Possible first human clone born

Found on CTV

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There is a report late Thursday that a Canadian-based group will announce one of its members has given birth to the first human clone. The group has scheduled a news conference for Friday to offer details on the claim.

The Raelians, a religious cult based in Quebec, announced on Dec. 18 that the baby was expected to be born in the next 14 days.

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Full Article Here Here

I don't know about anyone else, but I find this possibility both amazing and terrifying at the same time. I would like to hear everyone elses oppinions about this situation.

Syini666,

Sound like movie to me, hehe!!! No, really, i think is still to soon for people to have a clear idea about cloning. Personally, i don't know if this is good or bad because i have never seen a clon obviously. I haven't seen neither the advantages or disadvantages of this. If scientists are still arguing about this issue imagine what could it be if we ask the entire world people what they think about this too. Every single person has it opinion and, in many, many cases, persons think that cloning is really bad but can't say why. There is people that give opinions just for nothing, for example: "yes, cloning is bad, and bla, bla, bla"... and then you ask them why they think this and they say: "mmm... i don't know... but yes, cloning is bad". Again, for me it's too soon to know what cloning will give humanity. I'm open minded and would like to wait more and see what happen in a close future.

Bye.

well -DaRK-RaiDeR- is right. Nobody can say what advantages or disadvantages of this are yet but just try to imagine 50 or 60 Bill Gates in one place at the same time. :) Wow this is ...

Open your mind, think deeper.

Iaio > I see both sides of it, giving people a second chance at life through things such as stem cell research, but then I see the flip side, the fear that human cloning would bring about. Plus you get into the moral and religous aspects of it, and that complicates the matter ten fold. Its a really touchy subject really...

I fully support organ cloneing. But the world is already over-populated and these peaple want more humans running around? I remember hearing a story when I was a kid... Its about how the world gets over-populated and the peaple of earth are so noisy that the greek gods destroy the earth just so they could have a minute of peace. Alot of cities I've seen are so over flooded with peaple that it's hard to breath when you walk outside and just imagine what would happen if everyone wanted a clone. LOL

Well I am not a religous man so it is moral only to me. I believe in science and in me only.

Caught the quick-clip on PBS this morning, apparently this group thinks Planet Earth was populated 25,000 years ago by space-travelers cloning themselves (or something like that) to provide the first humanoids on this planet. Of course, that begs explanation for some of the great archaeological finds last century, like the 6,000 year-old frozen man between Spain and a neighboring country; skins for clothes, archery equipment, rudimentary tools... me wonders if he was 19,000 years up the food chain from the first clone, that original space-clone dude must have been one scary spaceman! BTW, they called the new clone-baby "Eve". Just wondering, if the baby is "Eve", then what is the mother's name? There is supposed to be some recognized investigative-reporter who will choose a reliable scientist-type who will go take DNA samples from the mother and baby-eve and compare the DNA-chains to see if they are duplicates or just normal gene-pool passons.
Apparently this story will have a chaper-2, they say within ten days.
We'll all stay tuned.
And, btw, from what i've read, cloning does not guarantee an act-alike, think-alike carbon copy of the original. In fact, a very loose representation of what the high-guessers are saying might be simplistically demonstrated in the hilarious flick... Multiplicity. :)

The stuff that I've read about cloning says that there is a great risk of premature aging and premature age related illnesses, and the way they actually make the clone is very similar to the whole insemination routine, or when older woman elect to use a younger womans egg to have a child. . .but I agree with most of the rest of you, cloning would be great for organs, but I don't really see any need to clone entire people. . .

The main thought that keeps running through my mind.....

....it's a very slippery slope.

I can't help but wonder about the ramifications where the child is involved. I would hope that they have enough sense to keep the name of her mother out of the public domain for the childs sake. I also seem to recall that there were some unforseen issues concerning "Dolly", who because she was cloned from a sheep that was 5 years old suffered from an accelerated aging phenomena. Since the "mother/DNA donor" is at least 30, it seems that this could be an issue with "Eve" also.

Guys,

For the moment i can only think of two advantages for cloning:


1) Organs - to replace other infected and/or irreparable organs.

2) Animals - to preserve different animal breeds at the edge of extinction.


Bye.

Just a quick update, it seems the child had actually already been born, and the DNA of the child and mother is already unergoing testing to see if its a true clone or a hoax.

allenb1963 > Actually the mothers name is out, I just saw her ona news broadcase just a few minutes ago. I hate to be a pessimist, but I don't think the child will live more than a year or two, giving the inherent problems encountered with Dolly.

Yeah the extinct animals too. . .here's an atricle on a group of Japanese scientist that are going to clone, hopefully, a wolly mammoth
http://www.cnn.com/2002/TECH/08/21/clone.mammoth/

bludgeon > Thats probably one of the best uses for cloning that I can think of. But I wonder, what would we do about habitat for them? Unfortunately the population growes every year, and we spread farther into un-touched lands, pushing animals into smaller and smaller habitats. With a creature as large as the wooly mammoth, I would think it would end up pushing other animals out of their natural habitats.

Pretty sure they're gunna keep it under lock and key at the zoo, poor little Wooly Mammoth, heh heh, I say clone a bunch of them and let them roam around Montana and the sparser populated areas of Canada, j/k, Yeah Syini I'm sure it would mess with the ecology if we releases extinct species like the mammoths into the wild, but there are other types of animals that are near extinction or just recently extinct that would do wonders for the ecology if they were brought back in mass. . .as well as certain types of plant life and algeas.

I think I remember seeing something about Dolly the sheep having advanced aging disease and that it could be a possible side effect of cloning. I hope this doesn't happen to this child (if the cloning is even real) as that would be a sad thing indeed.

I don't agree with cloning as I think we are tampering with things we don't fully understand or appreciate yet. We act like we understand genetics but if you get right down to it we don't. We can't even defeat a simple RNA virus so how can we know all there is to know about DNA and genetics? We have only started mapping the genome so I don't think we have a clear understanding of what we are doing yet.



El Diablo

Well its scarry having human clones. First off, this may sound harsh but people arn't ment to live forever. If we were supposed to then we would, dont you think? Next off, clones could be used by evil people to replace a real living human to get information or get control of some big buisness or something. The only good i see in cloning animals is for food.

Hi guys,

I am all for cloning, new research and new technology. Only when cloning or any research is done for greed, hate, and selfish reasons, then I will be against it. Mankind has always feared change and of the unknown. This cloned baby might not be perfect but at least we can learn more about our self. We still have many questions unanswered, but we have lot of philosophies, governments, religions and beliefs to stop us from the freedom of exploring.




also .............from Yahoo News


HOLLYWOOD, Florida (Reuters) - Scientists have reacted with strong scepticism to reports that a cult, which believes extraterrestrials created mankind, has produced the first clone of a human being.


The cult has offered no proof to back up its announcement on Friday that the world's first cloned baby had been born.


Clonaid chief executive officer Brigitte Boisselier, who belongs to the cult, said the baby girl was born to a 31-year-old American woman on Thursday at 11:55 a.m. She was cloned through cells taken from the mother, Boisselier told a news conference in Hollywood, Florida.


"I'm very, very pleased to announce that the first baby clone is born," she said. "We called her Eve.


"The baby is very healthy and she's doing fine. The parents are very happy," the French scientist said at the news conference at a beachside Holiday Inn.


The baby was not a monster or "something disgusting," she said. The parents, who had been infertile, did not wish to show off the baby, she said, declining to disclose who they were or where the baby was born.


Experts questioned Clonaid's claim that it had successfully produced the first human clone with procedures much like those used to clone Dolly the sheep.


Dr Harry Griffin, who heads the Roslin Institute that cloned Dolly, was among those scientists calling for hard evidence of the cloning.


He also questioned the safety of such a procedure. "All the available evidence from experiments on animals suggest it is a highly risky procedure that puts the child at risk of serious genetic disorders, maybe for the rest of its life," he told BBC Radio on Saturday.


Glenn Carter, president of the UK Raelian movement, said proof would be provided in the next few days.


"It would be a surprise to me if it were that simple to clone humans," said Dr Barry Zirkin, head of the division of reproductive biology at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland.


"Based on the experience with animals, one would imagine it would take many many shots to actually get a human baby."


Boisselier said an independent expert would conduct genetic tests on the baby to verify the breakthrough.


"You should have the answers and all the proof you need in about eight days," she said. "I received so many emails of hope. I received so many insults and death threats at the same time. ... I am not afraid."


The baby was delivered by Caesarean section and weighed seven pounds (3.1 kg), Boisselier said, adding that four more cloned babies would be delivered by the end of January.


CULT SAYS ALIENS CREATED MANKIND


Clonaid was founded by Claude Vorihon, who calls himself Rael and founded a cult called the Raelians. The company website lists Boisselier as "a Raelian Bishop."


The Raelians, who claim 55,000 followers around the world, believe life on Earth was sparked by extraterrestrials who arrived 25,000 years ago and created humans through cloning.


"I do believe that we have been created by scientists. I thank them for my life. If science created me, then science has done some good," said Boisselier, who has a mane of red hair streaked with grey and who dressed for the news conference in a black skirt outfit, fishnet stockings and a high-heeled boots.


"Is my science worse than the one used in preparing bombs to kill people? I create life."


Cattle, mice, sheep and other animals have been cloned with mixed success. Some have displayed defects later in life and scientists fear the same could happen with cloned humans.


Randall Prather, a reproductive biotechnology professor at the University of Missouri, said independent tests would be essential to determine whether the baby is in fact a clone.


"Is it possible in humans? Potentially. Have we seen problems with cloning domestic animals? Yes. Do we understand what causes those problems? No. Therefore we shouldn't do it," Prather said.


Carl Feldbaum, president of the Biotechnology Organisation, a trade group that represents the interests of the biotech industry in Washington, blasted the claim as irresponsible and questioned its accuracy.


"We're reiterating our strong opposition to human cloning on both safety and ethical grounds," he said.


Clonaid has been racing Italian fertility doctor Severino Antinori to produce the first cloned baby. Antinori said he expected one of his patients to give birth to a cloned baby in January.


U.S. President George W. Bush has asked Congress to ban the creation of cloned babies as well as the cloning of human embryos for medical research. The U.S. House of Representatives passed a ban but a similar bill in the Senate stalled after scientists argued such a law would hinder medical advances.


Republican Senator Sam Brownback of Kansas said on Friday: "While I'm sceptical about today's report, this points to the need for Congress to enact a permanent and comprehensive ban on human cloning when we return."


CRITICS CALL FOR CLONING BAN


Non-profit and public interest groups have lined up on both sides of the controversy. Early Friday, anticipating the announcement, Chicago-based Centre for Bioethics and Human Dignity said it condemned the Clonaid effort.


"The fact that renegade scientists are apparently continuing to work to clone human beings despite the proven dangers of mammalian cloning shows that the United States and the rest of the world need to pass a complete ban on this dangerous and unethical procedure as soon as possible," said C. Ben Mitchell, a senior fellow at the centre.


The Vatican's top moral theologian, Father Gino Concetti, also condemned the possibility of human cloning in a recent interview.


Clonaid started work with human eggs last January and made 10 implantations in the spring, Boisselier said. Five were terminated and five were successful.


The next baby would be born to a lesbian couple in a hospital somewhere in northern Europe next week, she said. The other expectant parents were a U.S. couple and two from Asia.


Twenty more implantations were planned for January. Clonaid planned to open at least one cloning clinic on every continent and had received thousands of requests, Boisselier said.


She also said Clonaid planned further clonings as a commercial enterprise as investors expected some return.


Asked about the cost, she said. "I don't know. I'm not very good at business."

More Links to Cloning :

http://194.83.182.241/MillHillEssays/1997/cloning.htm

http://www.globalchange.com/clonech.htm

http://www.agrino.org/shangaris/GenClon/

http://www.humancloning.org/

http://www.reproductivecloning.net/

http://www.truthtree.com/clone.shtml

http://www.wordwiz72.com/cloning.html

http://www.srtp.org.uk/cloning.shtml

http://www.nationalreview.com/commen...th011402.shtml

Lets keep an open mind..............

[gloworange]Dr_Evil[/gloworange]

Actually were nearing completion, if not completed, on mapping the human genome, now we're moving onto mices and other things, like corn. . .http://www.ornl.gov/hgmis/ (don't know how up to date it is, because they said that we will complete the sequencing in '03, but I thohught I read somehwere that we had already completed it). The whole process of cloning someone really isn't all that hard to imagine, they take an ovum, remove all the genetic material from it, replace it with the donor dna and implate it into the womb of a mammal, just like a lot of pregnancies now and days, only they don't remove the genes. About the whole you can replace someone with a clone thing. . .you can't do that, you are you, Madsel, even if you were cloned, and the clone looked just like you, there would stil be small distinguishing characteristics, and a completley seperate personality, nature vs. nurture and all that, cloning isn't making a carbon copy, it's more like making a very very close approximation of the original.

ugh, people trying to play God...Watch day of the dead by george a romero, people have to learn to leave some stuff alone, its amazing what cience can do.... When no one tells them to quit.

Personally I think the CEO of Clone Aid had best watch the original Star Trek episode Space Seed, followed by Star Trek 2 before she keeps going. Those of you that have seen these episodes know what I'm talking about

Guys,

Knowing that cloning isn't totally dominated, i mean scientists still need to walk a long way to discover all about cloning. Well, knowing this, we could suppose that something can go wrong when cloning, so what then? what if, for example, after cloning they get a deformed child when he/her grows up a little? Could this be possible? Will they treat him/her like a human? Which family will want this kid? If this happens, will scientists keep this as a secret? You know how people is, we tend to refuse, reject, repel and/or repulse nature "errors", what about science "errors"?

Will people treat clones as human beings?

Bye.

I would have to agree with the feelings of the majority of the people in this thread. Just imagine you in his/her shoes. Growing up. In my opinion,the discrimination that would take place would be extremely difficult to cope with. Even though I don't know many of the details, I'm just worried about how technology is having an increasing effect in our lives each and every day.

P.S. ...but then again, for those of you who have seen Multiplicity, that guy turned out to have an easy life so it might not be so bad after all. haha. A joke, only a joke! :)

OK, I might have been wrong about the taking over someone else's life and stuff, but i just think cloning is wrong. Yeah it has its positive sides but it also has many negative sides that we haven't even thought about or comprehended yet. Mabye someone will clone an army of super humans after genetically enginerring an embrio. Mabye someone will clone people specialized to work(slaves) which is wrong. There are many posibilites to cloning. While some of them might be positive, some are negative. And like someone else said up there, what if you are in their shoes? Wouldn't you want to be a normal person, not a clone of someone else.

Alrighty, i have been to an unlimited amount of United Nations Conferences and participated there, and one of the times, the topic being cloning. My stand was simply put - Total cloning has to be banned, because if you support cloning of organs, you dont have control over the people who clone, and once they start doing it, you cant stop 'em from fully cloning. Although organ cloning is useful and sounds a nice idea, we'd have forget about it thinking it never existed because if this race begins, we might find another clone when we wake up the next morning.
It will create an imbalance in nature, and as man has already been abusing nature quite widely and expressively, this would only be a step forward.

Just for information : The first clone has been claimed born. She's a girl called Eve.

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Rael, leader of the religious sect connected to the company claiming it has produced the first human clone reacts to questions on the topic (December 27)

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Brigitte Boisselier, the scientific director of Clonaid, announced the first cloned baby has been born.

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Here's the cover Story

I don't think we should take such a black/white approach to it. . .I don't think we should completely ban cloning, the potential for saving people's lives is too great. . .I know I'm going to need a new liver when I hit 40, I want to have one!! I don't think that there will be a large amount of people that would want to clone themselves for the reasons you gave, "It will create an imbalance in nature, and as man has already been abusing nature quite widely and expressively, this would only be a step forward". I think what it comes down to is the approach you take to the subject. . .going back to the group of people that cloned Eve, that's the wrong approach, the only sound byte I saw of the story sums it up well, and older guy in robes and stuff was saying "There should be no ethics in science", that's the real danger, the people, not the method. IMO.

i don't think we have to worry about the ethics or morels of this babys birth:

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http://www.newsoftheworld.co.uk/news/news2.html

DRESSED from head to toe in figure-hugging black, baby-clone doctor Brigitte Boisselier strutted between 17 nervous ‘initiates' to her sex cult.

The ten men and seven women gathered at a remote farmhouse on the 2,000-acre estate of Sir Richard Glyn near Wimborne in Dorset.

And by the flickering light of candles and the booming sound of whale song, the prospective converts to the Raelian movement, in which Brigitte is a ‘bishop', were coaxed into sharing and exploring their darkest fantasies.

The £120 course in May 1997 was jointly run by Brigitte and Swiss-born Gerard Jeandupeux.

This is the same woman who, on Friday afternoon, made the shattering announcement that her Clonaid operation, a medical offshoot set up by the Raelian cult, was responsible for the birth of the world's first cloned baby. She said a 7lb girl named Eve was delivered on Boxing Day morning.

The Raelians, led by Brigitte's svengali Claude Vorhilon, believe alien experimenters created the human race 25,000 years ago using DNA technology. The cult preaches the power of group sex and asks for up to 10 per cent of members' earnings after tax to help build an ‘alien embassy'.

His cult, which has an annual turnover of around £5million, now claims 1,000 members in Britain and 55,000 wordwide. Vorhilon himself is a multi-millionaire with a passion for motor racing. In a copy of his book, Extra Terrestrials Took Me To Their Planet, that we obtained at the time, Vorhilon says: "Children should be taught to have sex purely for pleasure without any emotional commitment to the sexual partner."

"Sect members should also not reject but have sex with another person if that person wants to gratify them sexually.

He adds: "Women particularly should have sex with one or more individuals of either sex as long as those individuals agree, since contraception has freed women from fear of pregnancy
Sect members should also not reject but have sex with another person if that person wants to gratify them sexually.

"Sect members can have heterosexual, homosexual and bisexual sex in couples, threesomes, foursomes and ‘moresomes'." The sect's HQ in Canada is called UFOland—complete with a replica of the flying saucer Vorhilon insists he saw.


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i was born at night, but it wasn't last night! These are the people who claim to have cloned a human? these are the ways of your average, run of the mill religious cult... like the manson family.

but if by some black miracle im wrong, and these guys land... i say we drive them back out into outerspace where the belong. But wouldn't that really be a bitch, mans first contact with life alien to this planet and they turn out to be a bunch of pervs!