I'm Bummed, I Just Found Out That I Can't Be Cloned, page 3

I doubt it really matters. Nobody is getting cloned. Even the successful cloning of some animals has been beset by trouble. By the time it does matter they'll know how to clone anybody.

More likely than cloning is gene switching or grafting or insertion or therapy, essentially genetic engineering. They already have mapped the human genome, but they're busily figuring out how the genes work together. They're figuring out which configurations of genes are good and which are bad. For example, they've linked some genes potentially to alcoholism or addictive disorders. They've linked others to cancer. For example, Angelina Jolie discovered she had a particular gene or sequence of genes which greatly incrfeases rates of cancer in the breast and ovaries, so she chose to have a double mastectomy. She also had her ovaries and fallopian tubes surgically removed.In the future, they might figure out how to disable those genes or how to remove them from the general population. It may also turn out that not all out removing them is better.

The problem with cloning is it copies everything, flaws and all. If you had to rely on it, you'd have ot constantly find new people to clone who had the optimal genes. Trouble with that is environments constantly chagne and knowledge changes too, so very likely there's no perfect arrangement of genes in a given human. The end result is only by editing the genes direclty will we be able to achieve the control we want.

But even changing genes won't yield perfect results. A healthy lifestyle still means an active one with medical care availaable.

Here's the story about Angelina Jolie:
www.nytimes.com - Angelina Jolie Pitt: Diary of a Surgery...

And we're still in the beginning stages. Here's another gene they found linked to depression and stress. Note the quote below the link:
www.webmd.com - ‘Depression Gene’ Linked to Response to Stress...

Gene Testing Not Advised

Researchers still don’t know how this gene affects depression risk. “It seems like people who have the short genetic variant are more reactive to positive and negative events,” Sen says. “They react more emotionally in both ways.”

No one should go out and get tested for this gene given the small effect it has on depression risk, he says.

That said, discoveries like this one will help usher in the era of personalized medicine for the treatment of depression.

(....)

George Tesar, MD, a psychiatrist at the Cleveland Clinic in Ohio, says this genetic variation “is not a cause of depression, but a factor that increases risk of depression in certain individuals.”

It is not a given that if you have this gene, you will develop depression when you experience a stressful situation, he says.

edit on 8-7-2015 by jonnywhite because: (no reason given)