Animal Cloning

The specific type of cloning being referred to is Somatic Cell Nuclear Transfer (SCNT). For anyone unfamiliar with the process I suggest you research the topic prior to engaging with this debate. Nothing my opponent has stated is fallacious and all of those quotes for the intents and purposes of this argument are sound. However, I will demonstrate why it is wrong to use these arguments to support her point. Animal cloning, as a science, is in it's infancy. A science which many researchers are dedicating their lives to endeavour due to the inherent benefits perfecting such a biological technique may have (a point which I will return to later). My opponent has stated many of the inherent problems encountered when attempting to generate a genetic clone. Point (1) refers specifically to the radical inefficiency of generating and bringing to term an animal clone to term. Point (2) points out the poor quality of life of a genetic clone, namely Dolly the sheep. Point (3) I'm afraid is irrelevant as the infection was not related to the fact that this animal was a clone and has no bearing in this argument, the animal died from common dysentery [1]. Point (4) paragraph 1 cites from the FDA guide to animal cloning in the context of veterinary care and medicine. Paragraph 1 iterates the risk to the surrogate during spontaneous abortion in mid-late stages of pregnancy. This is brought up by my opponent I assume because the number of foetuses that don't come to term in cloning, which poses the aforementioned risk. Point (4) paragraph 2 actually iterates all of the confounding factors involved in pregnancy loss, which is a very valid point against my opponent and one she should consider when evaluating the rates of cloning efficiency in SCNT. The latter part of my opponents argument are a statement of the complications exhibited by successful clones. Or rather certain types of successful clones. While it is true, sheep clones such as Dolly the sheep often develop with genetic problems, mainly due to our lack of ability at this time to control and understand all of the specific epigenetic changes that occur in the zygote during embryogenesis, my opponent fails to mention, or perhaps realise, that goat clones by comparison exhibit little or no genetic problems (Wells et al. 1998a; Young et al. 1998; Baguisi et al. 1999; Reggio et al. 2001; Keefer et al. 2002; Ptak et al. 2002). The problems that are associated with cloning are a consequence of a gap in our understanding of the changes that occur to the somatic nucleus when added to an enucleated ovum. With this in mind, why should we stop? When in the history of the universe has stopping when facing a gap in our knowledge or a flaw in our methods ever yielded us with progress? Ladies and gentlemen my opponent has taken an issue with the trial and error method of problem solving. Science necessitates we try things, and where our endeavours fail or end up imperfect, we learn from those mistakes. My opponent would have you believe it is right to stop animal cloning research as it can harm it's subjects, this is know as argumentum ad misericordiam, an appeal to pity. This argument could be likened to that of stage 3 clinical trials of new pharmaceuticals. An argument of this nature would state that it is wrong to conduct such trials as a control group must go without a this potentially disease altering medicine. These types of argument seek to save the immediate cost to test subjects without considering the loss to the greater goal. To bring this back in to context, let us discuss briefly the greater goal and benefits of SCNT cloning. SCNT, in a theoretical sense, can produce a genetically identical clone of any animal. There are a huge number of benefits to this. In agriculture, imagine having a particular dairy cattle that was an exceptional milk produce, with almost 50% higher milk production than any other cow in the herd. Now, traditional breeding would have us breed this cow with the aims of producing calfs that will mature into high milk yielding cows. This, not only does not guarantee that the calfs will be good milkers, but it is also a long an arduous process, involving having an expensive bullock in your herd. SCNT would allow a farmer to have a herd full of this particular cow, drastically improving his milk yield and drastically increasing the supply of milk he can sell. Now imagine this on a global scale. A world full of extremely high yielding cows. Imagine the ease with which farmers in third world nations could generate a herd to sustain the demand for dairy in his region. This is just one example where SCNT could be useful. My overall point here is that to stop the progress of a technology because in its current form it is harmful to the animals it is being tested on would be wrong, because the overall goal could have an enormous benefit to humanity. I do not wish this to become a debate about animal rights and research ethics but animals subjected to these tests receive the utmost degree of care and husbandry and are not suffering expect for the complications that can arise in the research.