The Dark Side of CRISPR

Its potential ability to “fix” people at the genetic level is a threat to those who are judged by society to be biologically inferior

Scientific American

Sandy Sufian, Rosemarie Garland-Thomson

Americans have celebrated the fact that the Biden administration is embracing science and returning the country to evidence-based policymaking. We agree that science should guide policy—except in cases where it wouldn’t assist people to live their lives but would, instead, exclude them.

The CRISPR-Cas9 gene-editing technology, for which biochemists Jennifer Doudna and Emmanuelle Charpentier won the Nobel Prize in Chemistry, has the potential to do just that. So do other forms of scientific technologies. We should therefore always be aware of the ethical choices these technologies can pose. . . continue reading