Ethics of cloning
If we were meant to be perfect, then why doesn't god make us so? Paul says that we should rejoice in our weakness because it gives us reason to want to get closer to God. One might argue that we now have the means to "improve" on God's work, to help those in need lead a more normal and productive life. This is not genetic engineering per se, but genetic therapy. We would be able to remove some unnecessary suffering and give someone a more normal life. Pope John Paul II even says:"A strictly therapeutic intervention whose explicit objective is the healing of various maladies such as those stemming from deficiencies in chromosomes will in principle, be considered desirable, provided it is directed to the true promotion of the personal well-being of man and does not infringe on his integrity or worsen his life. Such an intervention, indeed, would fall within the logic of the Christian moral tradition."The Catholic Church is against the potential that may occur where genetic engineering goes beyond therapeutic and becomes twisted in its intention. Specifically, those who are weaker -- and therefore cannot speak for themselves as to their needs and wants -- are denied a full and meaningful life. We need to consider the right
Also, even though we have improved prenatal genetic testing to help enhance life, we have also increased the chances of voluntary and coerced abortions based on misguided reductionism. Are we so sure that this sort of misconduct would not occur in an area where we create life only for the sake of knowledge or research?With cloning and artificial conception, we run the risk of becoming too utilitarian in our view of human life. This study was the longest, non-therapeutic experiment ever conducted in the United States in the 20th century. On December 1, 1994, a special committee of the National Institutes of Health issued a report declaring that a variety of research projects involving the intentional creation of human embryos for the purposes of genetic and other research are ethically acceptable. If someday we were able to create these god-like humans, so perfect in their evolution that pain and suffering is a foreign concept, that the need for each other and God are negligible, we would become isolated and less than human. We may have the perfect bodies but we are less than fully human in our souls; we lose what makes us truly human. We can look at another illustration of the potential that can happen: the Tuskegee Study of Untreated Syphilis in the Male Negro. We are soon reaching an age where a person's right to live a dignified life might be based mainly on their genetics. Technology has made great advances, but these great advances have also come at a great cost. This study was initially started to examine effect of syphilis on migrant male Negro in the 1930's. Here we see a clear example of medical misconduct in human research and the abuse of a weak class of people. We are opening the Pandora's Box for legalities being put in place that would allow for abortion based on genetics. Without a proper guide for human actions, our objective would become the achievement of individual goals and/or maximization of human pleasure. As human beings, we cannot even agree as to when life begins.
Common topics in this essay:
Pandora's Box,
Catholic Church,
Male Negro,
Letter Corinthians,
Paul II,
,
Institutes Health,
artificial conception,
research cloning artificial,
cloning artificial conception,
lower class,
genetic profiling,
perfect race,
human life,
cloning artificial,
genetic research,
research cloning,
catholic church,
male negro,
|
Acceptance Essays
