We're One Step Closer to Creating Genetically Enhanced Humans * By Marcy Darnovsky <http://www.alternet.org/authors/6100/>, AlterNet<http://www.alternet.org/>. Posted October 19, 2007<http://www.alternet.org/ts/archives/?date%5BF%5D=10&date%5BY%5D=2007&date%5Bd%5D=19&act=Go/> .*
It's Nobel Prize season, and the Nobel scientists are very much in the news. James Watson, awarded the laureate in 1962 for helping to deduce the now-iconic double-helix structure of DNA, is currently embroiled in controversy after making a series of blatantly racist remarks in the UK *Sunday Times* this month. But related views espoused by one of this year's laureates have gone unnoticed. In early October, the Nobel Prize for biology went to three scientists (one of whom, Mario Cappechi, worked with Watson) whose talent and persistence gave us "knockout mice," the genetically engineered lab animals widely used by researchers to model and study human diseases. In the words of a Nobel committee member, these designer mice have "led to penetrating new insights" in several biological fields. But there's another aspect of Mario Capecchi's life that may sound more like science fiction than fairy tale. The new Nobel laureate, like his former mentor Watson, has spoken enthusiastically of using the genetic science he's helped advance to engineer biologically enhanced children. The prospect of a renewed, high-tech eugenics is extraordinarily controversial, but it is not just a fantasy. It is coming ever closer to technical plausibility, and for a disturbing number of influential scientists and eccentric futurists, it is an agenda. At an infamous UCLA conference in 1998, Watson, Capecchi, and other prominent scientists gathered to strategize about how to make it "acceptable" to the public. The event was titled *Engineering the Human Germline* -- a reference to what is now more commonly called "inheritable genetic modification" -- and covered on the front pages of the *New York Times* and *Washington Post *. To read the entire story, go to the following link. http://www.alternet.org/healthwellness/65678 -- The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for existing. Albert Einstein -- He, who by good deeds covers the evil he has done, illuminates this world like the moon freed from clouds. - Buddha -- He, who by good deeds covers the evil he has done, illuminates this world like the moon freed from clouds. - Buddha _______________________________________________ RSS, archives, subscription & listserv information for: [email protected] http://lists.mutualaid.org/mailman/listinfo/sustainabletompkins free hosting by http://www.mutualaid.org
