Designing Babies A Eugenics Race with China.doc

Designing Babies: A Eugenics Race with China? By Eric G Swedin The Futurist , May/Jun 2006 ?Copyright World Future Society May/Jun 2006 2054 words The rapid pace of genetic research, the author argues, guarantees that we will see genetically manufactured babies before the end of the century. 1 Human eugenics - the science that deals with improvements in hereditary qualities of a race - and the creation of genetically engineered advanced humans are probably inevitable. Granted, such a bald statement flies in the face of certain U.S. laws and most bioethical thinking, but within the next two decades, we will likely see human beings born with enhanced genetic characteristics in China, and competitive nations such as the United States are unlikely to allow a smart-baby gap to emerge. Many Americans will overcome their misgivings and support efforts to keep up in this new realm of international competition. The time has come to ask two questions: What is the potential of genetic engineering, and why is China predisposed to adapting genetic engineering to human enhancement? Achievements in Genetic Engineering 2 The discovery of the structure of DNA in 1953 eventually led biochemists Herbert Boyer and Stanley Cohen to develop the techniques of genetic engineering in the early 1970s. Recognizing the extraordinary power and potential danger of this new technology, scientists agreed to a temporary moratorium on further research until guidelines could be developed to minimize the risk of a genetically engineered organism accidentally escaping into the wild. But biotechnology continued to advance rapidly when the moratorium ended just a year later. Today, many historians and prognosticators believe that biology and biotechnology may be the queen of twenty-first-century science just as physics and quantum mechanics were the queens of twentieth-century science. 3 When microbiologist Ananda Mohan Chakrabarty, an employee of General Electric, developed an oil-eating b