Two research teams grew synthetic mouse embryos using stem cells
nature.com
nature.com
It could revive black mirror.
If you'd like this breadcrumb as something that could help make the world of the story feel like it could be our world, here's an interesting thing which is that Alan Turing thought that telepathy could be possible, and tried to account for this when designing the Turing Test.
https://stackoverflow.com/questions/19728844/extrasensory-pe...
If telepathy were to be possible as described in your story, you could explain it as mind-body dualism being real https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mind%E2%80%93body_dualism and that the new animal born from the person temporarily shares a neural link with the person's brain, causing the sharing of one spirit, and that when the neural link is broken as the animal separates, the spirit is still anchored to both parts of the formerly-unified nervous system. The explanation for why this wouldn't happen during standard childbirth is that mother and child don't share a neural link, only a blood link.
Here's another breadcrumb for this idea https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/01/170125093823.h...
Edit: oh you are the author, very good writing.
The original notes that inspired all this are at detach.html without suffix. None of these are linked on the website as they are a work in progress. (Why have a personal website without some hidden gems?) The dream I think would be an anthology of short stories related to different paths from this kind of multiplicative ability.
To digress. I want a clone, more than anything. It's only thing I'd pay more than $100k+ for aside from housing.
I submit that society would benefit if every other generation was a clone. If I were raised by my parent-clone I would have matured faster and been more skilled at playing baby-roulette with a natural child.
Whenever I meet a 20-30 year old that has the temperament and calmness of a 40-50 year old I suspect one of two things:
1) their young-ish parents won at baby-roulette and their child had a personality similar to theirs and were able to guide them through adolescence in a more optimal way.
2) their parents were older and maturer and could navigate the personality conflicts in a way that didn't lead to long-term family dysfunction.
but even #2 is rare since not all older parents can handle all personality types, hence my suggestion for a third option: family lines based on alternate generation cloning.
This is leaning heavily on the assumption that your personality is primarily a product of your genetics, and not of your life experiences. Outside of relating on physiology, what makes you think you would understand their reactions to unique life experiences at such a young age?
Speaking as someone who had a dramatic personality shift from early trauma, I don't think that what you hypothesize is true.
Not really. If you allow that it is even 1% due to genetics, that better parenting compounds over generations. And there is a lot of evidence that it is much more than 1%. I too experienced numerous traumatic events by the time I was 12 and was then prone towards neuroticism for decades after. I still submit I'd be a much better parent to a clone than someone who has half my dna.
The OP has no way of knowing if they would be a better parent, but yet they still very strongly think that they would be a better parent to a child that has 100% similar dna than 50% similar dna. How can you know this unless you are biased towards the idea of a clone? "I want a clone, more than anything" suggests there is bias.
Can you explain why you want a clone? Genetically identical twins can and do end up having very different lives and personalities.
I would imagine the desire to have a child that is genetically yours is a consequence of evolution. Those whose genes instill within them the desire to have a child of their own would be more driven to actually reproduce and pass on those genes.
[0] Opening paragraph of Anna Karenina, Tolstoy
why is that 'most likely'?
certainly very few people would say that so bluntly to anyone interested in natural child rearing or adoption -- why does this circumstance permit one to make such a blunt and likely ill-informed (we don't have a lot of experience with human clones..) statement?
Parthenogenesis is also a strategy employed as needed by fish, reptiles, and some birds.
I'm not suggesting that cloning is superior, but to call it "not a viable mechanism" is a mischaracterization.
Parthenogenesis has also been induced in mammals (mice) in a lab setting, though it has not been observed in the wild yet.
However, bacteria have other ways of exchanging genetic material with each other, and more complex clonal organisms go extinct fairly quickly in geological time frames. But more will arise.
It seems a good solution for the future of their population, the fertility rate will probably never go back to 2.
No evidence of human parthenogenesis ('virgin birth') is known.
The immaculate conception was the conception of _Mary_, who was born without Original Sin (that's what makes it immaculate), in order to be clean enough to carry Jesus aand bear a virgin birth. The whole prior sentence should be sprinkled with 'allegedly' appropriately in every clause.
Granted, high population also means small 'mansions' and maybe THAT is their greatest worry.
Underpopulation is what I was referring to. Some countries have extremely low birth rates, and stabilizing them is important.
I don't see how cloning helps with that.
If human cloning ever becomes accepted, I suspect racism will end up promoting an even smaller gene pool than it already does, with anyone who isn't a clone of Dear Leader And His Chosen Ones forming the out-group.
Such a system would still hate immigration.
Seriously, we need to loosen the regulations on cloning, including animal and, yes, human cloning. We are holding back innovation.
The same is true about the Wunderwaffen btw. The "wonder weapons" were more of a lame marketing gimmick than actually feasible threats. They were mostly inconveniently oversized versions of existing weapons with no strategic use. Most of them never saw the light of day but wouldn't have skewed the outcome of the war, at least not in any direction favorable to the Nazis themselves.