# Would you pay $50,000 for a cat? **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [December 23, 2004, 3:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pay-50-000-for-a-cat/281335 "2004-12-23T15:49:02Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Eve](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Eve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eve)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2004, 6:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pay-50-000-for-a-cat/281335/21 "2004-12-23T18:15:02Z")
> [@Aesiron](#): > > Brief hijack: While not quite as easy as that scenario, euthanasia or physician assisted suicide is legal in Oregon. I’m movin’ to Oregon. ---
**Author:** ![calm\_kiwi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/9fc348/32.png) [@calm\_kiwi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/calm_kiwi)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2004, 6:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pay-50-000-for-a-cat/281335/22 "2004-12-23T18:15:20Z")
> [@Eve](#): > > I just wish we had that choice with people! Well said **Eve**. I promised myself I wouldn’t climb on that hobby horse again so thank you for saying it. ---
**Author:** ![Tiggrkitty](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tiggrkitty/32/17966_2.png) [@Tiggrkitty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tiggrkitty)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2004, 6:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pay-50-000-for-a-cat/281335/23 "2004-12-23T18:17:13Z")
I had the pleasure of owning a cat for 22 years. Would I have cloned him? No. A clone is not 100 percent of the cat it was cloned from. It is the image of the cloned cat but in no way would have the original’s personality. Consider twins. They look alike, but they do not act alike. I would rather have the original than a copy. ---
**Author:** ![Revtim](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/revtim/32/1042_2.png) [@Revtim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revtim)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2004, 7:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pay-50-000-for-a-cat/281335/24 "2004-12-23T19:10:07Z")
> [@Annie-Xmas](#): > > I wouldn’t even pay $25,000 for [Schroedinger’s cat](http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a1_122.html) Especially since half of 'em turn out dead. ---
**Author:** ![delphica](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e9a140/32.png) [@delphica](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/delphica)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2004, 7:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pay-50-000-for-a-cat/281335/25 "2004-12-23T19:27:14Z")
I wouldn’t clone my cat, certainly not for $50,000 and probably not even if it were free. Nothing could replace the Gryff, he’s an individual. However, I will freely admit that if I had $50,000 stashed away somewhere, and the little Gryff was catnapped and held for ransom … I’d have a hard time not parting with the $50,000. Despite the insane premise (Who would catnap the Gryff? It would be more like the Ransom of Red Chief.), I feel that spending $50,000 for my own cat would make more sense than spending $50,000 for some random copy of my cat. Of course, it would be nice if the $50,000 were just a decoy and the Feds were able to retrieve the Gryff, catch the catnappers, and return my $50,000 to me … okay, things are obviously a little too quiet in the office the day before Christmas Eve, as I’m going _way_ too far down this path. This is all based on the notion that I have $50,000 hanging around, which I do not. So don’t get any ideas about snatching the Gryff! 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Oregon\_sunshine](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/50afbb/32.png) [@Oregon\_sunshine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Oregon_sunshine)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2004, 7:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pay-50-000-for-a-cat/281335/26 "2004-12-23T19:40:05Z")
If it was $500 to clone kitties, I would _definitely_ clone my Lucky. Preferably years and years prior to her death - so she could help to socialize the new little tadpole, of course. Lucky is the _best_ of barn-cat stock - personality, affection, intelligence, and survival instinct. If you’ve never met her, you probably wouldn’t understand. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![scr4](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/59ef9b/32.png) [@scr4](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scr4)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2004, 7:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pay-50-000-for-a-cat/281335/27 "2004-12-23T19:57:29Z")
I don’t see why some people are upset about this. It’s no more unnatural than a breeder saying “this cat and that cat have desirable traits so I’m going to breed them.” Also, wouldn’t this be a good way to advance cloning technology without the ethical problems of human cloning? Something that may one day be applicable to therapeutic cloning, perhaps? I’m very happy to hear companies making money while working on this technology. ---
**Author:** ![ivylass](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/9de053/32.png) [@ivylass](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ivylass)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2004, 8:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pay-50-000-for-a-cat/281335/28 "2004-12-23T20:00:17Z")
The owner, Julie said > [@](#): > > “He is identical. His personality is the same,” the owner, Julie, told The Associated Press in a telephone interview. So I don’t think she did it as a replacement. She did it in an attempt to bring her pet back to life. That’s just a bit icky. ---
**Author:** ![CrazyCatLady](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/dfb087/32.png) [@CrazyCatLady](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CrazyCatLady)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2004, 8:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pay-50-000-for-a-cat/281335/29 "2004-12-23T20:03:29Z")
> [@badmana](#): > > it’s probably close enough “Close enough”? I don’t want to get into a discussion of the idea of “close enough” to something or someone you loved dearly. Anyway, people who would pay this kind of money for a clone of their beloved pet don’t want “close enough;” they want the exact same pet again, little personality quirks and all. And that’s exactly what they can’t have. A clone is just an animal that’s genetically the same as your pet. It’s going to have different conditions for fetal development, different nutritional factors after birth, different formative experiences. In short, it’s going to be a whole different animal. It’s just going to look a lot like the other one. I don’t know about you, but I don’t love my animals because of how they look. I love them because they’re _them_. A clone wouldn’t and couldn’t be _them_. The important part, the part I’d want, would be gone. I dunno about you, but I can’t see spending $50K on a Mars bar in a Snickers wrapper, when I could go buy a Mars in a Mars wrapper for a buck. ---
**Author:** ![aruvqan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aruvqan/32/2891_2.png) [@aruvqan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aruvqan)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2004, 8:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pay-50-000-for-a-cat/281335/30 "2004-12-23T20:21:12Z")
> [@vetbridge](#): > > I walk into the next room and diagnose end stage bone cancer causing excrutiating pain, and the client declines euthanasia in order to save $20. > > Different strokes. Hm, I can donate 20 towards the next owner like that…if you can give a dose to the pet and to the owner…sheesh. I have been so broke I had to get the vet to take $5 a month for euthanasia for one of my pets. Maybe we can hope the owners like that end up in some similar illness and have a doctor that disbelieves in medicating terminal patients with that heroin speedball stuff my uncle had when he was dying… ---
**Author:** ![aruvqan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aruvqan/32/2891_2.png) [@aruvqan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aruvqan)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2004, 8:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pay-50-000-for-a-cat/281335/31 "2004-12-23T20:23:57Z")
> [@Podkayne](#): > > OTOH, it might be good for our society to get some “experience” with this process with pets before we are able to clone humans. If people have cloned their cats and found that, surprise, it’s not the same cat, then maybe we’ll be less inclined to create human lives laden with unrealistic expectations. I can’t imagine wanting to do so itself, but if someone really _understands_ the implications of cloning a dead kid and decides they really want to do it, well, best wishes, I guess. And cloning pets could give people a way to really understand cloning. That is a damned good idea=) I know I would love to see cloning of body part replacements, my back could do with a good replacement, as would my pancreas=) but I couldnt bring myself to want to actually kill a person for the organs evenif it was jsut a mini-me…though making a clone of me to raise as a child-not-me would interest me[or maybe one of my hubby] Now if they can come up with some way to take biopsies of my organs and use those to clone a duplicate organ… ---
**Author:** ![jackelope](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/a6a055/32.png) [@jackelope](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jackelope)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2004, 8:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pay-50-000-for-a-cat/281335/32 "2004-12-23T20:36:07Z")
The trend in this thread seems to be that most people would NOT pay $50,000 for a cat. If anyone DOES want to pay $50,000 for a cat, my e-mail is in my profile; contact me and we’ll dicker. Don’t tell my wife I said that. ---
**Author:** ![FilmGeek](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/b19c9b/32.png) [@FilmGeek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FilmGeek)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2004, 8:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pay-50-000-for-a-cat/281335/33 "2004-12-23T20:51:02Z")
I’ll pay $100 for a cat. (that’s the adoption rate + alteration at our local humane society). Cloning anything to “get it back” is, as was said above, icky. ---
**Author:** ![yosemite](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/3ab097/32.png) [@yosemite](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yosemite)\ **Post date:** [December 23, 2004, 10:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pay-50-000-for-a-cat/281335/34 "2004-12-23T22:02:35Z")
Cloning to “get it back” is deluded, but if that’s what they want to do, and it makes them happy—hey, it’s their money. I also agree that the "But you could spend the money so much _better_ . . . " line of reasoning is very irritating. If everyone took that sort of thinking to heart, we’d all live in little grey box houses and drive little grey box cars, and we wouldn’t have any hobbies or pastimes, because _really_, the money could be spent better, now couldn’t it? Ugh. Irritating. Agreed, I’d say that this woman wasted her money (according to my idea of “waste”) but it’s her money, her emotions, and at the end of the day, it’s not my call to make. I hope she’s happy. I hope that the cloned kitty lives a long time and has a good life. ---
**Author:** ![badmana](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@badmana](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/badmana)\ **Post date:** [December 24, 2004, 4:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pay-50-000-for-a-cat/281335/35 "2004-12-24T16:07:23Z")
> [@CrazyCatLady](#): > > “Close enough”? I don’t want to get into a discussion of the idea of “close enough” to something or someone you loved dearly. Anyway, people who would pay this kind of money for a clone of their beloved pet don’t want “close enough;” they want the exact same pet again, little personality quirks and all. > > And that’s exactly what they can’t have. A clone is just an animal that’s genetically the same as your pet. It’s going to have different conditions for fetal development, different nutritional factors after birth, different formative experiences. In short, it’s going to be a whole different animal. It’s just going to look a lot like the other one. I don’t know about you, but I don’t love my animals because of how they look. I love them because they’re _them_. A clone wouldn’t and couldn’t be _them_. The important part, the part I’d want, would be gone. I dunno about you, but I can’t see spending $50K on a Mars bar in a Snickers wrapper, when I could go buy a Mars in a Mars wrapper for a buck. No, what I’m talking about are people who so desperately want their cat/dog/child back that _anything close to_ their cat/dog/child is enough to replace them in their mind. I’m not saying that’s right or wrong but it’s just how it is. I personally know I can’t have my cat back but if I could get an all white cat back with the same face, ears and body shape I’d take it (although not for 50K unless I was seriously rich). I’m thinking this lady might truely be delusional but since she’s not hurting anyone (but herself maybe) I won’t bother her. And I’d like to think anyone who actually looked up a cloning company (I didn’t even know they existed!) would also do some basic research on how cloning works. It might just be possible that cats and other “lower” animals do have genetic dispositions to certain things making some of their personality a genetic trait rather than fully environmental. ---
**Author:** ![Morgyn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/morgyn/32/3041_2.png) [@Morgyn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Morgyn)\ **Post date:** [December 24, 2004, 6:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pay-50-000-for-a-cat/281335/36 "2004-12-24T18:54:27Z")
> [@Eve](#): > > My cat has lung cancer (I _told_ her to quit smoking, but did she listen?) and the vet said, “well, you could do surgery and radiation and chemo,” and I said that Dorothy is 15 years old, has a serious heart condition, thyroid trouble and an abdominal hernia, and I am _not_ going to put her through torture to maybe give her another year. I’ll wait till she seems to be in _any_ discomfort (she seems fine so far), and the vet will come over here and euthanize her at home. My cat has stomach cancer. My vet told me that we could treat aggressively with chemo, but it would be 6 months of treatments happening once a week. If we were lucky, she’d get maybe 6 months to a year more. Without, the vet thought 3 to 6 months. Koshka is 14 and otherwise in perfect health, but I wouldn’t put her through the treatment regimen described either, and for the same reason. As long as she’s happy and confortable, I’m happy. She gets lots of extra loving, and when it comes time the vet will do what’s necessary. ---
**Author:** ![shijinn](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/cc9497/32.png) [@shijinn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/shijinn)\ **Post date:** [December 24, 2004, 8:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pay-50-000-for-a-cat/281335/37 "2004-12-24T20:39:03Z")
> [@badmana](#): > > … Even if it’s not an “exact” copy, it’s probably close enough and it’s a nice feeling to have your pet back (I’m sure lots of parents with dead kids will want this even though it’s not “the same kid”). … No. think about it. really? would you want some innocent doppelganger to pretend that he or she is your lost child? that is just, _wrong_. > [@scr4](#): > > … I don’t see why some people are upset about this. … it’s not the money. it’s just that the amount spent shows that the expectation is to resurrect or make an exact copy of the same cat, but that isn’t true. from the OP’s link: > [@](#): > > … It takes many gruesome failures to produce just a single clone. … is that anything like that Alien sequel that does not exist where ripley saw her deformed clones? ---
**Author:** ![OpalCat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/8edcca/32.png) [@OpalCat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OpalCat)\ **Post date:** [December 25, 2004, 2:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pay-50-000-for-a-cat/281335/38 "2004-12-25T02:50:50Z")
I can understand cloning an animal that was really exceptional, like a trained animal that was really, really smart (a really good seeing eye dog, for example) because the chances of the clone also being really, really smart and trainable are high. ---
**Author:** ![Diceman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/22d042/32.png) [@Diceman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Diceman)\ **Post date:** [December 25, 2004, 3:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pay-50-000-for-a-cat/281335/39 "2004-12-25T03:28:32Z")
> [@OpalCat](#): > > I can understand cloning an animal that was really exceptional, like a trained animal that was really, really smart (a really good seeing eye dog, for example) because the chances of the clone also being really, really smart and trainable are high. Apparently, they already clone prize cattle, and some companies want to clone dogs (presumably, purebread breeds that are in high demand). I don’t have a problem with this, because the customer knows what he’s getting: an animal that is genetically similar to one that he admires. Nothing more. The woman who had her cat cloned is clearly hoping to get _the very same cat that died_ back. These people are taking advantage of her, and that’s wrong. ---
**Author:** ![Typo\_Negative](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/typo_negative/32/484_2.png) [@Typo\_Negative](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Typo_Negative)\ **Post date:** [December 25, 2004, 3:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pay-50-000-for-a-cat/281335/40 "2004-12-25T03:54:30Z")
I would not pay 5 dollars for any cat. I can a cat for free. And I would love that cat as much as the one some nimrod paid 50 grand for. True, it’s her money. But a fool and her money have been parted. She wanted her beloved cat back. Understandable sentiment, to be sure. _But she doesn’t get her beloved cat back!!_ She gets one with same genes. Unless it has the _exact_ same life experiences, and even then… > [@](#): > > “He is identical. His personality is the same,” I submit that this is wishful thinking. This seems like chapter one of a bad science fiction story… [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pay-50-000-for-a-cat/281335.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/would-you-pay-50-000-for-a-cat/281335.md?page=3)