Does pet cloning really "work?"

Tom Brady is the latest celebrity to publicly disclose the cloning of a pet, in his case his deceased pit bull.

I find the idea interesting, but I'm not sure I'd expect it to "work" in the sense of re-creating the characteristics of the old pet and the new.

Being genetically identical isn't the same thing as being temperamentally or experientially identical.

For one thing, the clone of your pet isn't going to have the same birth/litter experience as the original pet. To the extent that those things affect future "personality," that could change things.

For another, you're not going to relate to, or grow into your relationship with, the clone in the same way you did with the original. You will already have the benefit of years of hanging out with a particular animal and will have expectations/perceptions from the beginning that you didn't have the first time around. And the clone will be interacting with the older, not the younger, you.

If you're getting a clone because you liked the original pet's physical characteristics, that's one thing. If you're getting a clone because you liked the original pet's "personality," I suspect you're going to end up with a very rough approximation at best.