{ "export": { "source": "https://urth.darkrealm.vip/thread/urth/6495", "note": "Exported from an unofficial mirror of a public mailing list. Copyright in each message remains with the person who wrote it. Email addresses are obscured as `user at host`, the form the original archive published. This file was rebuilt from parsed fields rather than retained headers, so it is faithful in content but not byte-exact.", "addresses": "obscured as 'user at host'" }, "archive": "urth", "thread": { "id": 6495, "subject": "The future of cloning, continued", "messages": 4, "voices": 2, "first": "2013-12-23T19:50:51+00:00", "last": "2013-12-30T19:40:44+00:00" }, "messages": [ { "message_id": "<1387828251.95489.YahooMailNeo@web121606.mail.ne1.yahoo.com>", "from": { "name": "DAVID STOCKHOFF", "address": "dstockhoff at verizon.net" }, "date": "2013-12-23T19:50:51+00:00", "subject": "(urth) The future of cloning, continued", "in_reply_to": null, "reply_link": null, "blocks": [ { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "I'm sure some of you are already up on cloning news, but some on this list may not be. From a nonscientific publication:\n\n\"While cloning was once the next big thing, it has lost its luster \nbecause of a problem called “epigenetic dysregulation” which causes up \nto 90 percent of cloned offspring to die. In fact, so many animals die \nto make one surviving clone that the European Group on Ethics in Science and New Technologies said “the current level of suffering and health \nproblems of surrogate dams and animal clones” renders it not “ethically \njustified.” Cloned offspring “tend to be large for their breeds, and \noften have abnormal or poorly developed lungs, hearts, or other affected internal organs (liver and kidney), which makes it difficult for them \nto breathe or maintain normal circulation and metabolism,” says an?FDA \nreport.??The problems are so common in cloned cattle and sheep, they are called Large Offspring Syndrome.\"\n\nThis would make Number Five more like Number 50, ha ha. But the reference to Large Offspring Syndrome caught my eye as well. Is Doctor Talos in the house?" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Lee", "address": "severiansola at hotmail.com" }, "date": "2013-12-24T14:02:05+00:00", "subject": "(urth) The future of cloning, continued‏", "in_reply_to": "<1387828251.95489.YahooMailNeo@web121606.mail.ne1.yahoo.com>", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "David Stockhoff: Is Doctor Talos in the house?" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Or even Doctor Crane?\n\nI'm not an expert but it seems to me the current obstacles to \ncloning animals (plants are easier) reside mostly in the \ntechnology being in its infancy. I think epigenetic problems\nderive mostly from the accumulated centromere shortening and\nacquired mutations found in adult animal cells.\n\nIf you started your clone from a cell culled from a gastrula or\neven an embryo or fetus, I think most of the problems are avoided\nand you have your khaibit, ready to supply you blood (and body \nparts?) as needed. \t\t \t \t\t " } ] }, { "message_id": "<52B9952C.1090402@verizon.net>", "from": { "name": "David Stockhoff", "address": "dstockhoff at verizon.net" }, "date": "2013-12-24T14:07:40+00:00", "subject": "(urth) The future of cloning, continued‏", "in_reply_to": "", "reply_link": "header", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 2, "text": "On 12/24/2013 9:02 AM, Lee wrote:\nDavid Stockhoff: Is Doctor Talos in the house?" }, { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "Or even Doctor Crane?\n\nI'm not an expert but it seems to me the current obstacles to\ncloning animals (plants are easier) reside mostly in the\ntechnology being in its infancy. I think epigenetic problems\nderive mostly from the accumulated centromere shortening and\nacquired mutations found in adult animal cells.\n\nIf you started your clone from a cell culled from a gastrula or\neven an embryo or fetus, I think most of the problems are avoided\nand you have your khaibit, ready to supply you blood (and body\nparts?) as needed. \t\t \t \t\t" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "Makes sense. Stem cells, in other words. And you'd want to clone a \nperson at birth anyway to get a khaibit of the same age. Not to mention \nthat the decision to clone you is not based on your adult \naccomplishments but your status at birth.\n\nI wonder what happens to khaibits whose originals die. Do they take \ntheir place in secret? They would then be able to marry and carry on the \nfamily. Or are they discarded?" } ] }, { "message_id": "", "from": { "name": "Lee", "address": "severiansola at hotmail.com" }, "date": "2013-12-30T19:40:44+00:00", "subject": "(urth) The future of cloning, continued‏", "in_reply_to": "<52B9952C.1090402@verizon.net>", "reply_link": "subject", "blocks": [ { "kind": "quote", "depth": 1, "text": "David Stockhoff: I wonder what happens to khaibits whose originals die. Do they take \ntheir place in secret? They would then be able to marry and carry on the \nfamily. Or are they discarded?" }, { "kind": "text", "depth": 0, "text": "The implication from House Azure is that the khaibits are notably shorter than their\nexultant donor/mistresses.\n\nStill, I remain enamoured of my theory that nomenclature can denote clone status, as\nThea is a derived diminutive of Thecla and Pega is the same for her mistress named \nPelagia.\n\nBut Thecla and Thea seem both to be equally of exultant height. And Thea has her own\nkhaibit named Thais (wordplay for \"Thea's\"?)\n\nThen there are the \"sunken cheeks\". Thais has them. So does Severian. And is a \"heart-\nshaped\" face a sunken-cheek version of a \"triangular face\"? Mark of a clone? A product \nof having blood siphoned off? \n\nI dunno. Too much contradictory and inconclusive evidence. I have to concede that Wolfe\ndid not want us to fully know so much about everyone who is a clone in BotNS, perhaps to \nmaintain the dark sense of identity mystery first established in Fifth Head of Cerberus. \t\t \t \t\t " } ] } ] }