To clone or not to clone.
Read the text and choose the correct answer.
The issue of cloning is extremely controversial — different communities have different opinions on its moral acceptability and refuse to compromise. Like any other technological breakthrough cloning can be both beneficial and dangerous for people, which makes the necessity of further research into cloning quite uncertain.
In simple words, cloning means creating an identical copy of an organ, animal and even a human being. Scientists have already experimented with growing organs and animals — sheep Dolly caused a real sensation! — but human cloning is seen as a great risk and further research is being deliberately blocked. There are certainly very important reasons that make people passionately object to boosting cloning technologies. They are very anxious about legal and ethical aspects of cloning and believe that before investing into any further research and approving of it, society should think very carefully.
Their first concern is the legal status of a human clone. Is he or she going to enjoy equal rights or is it going to be a bio-robot, just in case the original body needs some spare parts to replace the damaged or amputated ones? They also worry that someone may want to create an army of clones for military purposes or an army of slave workers. They also think that cloning can be dangerous genetically as we never know its potential effect on the human gene. It can make a negative impact on society as clones will face lots of the social challenges: they won’t have parents, they may be treated as second class people. This is not a complete list of issues anti-clonists want to drive people’s attention to and their arguments certainly give them solid ground to say that human cloning should not take place till all the controversies are fixed.
On the other hand, supporters of cloning have their points too. They say that technological progress cannot be stopped and insist that cloning is not necessarily about cloning people. Cloning cells — that’s what is going to be very beneficial. The recent researches proved that stem cells are very promising as they can generate in any type of cells to build a liver, lungs, a heart and any other organ. Scientists hope that one day therapeutic cloning can be used to generate tissues and organs for transplants. Transplants needed for operations can be created in laboratories, not taken from donors. To do this, DNA would be extracted from the patient and inserted into an egg, from which the nuclear with the genetic information has been removed. Then the cell would be used to generate any organ or tissue that genetically matches the recipient and cannot be rejected by the body. Diseases like cancer, Alzheimer’s or heart diseases will be defeated. Alternatively, scientists can clone damaged cells and use them as models of the disease for testing new drugs. The technology could save thousands and millions of lives.
Growing transplants is an ethically better solution than using donors’ organs, however, another problem is arising here. Organs can be grown from the stem cells. When the egg with the inserted DNA divides, it creates an embryo. To get the stem cells, the embryo has to be destroyed. Is it morally
acceptable or not?
Now one can see why moral views on cloning are hopelessly divided. But to ban cloning and refuse to discuss the matter is not an option. Probably ethic committees and committees of experts should examine each research proposal individually. Ultimately our experience will help us indicate the way forward.
1.The author thinks that research into cloning
a)is very important.
b)has very good prospects.
c)is rather problematic.
2.According to the text, most people
a)are in two minds about cloning people.
b)find cloning people very beneficial.
c)don’t want to think about cloning people.
3.People who are against cloning
a)are afraid of bio-robots.
b)want everyone to be aware of possible consequences.
c)don’t want clones to have the same rights as genuine people.
4 Supporters of cloning want to focus research on
a)cloning people.
b)cloning animals.
c)cloning cells.
5 The author states that
a)any organ for transplantation can be grown from a stem cell.
b)to grow a heart, scientists need a heart cell.
c)in laboratories cells can be kept for years.
5 The author believes that growing organs from cells
a)is technically quite possible.
b)is a matter of very distant future.
c)is not a realistic aim.
6 The author insists that growing organs from stem cells
a)doesn’t create any ethical problems.
b)still raises some ethical problems.
c)should be discussed in a referendum.