I do wonder about the moral implications of this line of thinking. If we can identify people who are born with “serial-rapist genes” or “mass-murderer genes”, can we go ahead and imprison them to prevent harm to the citizenry? Or do we have to wait for the inevitable tragedy?
Also, can we just go ahead and genetically engineer all the undesirable traits out of everyone? Who gets to decide the undesirable traits? Always fun to throw out questions like this.
I think as long as the statistical gap between genetic expression and behavior is better than say 1% we’ll always hold to the innocent-before-proven guilty principle. I’m not a big fan of biological determinism as an excuse for immorality. However, that said, it would be somewhat foolish to refuse to acknowledge that our biology can tempt us, and that there may be a possibility of taking control of our biology to help us make the moral decisions we believe are right. In other words, if I had a serial cheater gene or two, and were sorely tempted to commit adultery, and there were a pill available to mitigate that temptation, I’d be a fool not to take it. Thankfully I either don’t have the gene or have better self control than I thought (or I’m getting fat and ugly).
“Also, can we just go ahead and genetically engineer all the undesirable traits out of everyone? Who gets to decide the undesirable traits? Always fun to throw out questions like this.”
Indeed, some speculative or science-fiction touches these concepts, but the classic has to be Brave New World.
I do not doubt for a second that police states will, once practical, do any number of the things you mention. As far as the west goes, the UK is the forerunner.