I don’t want this to turn into a Debate or anything, but I was wondering:
When cloning does come around in "everyday life" (I am assuming that it will *sometime* in the future), how would we be able to tell two clones apart from one another? For example: Say someone's clone steals a car, or commits a murder, how would it be proven that it was the clone, instead of the cloned person?
Currently, we have several methods that can be used to identify a suspect: blood test, feature recognition (facial, etc.), DNA test… but conceivably, none of those methods could be used in a case like this.
Is there something out there that I'm not aware of (or am I mistaken in my assumption that clones carry the **exact same** DNA structure)? Because I think we should think about things like this, with the idea of cloning becoming more and more of a reality.
And if the clone collects kiddie porn and you throw him out a window, you’d be making an obscene clone fall!
Someone had to say it.
I don’t see why the laws have to be changed one whit, since the justice system has already managed to survive the whole “identical twin” thing without crashing.
Now, when people start using DNA to frame each other… watch out!
It helps if you throw away that confusing “clone” term and think about it realistically.
What happens if a twin performs an illegal action? Well he is brought to justice. He still has unique fingerprint patterns iris patterns… all kinds of biometric data that is his alone. DNA is not a person, only the blueprint.
Of course, if I were cloned today, and my clone went on to commit a crime when he turned 18, we’d be distinguishable because he’d look 18, whereas by then I’d be 50 and presumably would be marginally less youthful-looking. Of course, if I had two clones of myself made today, this would present the same problems of identification which would be presented by various hypothetical scenarios involving criminality by my uncles Ronnie and Donnie. It’s still conceivable for two clones (or two naturally-born identical twins) to be readily distinguisable in appearance, for example if one of them gains or loses a lot of weight.
Ahh… I was unaware that identical twins carried the samd DNA structure as well (I thought it was just similiar… but it’s exact).
In the case of identical twins it looks like fingerprinting is used for identification (their fingerprints are different)… but that brings me to another question:
Do we know anything yet about the fingerprints, or iris’ of clones (would they differ like identical twins’ do)?
Well, given that identical twins have the same DNA, and they don’t have the same fingerprints, retinal patterns, etc., then of course this shows that clones won’t have identical fingerprints either.
Now, if someone ever invents a matter replicator/transporter like on Star Trek, that would be a different question.
A clone will have different fingerprint patterns and iris patterns than the cloned person, since a clone for all intents and purposes IS an identical twin (just born many years later). All the things we use now to distinguish identical twins will also work on clones. In fact, as several previous posters have pointed out, a cloned person and his/her clone will be EASIER to tell apart than naturally occuring identical twins, as they will probably differ greatly in age (and thus in physical appearance).
There are a lot of misconceptions of what a clone is, but calling it an identical twin seperated by years is probably the best non-technical summary, yes.
In fact, a lot of studies have been attempted on identical twins seperated at a young age and raised differently to attempt to answer the age-old biology vs. environment debate, which is quite pertinent.
Assuming that you were aware of the possibility of the criminal being a clone, you could either test the mitochondrial DNA or you could run other - more comprehensive - DNA tests on your forensic samples. Dolly the sheep was created from an udder cell of an adult sheep - when you genetically test Dolly, that inheritance shows in every one of her cells.
If you cloned an embryo, then you’d probably still get the same differences you see in monozygotic twins - different fingerprint and other biometric patterns.
