Should We Genetically Modify Our Kids?
James Poulos, Ed. ·
Jul 1, 2010 at 4:46pm
The debate is on: Andrew Sullivan inveighs against trying to 'normalize' children in utero, while Megan McArdle admits that she knows from experience why genetically deleting a few inches from a supertall daughter's height might be morally choiceworthy. I'm still thinking this one through.
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May '10
Re: Should We Genetically Modify Our Kids?
Wow, that's a tough one. And it will only get tougher as, say, China decides to dabble in this area, and the West will be faced with either keeping pace or producing offspring which are "inferior" to its competitors. Strange times ahead.
Jun '10
Re: Should We Genetically Modify Our Kids?
I'm in favor of modifying children in utero because then you don't have to listen to them screaming. If you've ever tried it post-natal with a pair of tin snips or a rusty set of garden shears, you'll know what I mean. First it draws the neighbor's attention, and then the cops. I know what you're thinking. ~Paules is not as funny as Klaven. True. But I will be as soon as I can figure out what he drinks.
Jun '10
Re: Should We Genetically Modify Our Kids?
As a pure philosophical exercise, I can appreciate the dilemma. From the point of personal conviction, however, I stand on Psalm 139:8-18.
Besides, if you go down this road, eventually you'll end up with Khan Noonien Singh.
May '10
Re: Should We Genetically Modify Our Kids?
What is it about Sullivan and uteri?
Re: Should We Genetically Modify Our Kids?
But isn't one of the major tenets of the Left that it isn't a child in there? It's, like, some Other Middle Thing?
May '10
Re: Should We Genetically Modify Our Kids?
It is indeed a tenet of the left that it isn't a child in there--because they subscribe to the "Magical Birth Canal Theory," whereby the vagina bestows human life upon the fetus as it passes through.
Justice Scalia best exposed this theory when, during arguments in a partial-birth abortion case where the sides were in disagreement as to how to refer to the entity in question, he said (paraphrasing), "Well, actually, you're both right: the torso and limbs are a baby, and the head is a fetus." Nervous chuckles followed. Scalia 2012.
Jun '10
Re: Should We Genetically Modify Our Kids?
My daughter was born with a cleft lip and palate, so I find Magan Mcardle’s suggestion that correcting this defect somehow justifies her desired to shrink her daughter that she might shop off the rack offensive. I’ll bet that when her daughter was born, mamma and papa Mcardle never felt the almost overpowering urge to reject her. My first thought on seeing my daughter was that she wasn't mine. This response, I was told, is a “normal” first reaction to birth abnormalities. Yet, all parents know a child should be met with an instant love that causes parent and child to bond. My daughter was not so blessed. As I struggled early that morning to bond with my newborn, my thoughts did not stray to how she might fit her clothes. Still, fashion played a part in this experience. One day a woman bedecked in jewels and furs rushed up from behind her to coo my baby and, on seeing her face, said to my wife, “That’s the ugliest baby I’ve ever seen.” The thing about that woman was that she was the best dressed woman in the supermarket; she had real style.
Re: Should We Genetically Modify Our Kids?
Well, imagine that. Here’s something I can actually comment on.
I have Huntington’s Disease, a hereditary, neurological disorder which, from what seems good reasoning, was probably caused by antique genetic engineering—the inbreeding of royals—and I can assure you that this is every bit as bad an idea in the 21st Century as it was back then. The decoding of the genome was all science did. It doesn’t understand it. It now just has a ridiculous amount of undecoded data to process.
Even minor screwing with the code—which is how you would have to decode it: tweak it, grow the animal or plant subject and watch how the new code works in its life cycle—might cause unknown problems later in life like Dolly the cloned lamb did.
And science can’t fix what is broken already. Your darling, genetically perfect little Aryan daughter may end up shambling around like a broken animatronic robot much like I do and there will be no dealing with it. And she is just as likely to pass it on to her children as I am.
Re: Should We Genetically Modify Our Kids?
Oh, Cas, I know how you feel. Coming to love the features of my daughter with Down syndrome took time and effort. I've said it before, but when I found out my baby would be born with DS, I Googled it, and had to turn away. I was repulsed by "the look." But a miraculous love has grown more powerful to the point where I adore my daughter's "different" features ... yes, the peeks from stangers into the stroller those earliest days were so terribly painful to bear. Cas -- I assume you've read: http://parenting.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/02/25/lessons-of-a-cleft-lip/