Posted on 06/26/2020 7:33:37 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
[PHOTO:TELESUR]
For years, Ive worried and warned about the dangers posed by gene-editing technologies, such as CRISPR. In the words of one of its inventors, CRISPR (clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats) makes the human genome as malleable as a piece of literary prose at the mercy of an editors red pen. At least, thats the promise that has yet to materialize.
In 2018, a Chinese scientist announced hed used CRISPR to genetically modify human embryos. At the time, more respectable scientists denounced his actions as unethical, given how new the technology was and how little ethical oversight there was for using it. In essence, this dangerous technology has been released into the world with no limitations except play nice.
Nearly all of the criticism directed at Dr. He had to do with secondary issues such as informed consent. Relatively little was said about the possibility of gene edits producing mutations that might lead to cancer or other illnesses. Essentially nothing was said about the ethical nature of the technology itself, whether or not editing genes is something we should do at all.
Why was the ethical outrage so shallow?
Two reasons: First, science advances today on a philosophical mandate that is barely contained by an ethical utilitarianism. Thats a big-worded way of saying that our worship of science comes with the idea that if we can do it, we should do it, and the only thing that limits that is if someone gets hurt. Case in point: The Guardian called CRISPR, not a bad idea or a dangerous technology, but an imperfect tool. Why? Because it could lead to off-target edits.
That squishy bit of ethical reasoning leads to the second reason I thought that the outrage directed at the Chinese scientist was, as I put it at the time, faux. I believed that other scientists, including those who decried Dr. He as being rogue, were doing the same thing, just more discretely. In other words, I did not believe that the loud denunciation and even imprisonment of one Chinese scientist would stop others just as intent on playing God.
Turns out, it didnt.
Apparently, a team of researchers at the Francis Crick Institute in London used CRISPR to edit 18 donated human embryos. The purpose, they claimed, was to study the role of a particular gene in the earliest stages of human development. Unfortunately, around half of the embryos contained major unintended edits.
Major unintended edits is a euphemism for mutation and genetic damage which, as Medium told its readers, could lead to birth defects or medical problems like cancer later in life. As one genetics researcher put it, youre affecting so much of the DNA around the gene youre trying to edit that you could be inadvertently affecting other genes and causing problems. Even worse, the Crick Institute team didnt inadvertently mess with a gene near the one they were targeting. In other words, they hit their targets. The results were, however, unexpected.
Fyodor Urnov, a professor of molecular and cell biology at Berkeley, was more blunt: Theres no sugarcoating this . . . This is a restraining order for all genome editors to stay the living daylights away from embryo editing.
Once a gene-editing expert gets frightened, youd think we might want to cool our jets in this whole playing god thing. I doubt it. Scientists will ignore any restraining order that lacks legal punch. What happened in China didnt deter researchers in London. What happened in London wont deter anyone else. By the way, all the embryos affected by the Francis Crick Institute team were destroyed.
When science operates independently of religion, philosophy, law, and public policy, then researchers (to paraphrase a line from Jurassic Park) become so preoccupied with whether or not they can do something, they never stop to think if they should.
So we, working through our elected leaders, must be the ones to tell scientists no. They may whine and moan, as they did when President Bush curtailed embryonic stem cell research, but so what? As it turned out, we didnt need to kill embryos for their stem cells. Likewise, we dont need to play God with the human genome or with unborn children, either.
Originally posted at breakpoint.org
A “restraining order” is already in place. It is called the fear of some irreversible unknown — the Frankenstein factor. But mad scientists seldom listen.
RE: A restraining order is already in place.
How do you put a restraining order on Chinese Scientists?
Scientists will ignore any restraining order that lacks legal punch.
...
Doesn’t the same also apply to non-scientists?
Here is a more level headed article on the ethics of CRISPR:
No time to wastethe ethical challenges created by CRISPR
https://www.embopress.org/doi/full/10.15252/embr.201541337
From “Jurrasic Park”:
Ian Malcolm: Your scientists were so preoccupied with whether they could, they didn’t stop to think if they should.
Science, so much knowledge, so little wisdom.
Thanks for the post.
Here’s an article on it from Nature.
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-01906-4
Says it “wreaks chromosomal mayhem”.
Crispr has always been an exaggerated hype.
It may inadvertently have told us something about the molecular etiology of cancer.
The gist of what you say is contained in my last phrase, “But mad scientists seldom listen”.
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