Eugenics is the attempt to improve the quality of life by manipulating human genetic traits, and while it can be useful when limited to therapeutic purposes, unethical applications risk undermining human dignity. It is important to establish ethical standards through social consensus.
When we meet another human being, we ask them a number of questions to get to know their personality and characteristics. One of the most common questions is to ask the other person’s blood type. This is because there is a myth that blood type can reveal a person’s personality and constitution. As such, most humans are naturally curious to understand people. We all seek to understand ourselves through our interactions with others, and this understanding plays an important role in forming and maintaining relationships. As far back as 19th century Europe, it was argued that the size and shape of the human brain could be used to understand the quality of mental activity, and more recently, MRIs have been used to measure IQ. These biological studies are contributing to a better understanding of human traits and abilities, which is useful in many areas, including education, career choice, and psychotherapy. The biological study of human beings has developed radically with genetics, and our understanding of the human mind and body is deepening every day.
However, understanding human beings is not just a matter of academic curiosity or intellectual inquiry, but also leads to practical applications and raises various ethical and social issues. Since the late 19th century, there has been a discipline that has attempted to develop and maintain the best and most desirable traits in humans, rather than just understanding them. Darwin’s cousin Francis Golton founded the field of biostatistics, the study of humans by scientifically measuring human traits. He also devised eugenics, which builds on Darwin’s idea that natural selection through competition for survival determines the evolution of species. Golton defined eugenics as “the study of the social control of those factors which may increase or decrease the quality, mentally and physically, of future generations of the race.”
From there, eugenics can be broadly categorized into positive eugenics and negative eugenics. Positive eugenics focuses on encouraging the reproduction of people with socially desirable mental and physical traits. Negative eugenics, on the other hand, aims to discourage the reproduction of people with genetic diseases, disabilities, and those deemed socially unfit. Each of these two classifications of eugenics has positive and negative aspects, which can be interpreted differently depending on social values and ethical standards.
While the original Golton Project was positive eugenics, which focused on eugenic reproduction to produce socially superior people, negative eugenics, which focused on reducing the birth rate of the unfit, quickly spread in Europe and the United States in the 20th century. The most prominent and tragic example of this is the genocide that occurred at the Auschwitz concentration camp during the five-year period between 1940 and 1945. The number of people who died is estimated to exceed 5 million, including not only Jews but also those deemed unfit members of society, such as the sick, disabled, and poor. These examples starkly illustrate the tragedy that can occur when eugenics is applied in the wrong way. Because eugenics was the scientific backing for the ruthlessly murderous ideology of the German Nazis, eugenics was for a time considered a distorted pseudoscience after the end of World War II.
This view of eugenics as a pseudoscience or heresy slowly began to change over time. It was discovered that eugenics was not the sole preserve of the German Nazis, but was practiced in very different forms on every continent, from the United States to the United Kingdom, Japan, Latin America, and the former Soviet Union. This suggests that eugenics is not simply a national or ideological phenomenon, but rather an issue where science and society are closely intertwined. Eugenics is not a pseudoscience per se, given that science is not value-neutral and pure knowledge in and of itself, but has historically been shaped by the ideological underpinnings of society. Eugenics, by the very nature of science, exists in relation to society and is closely tied to social ideology, but the way it is applied is wrong. Eugenics was the basis for inhumane acts in the past because the research and practice of eugenics was not based on the consensus of society, but was used as a tool by a small group of rulers to realize a particular ideology.
Today, as biotechnology has advanced by leaps and bounds, eugenics is back on our radar. Advances in genetic engineering and the prospect of gene therapy bring with them new possibilities, expectations, and concerns for eugenics. Pre-implantation genetic testing or expendable embryo research can directly introduce the concept of eugenics on a broader scale. With the development of genetic manipulation technologies, the concept of eugenics is once again gaining traction as it becomes possible to improve human genetic traits and prevent disease. Therefore, it is very important to determine how eugenics will be applied in the future. In this regard, we believe that eugenics in any process can only be permitted for therapeutic purposes. Furthermore, the scope of eugenics, i.e., the areas in which it is acceptable for therapeutic purposes, should be established and specified through social consensus, and we have the following specific rationale for this.
First, manipulating and programming the genes of a fetus through eugenics approaches unilaterally dictates the life of an organism without its informed consent. While it is natural for a fetus to inherit its parents’ genes, artificially manipulating genes takes away the unborn human being’s right to self-determination. Therefore, neither the parents nor the child have the right to selectively inject certain genes and decide to live with them for the rest of his or her life. However, genetic interference with a clear purpose of “treatment” should be allowed. This is because it can be assumed that consent can be obtained, even after the fact, to treat a disease or disorder. Some may argue that there is a potential for unjustified treatment, where a person may not consent. However, it is safe to assume that the members of any country or society would consent to treatment for congenital disorders such as cataracts, which are passed on genetically, or for diseases with a high mortality rate after childbirth. This is why it is important to carefully consider the scope of the treatment. Genetic modifications that are categorized as non-therapeutic should be banned because they take away the right of human self-determination.
Second, it is a violation of the dignity of human life to determine whether a human being lives or dies based on whether he or she meets certain conditions set by the individual before birth. For example, suppose a couple of different skin colors had a child, and the couple wanted to have a child with a certain skin color. If genetic analysis is used to decide whether or not to have a child from the fetal stage, the disrespect for life would be significant. After all, simply wanting to produce a child with a desired trait is akin to the dehumanizing negative eugenics practiced by the Nazi regime.
Third, objectification, such as genetic interference with human life before birth, will fundamentally alter the self-understanding of the born person. The moment a human being learns that he or she is a genetically programmed person, he or she will cease to perceive himself or herself as an equal subject to others. The fundamental condition for a human being to be an equal and moral agent is naturality. Of course, it cannot be denied that in a modern capitalist society, a person’s social and economic position is determined to a certain extent at birth. However, material considerations aside, all human beings deserve to be treated as equal persons from birth, and this recognition is based on the fact that we are naturally born from our parents. This naturalness is an important factor that enables humans to accept their existence positively and take ownership of their role in society. Eugenics approaches and interference with the human mind and body will upset this foundation, which in turn will cause chaos in society and disrupt the order of a democratic moral community.
To summarize, genetic manipulation of the unborn child based on an indiscriminate eugenics approach can take away the right of human self-determination, degrade the dignity of living beings, and disrupt the order of democratic society. Therefore, any interference with genetic predisposition or interference with human nature, and any research on it, should be regulated as “therapeutic” only. Genetic engineering still has a long way to go before eugenics can be fully realized. However, given the rate of progress in radical science, it is possible that the ability to manipulate human traits on a gene-by-gene basis will be realized in the near future. Therefore, we need to have a public debate and build consensus on the social and ethical issues that genetic engineering may bring in the future. Only when eugenics is applied to the ideology of a society built on sound consensus can it truly improve the quality of human life and contribute to the development of humanity.
