• Question: how long would it take to clone a human?

    Asked by beccawilko to Simon on 21 Jun 2013.
    • Photo: Simon Holyoake

      Simon Holyoake answered on 21 Jun 2013:

      I believe it’s technically possible to do so with current technology!

      they have already cloned animals (dolly the sheep being particularly famous) however there are many cultural and societal issues with human cloning, plus one of the big obstacles is the ‘age’ of the donor

      all of our cells have a pre-programmed number of divisions in them (how many times they reproduce before they die off) it’s these divisions that determine how old we are

      if we take a cell from a 50 year old person and use it to make a clone, the clone will be born a baby, but its cells will think they are 50 years old, which will probably lead to lots of health problems and all kinds of suffering (just like dolly the sheep was not a healthy animal)

      to overcome this we need much more research into genetic engineering, and it may never be carried out due to the moral and ethical questions around it

      Fantastic question! really enjoyed thinking about this one!

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