Alright. I'll be the first to say that this strange story is about as strange as strange can get. But it is significant insofar as modern biomedical technology is very close to, if not already at, the point of actually doing what these researchers are proposing: using extant DNA latent in the blood of long-deceased persons (in this case, from nothing other than the Shroud of Turin), in an attempt to produce a human clone.
Bizarre? Yes. But, sadly, it's more than a mere theoretical curiosity to those involved in this project. Read what the Russian newspaper Pravda (Правда — which, ironically, means “the truth”) said a couple of years ago about this venture:
Researchers say they would like to clone Christ. But with this good intention they on the contrary may get an antichrist. Famous chemist Alan Adler who studied samples of the Shroud of Turin, the legendary burial cloth into which Jesus Christ was wrapped after crucifixion, made a sensational statement not long ago.
The researcher said there was blood on the Shroud and it was shed by a man who died a violent death.
The University of Texas Center for Advanced DNA Technologies, USA, analyzed the DNA of the bloodstains. Head of the Center Victor Tryon confirmed that was human genetic material. It was divided into several samples and sent to different laboratories for further analysis.
No results of the research have been published yet but there are certainly some. Dr. Leoncio A. Garza-Valdes, one of the few researchers allowed to touch the Shroud of Turin is working on his book that will have a shocking name, The DNA of God.
The very abbreviation DNA seemed to be rather common for majority of people a couple of years ago. But today it is a serious cause for anxiety. Indeed, DNA gives researchers an opportunity to produce clones, a copy of any creature whose DNA is available for experiments. Experiments of this type have been already made public: Dolly the sheep became an absolute cloned copy of a sheep whose genetic material, DNA, was available.
Soon, it became clear that cloning humans was also possible. Professor Richard Seed declared he would solve the human cloning problem by the end of the millennium. He said he was seeking a fitting candidate for cloning. Finally, researchers supposed that blood found on the shroud of Turin might be used as genetic material for cloning . . . (continue reading)
