The 1996 birth of Dolly the cloned sheep moved the cloning of
human beings from science fiction to possibility, but Americans
remain overwhelmingly opposed to the idea. According to a May 2004
Gallup Poll*, 88% think cloning humans is morally wrong --
essentially unchanged since Gallup began asking the question
regularly in 2001. Only 9% of Americans say human cloning is
morally acceptable.
Americans are less rigid about the moral acceptability of
cloning animals, although they say this practice is
morally wrong rather than morally acceptable by a 2-to-1
margin.
In follow-up interviews, a number of respondents were given the
opportunity to comment further on the issue. Their remarks
illustrate how the topic of cloning tends to provoke strong
feelings, involving in many cases Americans' powerful religious
beliefs as well as the typical American appreciation of the need
for scientific progress. Two comments in particular illustrate the
opposite viewpoints:
"Call me old-fashioned, but I think all cloning is morally
wrong," says Veda Hobbs of Arkansas. "I'm a Christian who believes
in creationism, and I think these things should be left up to
God."
Kevin, a 52-year-old Pennsylvanian who asked that his last name
not be used, disagrees -- he feels that all cloning is morally
acceptable. "We have to medically and scientifically move the human
race forward," he says. "If everyone was afraid of the unknown,
we'd all still think the world was flat."
What Does "Cloning" Mean?
The May 2004 poll question does not differentiate among the
various types of cloning -- such as reproductive cloning (a process
designed to result in the live birth of an animal or a human) or
cloning for research purposes (which may only involve cloning cells
or organs). The results of the current survey, taken in the context
of a 2002 Gallup survey asking about different types of cloning,
strongly suggests that respondents are thinking about cloning that
results in the creation of a human being when they are simply asked
for their views on "human cloning."
In that poll, 8% of Americans favored and 90% opposed "cloning
that is designed specifically to result in the birth of a human
being," nearly identical to the results from the current poll. But
the 2002 poll found higher support for more limited types of
cloning, including 59% for cloning organs to be used in medical
transplants and 51% for cloning human cells from adults to use in
medical research.
As those numbers suggest, the views of many Americans may have
grown more nuanced as the issues surrounding cloning research have
grown more complex -- and more controversial -- in the last few
years. When called back for further comments on their cloning
opinions, several respondents brought up the related issue of stem
cells. "Are you asking me about stem cell research?" was the first
thing Dolores (last name not used by request), a 73-year-old
respondent from Washington wanted to know when asked if she felt
cloning was morally acceptable or morally wrong. Regardless of her
opinion on stem cell research, Dolores feels strongly that cloning
both animals and humans for reproductive purposes is always wrong.
She does not see cloning as a moral or religious matter, but rather
as a pragmatic issue. "It's not natural and I can see no purpose to
it," she says.
But not all Americans automatically equate "cloning" with
reproductive duplication. Another respondent to the 2004 survey, a
Texas mother of 11-year-old identical twins who asked not to be
named, defines cloning primarily in terms of stem cell development.
"Twins run in my family," she explains, indicating there was no
scientific intervention in the twins' conception. "Cloning is not
only morally acceptable, it's absolutely necessary. If Congress
prohibits cloning to harvest stem cells for research, many
scientific possibilities may go undiscovered -- from replicating
cells to producing whole organs for transplant."
Bottom Line
Former President Ronald Reagan recently died after a 10-year
battle with Alzheimer's, a disease whose cure many scientists feel
can be greatly advanced through stem cell research. Former first
lady Nancy Reagan continues to advocate for the Human Cloning Ban
and Stem Cell Research Protection Act of 2003 currently being
considered in Congress, a bill that specifically prohibits
reproductive cloning but allows for the creation of new embryos for
stem cell research.
The bill's middle-ground approach may appeal to Americans
looking for a solution that addresses both ethical and medical
challenges. Walter Hochbaum, a 79-year-old retiree from Texas, has
serious moral concerns about cloning in general, but he makes
distinctions. "While I don't condone cloning for the purpose of
reproducing live animals or humans," Hochbaum explains, "I do feel
that cloning for therapeutic purposes and stem cell research is
morally acceptable."
*Results are based on telephone interviews with 1,000
national adults, aged 18 and older, conducted May 2-4, 2004. For
results based on the total sample of national adults, one can say
with 95% confidence that the margin of sampling error is ±3
percentage points.
