A Clone of Your Own?

by Arlene Judith Klotzko

Overview

Someday soon (if it has not happened already in secret), the first cloned human being will be born and mankind will embark on a scientific and moral journey whose destination cannot be foretold. In A Clone of Your Own?, Arlene Judith Klotzko describes the new world of possibilities that can be glimpsed over the horizon. In a lucid and engaging narrative, she explains that the technology to create clones of living beings already exists. inaugurated in 1996 by Dolly, the sheep, the first mammal clone formed from a single adult cell, Dolly was the culmination of a long scientific quest to understand the puzzle of our development from one cell into a complex organism—the outcome of a "fantastic experiment" envisioned six decades before her birth. The human fascination with cloning goes beyond science and its extraordinary medical implications. In riveting prose full of allusions to art, music, and theatre, Klotzko explains why the prospect of human cloning triggers our deepest hopes and our darkest fears and forces us to ponder what it would mean to have a "clone of our own." Readers interested in the legal and ethical ramifications of cloning and desirous of a clear explanation of the science involved will not want to be without A Clone of Your Own?. Arlene Judith Klotzko, a bioethicist and lawyer, is Writer in Residence at the Science Museum, London. She is also a Visiting Scholar in Bioethics at the Windeyer Institute, University College, London. She provides commentary on science, ethics and policy for television and radio in the U.S., UK and worldwide through Sky News, BBC World Television News, Bloomberg Television, Voice of America and the BBC World Service.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780521852944
Publisher:	Cambridge University Press
Publication date:	01/16/2006
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	200
Product dimensions:	5.86(w) x 7.86(h) x 0.76(d)

Table of Contents

List of illustrations; Introduction. Facts and fictions; 1. Power without responsibility?: creating life in the laboratory; 2. Reversal of fortune: the science of cloning; 3. Animal farm: cloning applications; 4. Building your own body repair kit: cloning for cell therapies; 5. A chip off the old block: cloning for human reproduction; 6. Double trouble: the fragility of identity; Conclusion. There's only one Mona Lisa; Further reading; Index.

Editorial Reviews

"Bioethicist and lawyer Klotzko has written a terrific book relevant to any library looking for sound science on a topic timely to us all since the 1996 birth of Dolly, the first mammal cloned from an adult cell." Library Journal

"...straightforward, accurate, and up-to-date...with a refreshing lack of hysteria." The Lancet

From the Publisher

British bioethicist, lawyer and science writer Klotzko delivers a straightforward and breezy look at cloning and related issues like stem cell research. Our fears of reproductive cloning (which she says is inevitable) are based on misconceptions: "In a time when beliefs of genetic determinism are in the ascendancy, a clone, with a genome chosen for him by someone else, may seem to be as hobbled, constricted, and dehumanized as the products of Brave New World's Predestination Room." To correct this misperception, she provides an excellent overview of "the unfolding of this fantastic experiment" that spans more than 60 years, from the early theories of August Weismann to the recent cloning of Dolly the sheep. She is most effective in presenting her main arguments, which are that a clone, like an identical twin, "would not and, indeed, could not, be a mere copy of its progenitor," and that, since she guesses that stem-cell-derived therapies may reach clinics in "five to ten years," unless the current U.S. prohibition of federal funding of embryonic stem cells is ended, Americans will be way behind the technology curve. Agents, Daniela Bernardelle and Bruce Hunter for David Higham Assoc. (Oct.) Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information.

Publishers Weekly

Bioethicist and lawyer Klotzko (Windeyer Inst., University Coll., London) has written a terrific book relevant to any library looking for sound science on a topic timely to us all since the 1996 birth of Dolly, the first mammal cloned from an adult cell. Klotzko clearly distinguishes between therapeutic and reproductive cloning, discusses stem cell research and its place in this burgeoning research area, and touches on the legal and ethical ramifications of the phenomenon, forcing us to think about what it would mean to have a "clone of our own." Drawing on science fiction, theater, and literary works and illustrated by art, photographs, and cartoons, this short and accessible title is highly recommended for all libraries and readers.-Mary Chitty, Cambridge Healthtech, Newton Upper Falls, MA Copyright 2005 Reed Business Information.

Library Journal