INTERVIEW:
Question 1
Will cloning will make us immortal?
Answer
Cloning will not change our immortality at all. It is our genes which are immortal; we
inherited them from an early star system and they will go on maybefor ever. But talking of
us as individuals, there's no possibility of cloning that can make us immortal.
Question 2
In the future, will it be possible to create absolutely the same life, twice?
Answer
It's absolutely impossible. There are so many influences on individuality. First, if I
copy my genes, they will not be the whole genetic inheritance from cloning because there
is also something called mitochondrial DNA - that's separate DNA in each egg - so a clone
will be more diverse even than a monozygotic twin. The second reason why it is impossible
is, if I clone myself, have a little baby that I want to be a copy of me, this baby will
have many differences. Firstly, it will not be brought up by my parents, it will be
brought up by me, so it will have different parents. Secondly, it will be alive many years
separated from my own childhood, so again there will be a huge difference in the
environment. Let me give you an example. People have talked about cloning Lenin. Lenin was
born in 1870, in pre-Revolutionary Russia. If we use his genes today to create a little
boy who is supposed to be Lenin, he will be born one hundred years apart from the original
Lenin. He will have different parents, he will born not only into a post-industrial, but a
post-scientific age. There is no chance of reproducing Lenin.
Question 3
In your book "Superman and Wonderwoman" you wrote about cloning in 1992. Have
you seen any important changes in the last five years?
Answer
In my book, which was first written in 1992, one of my main objects was to try to
anticipate scientific advance, because I think it is very important that we discuss the
ethics of scientific advance before it happens, so that we know what our attitude should
be, whether to welcome it or to be horrified by it or to reject it. I tried very hard to
anticipate a whole range of scientific changes that would take place, not only in the next
ten years from 1990 but in the next 20 years. So in many ways I think I have anticipated
most of the main advances that have happened so far.
Question 4
What do you think about the future? What will be the main changes be from now on?
Answer
Since 1992 the rate of scientific advance has become more rapid, so that we will see
faster and faster changes. I think we will see many more possibilities for making genetic
interventions and we will see pressure to change our conventions about not operating ,for
example, on the germ line, about not using genetic interventions in humans. We will see
the possibility of slowing the ageing process in humans, and so there will be pressure to
make this available. We will see, I believe, the possibility of protecting individuals
genetically against disease, particularly viruses. We will see the possibility of coding
genes for antibodies to infections and inserting these in the embryo as a substitute for
vaccination. Of course these will make, I hope, revolutionary changes in our attitude to
genetics.
Question 5
Do you think it is morally right? In the future if nobody dies, there will be too many
people.
Answer
Well, I don't think there's any question of us becoming genuinely immortal, immune from
death. We will live slightly longer and, I hope, much healthily lives. But of course we
are already living longer. The average life expectancy now is much greater than it was 100
or 200 years ago. I think we can cope with another 20, 30, 40 or 50 years of life
expectancy without there being any great disasters in terms of over-population. People
will still die, they will just live longer. We have already learned to adapt to a longer
and healthier life expectancy. I believe that we are sufficiently adaptable as human
beings to go on doing that.
Question 6
What about cures for diseases in the future?
Answer
Well, the idea of people freezing themselves after death and waiting for a cure and then
being revived and cured is an illusion. Imagine that all the people with cancer now are
frozen, and in 100 years we have a cure for cancer, and there are millions and millions of
people frozen. Firstly, we would not be able to afford the cost of freezing them.
Secondly, the generation that exists 100 years from now themselves will wish to be cured
from cancer and they will use all of the resources available. They won't bother to defrost
frozen individuals in the fridge in order to cure them, so it's an illusion.
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