“The First GM Human Embryo Could Dramatically Alter the Future”

The First GM Human Embryo Could Dramatically Alter the Future – The Daily Galaxy

John Harris, the Sir David Alliance Professor of Bioethics at Manchester University, takes it a step further. He believes that as parents, citizens, and scientists, we are morally obliged to do whatever we can genetically to make life better and longer for our children and ourselves. Society currently devotes so much energy and resources towards saving lives, which, in reality, is simply postponing death, he notes. If it is right to save life, Harris reasons, then it should also be right to postpone death by stemming the flow of diseases that carry us to the grave. (My emphasis added in bold.)

Exactly.

If disease could be curtailed or eliminated through genetically altering human embryos, it should be pursued.  Just because some might use this technology for “designer babies” and such is not a good enough reason to stop the progress that could save and improve the quality of millions upon millions of lives.

For Harris, having the ability to improve our species lot in life but refusing to do so, makes little sense. He has a difficult time understanding why some people are so insistent that we shouldn’t try to improve upon human evolution.

“Can you imagine our ape ancestors getting together and saying, ‘this is pretty good, guys. Let’s stop it right here!’. That’s the equivalent of what people say today.”

Every technological revolution has a dark side; fear of that dark side should not preclude something that could prevent so much pain and suffering.

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