Clones - think twins rather than town

Victor

If an embryo is copied (as happens naturally in the case of identical twins) and both grow, the relationship between the two is of siblings.

If one takes DNA from a born person and create a clone, genetically, they are identical twins (or close enough), but what is the relationship? There's an argument that it is of parent and child - the original's parents have not had another child.

Peregrinus

Victor wrote: »

If an embryo is copied (as happens naturally in the case of identical twins) and both grow, the relationship between the two is of siblings.

If one takes DNA from a born person and create a clone, genetically, they are identical twins (or close enough), but what is the relationship? There's an argument that it is of parent and child - the original's parents have not had another child.

Genitically, they are siblings to one another, and both share the same parents.

Is this fundamentally different to the case of identical twins? In both cases you start out with a single individual, but after a certain time division occurs and you have two distinct individuals with identical genetic composition. The only difference is that in one case the "certain time" is relatively shortly after conception, but in the other case it is many years later.

The social reality, of course, may be quite different from the genetic reality. As to who fills the parental role, and whether they can or should be regarded as akin to adoptive parents - that will depend on the facts, and we are going to have to develop some social and legal norms about this if and when human cloning becomes a reality.

Claw Hammer

These issues are arising in surrogacy cases where there is an argument that the woman who bears the child is the mother despite her having no genetic link to the child. There are knock on consequences with regard to siblings and grandparents. What if a clone turns up when a genetic parent has died and seeks a share of the estate? What about inheritace tax? Is the gift from a parent or stranger?

Carawaystick

Good job from a CAT aspect, Clones in in Monaghan, not Cavan....

I imagine the state will be very slow to legislate for this and cause unnecessary hassle for the first people to need to deal with this.

nuac

Mod
Thank you Caraway, but let's keep this simple rather than introducing the Ulster dimension