Examines the arguments for and against genetically engineering your child’s appearance, intelligence, and health to improve their quality of life and ensure their freedom of choice.
Before we get into the arguments in favor of and against genetically engineering your child, it’s important to consider what aspects of your child can be designed and what level of influence you would have on their lives if you did. Genetic engineering technologies will allow us to design our children’s physical appearance, including their height and face, as well as their intelligence, their likelihood of developing genetic diseases (or disorders), and how long they will live. These technologies offer parents great responsibility and choice, and they raise ethical, social, and scientific debates in modern society.
First of all, the ability to design your child’s appearance through genetic engineering means the possibility of ensuring that your child’s appearance conforms to social standards. This could contribute to reducing social prejudice and discrimination. While standards of beauty vary across time and cultures, equipping your child with a universally accepted appearance can reduce the appearance-based disadvantages they may face in society. You can also improve your child’s overall quality of life by increasing their intelligence or strengthening their immunity to genetic diseases. This may be the best gift you can give your child.
However, the phrase “designing your child with genetic engineering” implies that in a society where genetic engineering is used, 100% of the traits you want will be written into your child’s DNA, and that the technology is already stable. However, as Professor Manolis Kellis wrote in Nature in February 2015, the environment, as well as genes, plays a role in the expression of human traits, so designing a child with genetic engineering technology can be defined as the act of a parent instilling a trait into their child, but only increasing the likelihood that the trait will be expressed.
An argument against the use of this technology could be made that by designing a child through genetic engineering, you are designing his life, and his life will eventually follow the trajectory set by his parents. However, this is based on an incorrect understanding of genetic engineering. As stated in the paragraph above, what parents can design is limited to their child’s DNA, the expression of which is influenced by the environment, so it is a leap of logic to say that parents design their child’s life. Designing your child means that no matter what they want to be in the future, you can ensure that their dreams are not thwarted by their genetics. It’s about enhancing the quality and diversity of their potential.
The counterargument to this is that genetic engineering narrows down options. For example, suppose a parent instills in their child the trait of being tall, but the child wants to do acrobatic gymnastics, which is advantageous for shorter people, and dreams of becoming a gymnast, would not genetic engineering have violated their freedom of choice? While such cases are rare, they are certainly a possibility. Nevertheless, there are good traits that are universally recognized. For example, strong bones, healthy body organs, and high intelligence. These are not enough to categorically oppose design through genetic engineering. We can also choose not to design for traits like the ones above at all.
Some might object on bioethical grounds. Human beings have dignity. Therefore, a fetus should be recognized as such from the moment it is in its mother’s womb, and genetic engineering is a challenge to human dignity. However, we need to consider what the fetus will think when it grows up: will the person who could have had some of his or her DNA manipulated by genetic engineering, but chose not to do so, be satisfied in life that his or her dignity was respected, or will he or she be dissatisfied with a life that could have been improved by genetic engineering?
In response to this, a criticism may be raised that children may be dissatisfied with the traits that their parents instilled in them. This argument overlooks the fact that genes are influenced by the environment. Environmental influences can activate the epigenome to deactivate the DNA code that carries the information for the unwanted trait, and this can prevent the expression of the unwanted trait through acquired efforts.
Genetic engineering technology can design your children. It can give your child a high quality of life, and it can prevent your child from being thwarted by congenital factors before he or she has a chance to pursue their dreams. Therefore, I think it is better to accept genetic engineering in society after careful consideration and after the laws and institutions are in place. It is important to fully consider the positive impacts of genetic engineering and the ethical issues that come with it, and to build a social consensus. In the end, genetic engineering can be a tool to expand options for our children’s future and provide them with a better life.
