Here, Kitty, Kitty!

摘要

With her big round eyes, her button nose and her I'm-ready-for-fun expression, the kitten named cc (short for carbon copy and copy cat) has a face that's almost impossible not to love, which may help explain why the hostility that usually accompanies news on the cloning front was almost drowned out last week by the sound of the press corps cooing on cue. Cc is the name the scientists behind the first cloned house pet gave their creation, a shorthaired calico that is a genetic (though not a visual) duplicate of her biological mom. Because she is so seductively cute-pulling at the same heartstrings an infant human clone would invariably tug-she lays bare the emotional subtext that has so far been missing in the great cloning debate. It's one thing to argue the merits of cloning when you're talking about uncuddly sheep, mice, cattle, goats and pigs. It's quite another when the clone is practically sitting in your lap, mewing and purring and begging for love.