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Dave W.
Info Junkie
USA
26021 Posts |
 Posted - 11/14/2007 : 11:01:38 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by chaloobi
I've always approached this from the POV that I am my brain. If you take my personality and memories and put them into a fresh brain then let the old one die, then I'm dead and there's a copy of me walking around that thinks it's actually me with a new lease on life. But it's not. Same goes with uploading into a computer. It's not you, just a clever technological copy that thinks it's you.
I imagine a far future with nanobots, or something similar, that go into your brain and clean up all the aluminum plaque or whatever, and repair and replace the aging and dying cells and blood vessels. They refurbish, rebuild, replace, and even enhance your brain, little by little, right in your very own skull, even while you use it. I wonder, when its all set and done, is the result really you?
If you effectively replace your brain bit by tiny bit over a period of time, the only functional difference between that and transfering memory and structure to a new brain is continuity. In the bit by bit there's no sudden off here and on there. It's smooth and unnoticable.
I wonder, is this smooth change any different than life? Is the brain of a 5 year old the same brain of the adult 30 years later? Clearly not and in more ways than one. So is the 5 yr old and the the 35 year old the same "you"? And right now, what can properly be said about the disposition of the "you" of 30 years ago? What is "you" anyway? |
There are some classic examples.
In one, someone has developed a teleporter. It scans your body at the atomic level, destroying it in the process, and sends the data to a receiver which rebuilds you, atom by atom. Is the rebuilt copy "you," or just a copy of you and you have died? Now, what if the transmitter breaks in such a way that the original you isn't destroyed. Which one of you is you?
In the other, hypothesize that the technology exists to build fully functional electronic/robotic versions of neurons at a 1-to-1 scale. Say that your nanobots enter your brain and over the course of a year replace all your biological neurons with electronic neurons, such that your conciousness never notices a difference. If you are your brain, then at what point during the year did you stop being you?| Yes, they would be horrified. That's unnatural. It's a perversion of nature, an abomination. |
Same goes for cooking.| If we withdraw our aid or we go extinct, they have no hope of going on alone. Are they even an organism anymore? |
Was Terry Schiavo? Does any person in a coma stop being an organism simply because without help, they'll die? There are plenty of intensely specialized parasites or symbionts in the world already. If their hosts all die, so do they. Does that strip them of being independent organisms? If all plant and animal life on Earth - other than humans - were suddenly vaporized, we'd be hard-pressed to live off bacteria. Are we not organisms because we're dependent on higher life forms for our continued existence? |
- Dave W. (Private Msg, EMail)
Evidently, I rock!
Why not question something for a change?
Visit Dave's Psoriasis Info, too. |
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chaloobi
SFN Regular
1620 Posts |
Posted - 11/14/2007 : 11:28:22 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by Dave W.
Originally posted by chaloobi
I've always approached this from the POV that I am my brain. If you take my personality and memories and put them into a fresh brain then let the old one die, then I'm dead and there's a copy of me walking around that thinks it's actually me with a new lease on life. But it's not. Same goes with uploading into a computer. It's not you, just a clever technological copy that thinks it's you.
I imagine a far future with nanobots, or something similar, that go into your brain and clean up all the aluminum plaque or whatever, and repair and replace the aging and dying cells and blood vessels. They refurbish, rebuild, replace, and even enhance your brain, little by little, right in your very own skull, even while you use it. I wonder, when its all set and done, is the result really you?
If you effectively replace your brain bit by tiny bit over a period of time, the only functional difference between that and transfering memory and structure to a new brain is continuity. In the bit by bit there's no sudden off here and on there. It's smooth and unnoticable.
I wonder, is this smooth change any different than life? Is the brain of a 5 year old the same brain of the adult 30 years later? Clearly not and in more ways than one. So is the 5 yr old and the the 35 year old the same "you"? And right now, what can properly be said about the disposition of the "you" of 30 years ago? What is "you" anyway? |
There are some classic examples.
In one, someone has developed a teleporter. It scans your body at the atomic level, destroying it in the process, and sends the data to a receiver which rebuilds you, atom by atom. Is the rebuilt copy "you," or just a copy of you and you have died? Now, what if the transmitter breaks in such a way that the original you isn't destroyed. Which one of you is you?
In the other, hypothesize that the technology exists to build fully functional electronic/robotic versions of neurons at a 1-to-1 scale. Say that your nanobots enter your brain and over the course of a year replace all your biological neurons with electronic neurons, such that your conciousness never notices a difference. If you are your brain, then at what point during the year did you stop being you?| Yes, they would be horrified. That's unnatural. It's a perversion of nature, an abomination. |
Same goes for cooking.| If we withdraw our aid or we go extinct, they have no hope of going on alone. Are they even an organism anymore? |
Was Terry Schiavo? Does any person in a coma stop being an organism simply because without help, they'll die? There are plenty of intensely specialized parasites or symbionts in the world already. If their hosts all die, so do they. Does that strip them of being independent organisms? If all plant and animal life on Earth - other than humans - were suddenly vaporized, we'd be hard-pressed to live off bacteria. Are we not organisms because we're dependent on higher life forms for our continued existence?
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A couple of thoughts . . . .
This whole question of when you stop being you is rooted, perhaps, in the idea of a soul or mind-body duality most of us are schooled in from birth. If a soul doesn't exist, then there's no difference between you and an exact copy of you. At the instant the copy is made, an entity that was you diverges and becomes two increasingly distinct individuals. If the original dies at the instant the copy is made, then the copy goes on as a distinct invididual with the same formative past that the original had. No big deal.
Regarding Terry Shaivo, and other coma people, that's not an accurate analogy. I'm imagining animals that are genetically engineered to be brainless or headless; that are that way by their new nature, which we created. Terry S. was a victim of injury - she was not born that way.
Regarding parasitism - good point. If I die, so goes my tape worm. If all humanity, and any other hostes to the tape worm, goes extinct, so goes the tape worm. Ditto for your headless cows.
Regarding cooking, that's only really true in the case of my mother-in-law and those of like skill. |
-Chaloobi
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HalfMooner
Dingaling
Philippines
15831 Posts |
Posted - 11/14/2007 : 11:28:35 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by bngbuck
HalfMooner.....
You said:It clearly could be handy, and even a life-saver, for each of us to own a clone of ourselves for possible spare parts as needed. These could probably be raised most efficiently on stock farms. No parental nurturing, language skills or education required, just common innoculations, veterinary care, and feedings of monkey chow.
But, IMO, it would be wrong. This would be a kind of human cloning I would oppose. I haven't seen such a thing proposed seriously by anyone. |
First, let me say that I agree with you 100%. However,I am curious as to why, in your opinion, it would be wrong? In fact, I am curious as to why I think it would be wrong! Your views would be useful.
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I'll give a few of my reasons. Much of this is repulsion on a visceral level.
In my extreme example, we'd be raising completely intact human beings as livestock, ignoring their intellectual needs and only caring for them as sources of valuable, transplantable meat. That strikes me as wrong on its face, as well as being human rights abuse under our laws, as murder and slavery.
Second, we'd cheapen the value of human life by growing comfortable with the abuse of complete, thinking, human beings. I cannot but think that this would influence people in the "free-range" category to hold all human life more cheaply, and to care less about their neighbors.
It would turn every living human who had a back-up clone into a criminal, just as Black slavery turned millions of Americans into criminals. And I mean criminality as a personality trait like sociopathy, not as a legal condition.
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“Biology is just physics that has begun to smell bad.” —HalfMooner
Here's a link to Moonscape News, and one to its Archive. |
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Dude
SFN Die Hard
USA
6891 Posts |
Posted - 11/14/2007 : 15:39:28 [Permalink]
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chaloobi said:
| In the text you quoted, I was referring to the genetically engineered headless calf for veal production mentioned by Dave or the scenario of a vat-grown haunch of meat. If these things became our primary meat source, the animal species they originated from would no longer benefit from any kind of 'partnership' with humanity, since the portions of them we would be cultivating are not independantly viable organisms. |
No, I understood you. (I think) I'm just saying that if we stopped farming pigs, cows, and chickens today that their species would do just fine without us helping them.
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Ignorance is preferable to error; and he is less remote from the truth who believes nothing, than he who believes what is wrong.
-- Thomas Jefferson
"god :: the last refuge of a man with no answers and no argument." - G. Carlin
Hope, n.
The handmaiden of desperation; the opiate of despair; the illegible signpost on the road to perdition. ~~ da filth |
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chaloobi
SFN Regular
1620 Posts |
Posted - 11/14/2007 : 18:55:32 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by Dude
chaloobi said:
| In the text you quoted, I was referring to the genetically engineered headless calf for veal production mentioned by Dave or the scenario of a vat-grown haunch of meat. If these things became our primary meat source, the animal species they originated from would no longer benefit from any kind of 'partnership' with humanity, since the portions of them we would be cultivating are not independantly viable organisms. |
No, I understood you. (I think) I'm just saying that if we stopped farming pigs, cows, and chickens today that their species would do just fine without us helping them.
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Yeah, I agree they'd probably survive, but their overall population numbers would crash. There's billions of chickens alive at any give time in the factory farm system. They wouldn't sustain those numbers on their own I don't think. Whether that matters or not depends on how you measure success, evolutionarily. If it's genetic diversity, for example, then our food animals don't do very well right now and would be better off in the wild. |
-Chaloobi
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The Rat
SFN Regular
Canada
1370 Posts |
Posted - 11/14/2007 : 21:06:55 [Permalink]
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I have a lot of trouble reading things on a screen, so excuse me if this has been covered already:
Regulation yes, banning no. The most obvious regulation would be to prevent the scenario HalfMooner brought up - you would not be allowed to cut up your clone for parts. But as far as banning the procedure, how can we enforce it? If science can do something then sooner or later it will be done. So what happens if a woman is found to be carrying a clone? Forced abortion? This would send the fundies into fits because it's a given that 99% of them would be against cloning too, so how do they wriggle out of this one? If a woman actually gives birth to a clone then what? Declare it illegal and kill it? Tell the mother she can't keep it and rip it from her arms? I can't see any way of rectifying the situation without measures more repugnant than cloning could ever be. |
Bailey's second law; There is no relationship between the three virtues of intelligence, education, and wisdom.
You fiend! Never have I encountered such corrupt and foul-minded perversity! Have you ever considered a career in the Church? - The Bishop of Bath and Wells, Blackadder II
Baculum's page: http://www.bebo.com/Profile.jsp?MemberId=3947338590 |
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chaloobi
SFN Regular
1620 Posts |
Posted - 11/15/2007 : 07:30:32 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by The Rat
I have a lot of trouble reading things on a screen, so excuse me if this has been covered already:
Regulation yes, banning no. The most obvious regulation would be to prevent the scenario HalfMooner brought up - you would not be allowed to cut up your clone for parts. But as far as banning the procedure, how can we enforce it? If science can do something then sooner or later it will be done. So what happens if a woman is found to be carrying a clone? Forced abortion? This would send the fundies into fits because it's a given that 99% of them would be against cloning too, so how do they wriggle out of this one? If a woman actually gives birth to a clone then what? Declare it illegal and kill it? Tell the mother she can't keep it and rip it from her arms? I can't see any way of rectifying the situation without measures more repugnant than cloning could ever be.
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If a clone were created, I'd think the cloners would be punished, not the clone. After all the clone will just be another person without a unique genome (ie equivalent to a twin) - probably one with a shorter and sickly life, if Dolly's any indication. |
-Chaloobi
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BigPapaSmurf
SFN Die Hard
3192 Posts |
Posted - 11/15/2007 : 08:08:11 [Permalink]
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| What ever happened to the cult who said they had cloned some babies, then refused to prove it for privacy of the individuals....? |
"...things I have neither seen nor experienced nor heard tell of from anybody else; things, what is more, that do not in fact exist and could not ever exist at all. So my readers must not believe a word I say." -Lucian on his book True History
"...They accept such things on faith alone, without any evidence. So if a fraudulent and cunning person who knows how to take advantage of a situation comes among them, he can make himself rich in a short time." -Lucian critical of early Christians c.166 AD From his book, De Morte Peregrini |
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Dave W.
Info Junkie
USA
26021 Posts |
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Dude
SFN Die Hard
USA
6891 Posts |
Posted - 11/15/2007 : 13:53:02 [Permalink]
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chaloobi said:
| If a clone were created, I'd think the cloners would be punished, not the clone. After all the clone will just be another person without a unique genome (ie equivalent to a twin) - probably one with a shorter and sickly life, if Dolly's any indication. |
One more time....
Dolly the cloned sheep was euthenized because she contracted a common contagious retrovirus (JSRV- it is found in sheep and goats) that resulted in ovine pulmonary adenocarcinoma.
There is no evidence to suggest that her being a clone shortened her lifespan.
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Ignorance is preferable to error; and he is less remote from the truth who believes nothing, than he who believes what is wrong.
-- Thomas Jefferson
"god :: the last refuge of a man with no answers and no argument." - G. Carlin
Hope, n.
The handmaiden of desperation; the opiate of despair; the illegible signpost on the road to perdition. ~~ da filth |
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chaloobi
SFN Regular
1620 Posts |
Posted - 11/15/2007 : 18:54:12 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by Dude
chaloobi said:
| If a clone were created, I'd think the cloners would be punished, not the clone. After all the clone will just be another person without a unique genome (ie equivalent to a twin) - probably one with a shorter and sickly life, if Dolly's any indication. |
One more time....
Dolly the cloned sheep was euthenized because she contracted a common contagious retrovirus (JSRV- it is found in sheep and goats) that resulted in ovine pulmonary adenocarcinoma.
There is no evidence to suggest that her being a clone shortened her lifespan.
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No kidding? I swear I read that her telomeres or whatever were the same length as her "mother's" and that she had health problems and died younger because of it. You'd think they would have safe-guarded her from infectious disease a bit better, she being a mondern wonder of the world and all. 
EDIT: Wiki...
| On February 15, 2003, it was announced that Dolly had been euthanised because of a progressive lung disease and crippling arthritis. A Finn Dorset such as Dolly would have had a life expectancy of about 12 years, but Dolly only lived to 6 years of age. Some believe the reason for this is because Dolly was actually born genetically 6 years old, the same age as her donor at the time that her genetic data was taken from her. Surprisingly, Dolly did not die because of being a clone, a autopsy confirmed she had Ovine Pulmonary Adenocarcinoma (Jaagsiekte), a fairly common disease of sheep caused by the retrovirus JSRV. Roslin scientists stated that they did not think there was a connection with Dolly being a clone, and that other sheep on the farm had similar ailments. Such lung diseases are especially a danger for sheep kept indoors, as Dolly had to be put to sleep for security reasons. |
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-Chaloobi
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| Edited by - chaloobi on 11/15/2007 18:56:39 |
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Dude
SFN Die Hard
USA
6891 Posts |
Posted - 11/15/2007 : 19:59:08 [Permalink]
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Yes, telomeres in most somatic cells shorten over time. There is still a lot to learn about the function of telomeres and cell senescence however. Some of your body cells (immune, bone marrow, other rapidly reproducing tissues) express telomerase (a reverse transcriptase that carries around an RNA template to add extra telomeric sequences "TTAGGG" to the 3' ends of chromosomes). Telomerase is also linked to some cancers and telomere shortening is linked to some of the premature aging diseases in humans.
Embryonic cells also express telomerase before they differentiate.
As far as I know no one has conducted a study on telomere length in clones that have been derived from somatic cell nuclear transfer techniques (as Dolly was). It would definitely be interesting to study the effect of SCNT on telomeres. The field is still brand-spanking new though, and this is one of those things that you are going to want to look at before you try to clone a human, I think.
Another thing to consider with SCNT derived clones is that they are not an exact genetic replica of the nuclear donor. Mitochondrial DNA will come from the egg donor.
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Ignorance is preferable to error; and he is less remote from the truth who believes nothing, than he who believes what is wrong.
-- Thomas Jefferson
"god :: the last refuge of a man with no answers and no argument." - G. Carlin
Hope, n.
The handmaiden of desperation; the opiate of despair; the illegible signpost on the road to perdition. ~~ da filth |
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Cloning Ban?
