry friends”. This shows that there are many willing participants that are willing to follow the Genetic Saving & Clone Company to clone their pets, because they see it as a way to reunite with the past pets. However, according to David Magnus they’re not “getting a pet exactly like the one they had before” because “it’s simply not possible”. Magnus findings are extremely useful because they shed insight that even though you can spend thousands of dollars on getting your pet clone, it will not be the original pet you were expecting.
hThere are other reasons that cloning might be beneficial for society, if it’s properly done. Potential benefit includes replaceable organs, medical advances and future medical research, which can help those in need and by creating a cloning system that is useful for society it can benefit of the future. In the article “FDA Says Food from Cloned Animals Is Safe” Andrew Martin and Andrew Pollack stated that “Interest from the food industry has been tepid, with some companies declaring that they will not sell milk or meat from cloned animals or their offspring”. Consumer groups would be resistance on buying clone meat because they are uncomfortable with the idea of clone meat. The consumer acceptance is really low at the time which means that a cloning corporation will have a hard time getting clients to buy their items. So cloning should be left to scientific studies for advance in cloning research because that way it could have the potential to benefit large numbers of people.
Cloning has opened a number of doors to many remarkable innovations, but it will come with the dilemmas of whether or not cloning should become a capitalist industry for future success. We need to improve the scientific research in the field of cloning where it is used for the benefit of humanity and not be taken advantage of for the marketing profit.