Robert Wachbroit

About the author: Robert Wachbroit is a research scholar at the Institute for Philosophy and Public Policy at the University of Maryland School of Public Affairs.

Many people incorrectly believe that cloning would produce children who are genetically predetermined to possess particular traits or to serve a utilitarian purpose and who consequently would be viewed as something less than human. Cloned humans would develop individually, the same as any other human, and therefore would be afforded the same rights as noncloned humans. A ban on human cloning would be counterproductive because it would encourage belief in genetic determinism—the false theory that an individual's personality is entirely determined by genes and that the environment plays no role in development. Such a ban also would likely be ineffective because cloning technology is simple to...