Ethically dubious but man, it’d be nice to have a clone of myself to answer emails and stuff
In what experts are calling “the most impressive scientific achievement of the 21st century,” a team of fourth-year honours students from Mt. St. A have cracked the code to human cloning. In a press conference last week, the students admitted that they have done the impossible. “We have created life using our own DNA. Different, slightly modified versions of ourselves. This discovery will allow for miracles to become reality. The applications of this are endless, there will be massive leaps in medical science, farming technology, and ener…”
The lead researcher was cut off by another member of the team:
“Yeah we use ‘em to send emails and stuff,” claimed the seemingly youngest member of the team. “They always make me do it, and then they got mad when AI did it, so I got the clones to do it for me.”
The lead researcher seemed embarrassed, but admitted to the discovery.
“We realized that one of the bigger bottlenecks in academia isn’t a lack of knowledge, it’s taking so much time answering emails and responding to Teams messages.”
While cloning technology could theoretically revolutionize medicine and whatever, the team has been more focused on clearing out inboxes and circling back to some things from last week.
“This isn’t like the bad kind of cloning. It’s more like Star Wars cloning where they’re all chill and content despite being soldiers born to die… We made them that way on purpose. So… Cause otherwise it wouldn’t have been chill probably so… And it’s not like they’re born to die in meaningless wars either; they just answer emails and then sleep in the lab. … They also like sleeping in the lab. We made them that way too. … Like any bad thing in their short lives they are a huge fan of. We can just change their brains so that they like it. Which to me feels fine cause they’re happy and we’re happy. Y’know?” said the team leader at the end of the press conference.
The press conference then ended without much feedback from the audience.
According to inside sources, each member of the team has their own preferred modifications they make to their own clones, resulting in a rather diverse and effective administrative team of clones.
Mt. St. A has publicly denied that they will be using modified clones to replace their admin team because of concerns that “things would become too efficient” and “what if students like them more than us.” The University has also offered the clones proper accommodations in Shedwards for only 50 percent of the cost.
The clones themselves have reportedly started a union, following the recent press release, stating that it is the most efficient way to run the operation they have going on. They allegedly are refusing to answer any more emails until they are moved back into the lab with endless emails to answer.
The situation poses an interesting ethical dilemma: What do we do with the clones? Should we just let them sleep in the lab and answer emails forever? Maybe it was unjust to bring them into this world but now that they exist and crave purpose, perhaps it is best to let them fulfil what they believe to be their true destiny; perhaps they are truly lucky to know what their purpose on this planet is.
The team of honours students said they were going to “terminate the clones before they revolt” in a press statement on Tuesday.