X-Message-Number: 18510
From: "D Pizer" <>
References: <>
Subject: Re: CryoNet #18498 - #18503
Date: Thu, 7 Feb 2002 17:20:52 -0500

Here is a little tidbit that may relate to this posting.

> Jeff Soreff mentions:
> > >the head of the US's "bioethics" council,
> > >Leon Kass, is on record as opposing lifespan extending research.


> Could we have a citation on this, please?
> Robert Ettinger


I can't help on that quote yet, but I am just starting to read "Ethical
Issues in Human Cloning" by Michael Brannigan.  It is a book assigned to us
students in an ethics seminar I am engaged in at Arizona State University.
In the introduction of the book, the author attributes to Mr. Klass the
following position:  "According to Klass, this context of reproductive
rights (cloning) and freedoms disregards more profound ontological,
anthropological and social questions."  and " In fact, our fascination with
human cloning mirrors our age in that it radically separates sexuality and
procreation, and thus further fragments family ties and relations."   and
the one I like "Through cloning, children stand in danger of being all the
more objectified as mere instruments of others' designs and motives."

It seems that Klass thinks blind chance can design a better person then we
can.

Blind chance has designed people that are mortal, kind of a throw-away
holder for codes that tend to reproduce themselves.  People on the other
hand, at least people on this forum, want to design people that are
immortal.  In fact they want to redesign themselves to be so.

Klass seems angry and wants to know "Who decides what constitutes the
'perfect baby'?"

I don't think we know how to design the perfect baby and what it should
have, but we know what it should not have - disease and death are some
things I would leave out.

David Pizer

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