Don’t expect these cloned glow in the dark cats to replace the Glowworm in your home anytime soon…Â
I don’t spend much time on news sites, but yesterday I felt compelled to check out CNN.com and browse around the medical news. I was lucky enough (if lucky is the right word!) to find this video on cloning glow in the dark felines:
NOTE: This is about a 9 rating on the “Scariest Medical Experiments Of All Time” List.
I think what concerns me most is not the fact that these cats glow in the dark or the fact that they’re cloned. I think what bugs me most is that they’re BOTH.  It’s hard to not think that these scientists are experimenting with animal life by cloning as if the act of replicating the genes of these cats makes them less of a living being.Â
With that said, I assume then it’s OK to “pollenate” them with some highlighter fluid and see if they can’t hide in a dark closet or underneath the deck at dusk.
Annmarie and I were at the San Diego Zoo a year or so ago (likely another entire blog post) and we came across the cloned cow that they have on display. I couldnt’ help but feel slightly uncomfortable around it. I think it’s only a matter of time (if it’s not happening already) that we’ll be cloning humans for who-knows-what with little care nor forethought about the consequences of messing with mother nature in this most intimate way.
So I’ll leave you with this video and let you draw some conclusions. I’m not the expert on cloning nor do I think I know anything about it… but to see the glowing rings around that cat’s eyes and it’s flourescent pink tongue gives me a little tinge of unease. I would love to hear what you think! To make a comment on these glow in the dark cats, click here and scroll down to the bottom of the page!
Live Awesome!
Kevin
11:23 pm on December 16th, 2007
Way too often people with skills, intelligence and opportunity spend too much time thinking about what they can do and too little time thinking about whether they should. Science can be SO invasive and disruptive without thinking of the consequences. I whole heartedly believe that you’re right, Kevin. This is just the beginning of nothing good. They’re playing with fire.
8:37 pm on December 18th, 2007
Fire, yes they are playing with it and we’ll get burnt to a crisp.
We really need to get back to more of a farming economy — keep the organics, allow the bees and aniimals to flourish without being subjected to the nasty pesticides, feed the animals that we eat a vegetarian diet, bring back raw dairy, buy local.
We also need to stop trying to change the world. Stem cell research is fine but we should leave it at that.
Get rid of vaccines, keep the herbs and supplements 00 but don’t dare irradiate them.
9:27 pm on December 18th, 2007
Hi…
I was so moved when I saw this clip on the news a few days ago… and I was nearly sick when I saw it again today.
I’m not a scientist, I don’t have a science background… but I find it abhorrent that they could rationalise demonstrating that they can genetically modify a species to glow in the dark! And for what purpose? For what real purpose that actually benefits humanity??
Let’s get back to basics… basic respect for all life — including cats!
Jeanne
http://www.aspirationsplus.com
5:16 am on December 19th, 2007
Scientism as a religion (because it is one – it’s a belief system like any other) has one very large and gaping hole… Unlike almost any other system of belief (except politics, in fact) it has no moral obligation… It survives in a just post-Newtonian model of the universe, and has not even begun to understand the import of its own discoveries, let alone anything else.
This is not to knock science as such (which is a totally different discipline) but definitely to point a finger at the pseudo-science funded by military and corporate interest (and very often paid for by you and me).
The fascist assumption that we and our so-called “human intelligence” are the peak of evolution in fact goes back to some very wogga-wogga beliefs at the root of several particularly Near eastern religions… The fact is that EVERYthing present in the universe at this instant is the peak of evolution, and that we are all fellow travellers, in this together as we wing onward into eternity. Until we realise this, we are lost.
11:23 am on December 20th, 2007
We could spend the time and money making the world a more level playing field, for things like hunger, disease, housing, we have enough to go around, but some people think starting wars is a fiscal answer to our problems.
9:21 pm on December 20th, 2007
Many times throughout my day I find myself a bit saddened at what is happening to poor innocent animals as we are living our great lives.
They are being slaughtered for human consumption by the hundreds of thousands every 5 minutes, tested on for perfume and make-up and now we are cloning cats for glowing in the dark.
The only question I have is, ‘WHY?’.
What reason could there possibly be to do this? I cannot think of any..
Our animals are treated like ‘things’…not like living creatures who have feelings just like us. They cry, they laugh and they feel.
This is so sad..
10:39 pm on December 20th, 2007
In 1989 I graduated with a Bachelor degree in Biochemistry. I worked in a biomedical engineering corporation until I became a mom a couple years later.
During my employment in Research and Development I learned about the FDA regulations required of manufacturers regarding animal testing. I never participated in such abhorrent practices, and I strongly debated my superiors regarding subjecting animals to needless and pointless “tests”. (My work involved creating and improving surgical implements.)
True science does not advocate the use of animals to test products that will be used by humans. Animal and human physiology are significantly different – so much so that a separate education is required to be a human doctor or an animal doctor. How many schools do you know of that combine Medical School with Veterinarian School? These two programs might be on the same campus, but they are significantly different fields of study.
So how is animal testing scientifically justified? A true scientific mind will come to the conclusion that animal testing isn’t justified. However, there are those in scientific circles who have lost their ability to reason and have forgotten the true meaning and goal of scientific study.
This is arrogance of the highest order – having placed themselves as manipulative and careless gods over those whom they should be caring for with respect, and using their minds to improve the existence of others.
I am thankful for my education and all I learned while working in that field. I am also thankful for the last 15 years and the events that moved me away from a doctorate in pharmacy to a doctorate in Naturopathy.
Each time this topic of animal testing comes up in conversation, I quickly take scientific argument against this scientific idiocy. It makes absolute physiological nonsense to test one species for a product used on another species.
One of the excuses used by animal testing advocates is that they don’t want to get sued if a person is damaged or killed using their product. Well, that ‘all for profit’ mentality comes from two sources: 1. a society that is too quick to go to court and sue another person, and 2. the dumbing down of society as a whole, to the point that the average person does not possess even the slightest amount of common sense.
Such is the corruption of this human existence we now experience. And one of the consolations of this depravity is such things as glow-in-the-dark cats.
4:52 am on December 21st, 2007
It is so sad the way humans treat animals and shows how lacking in compassion and respect for these life forms. When we see more ethics in our treatment of animals the world will be a better place. Small things amuse small minds and these so called scientists are so much in their minds they have lost touch with their inner nature. They would contribute so much more to humanity if they used their minds for far greater things. The reason we have so many diseases, sickness in society is clearly shown from our avoidance of a natural wholefood diet in favour of processed foods. When we look for outer forms of gratification to feed our hungry souls we have forgotten who we really are.
10:26 pm on December 21st, 2007
On one hand they are behaving exactly like little children: the sort who pull the wings off of creatures to see what happens, or who torture cats and squirrels, etc… We’ve all heard stories or perhaps even have personal experiences of this behavior as children. There is some need to inflict dominance and pain to relieve their own. It is sad, and one can only hope that the greater good speaks out where it is most useful, to those responsible for allowing these sorts of errors in judgement. Science is accountable to the public, after all, but only if the public cares enough to lovingly correct them. They really need our help.