South Korea Scientists Clone Human Embryos

[Luke T.]

South Korea scientists clone human embryos (http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/200402/12/eng20040212_134708.shtml)


Researchers in South Korea said Wednesday they have successfully cloned a human embryo to obtain stem cells they hope could one day be used to treat disease.

The experiment, the first reported cloning of human stem cells,means the so-called therapeutic cloning is no longer a theory but a reality. The details of the research will be discussed here Thursday morning at the annual meeting of the American Associationfor the Advancement of Science (AAAS).

I put this in Politics and Current Events instead of Science for what I think will become obvious reasons over the next few days.

[nightwind]

Thank you South Korea!

[headscratcher4]

The bad news is that the North may now have Kim Jong Il for a very, very long time....:(

[Ignatius]

from NY times (http://www.nytimes.com/2004/02/12/science/12CELL.html)

Dr. Leon R. Kass, chairman of the President's Council on Bioethics, called for federal legislation to stop human cloning for any purpose.

"The age of human cloning has apparently arrived: today, cloned blastocysts for research, tomorrow cloned blastocysts for babymaking," Dr. Kass wrote in an e-mail message. "In my opinion, and that of the majority of the Council, the only way to prevent this from happening here is for Congress to enact a comprehensive ban or moratorium on all human cloning."

The House has twice passed legislation that would ban all human cloning experiments, most recently in February 2003. But the bills have foundered in the Senate, where many members who oppose reproductive cloning do not want to ban it for medical research.

My prediction:
Legitimate questions and debate about the ethics of human cloning will be drowned out by the indignant, moralistic posturing of opportunistic bible-thumping politicians.

[ssibal]

This is great news. Hopefully people will start getting used to the idea and there will not be so much opposition to human cloning.

[Regnad Kcin]

Originally posted by Ignatius
My prediction: Legitimate questions and debate about the ethics of human cloning will be drowned out by the indignant, moralistic posturing of opportunistic bible-thumping politicians. Here's your one-million-dollars!















Not really.

[Ignatius]

Originally posted by Regnad Kcin
Not really.

But I already started writing checks!

[diomedes]

This is old news.

I lived in South Korea before.

It is already a country of clones.

It is like the Stepford Wife Scenario on a country-wide scale.

You can stand on a street corner at Kangnam Station in Seoul and all of the Koreans on the other side of the street would be dressed exactly alike. All the guys wearing the exactly same turtle neck sweaters and all the girls carrying the exactly same Louis Vuitton bag.

I remember the front page of the English language Korean Times in 2001. The headline said, "Korean genome mapped by Korean genetics company." My first reaction was, "See, they are not human after all." My co-workers wondered out loud if maybe they could identify the gene that makes them such horrendous drivers.

[subgenius]

Woo Suk Hwang made the announcement.

(I heard there's a whole mini industry in this country changing Korean's names into something not so rude in English.)

[headscratcher4]

It is already a country of clones

Hey, I resemble that remark!

[Luke T.]

Originally posted by headscratcher4
The bad news is that the North may now have Kim Jong Il for a very, very long time....:(

LOL!