Doppelgänger

A doppelgänger (ˈdɒpəlɡɛŋəɹ,_-gæŋəɹ), sometimes spelled as doppelgaenger or doppelganger is a biologically unrelated look-alike, or a double, of a living person. In fiction and mythology, a doppelgänger is often portrayed as a ghostly or paranormal phenomenon and usually seen as a harbinger of bad luck. Other traditions and stories equate a doppelgänger with an evil twin. In modern times, the term twin stranger is occasionally used. The word doppelganger is a loanword from the German noun Doppelgänger, literally meaning double-walker. The singular and plural forms are the same in German, but English writers usually prefer the plural "doppelgangers". In German, there is also a female form, "Doppelgängerin" (plural: "Doppelgängerinnen"). The first known use, in the slightly different form Doppeltgänger, occurs in the novel Siebenkäs (1796) by Jean Paul, in which he explains his newly coined word in a footnote; the word Doppelgänger also appears in the novel, but with a different meaning. In German, the word is written (as is usual with German nouns) with an initial capital letter: Doppelgänger. In English, the word is generally written with a lower-case letter, and the umlaut on the letter "a" is usually dropped: "doppelganger". English-speakers have only recently applied this German word to a paranormal concept. Francis Grose's, Provincial Glossary of 1787 used the term fetch instead, defined as the "apparition of a person living." Catherine Crowe's book on paranormal phenomena, The Night-Side of Nature (1848) helped make the German word well-known. However, the concept of alter egos and double spirits has appeared in the folklore, myths, religious concepts, and traditions of many cultures throughout human history. In Ancient Egyptian mythology, a ka was a tangible "spirit double" having the same memories and feelings as the person to whom the counterpart belongs. The Greek Princess presents an Egyptian view of the Trojan War in which a ka of Helen misleads Paris, helping to stop the war.

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Cloning

Cloning is the process of producing individual organisms with identical genomes, either by natural or artificial means. In nature, some organisms produce clones through asexual reproduction; this reproduction of an organism by itself without a mate is known as parthenogenesis. In the field of biotechnology, cloning is the process of creating cloned organisms of cells and of DNA fragments. The artificial cloning of organisms, sometimes known as reproductive cloning, is often accomplished via somatic-cell nuclear transfer (SCNT), a cloning method in which a viable embryo is created from a somatic cell and an egg cell.