Gentleman John said:
In the past I've toyed with various ideas on clones. At the minute I lean towards a model based on random recombination of DNA to ensure a variety in the supply of new citizens. But there's no reason why Friend Computer would not maintain a database of appropriate DNA templates. There's a lot of potential for - ahem - creativity in your suggestion.
Indeed. Even if we assume the clone is 'randomly generated' from a relatively small pool - a human has 46 chromosomes, in 23 pairs - you can get a frightening number of combinations with relatively few starting options. With only two options for each chromosome, randomly picking, you can get seventy million, million unique individuals.
However, in a setting like Paranoia, million-to-one chances crop up nine times out of ten, so yes, there's always the chance that a genetically identical individual pops out of a cloning vat to a previous - or even currently existing - clone. I'm sure that Friend Computer has a carefully designed census-checking failsafe to stop that happening, and I'm equally certain it doesn't actually work in practice...
...Which could lead to interesting situations if, say, a new clone were to have the face as a celebrity. Or worse, the same DNA and tongueprint as a high programmer. Or what happens if a vat complex gets 'locked' into one specific combination and keeps churning out Im-U-TOO, over and over again until dozens, hundreds, or even thousands of this one clone are overrunning a sector.
