By Liam M.
Did you know that one out of five genes in your body is patented by somebody else? According to Patent Attorney Pat Noonan, private firms and universities hold the majority. Technically, they own the legal rights for what makes you, you. Now if you plan on slicing yourself open and decoding your own DNA, these patents may be a bit of a roadblock for you. Most likely, however, this is not the case, and you will live comfortably with you genes untouched. This issue brings up a large moral and ethical question, which is whether or not we should patent, and subsequently interrupt the natural processes of life.
With certain genes, scientists can grow body parts. This technology is in its beginning stages. The dream is to one day be able to grow organs for those who need transplants. Others have already made plans for supermarkets that will sell man-made meat resembling any animal imaginable… including humans.
I understand the desire to save those who are losing their lives to organ failure, but we cannot be ignorant of the possibilities that can and will arise from this research. For all of time, humanity has had only limited control of what comes into existence. Altering this can bring results that will be similarly out of our control, and potentially a lot more dangerous.
Our technology has brought us to invade of the most sacred of places—a mother’s womb. Gene engineers can alter a fetus in the embryonic stage, deciding its outward characteristics such as hair and eye color. If we will allow the altering of fate in a mother’s womb, where is the limit? Do we really want to bring our will into the appearance of our children, permanently shifting them from what they were supposed to be like to some pre-determined “model child?”
I believe that life is life, no matter how small. Our attitude towards plants and animals reflect that which we have on ourselves and each other. Farmers, as seen in “The End of Organic Farming?” on page 4 of this issue, get run off their land if they don’t plant seeds that have been altered genetically. We penalize those who are trying to grow the most natural and healthy crops possible, and favoring scientists who pump human growth hormones into tomatoes to make them last on the shelf longer.
Animals that are raised to be slaughtered are shot up with steroids from birth. They bulk up so fast that many of them can hardly stand upright, since their young skeletons buckle under their tremendous weight. As revealed in the documentary “Food, Inc,” they endure immense suffering from birth to death, packed together like eggs in a crate, knee-deep in each others’ manure. We are in some respects the masters of these animals’ lives. My question is, how will we treat each other when, with gene technology, we are the masters of other people’s lives?
