My general attitude toward life, conspiracy theories, and strange stories is this: If you see a black-and-white striped, horse-like animal on the savannah, assume it’s a zebra without overwhelming proof otherwise. Recently, our front pages have been hit by a truly strange bit of sensationalism — a sci-fi cult’s supposed attempt to clone a human baby. Me… with a strange, publicity-seeking cult, I assume that joke, delusion, or fraud is involved, just the same as, when a government the United States doesn’t like suddenly falls in Latin America, I assume we’re involved. In both cases, history, which doesn’t always have a lot to offer, should tell you this much. In the Latin American case, our media always starts by assuming, without incontrovertible proof otherwise, which often takes years to leak out, that the US isn’t involved. Now, it turns out that a similar attitude is on front-page display with the “Cult Clones Baby” story.
Not so long ago, this sort of story, along with rejuvenated Elvises, two-headed alien visitants, and Big Foot, was the stuff of supermarket tabloids, or at least very lazy summer media days. No longer. But, of course, underneath what will undoubtedly turn out to be a false claim, lies a sensationalism that must be addressed, that, in fact, is outracing, and will almost certainly continue to outrace, any attempts we might make to think, plan, legislate, or limit. At least, then, the media’s Raelian romp has led two fine writers, James Carroll in his most recent column in the Boston Globe, and Bill McKibben, environmentalist and author of, among other works, The End of Nature, in an op-ed in the Washington Post to put their brains to work on the issue of “improving” the species (thank you very much). I particularly like Carroll’s phrase, “our methods define us.” That could be a working definition of humanity, or inhumanity. Tom
Cloning, terror, and our humanity
By James Carroll
The Boston Globe
January 7, 2003THIS COLUMN was supposed to be about cloning. I was grappling with the questions implied in the bizarre claims of the cloning cult when the news came from Tel Aviv.
Theoretical problems tied to biology, and the quasi-comic way in which they presented themselves last week, paled before images of blood in the street, faces twisted in anguish, stunned witnesses. Even as I watched television closely, looking for familiar faces, afraid to find them, I knew I was back on the edge of the hole in the world’s heart. I found myself praying for my friends, who, as it happens, are Israelis and Palestinians both.
At times like this, the theoretical can seem a place to hide.
To read more Carroll click here
THIS COLUMN was supposed to be about cloning. I was grappling with the questions implied in the bizarre claims of the cloning cult when the news came from Tel Aviv.
Theoretical problems tied to biology, and the quasi-comic way in which they presented themselves last week, paled before images of blood in the street, faces twisted in anguish, stunned witnesses. Even as I watched television closely, looking for familiar faces, afraid to find them, I knew I was back on the edge of the hole in the world’s heart. I found myself praying for my friends, who, as it happens, are Israelis and Palestinians both.
At times like this, the theoretical can seem a place to hide.
To read more Carroll click here
Genetic Tinkering
A Threat to Our Coherent Human Future
By Bill McKibben
The Washington Post
January 6, 2003As the world waits for scientific confirmation or debunking of claims by the Raelians that they have cloned a human being, much attention has been paid to just how odd the group is. And rightly so. I interviewed Rael at UFOland, his Quebec headquarters, last summer, and it was among the strangest days of my life: a cordial chat with a former sportswriter wearing a white jumpsuit that looked like something from a “Star Trek” prop closet, just down the hall from a mock-up of the spacecraft where “the Elohim” first revealed themselves to him.
But the weirdness of the Raelians should not be allowed to obscure the wider mission they share with other self-proclaimed pioneers on the human genetic frontier — people who, though cloaked in science instead of sectarianism, foresee remaking human beings in ways that make the genesis of baby Eve seem almost innocent.
The writer is a scholar in residence at Middlebury College in Vermont and author of the upcoming book “Enough: Staying Human in an Engineered Age.”