Human Cloning: A Scientist's Story

A scientist’s human story.

Dr. Samuel Wood via interview , USA

I was so inspired by the field of molecular biology, genetics, that when I returned to school to become an Environmental Techy in the early 90’s, that I won awards with my grade 13 marks, even after two decades of daily Cannabis consumption. Since then I’ve followed the field eagerly for any new advances in the mass media, internet areas. Dr. Wood is a hero/a guru figure for me. That is why I find it so refreshing that he has been bold enough to put such a personal human face on this field. And truly, I understand the dangerous waters that he is trying to navigate. Well done on all accounts, Dr. Woods. Here is why I find his honesty so compellingly human. I don’t wish to give the impression that this a derogatory in any way, so please try to understand what I’m getting at.

“Even as a child, I knew I didn't want to just observe. I wanted to make a difference.”

I think what DR. Wood meant to say was, that he wished to make a difference by having input. I beg to differ with him that the role of an acute observer isn’t what all discovery is based on. I remember reading aboutt a techy who worked in a patent office, who made some astute observations and translated them into mathematical relationships. At one time math was not a strong subject for him.. I think his name was Albert something or other.

“At her funeral, I swore that one day I’d do something about conditions like hers.”

This is a very sweet human emotion and a strong common motivator for many people in their lives. I love the range and depth of emotions, Dr. Wood displays, especially the bonding with his mother. This is something we have in common.

“In 2004 and 2005 Hwang Woo-Suk fraudulently reported that he succeeded in creating human embryonic stem cells by cloning”

This statement speaks of Dr. Wood’s very humanly judgmental qualities. This brings him to my level, and I see my own frailties in the revelation’s of my hero.

“Back then it wasn’t known it was a fraud, so it was very exciting to think that a long list of diseases could be treated.”

There again is a very judgmental word Dr. Wood; Fraud. Could it have been a mistake?

“We went out for drinks one night and we started talking about our parents”

Here we would have much in common, although I don’t consume alcohol anymore. To achieve a confident “enhanced perception” I use Cannabis, to better results, I think. But still, Sam and I, would have a great time playing with ideas, I’m sure. I’ve sat at many a bar table and soared in many venues with intelligent people.
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“We wanted to do something that would be a legacy for them.”

What a Nobel inspiration, but not incorruptible as we will see. It’s a human sentiment, but as everything not overarching in itself.

“but at that stage people were not focusing on the stem cell aspect of cloning; they were focusing on the reproductive possibilities of cloning”

I like seeing Dr. Wood use the word “but” often. It tells me the at he is also conflicted, as am I. He looks at the history of stem research as if it were a distant thing, it speaks to me of an immature perspective, giving forth a judgmental tone. (perhaps for political purposes)

“Human reproductive cloning is just simply wrong ethically from a medical standpoint and a scientific standpoint, even ignoring any religious issues associated with it”

This again is his point of view, which could have been cobbled together to meet conformity to political views. It speaks to me of religious judgmental pressure on Dr. Wood..

“Even though people could take the techniques that we’ve developed and attempt to do it (or perhaps even be successful doing it), we hope that they would not do that.”

I find this, again, a political conformity statement. A statement in an introduction to a Carl Sagan book, said something like this, “If the end results of Maxwell’s observations were seen in the forms they take today, such as television, he might have been beheaded for witchcraft.” Even the brilliant Dr. Woods shouldn’t be talking of limits. This is too political for me, Sam.

“On the other hand, therapeutic cloning does not involve any type of risk to human life and actually provides tremendous potential for the relief of suffering in real human beings who are going through some awful things”

A shameless plea based on his self evaluation. Here I see that that I am exactly the same. That is why I don’t place people like the good doctor, or Yoko, on a pedestal; they are methane producers just like me. I like the ripples they cause in my life and could appreciate chatting in a deep way with either of them. They are special, because they are human, to me.

“I’m a pure scientist in some ways, and I know that many different studies or findings could be used for evil”

These could be the words of Obama’s preacher. I find them dangerously judgmental and bordering on small minded for a scientist. Dr. Wood, please, let’s keep evil out of science.

“Our job as scientists is to make the most of this technology and make it available to the greatest number of other scientists who can help us do good things with it”

My other hero the techy, Albert, would disagree with you, Sam. I tend to agree with him in that area. Albert thought it should be in the role of scientists to approach their work as play, not a job. Science should be attempted in the spirit of play to satisfy everyone’s curiosity. To do “good things” should not be the concern or judgment of a scientist. Only later can we be judgmental about the results, not before hand. This too, speaks of a human bending to political will not Pure Science to me, Dr.Wood.

“There’s really no effective way for an individual scientist to stop someone else from using the knowledge for something they shouldn’t”

Again it should not be the concern of a scientist to “stop” any one else from doing anything. This again is a very human judgmental statement that irks me, until I look in the mirror.

“There is no technology that hasn’t been used for some evil purpose at some point”

This is not a statement I expected a hero of mine to make, unless I put it into a political context with an appeasing motive. I forgive you Dr. Wood, and understand.

“I do think it’s inevitable, and it’s virtually impossible to legislate that away”

Thanks for that touch of pragmatic realism, I strongly agree!

“I am touted as the first man to, quote-unquote, “clone himself.” (chuckle)”

I’m touched by being the first free-roaming Oracle of modern times, too. And I’m still laughing, not just chuckling!.

“how to deal with the issue of whose cells we should use”

If this was an issue, you are not very mature in the ethics department, Dr. Wood. The way an Oracle looks at it is: Life is Life.

“whether we should let the world and the scientific community know”

Again a dilemma, I remember being a part of the pioneering stage of the sport of hang gliding. It was our strategy to spill our individually gained knowledge into the growing pool of common knowledge. We kept no secrets from each other, because our lives depended on being open and gaining knowledge. Here is another indication of the lack of ethical perspective of Dr. Wood. Wouldn’t the lives of all those suffering patients which motivated him, depend on a dissemination of info?

“In the end we decided that we wanted to put a human face on cloning”

You have indeed with this interview, more so than exposing your own role in the experiment, to me.

“I didn’t anticipate it would create the firestorm of controversy that it’s created”

This speaks to Dr. Wood’s other human quality, his myopia. He’s just too involved with his research to have understood its impact. Now you have learned something that I’ve known for a long time, Dr. Wood. Anything to do with reproduction research is controversial, because humans are “Fraudulent Apes” especial where sex is concerned.

“but I’m still glad we went down that path. We received thousands of e-mails and phone calls from people who need help”

Again I see the conflicted “but” in use. Of course you can’t regret having gone down a certain route, it is a waste of time.

“I think by coming forward and putting a face to it we made it very real”

this is evidence of the doctor’s conflict. To me that is a good sign, because he’s thinking. It is always important for a scientist to remain flexible in his thought processes.

“One other group had done this with a stem cell in humans, but other than that, there’d been no evidence that anyone had been able to take a fully differentiated adult cell”

Yes of course we know you were the one, Sam! But there were many on whose shoulders you stood. This is a display of a touch of human vanity. So glad to see the doctor wishes to join my club. This is also very human and sweet, because to me it means that he isn’t so full of himself. It really says he lacks self assurance, to me.

“I always thought that when our research was successful that I would just be pleased that we accomplished this when others had not. (chuckle)”

He’s a very competitive dude. If Sam flew hang gliders at the time I did, we would have had a good time trying to out distance each other.

“In reality, it is transcendent - when you look through the microscope, you see what you may have looked like a long time ago”

I’ve had many of those moments. I once looked up the high wing of my glider and realized that I was connected in real time to our Star through stellar fusion. In a glorious moment the understanding came to me that the energy which produced these surges of up acceleration I felt, the creaking of the airframe, the feel of the air stream on my face, were all born on the sun 93 million miles away. The energy had traveled at the speed of light to heat up the earth below me, which transferred that heat to the air, which I was soaring into the bottom of the cloud with. Talk about transcendent!

“When I looked down and saw that cloned blastocyst, it brought tears to my eyes”

I’ve actually had many such moments and have studied the processes of thought which might help stimulate them and written a treatise on it, entitled “Soaring and the Art of Umbrella Flight”. Many people see such insights in their own challenges and each is a wonderful experience. I’ll give one example of such a moment driven by necessity, the mother of invention, in my own life. My brother and I were in the wilds of New Brunswick on a borrowed BMW 500 old model motorcycle. I was pulling away from the pumps of a country gas bar just before closing time, when the clutch cable gave out. Upon checking it out, I saw that the barrel through which the cable interfaced with the two tines of the clutch fork lever had broken. The ball remained on the end of the cable, but could not engage the the tines, going right through them. It was at the moment that the first lights were being turned off, when the solution came to me. I ran to the owner and asked if had a vise and a hacksaw and hammer that I could borrow for just a moment. I cut a lot into a penny a little less than halfway through, and using a hammer curled the penny into a round shape imitating the barrel that had broken. The slot engaged the ball on the cable end just the same as the barrel had done. The repair lasted until we got home and for two more months until the new cable cam from the Father land. I’m sure thousands of eureka moments like this occur daily in every field. All are equally pleasurable and important to those who were seeking a solution.

“There are a variety of opponents to our work”

That’s too bad, because its stupid top restrain the pursuit of knowledge for religious reasons in my opinion. See http://www.topix.com/forum/ca/vancouver-bc/TTHAE72HT8ABGRGJM

“There’s usually no dialogue between the researchers in the embryonic stem cell field and those who oppose it”

That is the root of most human problems: poor communications. And I spell dialog that way sometimes, too.

“doesn’t make sense to me that it’s such an emotional and contentious topic. Logically, this is not life”

This statement again speaks to the good doctor’s naivety. It shows me that he is as human as I am, in some areas.

“I agree it’s a potential life, but the vast majority of embryos never become life”

Again the argument over semantics shows me an ethical state in flux. This means he is growing, open, and that is all one can ask.

“but it doesn’t make sense to me to look at an embryo in a lab and give it all the rights of a human life.”

It doesn’t make sense to me either and thanks for stating it.

“Cloning is the here and now, whether we like it or not, so we should strive to understand it”

That is why we shouldn’t really be too concerned about what the fundamentalists think, because they live in the world of Biblical times and in all of our history, have not gained a good reputation.

“but I assume they’ve looked very carefully at this.”

There has been a lot of meaningless political spin spun on this topic. This should pure science, period. You know what has been said about assuming anything, Dr. Wood, don’t you?

“From a scientific or medical standpoint, it’s hard to imagine there will be a problem with consuming a cloned animal

Yeah, you may be right, but having partaken of Dr. Hofmann’s magic, I have seen that every challenge/problem has so many facets of avenues of understanding that two examples of standpoints don’t cut it.

“Stem cell research is a very competitive field”

Which field isn’t? This again speaks to doctor’s understandable myopia. He’s focused on a very specific part of an area of study, and doesn’t even realize his own condition is a product of that isolation. This too, makes him sweetly human in my books.

“You want to let people know you’re making progress, but don’t want to say too much”

The fact he expressed this conflicted statement as to the goal of achievement of results for those suffering from diseases, makes him human to me. He wants to win the prize, recognition, money as much as he wants to help the suffering.

“This research involves the careers of various people, so you do protect what you’ve done until you’re sure you've done it right. It’s friendly competition”

This is the sentiment of someone interested in protecting patents as much as he is helping people who are suffering.

“It’s also a very expensive field. We’re privately funded”

Ah ha, there is the old pecuniary worm eating at principals and ethics, again

“We don’t plan on going public any time soon; we like the flexibility of being private”

Could this be a way of enticing more investors, with a lure of promise, wrapped in secrecy?

“No one really knows how long it’s going to take before we create products that are commercially viable or if there will be a payback”

There is the real goal isn’t it Dr. Samuel, isn’t it?

“If you’re doing this type of research, you should be doing it for love and not money.”

What an oddly human statement to make in light of he’s said just in the last breath, don’t you think? To me it shows his human inner flux and that he really is humanly out of depth in this ethical perspective. In my estimation he is trying, though.

“but, how can your focus be on money when you look at, literally millions of people suffering from degenerative diseases with absolutely no treatment available?”

Again, in my estimation, this speaks to Dr. Samuel’s sweet inner human nature that these conflicting thoughts are being verbalized by him. I respect him for his unabashed honesty and boldness.

“I think this is the future of medicine. It will be the "Century Of Stem Cells"...the century when all these diseases that have eluded treatment will be readily and routinely treated”

This is spoken with the true enthusiasm and a slightly human touch of myopia of an expert in his field. Many of these highly focused people have made such small minded but loyal predictions.

“My gosh, we were so backwards.”

“We ARE” would be more appropriate. I strongly suggest Dr. Wood read “Illusion of conclusion” http://www.orato.com/lifestyles/2008/04/30/illusion-conclusion

“It will be astonishing to anyone that there ever could have been a vote against this kind of research”

I sure hope that in the future there will be fewer people as naive in this area than Dr. Wood appears to be. This is normal human behavior to be against anything new. Even Dr. Wood seems to have a lot of things he’s expressed reservations about.

This whole interview exposes the human side of scientific thinking to me. The dilemma is simple: should we be afraid of progress? Should we put religious ethical restrictions on the pursuit of knowledge?

I think, that if we do allow religion to limit progress for ideological reasons, we will not survive as a species, nor do we deserve to.

These ethical questions must be tackled using reason by all humans, just like the doctor is trying to do