happythoughts 0 #1 February 9, 2005 clicky From an ethical standpoint, this is weird anyway. From the view of impact on society, it could get very weird. Same sex couples having kids by creating an egg/sperm from the other partner. Instead of finding a sperm donor, lesbian couples could use the other woman to create sperm from her skin cells. A same sex couple where the genetic makeup of both partners is used. (Works for male couples also, only backwards.) QuoteImagine your street 20 years from now. Your kids may have grown up and left home, but who might be living next to you? It could be a young lesbian couple and their biological daughter - created when an egg of one of the women was fertilised with the synthetic sperm made from the skin cells of the other This is what flips me out. QuoteStem cells taken from such embryos are genetically identical to the individual who supplied the skin cell. So, technically and theoretically, it should be feasible to create synthetic eggs, using the Schoeler method, by taking the skin cells of a man and manipulating them with the Dolly technique. All that is needed is a source of eggs from a female donor, which would have their own chromosomes removed. By inserting the nucleus of a man's skin cell into the empty egg and stimulating the cloned embryo to produce germline stem cells, it would allow that man to become the genetic or biological "mother" of his child - which would, of course, still have to be born to a surrogate mother. Technically, this is not reproductive cloning and so would not be banned under the present law. A man could be both the father and mother of a child. Isaac Asimov discussed this in one of his space fiction novels. The impact on society if mating could be done without different sexes. The planet was populated with hermaphrodites who mostly contacted each other through electronic means (video phones). Do you think that rich people will just clone themselves? For quite a while, technology has gone past the ability of people to deal with it. Here it goes again. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
mr2mk1g 10 #2 February 9, 2005 Quote Technically, this is not reproductive cloning and so would not be banned under the present law. Hmm... this got me thinking... to me, what they describe in the article was the Dolly technique which was what I thought sparked the legislation against cloning... so it seemed odd that act wouldn't cover the situation. So I went and looked it up. Quote HUMAN REPRODUCTIVE CLONING ACT 2001 1 The offence (1) A person who places in a woman a human embryo which has been created otherwise than by fertilisation is guilty of an offence. That's pretty much all the legislation says. I guess then the argument would be that the "Dolly" embryo has indeed been fertilised in the natural way (albeit probably in vetro - but that's legal anyway because of fertility treatment legislation). Sperm was introduced to egg and normal fertilisation occurred. The fact that the egg itself was created in a non-natural way doesn't matter, as this legislation only covers the creation of the embryo itself, not the precurser building blocks. As such I can see the argument that this legislation would miss it. Sounds like a pretty big drafting boo boo to me. I suspect a swift amendment would follow any attempts to slip through this loophole. Robert Winston is pretty hot on this subject and sits in the Lords... I suspect he'd be able to alert Parliament to the problem before the papers even got hold of it. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
WrongWay 0 #3 February 9, 2005 I think it's great for same sex couples wanting a child. Still, the idea of making an exact replica of somebody....dude that's freaky. Wrong Way D #27371 Mal Manera Rodriguez Cajun Chicken Ø Hellfish #451 The wiser wolf prevails. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Ron 10 #4 February 9, 2005 QuoteI think it's great for same sex couples wanting a child. Why when there are so many kids that need to be adopted?"No free man shall ever be debarred the use of arms." -- Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Jefferson Papers, 334 Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
WrongWay 0 #5 February 9, 2005 QuoteQuoteI think it's great for same sex couples wanting a child. Why when there are so many kids that need to be adopted? Very good point. Still I see the desire for those couples to want "their own" child, so people can say "she has your eyes" and all that good stuff. I'm all for adoption, but I can also see why some couple would want this option. Wrong Way D #27371 Mal Manera Rodriguez Cajun Chicken Ø Hellfish #451 The wiser wolf prevails. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
billvon 3,120 #6 February 9, 2005 >A man could be both the father and mother of a child. That would be a clone, although if he used a donor egg it would not be a true clone as the fetus would still have the donor's mitochondrial DNA. >Still, the idea of making an exact replica of somebody....dude that's freaky. We have them now; they're called identical twins. Cloning would just separate them in time. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
