Word: experimentally
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The experiment at the center of the controversy seems, in many ways, unworthy of the hoopla. It is not the Jurassic Park-type cloning most people think of, in which genetic material from a mature individual -- or DNA from an extinct dinosaur -- is nurtured and grown into a living replica...
Nor does the Hall-Stillman experiment involve genetic engineering -- the cutting and splicing procedures by which DNA strands within the nuclei of cells are mixed and matched. In one kind of genetic engineering, scientists have inserted human genes into the DNA of bacteria in order to mass-produce insulin and...
When one of those single-celled embryos divided into two cells, the first step in development, the scientists quickly separated the cells, creating two different embryos with the same genetic information. (This sometimes happens naturally inside a mother, and the result is identical twins.) In the process, though, the researchers...
The scientists replicated their procedure many times, producing 48 clones in all. That was the entire experiment. None of the clones grew for more than six days. The scientists had no intention of starting an embryo factory, selling babies or doing anything else that ethicists worry about.
In fact, Hall and Stillman were totally taken aback by the furor they created. TIME correspondent Ann Blackman asked Hall if he feared that his work would create a backlash against this kind of research. "I revere human life," said Hall, his voice choking with emotion. "I respect people's...