Commercializing children doesn't seem right, but then should the technology be held back and children be damned to suffer for the sake of keeping the status quo? Is there a just way to deal with this?
We don't have a clue how to edit DNA to make people smarter or taller or stronger. And there's no sign that we're going to get to that knowledge sometime this century.
Furthermore, what we do know about our genome and our proteome strongly suggests that lots of stuff are doing double-duty. The gene that causes sickle cell anemia also provides antimalarial resistance. That makes the argument for changing DNA one way or the other much more difficult to make.
And, furthermore, even applying CRISPR to human cells is still not exactly successful yet. Of the two CRISPR babies, one was mosaic (i.e., the edits didn't reach all the cells) and the other was heterozygous (i.e., didn't reach both copies of DNA), and neither actually contained the desired deletion. So all the ethics violations were in pursuit of a project that would have scored at best a C (just to underscore how much of a monster He was).
iterated embryo selection for those traits is at most 10-15 years away, though i suspect much closer
Bigger, faster, stronger, and MUCH smarter! Now 10% off!
Whether or not humans are responsible to equip technology is not really a concern to people who are advancing science, and maybe it shouldn't be.
The movie Gattaca explored this a bit. People in the film are heavily defined by their engineering. They might not BE just engineered, but being superior, or inferior is all encompassing. It becomes all they are.
In the film it is a bit of a curse even for the best. Jerome failed (got a silver medal) at something and can't recover. His medal only turns to gold at the very end.
I'd rather wait for 5-10 years to make sure I don't make a lifelong mistake.
The worst part of this is that it may not safe. If this introduced some flaws in the babies gene, how to control this, don't allow them have babies?
Cons: Seems kinda weird to commercialize children.
Cons: Companies or powerful governments influenced the design and meaning of "happier, more fulfilling and productive lives" such that their own agenda is fulfilled.
Maybe that fate would not affect everyone, but what temptation there would be to make a designer workforce. The perfect employee. The perfect citizen. The perfect subordinate.
It seems to me the just way is similar to how bread is legally required to be fortified with vitamins to avoid e.g. rickets. And how education is legally required. Beyond these community accepted minimums, knock yourself out.
As for the ethics, if gene editing research is inevitable and/or simple as claimed, then perhaps it should be carried out in public universities so as to prevent glory seeking people from causing unnecessary harm. Also, perhaps anyone who carries out gene editing should be held financially liable and even criminally liable for any damage to individuals.
If CRISPR and gene editing lives up to its hype, it feels like we are on the cusp of a brave new world.
What is the rationale behind this regulation? Is it that the baby is likely to be infected with HIV or is there some other reason?
> 2、禁忌症
> （1）有如下情况之一者，不得实施体外受精-胚胎移植及其衍技术
> ① 男女任何一方患有严重的精神疾患、泌尿生殖系统急性感染、性传播疾病；
> ② 患有《母婴保健法[1]》规定的不宜生育的、目前无法进行胚胎植入前遗传学诊断的遗传性疾病；
> ...
Translated to English and overly sum up: IVF-ET is forbidden if:
1, The donor or the receptor is currently carrying STD (Or genitourinary infection, or severe mental illness);
2, The patient not recommended to be pregnant according to the 《母婴保健法[1]》(Mother and child health-care law);
3, The patient is suffering from hereditary diseases that cannot be diagnosed with Preimplantation Genetic Diagnosis.
The rationale that you are curious about is still unknown here, but I do think this document and the law mentioned can be a good start if you want to figure it out. Sadly though, this field is far out of my range of knowledge, I can't even translate most of them for you (And That page on npc.gov.cn is still loading after 5 mins of waiting).
[0] http://www.moh.gov.cn/open/uploadfile/2005112816435508.doc (人类辅助生殖技术规范)
[1] http://www.npc.gov.cn/wxzl/gongbao/2000-12/05/content_500462... (母婴保健法)
With an intensive treatment regimen the risk can be made very low: https://aidsinfo.nih.gov/understanding-hiv-aids/fact-sheets/...
Unknown to me
>Is it that the baby is likely to be infected with HIV or is there some other reason?
With modern medicine the baby can survive birth without getting infected.
The elephant in the room is, did the gene editing work? If yes, are those babies protected from HIV?
If yes...the world is not the same anymore.
He Jiankui is being vilified now, but I wonder how history will remember him (if at all)
He Jiankui is being fired for publicly announcing his experiment and the subsequent backlash (mostly deserved) from his peers.
