Cloning Issue Essays - Cloning, Human Cloning, Dolly,

Cloning Issue Genesis 11:1-9 records the sad story of the building of the tower of Babel. That project stands out as the first chapter in a story that continues to this day, and includes many similar kind of undertakings. As technology and ability increase so does man's ability to do things that are ultimately not in his best interest. The first objection is that cloning is not wise. Wisdom is knowing the end of a matter from the beginning. Proverbs 14:15 tells us "The naive believes everything, But the sensible man considers his steps." It is sensible or prudent to think carefully about the path we are walking, and where it will lead us. Proverbs 22:3 reminds us "A prudent man foresees evil and hides himself, But the simple pass on and are punished." We want to be the kind of people who are actively looking out for evil before we are involved in it so deeply that escaping it is hard and painful. In Luke 14:28ff Jesus urges this same kind of thinking we He talks about counting costs. In that context He is urging us to count the cost of serving Him, but the principle applies to all of life: we should count the cost before we do something, before we embark on a project. We are at the place where wisdom says we need to stop for several reasons. First, no one really knows how it worked, if it will work again, or exactly why it worked. For certain, we know what they did, we know the procedure. But "Roslin scientists have said the cloning was the result of much hit-and-miss experimentation and needs to be refined through further research." Second, no one knows if the procedure is safe. To top it all off, we have no idea where this will lead. The possibilities and problems that could come from human cloning have not been thoroughly mapped out by any means. Interestingly, very little is said about potential good this could bring. No one is saying "If we can clone humans we can cure cancer." Science doesn't seem to be asking "Should we" only "Can we?" Yet everyone admits "the potential for evil is infinitely greater"than any good that might come of it. Think of some of the complications that may arise. What will we do with "bad copies" -- malformed babies who are the results of failed cloning experiments? The mind reels with the possibilities for sin and iniquity that human cloning presents. Cloning is just not wise. The folks at Babel ought to have asked "Should we?" before asking "Can we?" Are we wise enough to do better than they? The truth is that cloning is an attempt to control and choose who will be born. It is highly doubtful that we have the wisdom, moral sense, or moral fiber necessary to make good choices in that area. We lack the wisdom to develop cloning properly, use it, or understand it. Why should we continue down such a path? How wise is it to board a train going where we don't know, and traveling on untested tracks? The second objection to human cloning is that it can be outright sinful. This is true for several reasons. First, cloning results in abortions. Cloning is a complicated procedure that often does not work, so many, many cloned embryos must be made. In the Dolly experiment there were 277 cell fusions, resulting in 29 that began to grow and were implanted, 13 sheep became pregnant, but finally only 1 lamb. As one ethicist said, "It took 277 trials and errors to produce Dolly the sheep, creating a cellular body count that would look like sheer carnage if the cells were human." While toying with (and destroying) sheep embryos is not troubling to anyone what if that were done with human embryos? This is not an article on abortion, but we must advance the principle here that life begins at conception (see Psalm 139:13-16; Jer. 1:5). It is not right for scientists to murder hundreds of lives (that is what embryos are) in their scientific experiments! The means is not ethical. Further, cloning could be used to have a child outside of the family unit. God's order for the family is clearly set forth in Ephesians 6:1-4. Children need parents, both a mom and a dad. If you are not in a marriage where that home can be provided then the hard truth is God doesn't want you to have kids. But who is it

Rank of Four Countries by Various Democracy Rankings

Rank of Four Countries by Various Democracy Rankings to cover independent countries with population greater than 100,000. Vanhanen believes that the reason for the thirst for power is to get hold of the resources, increase in the power the people posses simplifies their access to scarce resources. Vanhanen democracy ranking offers an unconventional interpretation of democracy and autocracy. Autocracy is considered as the state where concentration of resources is higher in a single group. Democracy is achieved in situations where distribution of resources is among different groups. The conditions favorable for democracy are those which the spread of resources is broad and no individual group is neither able to retain its hold of the available resources over a long time nor is it able suppress the competitors. Variables indicating democratization level include competition (C) and participation (P). Competition and participation measures are combined into the democratization index through the use of the formula ID= (PC)/100. This formula is applicable in most countries independent of the civilization, economic, cultural, and geographic among other features that may be subordinate to the logic of evolution in political studies. Threshold qualifications for democracy are 10% for P, 30% for C, and 5% for the ID. (Melville et al, 2011). The human development index meets the wide concept of developments of the society and economy. From another perspective, although sometimes questioned the human development index is used as an indications of democracy. It is agreeable to say that the human development index offers the capability representing a greater measure of democracy. Although it is realized that the human development index considers life expectancy, GDP and other factors but fails to accommodate political structures. Democracy and political systems are correlated with democracy ranking placing great emphasis on the position of political structures on democracy In most cases a number of factors affect the democratic ranking of a country and they are politics 50%, gender 10%, economy 10%, knowledge 10% and health 10%(Campbell, 2008). According to polity project ranking the France system has a democracy of -8. This is because France in the recent years has witnessed political trends that have had the consequences of the country being downgraded and considered a flawed democracy state. Participation of public in politics has reduced and this has led to declined confidence of the public in political parties. With the nature of the French political system the president possesses great power and this is indicting a threatened democratic tradition. The current president, Nicholas Sarkozy uses an autocratic style, and this has seen the rise in anti-Muslim feelings and increased pressure on the media and journalist which has seen a decrease in the freedoms of the media (Liotier, 2011). Political parties are relatively few in France, workers unions are weak and the police system t is constantly accused with increased brutality the France government is highly undemocratic (Petzinger, 2011). With the justifications provided thereafter, the ranking of the United Kingdom using Dahls polyarchy measure is 5. Gender equity was already attained in the United Kingdom in the year 1928.The United Kingdom is believed to hold the reputation of being the mother of all parliaments but its system has complications that are mainly centered in key three areas. The ranking of the United Kingdom is downgraded by the fact that majority of its representation in parliament is distorted in that the actual seats in parliament is not solely determined by the votes. Other factors that reduce the ranking of democracy are; a media that mostly favors the interests of the private sector and the trust in the police force that is constantly declining (Petzinger, 2011). Basing on the Vanhanen index of democracy, Germany ranks at 10% in the ID. Germany accounts its high ranking in the democratic ranking to the comparatively large number of parliamentarians who are women and an impeccable separation between the arms of government that is the executive, the legislature and the judiciary with Bavaria being the most developed state. In most federal states a participation quorum of approximately 25% exists in any local referendum (Petzinger, 2011). Because of the suppressed political opposition and rights of the public, Russia ranks at 3 according to Dahls polyarchy measure. The trend in Russia system of government is that of unfair elections, intolerance of political oppositions, and courts that are characterized by high dependence. Currently Russia works on bribes and the opposition is literally invisible to the public, they cannot be allowed on television. Though there are constant demonstrations favoring democracy, they are largely ignored and authoritarian form of government presided over by Vladimir Putin is the order of the day (Lally Englund 2011). Out of the four democracy rankings considered in this essay, none of them is adequate enough to be satisfactory in the ranking of democracy. It is also noted that none of the democracy ranking measures includes (economic democracy) face four of Sodaros 4 faces which are: popular sovereignty, rights and liberties, democratic values, and economic democracy (Campbell, 2008). A number of factors have been found to contribute to democracy and as such must be included in the elements that are considered in the measure of democracy.