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In Defense of Authenticity

As children, most of us held to one of winter's most cherished miracles, that of the billions of snowflakes that fall from the sky, with no two identical. Each tiny flake bears its own crystalline, intrinsic symmetry that is unmatched, paradoxically, by any other equally symmetrical, equally unique snowflake in the world.

It therefore came as quite a jolt to some of us romantics when a few years ago a group of scientists managed to come up with a snowflake's identical twin. The discovery challenged our confidence in mystery and threatened to rend asunder our long held belief in the authenticity of natural phenomena.

And then Dolly the sheep entered our world - or should I say, re-entered. Cloning - the stuff of science fiction novels, the object of lore for hundreds of years - had arrived at a level in the biological order (the Animal Kingdom, to be precise), that caused no less than a major shock wave. If the A-bomb was what emerged from the Pandora's Box of the great physicists, was Dolly the biologist's great response? If so, wouldn't a cloned lion have been a more symbolically impressive icon?

The medical ethicists had a field day with Dolly (no pun intended). As much as the A-bomb, cloning presents tough and unwieldy questions that seem to multiply more quickly than, well, a cloned cell. But the overriding question on people's minds was ultimately self-centered - will they be able to clone humans? The potential seems to be quite strong, though to date no one has succeeded. But if they do, what repercussions will humanity face?

As with most purely scientific research, the tangible manifestations yield conflicting results, as far as their benefit or detriment to humanity. Dynamite has killed scores of people, but it has also served as an indispensable tool for construction of tunnels, roadways and dams.

We may pause to consider the Potential upside and downside of human cloning - banks of organ donors, ready- made warriors, voluptuous Stepford wives on demand, disposable running backs, replicated scientists with incredible raw brain power, two or more of every one of us Oust in case the first wears out or for practical jokes on the wife and kids), bands of roving identical bandits (I can see the police line-up now). The list continues on ad-infinitum.

Because it might appear that I am treating the subject with unusual levity, let's return to our cherished snowflake and the team of scientists who managed to find the twin, in order to point out a few overlooked relevant matters as far as the issue of authenticity is concerned. They must have been rather impressed with themselves, those inquisitive researchers, upon their discovery - as they had a right to be. But if one looks deeper at the question, one finds that the story neither begins nor ends with the two identical snowflakes in question, nor will it begin or end with identical sheep, cows, geese or humans.

For the defense of authenticity rests not merely on the genetic or crystalline likeness between two entities. One must also consider the history and fate of each and every animate or inanimate object in our vast universe. Of two particular snowflakes that may be exactly alike in form, differences remain. Did they emerge from the same bank of clouds? Did they drift to earth in the same gentle pattern? Did one find its home on a windowsill of a farmhouse, the other on the branch of a tree? Was one made part of a snowball, the other left to slowly melt away and drip into a cold running creek?

As with the snowflake, so with Dolly and so with potential human clones. A clone of John Smith may be identical in all respects physically to John Smith, but that's where the likeness diverges. For John Smith (II) will lead a different life, be raised by different parents, be exposed to social and environmental elements that will in turn recomprise his biology, personality and genetic predispositions. John Doe (I) may have a gene for pancreatic cancer that lays dormant - John Doe (II) may not be so lucky. How John Doe (II) copes with the cancer will be a function of his past history and will affect his personality deeply and well into the future.

There is no dearth of issues that human cloning raises, some of them very serious from an ethical point of view and worthy of deep consideration by all members of society, especially the scientific and legal community. But ultimately, in defense of authenticity, it's wise to remember that we all still live in a dual world of nature/nurture with less predictability than we care to admit. Chaos, as the term has come to be used recently, is not such a bad thing as a necessary thing - keeping change alive through the constant dynamic interplay of randomness and order. That's the wonder of the Pandora's box.

To suggest another metaphor, we may, like Icarus, feel that we're flying dangerously close to the sun. But rather than fall to earth with melted wings, we may indeed end up with our wings frozen by a unique flurry of snowflakes, two of which might happen to look exactly alike. Either way, our authenticity is ensured.

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