Currently, the extent to which cloning may harm an animal is still being studied, which leads to questions about ethics.
For example, Dolly the Sheep had shorter telomeres at age One than she should've, meaning her DNA (and, by extension, Dolly) was more exposed to damage caused by aging and DNA damage. However, while Dolly did suffer from arthritis, it is unknown if that is connected to her odd telomeres. Igt may also be important to note that she died at age 6, while the common sheep lifespan is 12, but it was because of lung cancer due to a viral infection.
Other studied clones have been shown to have increase in birth size, damage to important organs, premature aging, and damage to the immune system.
There is also ethical questions about cloning animals for lab testing purposes. However, a majority of these questions lie in the domain of genetic cloning, and as such, will not be adressed. This is about reproductive cloning, after all.
Many ethical questions are raised by the idea of human cloning.
The success of any attempts of human cloning thus far have all been failures. Many places have regulations against cloning, some parts of the world even have laws making human cloning illegal.
Human cloning, even as a mere thought, undermines many religious and social values, such as the ideas of individuality and autonomy.
Many supporters claim that human cloning could help couples that can't have children, eradicate genetic diseases by altering the DNA of fetuses, or even help reach the demand of organs needed for transplants. This can be a bit of a My Sister's Keeper situation, and I'm not qualified to talk about that.
All I can say is, that technology isn't here yet, and it's still illegal.
Some people have used reproductive cloning to bring beloved deceased pets back from the grave.
Well, in the genetic sense.
Not only is this process expensive, but many people are outraged by this phenomenon, as they believe it is wasteful and unethical to spend thousands of dollars bringing a genetic clone of a pet into the world while thousands of animals spend their lives in shelters, unadopted.
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