Genetic engineering has the potential to provide many benefits, such as fighting disease and preventing aging, but ethical issues and legal regulations have slowed its progress. We need to find both technological advances and ethical solutions.
In recent years, genetic engineering has become a hot topic again, with the rapid development of artificial intelligence, drones, robots, and other advanced technologies. Genetic engineering has gained a lot of attention since the world’s first mammalian cloned sheep, Dolly, was born through somatic cell cloning in 1997, but it hasn’t progressed much in the past 20 years due to the many problems that come with the development of genetic engineering technology. Genetic engineering and animal cloning have always been in the public eye, with South Korean Dr. Woo-Seok Hwang cloning his Afghan hound, Snuffy, and in January 2017, Samsung Chairwoman Lee Kun-hee’s pet Pomeranian, Benji, was cloned for the fourth time. Although it has yet to be commercialized due to its high cost, Seoul National University Animal Hospital and Dr. Hwang Woo-seok’s Sooam Research Institute, which has cloned more than 700 dogs since 2005, offer a dog cloning service for around 100 million won per dog. While genetic engineering and somatic cell cloning technologies have advanced beyond our wildest dreams, they have not been applied to human cloning or organ cloning due to legal regulations that focus on ethical arguments. Even though genetic engineering technology poses many problems, from a utilitarian point of view, the benefits to our society greatly outweigh the risks, so we should advance the technology as soon as possible.
First, the fight against disease and anti-aging are direct benefits of genetic engineering. Ideas such as using stem cells to clone damaged organs or slowing or preventing the expression of genes associated with cellular aging have already been demonstrated in experiments to be possible. For example, a patient with pulmonary fibrosis, which is caused by a genetic mutation, could be given a cloned lung without harming anyone in society. Further advancements in genetic engineering could also be used to treat mental illnesses that are complex in nature, such as schizophrenia, which is caused by the abnormal expression of hundreds of genes, overcoming the limitations of pharmacotherapy. Healthcare experts believe that the application of genetic engineering to fighting disease and preventing aging will contribute to lowering healthcare spending. Preventing people from developing Alzheimer’s disease through gene editing would have a huge financial benefit, as it would reduce the amount of money spent on hospitalization and care in later life. The positive effects of genetic engineering and gene editing advances on human health are enormous.
But for decades, advances in genetic engineering have been slow. The answer to this is relatively simple and obvious. According to Yoo Yong-ho, a professor at the Department of Forensic Science at Seoul National University College of Medicine, no one is willing to sponsor highly regulated experiments, and the nature of capitalist societies means that research that doesn’t make money is bound to stall. According to Article 47 of the Act on Bioethics and Safety, the development of gene therapy is legally restricted to “genetic diseases, cancer, acquired immunodeficiency, and other diseases that are life-threatening or cause serious disability.” In fact, legal restrictions have hindered the progress of Korea’s bioindustry, with Kolon Life Sciences’ gene therapy for degenerative arthritis still not approved due to ethical concerns. In contrast, Japan has greatly relaxed legal regulations on gene therapy development to attract foreign investment, and in the United States, Theranos’ genetic analysis service is already commercialized and sold in pharmacies. In his paper “Biotechnology and International Regulation,” Bae Young-ja, a professor at the Korea Institute for Science and Technology Policy, argues that the development of biotechnology can only be achieved through active discussions on transnational norms and the laws of individual countries in Korea. Therefore, we can only dream of the unlimited practicalization of genetic engineering technology by loosening current legal regulations.
Of course, genetic engineering technology raises many ethical and moral issues. First, as Putnam argues in his book The Genetic Revolution and Bioethics, the first reason to reject human cloning and excessive advances in genetic engineering is an instinctive gut reaction. From a religious perspective, manipulating our God-given bodies and allowing someone else to determine how we live our lives violates human dignity and is inconsistent with the morals of our society. Furthermore, the development of genetic engineering technology could ultimately become a political issue. John Locke’s theory of the Blank Slate, which has made a great contribution to social change as the ideological foundation of social progressives, is the theory that all humans are born with a blank slate and everything is determined by education. While this theory has been debunked by Richard Dawkins in The Selfish Gene and psychologist Steven Pinker in The Blank Slate: Are We Born with Nature, it is important to the idea that humanity is equal. Opponents of genetic engineering worry that gene editing could create individuals and groups that are superior from birth. This, they argue, is likely to lead to a higher class in a capitalist society. However, this is a problem that can be solved by legal regulation. For example, suppose gene editing is practiced through in vitro fertilization. The government should only allow gene editing in cases of suspected specific genetic disorders, such as Down syndrome or heart disease, where there are three chromosomes on the 21st chromosome pair. If every embryo that is fertilized in vitro is overseen by a government agency before it is placed in the mother’s womb, and only gene editing to correct fatal defects is legalized, then we won’t have the problem of so-called super babies – tall, handsome, healthy, and intelligent – coming out of the upper classes. Babies born different from each other due to gene editing could spark controversy by drawing comparisons to eugenics. But as Steven Pinker argues in The Blank Slate: Are We Born with Nature, equality in human society is political equality, not genetic sameness. Therefore, to oppose the pre-genetic editing of babies who may be born with fatal disadvantages by analogizing it to eugenics is “an extreme egalitarianism that does not even recognize individuality.” Of course, the ethics of gene editing are not as simple as this, but at the very least, gene editing to mitigate defects should not be subject to eugenics.
It is clear that advances in genetic engineering technology will bring overall benefits to our society. And we all recognize the problems it can cause. However, the benefits are too great to give up on a technology that has the potential to bring a paradigm shift to humanity. As a society, we’ve always worked to improve and solve problems as long as they benefit us in order to move forward. Genetic engineering is no different. If there are problems, we should work to find solutions, not abolish it. However, the ethical issues that can accompany technological advancement are enormous, and it is important to take the time to publicize them, build a social consensus on the advancement of technology, and find the right utilitarian solution.
Genetic engineering has been a hot topic since the 20th century, but its development has been slowed down by the risks that come with technological advancement. Genetic engineering, with its health benefits and economic benefits, is a field that should not be abandoned as it will bring a new paradigm to our society, and the elites of societies like ours must fight for the advancement of genetic engineering technology to make it practical. From the time a baby is born on the other side of the world in Africa to the day when a gene is edited to make it resistant to malaria.
