Which of the following techniques is the MOST moral choice for a couple wanting a child?

ommegang17 January 29, 2017 at 02:06 3375 views 3 comments

Combining the husband and wife's reproductive cells to produce 1000 embryos and then selecting the 'best' embryo for implantation. The other embryos are discarded.

Using a computer program to discover the 'best' combination of the husband and wife's genes then creating 1 embryo containing this DNA

Combining one of the wife's eggs with one of the husband's sperm and then using a gene editing tool like CRISPR to insert known genes that increase intelligence, strength etc. CRISPR is also used to repair any random genetic diseases the couple might have passed on by chance.

Natural sex, rolling the genetic dice. Allowing disease/good qualities to occur at random.

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Comments (3)

Deleteduserrc January 29, 2017 at 03:55 #50987 0 likes

Reply to ommegang17 Is your user name based on the brewery?

unenlightened January 29, 2017 at 13:57 #51040 0 likes

Aldous Huxley answered that a while back in Brave New World.

BC January 30, 2017 at 06:10 #51282 0 likes

Reply to ommegang17 Combining the genes of a male and female always results in at least somewhat unpredictable results. None of the techniques you list are possible now, because we don't have sufficient information about the function of each and every gene.

At some point will have the capacity to perform all of the suggested procedures.

Deleting gene errors that cause significant-on-up-to fatal genetic flaws seems morally proper if the error can be deleted without causing other problems. All the other possibilities mentioned involve too much corporate or state meddling in the lives of individuals and the future of the species. Customizing a child with CRISPR at the direction of the parents strikes me as morally dubious as well.

We do not know whether it is advisable or not to increase intelligence by gene editing. Same for strength, longevity, immune response, and so forth "Sirius" is a novel by Olaf Stapledon about a dog who was bred to have human intelligence (it also had to have an extra big head to hold the extra big brain.) You are proposing similar actions without knowing anything about outcomes of the decisions--just as the scientist had not thought through the future of Sirius.

What gene editing enthusiasts forget is that organisms are the successful product of a long process of evolution. Diving into the genome and starting to "fix" or "improve" on nature always entails risks. Our bodies are ourselves, not just raw genetic material to screw around with.