Sobre a clonagem

Uma discussão interessante no blogue Marginal Revolution sobre o desejo do economista Bryan Caplan (mais famoso pela sua crítica à escola económica austríaca) de ser clonado ("Yes, I wish to clone myself and raise the baby as my son.  Seriously.  I want to experience the sublime bond I'm sure we'd share.  I'm confident that he'd be delighted, too, because I would love to be raised by me")

Alguns comentários dos leitores:

 - Interesting that thus far, the two "arguments" against Bryan's position--"icky" and "kids should come from mom and dad"--are reminiscent of the arguments against gay marriage. Probably just a coincidence...

- Generally speaking, people who would like to clone themselves tend to be arrogant and lacking in common sense. Their children will tend to also be arrogant and lacking in common sense. The interpersonal dynamics between cloner and clonee would likely be disastrous.

- Would it be possible to clone yourself as a member of the opposite sex? This would only work for men, of course. You could substitute your Y chromosome for a copy of your X chromosome. Would sex with this female-you be illegal? Major ickyness ensues.

-  I think it'd be downright creepy after 20 years to see the 20-year-old near-version of your mate and life partner - consider all of the bizarre sexual feelings that would emerge. Good luck keeping your eyes off of your 22-year-old "daughter", who happens to be genetically identical and looks almost identical to your wife did when you met her. [a propósito da possibilidade de num casal tanto o marido como a mulher se clonarem]

- This cloning shtick sounds like a way for a guy to stick his wife with raising some illegitimate kid he fathered with a stripper -- assuming the wife is particularly dim-witted.

- Bryan is really a strange person. I hope he doesn't traumatize his other kids with this cloning story.


-  Bryan has a clone. Someone with Bryan's DNA kills someone. There is no other physical evidence. Neither has an alibi. The jury can't convict because there's only a 50% chance that the person charged did the crime, and that's not proof beyond a reasonable doubt. (Secretly the lab prepared another Bryan and trained him to be an assassin, you see.)

 A minha opinião sobre a clonagem humana - a minha objecção não é tanto à clonagem de humanos em sim, mas ao que seria necessário fazer para atingir: até ser possível desenvolver um processo de clonagem humana que funcionasse, seria necessário fazer experiências e ir gradualmente corrigindo as falhas do processo. Ora, isso significaria fazer experiências com seres (mais ou menos) humanos, a maioria dos quais iriam ser uma espécie de aberrações genéticas.