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The Moral and Ethic debate on using CRISPR to modify humans

Historical Context

The start of the mortal/ethical controversy around genetic editing of organisms began in the 1970s when Boyer and Stanley N. Cohen created recombinant DNA technology which could modify DNA. Although primitive in its application compared to CRISPR today, even this early conception of DNA editing sparked large ethical and moral debates within the scientific community. Is it right for humans to play god, like in Victor Hugo's "Frankenstein"? Will it have unintended consequences on the ecosystem if the wrong organism is modified the wrong way? Even if it helps with human illness, is it right to modify our own DNA? These questions and debates never went away, and laid the foundation for the much more mainstream and controversial debates regarding CRISPR years later.

In 2012, a breakthrough in science was made when Jennifer Doudna, Emmanuelle Charpentier and Feng Zhang discovered CRISPR, or Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats. This new tool made adding, removing, or modifying segments of DNA extremely more precise, easier, and cheaper. It was a significant jump forward in genetic modifying, so much so that it could now be applied to humans. The idea of creating "designed babies" because a hot topic for moral and ethical debates. Common questions asked were about the morality of modifying human life to make them humans taller, or more intelligent. It also raised questions about weather the rich would be able to have "designer babies" well the poor could not. These debates are on going to this day, and extremely mainstream.

Opposing Viewpoints

The controversy of CRISPR has created strange relationships between groups that normally would not be allied together in their arguments. On one hand, many more science oriented individual's and organizations argue about the benefits of CRISPR medically. CRISPR is a revolutionary tool for curing diseases, genetic disorders, and potentially at some point cancer. They note the extremely positive effects it can have on the lives of people with medical issues. On the more controversial side of the pro CRISPR debate, there are arguments that it would benefit society to use CRISPR in an effort to create more intelligent humans ("designer babies") as it would benefit society as a whole

On the other side of the argument, Religious groups and social justice groups alike are wary of the use of CRISPR for different reasons. Many religious and non religious groups alike see it as playin god, a dangerous thing to do and something that could bring about negative consequences like in H.G. Well's "The Island of Doctor Moreau". They also see it as an ethical conflict to personally modify the traits of an unborn child, determining what you want it to look like or be like. Finally, the concern over Eugenics-esq attitudes coming back because of designer babies is alot a great fear

Reductionist Thought

Reductionist thought applied to the moral and ethical issues surrounding CRISPR can create a slippery slope. As it reduces everything to its individual parts in an effort to understand it, this has both a negative effect in the genetic editing realm where it is multifunctional and reducing it down can worsen our understanding, and also in the moral/ethical realm, as the human mind is extremely complex and breaking it down to its parts can be a determent to understanding morals/ethics.

The "technical fix", the belief that science can solve all issues, is also in conflict with CRISPR moral debates here. Well it can cure diseases, there is concern other other ethical things and unintended consequences believers of the "technical fix" would shrug off, but could cause major damage to society if not addressed

Society’s Influence on Science

Socially, there has been a growing fear of CRISPRS potential (especially with "designer babies") about reviving thoughts similar to Eugenics, playing God, and redefining what it means to be human in a negative light. Well society as a whole feels positive towards the medical advancements CRISPR may and has provided for humans, as a whole it remains skeptical of going too far with it. Soon after CRISPR was announced, a well known and acclaimed film named "GATTACA" was produced, highlighting these facts and concerns in society, and displaying what could happen in a negative way if CRISPR's use becomes divorced with ethics.

This social concern has from the get-go created limitations on and regulations on CRISPR. Society's fears of its abuses have made major impacts, as regulations for CRISPR on humans and policy making have made the idea of "designer babies" practically illegal as of today. The debate on consenting adults willingly using CRISPR on themselves for non medical, biological enhancement is less clear however, and society has less of a strong negative opinion on it

Science’s Influence on Society

The mixing of social and scientific forces creates an interesting effect. Although science has and will continue to progress, the social element being mixed into it ensures that it will remain within the bounds of ethics and now run wild. The general fear of designer babies today in unfounded because although unchecked science may have made such a thing common place, social influences prevented it from occurring. Society limits science, however it also keeps it ethical at the same time.

Although our society is polarized, it may become united through fear of going too far with CRISPR, or with science in general. Strangely enough, the very real reality that CRISPR can be abused brought polarized and very different politically learning groups together, such as strong religious factions and strong social justice factions. CRISPR will begin to naturalize in society and slowly become more accepted for its medical uses, however because of society's influences on its development, it will never create the Eugenic-esq the dystopia it could have been and hopefully never will be.

References

Shelley, Mary Wollstonecraft, 1797-1851. (1998). Frankenstein, or, The modern Prometheus : the 1818 text. Oxford ; New York :Oxford University Press,

Wells, H. G. (Herbert George), 1866-1946. The Island of Doctor Moreau. London :Penguin, 2005.

Barrangou, R., Doudna, J. Applications of CRISPR technologies in research and beyond. Nat Biotechnol 34, 933–941 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1038/nbt.3659

Hough, S.H., Ajetunmobi, A. (2017). The Future of CRISPR Applications in the Lab, the Clinic and Society. In: Tsang, S. (eds) Precision Medicine, CRISPR, and Genome Engineering. Advances in Experimental Medicine and Biology, vol 1016. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-63904-8_9

Shivram, H., Cress, B.F., Knott, G.J. et al. Controlling and enhancing CRISPR systems. Nat Chem Biol 17, 10–19 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41589-020-00700-7