The Pros And Cons Of Genetic Engineering

With technology surrounding genetic engineering growing much faster than expected, many moral and ethical issues that are being questioned must be answered for the future of human genetic modification to be decisively agreed upon. The leading cause for the lack of progress in determining what is ethical regarding germline engineering, a science that focuses on the genetic modification of embryos and fetuses, is the complete opposition in differing views; additionally, the lack of discussion concerning this topic does not speed up progress either. Viewpoints regarding genetically modifying embryos range from the belief that the technology should be completely available to all expecting parents, to the belief that no expecting parents should

Skeptics believe that as this technology becomes cheaper and more available, more parents will choose to have their future child enhanced; consequently, the gene pool of a society will also be impacted. As stated by Jonathan Moreno, “There is also the prospect of ‘consumer eugenics’—eugenics driven by parental choice rather than by state order, which would have similar results to traditional eugenics, such as a multitiered social system based on certain enhancements” (Bosley, 2015, p. 481). Eugenics is defined as the science of improving a human population by controlled breeding or genetic modification to increase the occurrence of desirable heritable characteristics. This is a major concern for many people because as the ability to choose the genetic and phenotypic (physical composition) traits of one’s offspring increases, individuals without desirable traits may be viewed as outcasts. In addition to creating a new way to discriminate, eugenics may, in extreme circumstances, allow a future militia to assign certain traits to offspring that could help them on the battlefield (also noted by Jonathan Moreno [Bosley, 2015 p. 481]). With a militia consisting solely of people modified to do one thing, the anticipatory and problem-solving abilities that come with a diverse group are extremely

According to Hank Greely:

The anticipated individual health risks are off-target effects and genetic chimerism. In addition, there are also unanticipated effects of on-target changes. … In terms of enhancement, we’re so far from knowing and understanding ‘enhancing’ genes, at this point the individual benefits are asymptotic to zero. (Bosley 2015, p. 480)

Chimerism is the phenomena where an individual has two different traits where only one should be present, such as two different blood types, female organs in a male body, two sets of DNA, etc. With such substantial disorders being possible, it is a concern to skeptics that technology surrounding genetic modification is far from perfect. Another hazard is that not all research on DNA-editing techniques, such as CRISPR, is being treated with precautionary measures nor with entire concern regarding scientists’