Cloning and Buddhism

Robert Kirkpatrick

Edited by:Alan Weller
alan@zolag.co.uk

The cloning of a sheep was reported recently. Doesn't this shed doubt on the Buddhist idea of rebirth? What is the Buddhist ethical position on cloning humans?

The cloning of a sheep was reported recently. Doesn't this shed doubt on the Buddhist idea of rebirth? What is the Buddhist ethical position on cloning humans?

While we may marvel at the inventiveness of these scientists (There is nothing more creative than citta, as the Buddha said), this poses no challenge to Buddhist teachings.To those who understand (to some degree) that all realities are anatta, not self, the cloning procedure doesn't seem so incredible. The Dhamma explains that all conditioned realities arise and pass away extremely rapidly - millions of times in a split second. These realities are classified as nama (mentality) and rupa (materiality, matter). Rupa includes everything in the material world, microscopic or macroscopic, and it is rupa (actually countless thousands of groups of rupa) that scientists implanted into the emptied egg of the sheep ( another rupa ), which formed the basis for the unconventional birth. Lord Buddha explained almost 2600 years ago (long before western scientists had studied the fertilisation process under the microscope) how the egg from the mother combines with the matter from the father to form the basis for a future life. At this stage the fertilised egg is still only matter. For a new life to begin mentality must join with this special matter and thus the round of birth and death continues. All that scientists are doing with this process is manipulating some matter to make it suitable for nama to interact with. Scientists are still using matter taken from an animal - i.e. biological matter. Even if scientists were able to make this subtle matter up entirely from chemicals ( it is not sure that they will ever be able to do this ) and grow the foetus in an artificial womb they can never manufacture mentality, or the matter that is produced by kamma or citta. (see note) As for the Buddhist ethical position on cloning humans; no one ,of course, can give an official Buddhist positon about this, we are guided by the teachings left by the Buddha. Anyway we are not world managers, we can be pragmatic. This new development is likely to bring benefits and costs-- we should learn to face both, like all events, with equanimity and thus be able to respond wisely as situations change. Realistically then, there may be cloned humans in the future but we shouldn't fear this or consider them as strange or any less human. A cloned child has no reason to feel she is different from anyone else as far as Buddhist philosophy is concerned - her kamma conditions birth in a suitable state to bring its results. There can certainly be wise cloned humans, as well as foolish ones, ones that can follow the Dhamma and attain nibbana, ones that will have no interest, and so on. I do think some of the ethical concerns fall away when we understand that a clone of a human could not be an exact copy, psychologically and kammically. Only the genetic matter is the same. Anyone who is acquainted with a set of identical twins (who are identical genetically) appreciates that they are different people despite their similarities. The fact that an identical twin is genetically the same yet is not identical in every psychological or other area is actually powerful evidence for the truth of rebirth. If there were many more identical twins, cloned or otherwise, it would perhaps be even clearer that genetics is only one part of the conditions that make up life. It certainly isn't that the twin will have identical cittas. Cittas (mind states) change rapidly and are dependent on many conditions including objects in the present - the seen, the heard,the tasted, the touched, the smelt - (loosely called "environmental factors" in conventional terms), and also kamma and tendencies accumulated from the recent and distant past. Thus Buddhism is in agreement with scientists about the importance of genetics and the environment in the formation of human character. But these alone do not fully account for all the variations that abound. Buddhism also gives detailed explanations about the effects of past accumulations of mental factors such as intelligence, kindness, conceit, anger , patience and many others - see the Abhidhamma, in particular, for an extraordinarily clear analysis of conditioned realities. Finally, life in the truest sense only exists for a moment, and then another moment conditioned by the previous moment arises. Whether we are genetically the clone of another human or not is really beside the point. What matters is that we begin to develop understanding of the realities that are appearing now : by studying, considering, and applying the sublime teachings that the Buddha left. Note: The causes for matter are temperature, citta, nutrition, and kamma.

copyright ©Alan Weller