The Daily Surprise

Biologists in Oregon have already been using cloning to produce a monkey embryo and extract stem cells. Now, the possibility is very much higher than before that a human embryo will be cloned and that, inevitably, a cloned human will be born.

Whilst American and European scientists have made the most progress in biotechnology, God as defined by some Western religions is still a very large obstacle, in further pursuit of biotechnology.

Scientist in Asia, however, do not seem to face any religious restrictions.

“Asian religions worry less than Western religions that biotechnology is about ‘playing God,’” says Cynthia Fox, the author of “Cell of Cells,” a book about the global race among stem-cell researchers. She says, “Therapeutic cloning in particular jibes well with the Buddhist and Hindu ideas of reincarnation.”

“Most people in Hindu and Buddhist countries, have a root tradition in which there is no single creator God. Instead, there may be no gods or many gods, and there is no master plan for the universe. Instead, spirits are eternal and individual virtue — karma — determines what happens to your spirit in your next life. With some exceptions, this view generally allows the acceptance of both embryo research to support life and genetically modified crops.” says Dr. Silver, a molecular biologist at Princeton. Dr. Silver analysed the clashes of spirituality and science in his book “Challenging Nature”.

On the other hand, in the Judeo-Christian tradition, God is the master creator who gives out new souls to each individual human being and gives humans “dominion” over soul-less plants and animals. To traditional Christians who consider an embryo to be a human being with a soul, it is wrong for scientists to use cloning to create human embryos or to destroy embryos in the course of research.

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