Genetically Engineering ‘Ethical’ Babies Is a Moral Obligation, Says Oxford Professor
August 18th, 2012Via: Telegraph:
Professor Julian Savulescu said that creating so-called designer babies could be considered a “moral obligation” as it makes them grow up into “ethically better children”.
The expert in practical ethics said that we should actively give parents the choice to screen out personality flaws in their children as it meant they were then less likely to “harm themselves and others”.
The academic, who is also editor-in-chief of the Journal of Medical Ethics, made his comments in an article in the latest edition of Reader’s Digest.
He explained that we are now in the middle of a genetic revolution and that although screening, for all but a few conditions, remained illegal it should be welcomed.
Related:
UK Bioethicist: Pregnancy and Natural Birth Should Not Be Tolerated
University of Melbourne ‘Ethicists’ Call for Legalized Murder of Newborns
Maybe, genetically engineering ethical babies is a moral obligation, and the only reason we disagree (if in fact we do) is because we are genetically inferior, ethically. But genetically engineered ethical babies won’t have that problem, maybe.
But never having had genetically engineered ethical babies who could decide the morals, we have no way of knowing which of us is genetically inferior, ethically, or whether genetically engineering or *not* genetically engineering said babies is in fact the moral obligation.
We seem to be stuck in a quandary full of conundrums.
Curse you for your lack of existence, hypothetical babies!