Leon Kass Quotes
If one is seriously interested in preventing reproductive cloning, one must stop the process before it starts.
Kass, Leon R. Life, Liberty and the Defense of Dignity: The Challenge for Bioethics. Encounter Books, 2002, p. 163.
He prefaced his remarks by stating that he was speaking for himself and not the Commission.
Kass was appointed for his religious, anti abortion views and he is an excellent proponent of one perspective. There are others who do not necessarily see human cloning in such a dark light. Although, the process has to be developed, at some time it well might be a mode by which infertile people could have children. Kass’s criticisms were made by others when in vitro fertilization techniques were being developed.
In this case, some anti-abortion advocates who opposed stem cell medical research with fetal stem cells objected also to use of stem cells that were produced by SCNT (Somatic Cell Nuclear Transfer). They tried to stop such research in New York State on the grounds that there was a law prohibiting the use of state funds for Human Cloning. They then took the position that SCNY was a form of human cloning. Although almost all biological scientists disagreed, but the decision had to be made by the courts. Judge Garry’s NY Appellate Court opinion conformed the law and the science.
Freedman was the producer and narrator of a TV series on sophisticated topics of science. There are a number of jurisdictions in the world where it is not a crime to clone a human being. Once someone implants a clone into a human female, there is little society can do little to “prevent” the clone from being born. Many religious fundamentalists who oppose human cloning will fight to protect the life of the clone baby in utero. For all we know, clones have already been born and are attending school with other children as no one could easily tell that a child (or an adult) is a clone.
He had successfully cloned dogs, cats, sheep and an entire herd of cattle, and is one of the most advanced cloning scientists in the world.
Leon Richard Kass is an American physician, scientist, educator, and public intellectual. Kass is best known as a proponent of liberal education via the "Great Books," as a critic of human cloning, life extension, euthanasia and embryo research, and for his tenure as chairman of the President's Council on Bioethics from 2001 to 2005. Although Kass is often referred to as a bioethicist, he eschews the term and refers to himself as "an old-fashioned humanist. A humanist is concerned broadly with all aspects of human life, not just the ethical."
