Genetic Engineering

Imagine a world where people learned things twice as quickly as we do now. Where we could live for twice as long. Where even the average person could run for miles and miles without becoming tired. Where autism and other genetic diseases ceased to exist. Within the realm of genetic engineering, this is not only possible, but inevitable.

The human genome is the record of DNA of the human species, and within recent years, scientists have been working hard to understand and log as many of the genes, or chunks of DNA, as they can. By understanding this genome, we can get a better grasp of what causes so many different genetic flaws. More importantly, we can figure out ways to in turn treat or prevent these conditions from arising.

Take the case of Hugh Rienhoff. As a graduate with a medical degree at Johns Hopkins and founder of two biotechnology companies, he's no novice in the field of genomic study. However, his daughter was born with a very rare mutation that stunted muscular growth and development. Rienhoff knew enough to search for the reason behind this on his own, and started studies of his daughter's genetic information as a platform to discover and possibly treat this disorder. To top off the effort he put in, Rienhoff started a laboratory in his own attic as a means of studying and hoping to find the cause. This disorder is only one of countless genetic syndromes that exist, and by understanding the genome as Rienhoff tried to, we can start to understand many, many other diseases.

Further, our forays into genetic research have given other fun side effects that have become a huge debate both in the political spectrum and even in water cooler debate: Genetic engineering. Simply understanding the human genome is one thing, but improving it is quite another. Scientific research has given us many surprising feats. Most of our work in genetic engineering is in animals and plants, with mice being the classic example. By altering segments of the mouse genome, scientists have found some truly remarkable things. One recent example was a change in the gene expression of IL-15R-alpha in mice. This acted by making it so the mice essentially never became exhausted. In the world of endurance running and sports, this is huge. Imagine becoming nearly superhuman. Effectively genetic engineering when done properly might give rise to this. Further, Swiss scientists have claimed that by altering the NCoR1 inhibitor, we can create super strong mice (Mighty Mouse anyone?). Again, for sports this sort of development is both beneficial and detrimental. On one hand, the normally frail and weak could compete. On the other hand, it could be seen as cheating, like steroids.

Even forgetting these more experimental adventures in genetic alteration, we can look at the simple but effective ways humans have already altered the genomes of other organisms for their own benefit. For example, weaving spider DNA into goats so that their milk has greater nutritional values. Even the artificial selection of cattle to ensure that only the best, most delicious cows are used for food products is functionally similar. The issue that comes up is the way these developments are presented. The goat milk and selective breeding of cows is one thing, but when you go around talking about altering the genome, suddenly people are up in arms because they're scared about something they don't understand. And even if they do understand the ideas behind genetic engineering, there are other concerns that come up.

The problem here is that there is such a thing as too much change. As I brought up in my post about bionics, there are people who think genetic engineering is a bad idea. Again, I disagree, but only to a point. Genetic engineering might be playing God, but only just a bit. Effectively all it serves to do right now is to help find better, safer ways to treat disorders we don't currently have the solutions to, or at the very least enhance our lives. I'll admit that some of this engineering goes too far. Using it to act like the current human growth hormone and steroids some athletes use is abusive at best and would be a large concern. As with anything that has both pros and cons, we would have to regulate any developments that come from this engineering.

The best argument against genetic engineering comes from a movie, of all things. The movie is from 1997, but it has outstanding insight into a possible future of genetic engineering. Known as GATTACA, it shows one of the biggest downfalls of genetic engineering: causing class differences. In the movie, parents make "designer children", essentially whatever traits they would want in a kid, they can get because of in vitro alterations of embryonic cells. If you want an astronaut, they'll make you an astronaut. If you want a swimmer, you'll end up with an Olympic level one, like Jude Law portrayed in the film. The problem is, as the movie shows, that by having these genetic biases, the more genetically superior are prejudiced against lesser people. This class division is, I would argue, the one real downside to genetic engineering.

As a whole though, genetic engineering is most definitely a positive. Huge advancements can be made in the name of science, and as long as we keep any negatives, such as prejudice and cheating at sports, to a minimum, the pros most certainly outweigh the cons.


As always, feel free to share your own opinions. I love to hear what others think about such cool water cooler debates as these.