Would you be willing to pay $155K to bring your deceased pet back?

Nope.. And I love my cat. I would rather spend the money to have pets fixed. Or help people in Africa. Or have Republicans fixed.

Eesh that is seriously pushing it. No, sorry Shakira!! :S
But I wouldn’t do it on myself so yeah.

No. That’s not the deceased pet, that’s its twin.

No:

1. I don’t think the technology is perfected, which means genetically damaged animals are likely. I find that cruel.

2. Animals and people are the sum of their life experiences as well as their genetic code. The clone, from the moment it starts accumulating those, starts diverging from the original by definition.

3. With all the unwanted domestic animals in the world, this kind of expenditure is obscene for this purpose.

I don’t know whether or not I would even want to do that for my dogs. I have spent a lot of money already at the vet for them, but I think I would have to say no to this. They might look exactly the same, but their personality and spirit would be very different.

As for humans, I don’t think I would even touch that either. Everything in life must run its course. Death is inevitable.

Cloning merely duplicates the genotype. The phenotype will be an entirely new animal.

Nope.

Marina said it well and I could think of better things to do with that money (like adopt another daughter, pay for their college, etc.)

I find it particularly interesting that the clone goes to the bush where the original is buried and hangs out there. That’s kind of eerie. I would love to know the explanation behind that.

@PnL Some say that animals see the spirits of those that died. On a more prosaic note, most backyard burials are shallow and dogs are attracted to the smell of decomposing meat.

I would never do that. I don’t want to run the risk of utter disappointment let alone the risk of a demon or possessed animal.

Call me a cheapo, but I’m thinking Pet Cemetery.

My boyfriend and I just read this on CNN and were talking about it! He would totally do it to bring back his cat, but he never wants to have kids and the cat is pretty much it for him, child-wise.

I don’t think either of us could actually spend the money, as normals. That couple has all the NASCAR money, though, so good for them! Supporting science is important and probably spending unholy amounts to do this has really helped those scientists recover costs.

@Marina – Yes, but if it’s the smell that is the case, wouldn’t the other trillion i think it is actually 10 dogs be attracted to the same bush too?

there are factors to be considered…for instance, the first dog to be cloned was in 2005. So there is no evidence yet as to whether the animal’s life span is affected or not or whether a cloned animal will have problems at all.

For every successful cloned dog, there were more than 200 unsuccessful attempts.

IMO it’s a scam. For $150K, I’ll find you a copy of your pet.

I got a kick out of the fact that this couple WON the opportunity to have a cloned pet for $155K. However, the normal cost is $150K. They could have saved $5K by not WINNING.

@PnL If they got close enough to pick up the scent as more interesting than all the other fabulous scents they are taking in.

No, I wouldn’t be willing to clone my cat. Besides the fact that she’s been gone, lo, these nine years, I think it’s a waste of resources. The money could be better spent helping humans or cleaning up some of the messes we’ve made.

As much as I love my pets, my answer is no.
1. $155 thousand is a lot of money. Too much money for me. However, if a person had that much money and wanted to spend it on that then good for them. Personally, I would make other uses of it.
2. The clone is still going to die, right? I mean, they don’t live forever. Losing a pet all over again is just as hard as losing it the first time. It would hurt too much to go through that twice, especially with the “same” pet.
3. There are so many other abandoned animals that are just as loving who need a home. I’d rather adopt one of them and try to give them a good life and lots (and lots and lots and lots) of love.

Nope. It would not be the same animal, and with that amount of money I could do much better things.

No. Every animal is unique and I have better uses for the money.

Oops! scamp just said that.

Must be true, then.

Am I being snarky if i bring up the sourness of the ground up at the old Micmac burial mounds?

i waited for all the serious answer first :)

Since @Blondesjon has set the snark free…

I think that I will just hold onto my cash and hope that someday $155k will bring me back from the dead.

Husband, maybe, but not a pet.

No. In the words of Don Henley “don’t look back, you can never to back”.

@Lightlyseared – what? oh. do you mean you can never go back?

@PnL err… yes… thanks for that bloody iPhone

why is this popping up as a new question for me?

If I could be sure her clone would taste as good as she did, then yes.

@AstroChuck
Great minds think alike.

Pet Cemetery was free.. but you saw what happened there. I guess you get what you pay for.

NO I wouldn’t. I wouldn’t pay that much to get my grandfather back either. Haven’t you seen the sixth day?

WTF and I both agree. No, we would not want to bring back to life one of our pets. I asked WTF if he’d like to have OJ his cat of 14 yrs brought back be it a clone, OJ as a baby or at the time of his death. He said, absolutely not. He (OJ) live a long and good life. Plus we had him cremated. I told him I’d rather donate the money to the ALS Foundation.

Just because you pay the money for a cloned animal does not mean that you get the animal who died back. You get a GENETIC copy. Not an emotional copy, not the experiences who made this pet who they are, who they are. Just because you had a loving dog, for example, doesn’t mean you are necessarily going to get a loving clone of this dog.

No. I wouldn’t. It wouldn’t be fair to the memory of the animal, or human (if it was possible) to do so.