According to Star Trek, most of the worst diseases we face as a society will be obliterated by the time we are flying around space, discovering that every humanoid-alien life form came from the same blueprint. But even Star Trek didn't want to touch human cloning. Cross-dimensions where Bad Picard or Sleazy Dax exist, sure, but never a war between hordes of Jordies vs. packs of Seven of Nines.

Of course, in Star Wars there was that hazy history, talked of in low voices and fear by old-timers, called the Clone Wars. Obviously they had thought of the dangers or good things about cloning and then had quite a skirmish about it. And, possibly, we will get to see what those hushed voices were talking about come May 2002 when Episode II: Attack Of The Clones makes its debut.

But now a company called Advanced Cloning Clearing House (or some such thing) has successfully cloned a human at the cellular level. They are quick to say that what they have cloned is not actually a human. On CNN Sunday morning, the scientist guy liked the phrase, "The cell hasn't made up its mind to be human yet." I'm not really sure what that means, but I think what it means to the scientist is, "Don't throw me in jail you harpies!"

The scientist guy is really saying that this research is not to create replicas of famous or rich people who want a mini-me. It's about curing diseases and ailments that have, so far, been out of our reach. Diabetes, Parkinson's and spinal injuries--wipe out the bad cells and put new ones in to regenerate what has been rendered bad.

The House of Representatives has passed a bill that would make all of this cloning nonsense illegal. No "cloning" for medical purposes or anything else. Shut it down, arrest everyone and hold a military tribunal. The Senate, apparently busy tearing down other rights of ours (like attorney-client privilege and wire-tapping laws), has not had time to rubber stamp the bill yet. Mr. Scientist guy says the reason they came out with their research wasn't to influence our lawmakers to pause and take a step back, but he's not so naive to think this won't swing votes one way or the other.

Personally, I think scientist guys should go ahead and get the technology up to speed. We spent years in the northern mountains of New Mexico figuring out how to kill lots of people really fast (the atom bomb), so shouldn't we spend a few years figuring out how to save some people as well? It's the same thing, essentially, as building the atom bomb. Smart people playing with the building blocks of life. Except this time they are really wanting to save people's lives--not build a soulless army of cloned humans to obliterate our enemies. At least, that's what they're saying now.

And really, if some rich guy wanted to have a scientist "build" a younger replica of himself, who cares? It won't fix all the things the rich person thinks went wrong with his childhood. The replica would have to deal with a "father" who has the exact same DNA and thinks he has a chance to "do it all over." Talk about never really living up to the expectation of your parents. Try explaining to your dad why you flunked all the classes he was great at in high school if you are essentially the same person, just living in a different time. It's not like high school is harder today, just that there are more cops with guns in the hallways.

Sure, there are lots of bad things that could happen if we let the scientists run amok. But that would be discounting all the wonderful things that could happen at the same time. I mean, Congress let Microsoft build an inferior game console called the X-Box that plays the same games as all the other consoles. So obviously our country lets bad things happen to good people sometimes.

What I'd like to know is what happens to all of the bad replicas of humans. Y'know, like in Alien3 when Ripley discovers the laboratory with all of the failed attempts to bring her back. Are we going to have an exhibit at the Smithsonian with all of the half sheep-half human things floating around in formaldehyde? Are we going to replace regular humans in really dangerous jobs with cloned humans deprived of personality, like miners or postal workers? Can I get a clone of myself to sit in my desk and pretend to work on those days I don't want to come in and do it myself?

How about if we all send our clones to stand in line overnight for tickets to the next Star Wars flick? That would definitely be cool.

Matt Worley is Matt Worley is Matt Worley is...