Human interference in the Affairs of God
- M.N. Jha and S.K.
Misra
Department Of
Microbiology, Rajendra Agricultural University, (Bihar), Pusa,
Samastipur-848125, India
Eubios Journal of Asian and International Bioethics 13 (2003), 191-4.
We, human beings are
inborn selfish by nature. We have developed genetic engineering technology and
strengthened it day by day. The technologies have enabled us to develop transgenic
and cloned organisms, microbial bio-factories etc. and will enable us to create
life. We will be able to direct our evolution according to our wish whereas
other living creatures will depend on random mutation and blind chance for
their evolution. Genetic tinkering of the human genome may lead to the creation
of superman. But such superman if derived from bad gene may act as super demon.
There may be a situation when a woman just for fantasy intends to mate a
gorilla or wants to have child as big as elephant and we will be in a position
to fulfill the fantasy of such women. But the question is "What do we help to
learn from human cloning"? And why do we want to do it? Such case will be a
rank commercial enterprise, just ripe for sensationalism.
It seems that we are one of the follower of the "Devil's
Doctrine", that is "what can be done, must be done"? The blind assumption that
all knowledge must have good end points in finally being challenged as it is
becoming painfully obvious that we neither know nor understand quite as much as
we have hitherto led to believe. The very success of molecular biology will
lead to many questions such as What kind of society would we produce if we
extended our life span for fifty more years? How could we accommodate the population
in this already crowded world? How could we provide a life with meaning and
quality for all? Do scientists have a divine right to the pursuit of truth?
Does anyone have a God-given right to search for truth wherever it may lead? Is
there something that is better known? Whose is the responsibility to guide and
control the application of science? These questions are not new but it is human
clones, the concept of super bugs, plants and animal that has forced them out
into the open. The expected super creature will be neither innocent nor
abstract. The consequence will be irrevocable. So, do we do it or do we not?
While the developments
and possibilities of science are wonderful to some, they are down right
frightening to others. We are among those people who view them with a degree of
suspicion. Is any human being justified in asking a woman to go through
pregnancy with all its physical and emotional commitment on behalf of another
woman, only to have the child taken away at birth - even at a price? It has
been done. Since one person's wife was infertile, he paid a heavy amount for a
surrogate mother, who was artificially impregnated by him. Shall we regard this
as no more than a twentieth century extension of the medieval idea of the wet
nurse? Are we willing to contemplate a situation where playing one set of women
to bear children on behalf of others is regarded as a reasonable way of solving
poverty and unemployment? Suppose, surrogate mother refuse to hand over the
children to the social mother. How will law decide whose child would it be?
Further, a situation may come when busy women hiring others to be their cows to
produce their offspring. But being too busy to have the children may also mean
too busy to look after them. Will he be willing to undertake the same kind of
loving responsibility for that life with the care and attention that is not
only the right of every human individual and which is essential for normal,
happy growth or will it just be his "Experiment"? If the child is
defective in some way, would he be willing to undertake the responsibility for
its care?
A related question is
"Would we like a child with four parents? Dr. Mintz has created a living
mouse that fits this specification. She took two mouse embryos, dissolved the
protective membranes for amalgamation and inserted a composite embryo into a
surrogate mother, who finally gave birth. Actually the mouse had five parents,
depending on one's definition of motherhood; four genetic and one for
pregnancy. Its not only mouse but frogs, rabbit, sheep etc. has already been
developed and we human beings are also in queue.
In traditional
reproduction, genes carried in the sperm and egg co-mingle to produce an
offspring that has a unique mix of its parent's qualities. In human cloning
genetic material from ovum is replaced by desired human genome and such embryos
are genetic copies of only one parent.
Even if that number of
surrogate mothers could be found willing to act as milch cows, we may be
thankful that it will take just as long for every clone to grow up as it will
take for one.
In coming years there
will be a situation when you could walk into the local clinic and get yourself
cloned as easy as eating pie. Nine months later (with the paramedics taking
care of the technical Jargon in between) you get delivery of what? Weather your
child, your brother, your sister or yourself? Commonsense and custom would say
it's your offspring since you (a) instigated the a-sexual reproductive process
yourself to begin with (b) were solely responsible for its coming into
existence (c) probably given birth to it too if you happened to be female (or
if you are married your wife could have). Strictly speaking, through, one
reason the child is your sibling because it has the exact mix of his parent's
gene as you have. On the other hand from a genetic point of view the clone is
you. So, the question remains unsolved "what does your cloned child call you?"
As a civilization we
have not outgrown a rather sickening interest in the macabre. People used to
flock to the circus to see the fattest women on earth or the dwarf or the
monster. Such aberrancies pull in the audience and the cash. So, too, we may
confidently expect that commercial interests will eagerly exploit the result of
such bizarre unions. But, should we not bother about the feelings of the
exhibited?
The test-tube baby or
human clone will also relieve us from the necessity of sex. The technology will
relieve some women from the suffering and constraints of pregnancy. It will
provide powers of prediction and selection. It may be appropriate to avoid the
birth of a child with a terminal disease but is it right to use the same
technology to avoid the birth of girls. Can we draw a line between this
designer baby approach and allowing those who can afford it to exercise
consumer choice on the characteristics of their future children? If parents can
effectively choose the genes of their child then perhaps they will be
increasingly blamed for wrong choices. In India, babies are always welcome; as
we notice from our burgeoning population, but which baby? Boys - would be the
unanimous answer. But are we going to grow more boys, if there are no women
left to conceive them? Of course, modern science has answered this question in
the form of clone baby. Further development may result in the mass production
of wombs in vitro and its not
only men but ultimately women would not be needed either. End of story.
Recent developments in
human genetics also suggest the role of gene(s) in the social behaviour of
human beings. But, findings of gene with relation to specific character can be
highly controversial. For instance, the finding of the gay gene may be used
against people born that way or finding of divorce gene may select or reject
people on the basis of their genetic superiority. Healthy people who have gene
predisposing to illness may not be able to get insurance cover. People are not
responsible for their genes and they should not suffer additional social
burdens because of any misfortune that are beyond their control. There is
another side of story too. Terrorists may ask for an excuse of their acts on
the basis of the extra genes or even chromosome they inherited from parents.
The argument for the
treatment of genetic diseases through genetic engineering is that: we have a
moral obligation to work towards more effective gene therapies for those who
are presently suffering. That is one kind of priority-but there is another,
which of the genetic disease demands our first attention, and on what criteria?
Should we try to reduce the incidence of genetic disease in population or
should we do something along eugenic lines to deliberately improve the human
gene pool? Should we do everything possible to preserve genetic diversity in
the species, even if this means permitting harmful genes like the one that
produces hemophilia to remain? This diversity may by a very fundamental
prerequisite for variation and therefore genetic vigor.
We must neither make any
absolute judgment about genetic defects, nor be in too much of a hurry to
engineer them. Some characteristics may be both useful and harmful at the same
time. We might well wonder why during evolution the gene for sickle-cell
anemia, so prevalent amongst the black population, has been retained. It is so
obviously harmful that one would expect it to have been eliminated by natural
selection. There is an advantage associated with this condition, however for
these who carry this factor have been found to have a high resistance to
malaria.
Genetic disease must be
seen in its correct perspective and in the total context of human disease. The
population at risk from malaria is 1.5 billion. If one uses the world medical
situation as an argument for genetic engineering, the argument dictates that
scientists presently working on genes or gene therapies would be better
employed developing a vaccine for malaria, cancer, AIDS etc. The problem will
be further, complicated because the commercial exploitation of the new
knowledge of human cloning, embryonic stem cell research, gutted egg reprogramming
and gene therapy. Will the poor get the benefit of medicines of tomorrow? The
medicine of tomorrow in all livelihoods will be what may be called ' Genotype
medicine". They will be individualized medicine so every one of us will
have to have a diagnostic test before a drug is prescribed. Several genome
companies notably Celera, HGS and Incyte pharmaceuticals, have filed patent
applications for thousands of DNA sequences.
Another
question: should one apply the same kind of vigorous life saving and life-supporting
technology to features that in earlier centuries would have died because of
gene defects or chromosome aberrancies, but which because of our biomedical
technology we can now keep alive even though they may be prematurely born and
suffering from gross defects? But by doing so, we may be defeating our own goal
- that of having strong healthy children. To achieve such goal should we will
or abort the abnormal child. And if so, whose decisions will it be to terminate
its life - Surrogate mother's, doctor or future social mother. So, human clones
or embryo implantation may simply not be worth the time and effort. For
childless parents, adoption may be not only the most reasonable alternative but
given the overpopulation problem, the most socially acceptable too. For this we
will have to educate the people because Dr. Zavos of Andrology Institute,
Lexington (USA) claimed that more than 3,000 people have contacted him for
their clones and the market of human cloning is enormous.
The
danger of super microbes or engineered microbes is also enormous. Combining
genes from organisms that have never been joined before might produce an
aberrant result an organism with unknown properties, which could be suddenly
quite virulent. It is also possible that two pieces of spliced DNA which are
quite harmless in their parent organism could together form a dangerous
pathogen, giving rise to devastating epidemics or pandemics, world wide
outbreak of disease. The insertion of tumour causing viral gene in to the human
intestinal bacterial E.Coli
now living in the gut might be able to live in other parts of the body -
perhaps the cardiac muscle of the heart or its range might be extended to other
animals and plants. The newly created microbes may be cheaper to use and easier
to exploit as a silent weapon in biological warfare. It may go into the hand of
such people who can go up to any extent to damage the world community for
fulfilling their objective. It will not be easy for good people to locate such
weapon and at the same time it is not difficult for fanatic to multiply it by
providing little space and simpler food. The havoc of Anthrax is the most
recent one in this regard.
No
doubt, genetic engineering is already a part of our worldview. We think no body
has any problem with a safe and permanent cure of disease either heritable or
communicable. But what about the fusion between surrogate mother and human
clones. Everybody in their heart of hearts knows that within a decade or two
cloning will be as common as warts. The discord and friction is not only about
whether benefits of cloning outweigh the possible social consequences or that
its abuse can unleash power forces which can be exploited to produce horrendous
results. But, isn't it a step about human reproduction having passed from the
hands of God into the hands of man. Now, of all our many thousand of genes, the
study of ones involved in our behaviour has already prompted panic. Many fear
that genetic arguments might be used to excuse criminal acts or justify divorce.
Although federal law prohibits the experimentation of human cloning but the
danger, though is that a blanket ban may drive boffins in the backroom where
they will continue their search even illegally. There is also possibility that
the human embryo can be legally cloned in one part of the world, then implanted
in woman in a quite different part of the globe, such as the developing world,
where such implantation is not against the law. Thus, immediate need is to
create awareness in the society about the consequences of such interference in
the affairs of God.
Social, Ethical, Moral,
Political, Legal, Economic, Demographical and Ecological Consequences of
Biotechnological Progress
In summary we can see the following - applications of new
technology claimed to: "Relieve women from the suffering and constraints of
pregnancy." "Relieve human being from sex." "Solve poverty and unemployment by
hiring surrogate mother." "Provide power of prediction and selection." "Provide
children to childless couples" and to put therapeutic cloning within reach. One
can develop specialized organs of the body, may be curing cardiac disorders,
repairing spinal cord injuries or paralysis due to strokes or accidents.
Healthy cells of the required type could be made to replace dead or
malfunctioning tissues, to repair the cellular damage caused by Parkinson's
disease, provide organs like kidney and hearts for transplanting.
While these developments and
possibilities are wonderful to some, they are downright frightening to others;
we are among those people who view them with a degree of suspicion. Let us take
the new concept "wombs for rent"? Is it
justified to ask a woman to go through pregnancy with all her physical and
emotional commitment on behalf of another infertile women or busy women, only
to have the child taken away at birth - even at a price? Shall we regard this
as no more than a twentieth century extension of the medieval idea of a wet
nurse? Are we willing to contemplate a situation where playing one set of women
to bear children on behalf of other regards as a reasonable way of solving
poverty and unemployment? In the case of refusal of surrogate mother to hand
over the children to social mother, how will the law decide - whose child would
it be? If the child is defective in some way, would he/she be willing to
undertake the responsibility for its care? Would we like a child with four
parents? To a large degree a human clone will be the mirror image of targeted
person, will it not lead to hundreds of clones with hundreds of unidentical
surrogate mothers, all saying, "My son the great hero"? What does your cloned
child call you? Is it not a step towards acquiring lower organism character of
asexual reproduction? Is it not possible to exploit the result of bizarre
unions between man and elephant, man and gorilla, cow and tiger etc. for
earning money? Will it relieve us from the necessity of sex? Can we draw a line
between this designer baby approach and allowing those who can afford it to
exercise consumer choice on the characteristics of their future children?
The announcements of Italian
Scientist Antinori and Nobel laureate Dr. Seed (Physics) that they will clone
humans no matter what the law suggests there may be little hope. If all
countries ban this, they will hire ships and go to international waters in the
ocean for this. Such announcement inspires us to oppose such devil's doctrine
that what can be done, should be done at any cost. We need to develop a great
social sense of responsibility to face the challenges of human reproductive
technology, and consider what should be in "God's hands".
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