Oddities and the Occult

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Scientific Interests

I was confused where to place this, this document discusses the cloning of human beings. It's odd, yet it's also science. I'll place my research on this topic underneath this category for now.

Curiousity #1

I was doing some exploring because I was bored. I’m an adult with a lot of free time. Not by choice, nobody wants to hire me. I don’t know what I’m doing wrong in these job interviews; half the time, it’s not even my fault - these employers don’t show up to the interviews! I digress; let’s move on to the creepier topic. Cloning. I was trying to come across some unknown documents or files that would scare me.

The rabbit hole I will be diving down will be centered around the document: PREX 1.19:B 52/C 62 and N:\TEMP\CLONING.WPD, which is about cloning.

The goal is to get an understanding of what’s going on and if they’ve gotten successful results.

N:\TEMP\CLONING.WPD

The report starts off as such: In 1997, Harold T. Shapiro wrote a report for the National Bioethics Advisory Commission to present to President Clinton about the ethics and legality of human cloning, especially after Dolly the sheep was created. The Commission zeroed in on cloning through somatic cell nuclear transfer and concluded that it was still pretty uncertain science and posed serious risks to fetuses, which made it morally unacceptable. They suggested keeping the federal moratorium in place, asking private companies to voluntarily comply, and pushing for a federal law to ban cloning for making kids. At the same time, they pointed out the need for a wider national conversation and better public education on the topic, since people have different religious, cultural, and ethical views. Much of the worry comes from misunderstandings about science and deeper moral dilemmas concerning family, faith, and technology. The report also stressed the importance of improving the public's understanding of genetics and cloning so future debates and decisions could be well-informed.

In February 1997, President Bill Clinton reached out to Dr. Harold Shapiro, who was leading the National Bioethics Advisory Commission, about the recent news of sheep cloning. While he acknowledged that this was a pretty amazing scientific breakthrough with potential benefits for medicine and farming, he also raised some serious concerns about the ethical issues it brought up, especially the idea of cloning human embryos. He asked the Commission to take a close look at the legal and ethical questions surrounding this technology and to come up with recommendations in ninety days on how to avoid any misuse.

In 1997, Dolly the sheep made history as the first successful clone created by Ian Wilmut and his team at the Roslin Institute using somatic cell nuclear transfer from an adult animal. This was a huge breakthrough, showing that scientists could reprogram the genetic material from a mature cell to make a living organism. However, the success of cloning sparked a lot of debates about the ethics of cloning humans. President Clinton even put a stop to federal funding for any human cloning research and asked the National Bioethics Advisory Commission (NBAC) to look into it. They realized that cloning humans means creating embryos that could be implanted and born, which raises some serious moral questions on top of the ones already tied to embryo research. Important issues included safety risks for future kids, worries about how cloning could affect individuality and family, and the potential for viewing children as just objects. There were also fears about eugenics and social problems. On the flip side, some people supported values like personal choice in reproduction, privacy, and scientific freedom. The religious views varied—some thought cloning was outright wrong, while others felt it could be okay with strict rules. In the end, the NBAC decided that trying to clone humans was too risky and recommended a halt on any attempts to create children through this method. They stressed the need for more scientific research, ethical discussions, and national conversations before making any final decisions.

The Commission decided that cloning a human child using somatic cell nuclear transfer is unsafe and morally wrong right now, since it would put the fetus and child at serious risk. They recommended keeping the current ban on federal funding and asking private groups to also stop any attempts, while pushing for a temporary federal law against human cloning with a review in a few years. They stressed that this ban should only apply to cloning humans, not useful research like cloning DNA, cells, or animals, which has real scientific value. If the ban ever gets lifted, cloning trials should follow strict rules for safety, review, and consent. They also suggested the U.S. work with other countries to keep policies consistent, encourage open public discussions on the ethics of cloning, and improve public education in genetics so people can understand and join these debates.

In 1997, news of Dolly the sheep sparked big discussions about cloning, but most cloning scientists do isn’t about making whole animals—it’s about copying genes or cells for research, which has already led to medical advances like insulin and hemophilia treatments. Dolly was different because she came from a technique called somatic cell nuclear transfer, where DNA from an adult cell is placed into an egg, creating a genetic twin of the original animal. While this has potential uses in farming, drug production, and even future medical treatments like growing tissues that won’t be rejected, the science is still very rough. Dolly was the only success out of more than 200 tries, and it’s unclear if she was completely healthy. Because of these risks, especially the chance of serious defects, the report makes it clear there’s no good reason to try cloning a human right now.

That's basically the summary of the first fourteen pages.

Figure 1.

In the 1980s, scientists developed a more advanced cloning method called nuclear transplantation cloning. Instead of using both egg and sperm like in normal reproduction, they take the nucleus out of an egg and replace it with the full set of DNA from a regular body cell (a somatic cell), meaning the clone has just one genetic “parent.” Early experiments only worked when the donor DNA came from very young embryos, since as embryos grow, their cells lose the ability to develop into a whole new animal. In theory this method could create lots of identical animals, but in practice it’s limited by how quickly those early embryo cells lose their flexibility.

Figure 2.

What made Dolly’s creation so groundbreaking was that scientists used DNA from a fully developed adult sheep cell, not just from an early embryo. This proved that even specialized cells, like muscle or bone cells, can actually be “reprogrammed” back to an earlier state and grow into a whole new animal. Before Dolly, most biologists didn’t think this was possible, so her birth showed that cell specialization isn’t permanent after all.

Curiosity #1 Quenched

I know this document goes deeper than that, but I'm not the type of person to read 125 pages about the cloning of a sheep, as interesting as it is. I think I get the idea.

Artistic Journey

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