Ethics of Human Organ Cloning
Question
Must be a 5-page paper with 4 sources sited.


Solution
Ethics of Human Organ Cloning
Introduction
The ethical controversies about using genetic engineering to
clone human cells have been widely debated by philosophers, medical practitioners,
politicians, and the general public. Each side has raised numerous arguments on
the ethics of human organ cloning. However, much of the debate revolves around
humancentric principles of autonomy, consent, and individual rights. Organ
cloning is a therapeutic cloning process whereby embryonic cells undergo
distinct processes to obtain human biological organs. The cloned organs are
used for transplantation or other health purposes. Unlike human cloning, which
is used to develop fully functioning humans, organ cloning to reproduce a
particular type of cells is mainly used for research and therapeutic purposes.
This essay aims to address the genuine questions about the use of therapeutic
cloning by not only considering the intentions for using these genetic
techniques but the deepest ontological and moral statutes of cloning organs
from embryo cells. Foremost, the essay adopts a benevolence approach to human
organ cloning. Secondly, this essay stipulates that the ethics of human organ
cloning hinge on arguments claiming that cloned embryos' moral status does not
differ from other human cells from which they were derived. Lastly, it
distinguishes between the notion of personhood and a biological being before
offering moral status and statutory rights reserved for human beings to
embryonic cells.
Arguments
For and Against Human Organ Cloning
To evaluate the moral permissibility of organ cloning, it is
paramount to describe the human embryo moral status utilized to generate the
stem cells in human embryo (Ayala). Most of the cells used are embryos donated
from fertility clinics. However, in some instances, to ensure an exact genetic
match of the cloned organ with the recipient's body, embryos can be cloned from
the patient's tissue cells. In the U.S., thousands of people die annually from
failed organs due to illness or an accident. The primary source of human organs
has previously been through organ harvest from cadavers; however, through
regenerative medicine, therapeutic cloning can meet the demand for human organs
and bring about significant medical and social benefits to society (Ayala).
Furthermore, therapeutic cloning of human organs to preserve
human life and prevent human suffering is considered a breakthrough in modern
medicine. Subsequently, there are not enough human organ donors. The existing
protocols for organ transplant and research involve cultivating genetically
modified or cloned animals to supplement the growing demand for organs
(Savulescu). While cloning of human organs would significantly reduce the
demand for growing animals for organ harvesting, it would significantly reduce
the demand for human organs trafficked through the black market (Ayala).
Without a legitimate source of human organs, the black market has become the
alternative solution for organ demand, whereby people obtain organs through
illegal and inhumane methods.
Currently, the U.S has no federal prohibitions on cloning
human cells either for reproductive, therapeutic, or research purposes. While
most people may not favor reproductive cloning, most of the arguments regarding
organ cloning are based on the fact that cloning using human embryo cells is an
unnatural process and therefore bound to be immoral (Savulescu). The primary
debate regarding organ cloning revolves around the fact that organ cloning from
embryo cells involves the extraction of stem cells destroying the embryos.
Thus, the core ethical issue at hand regarding the embryos' ontological and
moral status is pertinent. If an embryo is equated to a human being, it would
be immoral to extract stem cells from it, irrespective of whether the cloned
organ is used to cure devastating ailments such as Parkinson's disease or save
victims from accidents. However, if a fetus is a person, it's obvious that all
forms of therapeutic cloning should be prohibited as well as all areas of
embryonic stem cell research (Savulescu).
Some individuals opposed the therapeutic cloning because it is
involved in human embryonic cells production for study (Bouhassira). However,
they have embraced stem cell research using surplus embryos from fertility
clinics (Bouhassira). Since vitro fertility clinics create more fertilized eggs
than required for implantation, it can be argued that using the excess embryos
to extract stem cells for therapeutic cloning is justifiable, given that the
embryos would have been discarded anyway. In this context, the idea of autonomy
and rights cannot adequately resolve the moral issues surrounding human organ
cloning. Nonetheless, to assess the moral acceptability of stem cell cloning,
it is critical to determine the moral status of the early embryo (Bouhassira).
The first issue is the ontological status of the embryo,
which is considered a distinct organism and biologically human in nature (Sandel).
Despite some authors highlighting that there is no distinction between the
notion of personhood and a biological being, both philosophers and theologians
have proposed that the criteria for personhood are more sophisticated than
those for being a biological human (Sandel). The criteria for personhood
feature self-consciousness, the ability to feel pain, reason, communicate using
language and use logic. Since human embryos lack all of the outlined traits for
personhood, the inquiry regarding their moral status disqualifies them from
being given any moral or legal rights. Since human embryos do not qualify for
moral protection, they lack any moral status and therefore lack statutory
rights reserved for human beings that have been born (Savulescu). Nonetheless,
before the ethics of personhood and a biological being is put to rest, it is
vital to consider the morally relevant of the sizes of the tissue as well as
their arrangement since the when tissues differentiate and when the first brain
structures are identified. Similarly, the sizes of the tissue as well as their
arrangement signifies the advent of brain functions, which support the earliest
forms of fetal development. Thus, justifying the rational self-consciousness
argument which upholds the criteria for personhood (Savulescu).
Those against organ cloning have argued that early human
embryos deserve to be given full statutory rights as human beings and have
equated the destruction of embryos during therapeutic cloning as murder. The
ethical argument that is made asserts that since embryos are a part of the
human species, they should be treated as such. Since the current legal and
moral statutes prohibit sacrificing human beings by destroying human embryos,
the atrocious acts of murder are unjustifiably committed (Sandel). Similarly,
those in opposition to organ cloning may concede that embryos lack appropriate
characteristics for them to be considered human beings. However, it is pretty
evident that they can develop to become human beings which is enough reason to
give them full moral status. Thus, killing an embryo to acquire stem cells to
grow organs is unilaterally comparable to killing a person. Given that most
people would not kill another human being knowingly, it is morally unacceptable
and unjustifiable to kill human embryos (Savulescu).
In retrospect, proponents of human organ cloning argue that
while embryo cells might belong to humans, they are equivalent to any other
cells in the human anatomy. Thus, the moral status of being a human being ought
to be determined at birth as opposed to any specific period during embryonic
cell development (Bouhassira). Furthermore, because the developing organism is
a unique individual and biologically human, it cannot be characterized as
belonging to any particular person. As a result, there is no legal obligation
to limit stem cell research using embryonic stem cells (Sandel).
Conclusion
The essay has addressed the fundamental ethical argument for
and against human organ cloning from embryonic cells. The ontological and moral
standing of the embryos has been discussed in this essay. The core arguments of
the advocates relate to embryos having inherent worth that necessitates legal
protection as humans under the Act. However, the ethical dilemma emanates from
the fact that embryo cells are intrinsically unique, unlike other cells, and
therefore decree for them to be respected. Thus, the level of respect owed to
embryos is not statutory enough to hinder the process of therapeutic cloning
and research, which has overwhelming medical benefits for humanity. Since the
concept of autonomy and rights cannot unilaterally resolve the moral question
of human organ cloning.
Works Cited
Ayala, Francisco J. “Cloning
Humans? Biological, Ethical, and Social Considerations.” Proceedings of the
National Academy of Sciences, vol. 112, no. 29, 20 July 2015, pp.
8879–8886, www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4517218/,
10.1073/pnas.1501798112.
Bouhassira, Eric. “Cloning,
Ethics Of.” The SAGE Encyclopedia of Stem Cell Research, by Eric
Bouhassira, SAGE Publications, Inc, 2015, pp. 298–303.
Sandel, Michael J. “The Ethical
Implications of Human Cloning.” Perspectives in Biology and Medicine,
vol. 48, no. 2, 2005, pp. 241–247, 10.1353/pbm.2005.0063.
Savulescu, J. “Should We Clone
Human Beings? Cloning as a Source of Tissue for Transplantation.” Journal of
Medical Ethics, vol. 25, no. 2, 1 Apr. 1999, pp. 87–95,
10.1136/jme.25.2.87.



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