ethical essay unit 1

Could genetic engineering lead to no diseases, or seeing yourself walking down the street?

Genetic engineering is becoming a very useful technology. Today plants, animals and bacteria are all being genetically engineered to produce biotechnology products. Plants are being engineered or changed to resist harmful insects or herbicides. A certain bacteria that consumes oil are being engineered to perform this task faster so that they can clean up oil spills. A type of genetic engineering called reproductive cloning is being used to generate animals that have the same nuclear DNA as another preexisting animal. The process in which this takes place is called “somatic cell nuclear transfer.” Genetic material from a donor organisms nucleus is transferred to an egg whose nucleus and genetic material as been removed. The egg is stimulated to cell divide and once division has started it is transferred to the uterus of a female host where is develops. Dolly the famous sheep was successfully cloned by using reproductive cloning. Therapeutic Cloning “embryo cloning” is another type of genetic engineering. This is the production on human embryos for the use of research. Stem cells are harvested from the embryo to use to study and generate virtually any type of cell in the human body. Genetic engineering is being used to alter DNA in plants and bacteria and could be used to alter human DNA or clone humans.

Which brings me to my first viewpoint, are these embryos alive and a person?
When these stem cells are harvested from the embryo is destroys or kills the embryo. A main concern is that this killing of the embryo is killing a person. Since the embryo is fertilized it has the potential of developing into a person and this destruction of the embryo can be thought of as killing a human. Some people believe that once conception or the egg is fertilized it is a person and that it killing that embryo in any way is wrong. Even though these stem cells have the potential of being used to treat heart disease, Alzheimer’s, cancer, and other diseases which would lower the need for organ donors it still raises the issue of killing a potential human.

A more positive side to genetic engineering is could it prevent child defects and diseases?
With the understanding of DNA we can use genetic engineering to screen parents and embryos for diseases like Alzheimer’s, certain cancer’s, down syndrome and prevent theses from being inherited by the next generation. If parents know that certain defects run in the family they could be prevented. This could provide children with a simpler life free of diseases. This also can raise an issue that we are playing god. Every person has a purpose and who are we to change who someone becomes. There are many children that are born with a defect and become very successful. There are children born with Autism that cannot perform normal daily functions but they are musically intelligent. When screening for diseases and if one is found but can not be prevented a potential down far is that an insurance company may reject covering you because you have a gene that could potential cause cancer or some other defect. This knowledge could be used against a person when its not there fault and it may never even develop.

The last concern of being able screen embryo’s and change DNA is that is could be taken a step further. Where parents are choosing the sex, hair color, eye color specific features that are supposed to be left up to nature or natural selection. Nature knows best is has gotten us this far and so it should know which genes should be matched up together. If people are given the opportunity to choose their child’s traits and/or sex it could eliminate individuality and the natural design of an equal amount of both genders.

Overall genetic engineering has both positive and negative sides. The ability to save lives by being able to reproduce organs with your same DNA so that it is not rejected would be wonderful, but destroying embryo’s in the process raises concerns. To use genetic engineering to prevent disastrous birth defects and give a child a healthy life that the wouldn’t have had otherwise could be a wonderful feeling to parents that lived with the disorder and know there kids wont have to deal with it. As technology advances more concerns both good and bad are going to be brought to attention and need to be taken seriously. I think that in the near future many decision are going to have to be made on whether we should or shouldn’t be using genetic engineering for cloning human parts or to alter defects in DNA. I think some kind of compromise is going to be made. Like if there is a way to not kill embryo’s when extracting stem cells and if strict rules are placed on what is screened in DNA and what is altered then maybe it will be more excepted by society.

Work Cited:

http://www.policyalmanac.org/health/archive/cloning.shtml