Eugenics

Cloning research caught a great deal of attention when Dolly the sheep was born (§4). While some fear surrounded the attainment (§§14-15), Wilmutʼs research itself has grown well, providing a less vicious manner to gain ES cells (§12). In this article, we review the progress of cloning research along with the concern of medical circles about its application to reproductive cloning, that is to say, making replicas of human beings (§§16-21). Note that all the content is ascribed to the author (...) alone, not to Musashino University. (shrink)

Sir Francis Galton a systématisé les idées et pratiques de l'eugenisme, influencées par le livre L'origine des espèces de son cousin, Charles Darwin, par lesquelles les mécanismes de sélection naturels étaient potentiellement déjoués par la civilisation humaine. Il a affirmé que la société humaine, protégeant les plus défavorisés et les plus faibles, était en contradiction avec la sélection naturelle, et que seule une modification de ces politiques sociales permettrait à la société d'être sauvée d'un « retour à la médiocrité », (...) une phrase transformée plus tard en « régression vers la médiocrité ». DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.2.23287.27041. (shrink)

The dominant framework for addressing procreative ethics has revolved around the notion of harm, largely due to Derek Parfit’s famous non-identity problem. Focusing exclusively on the question of harm treats what procreators owe their offspring as akin to what they would owe strangers (if they owe them anything at all). Procreators, however, usually expect (and are expected) to parent the persons they create, so we cannot understand what procreators owe their offspring without also appealing to their role as prospective parents. (...) I argue that prospective parents can wrong their future children just by failing to act well in their role as parents, whether or not their offspring are ultimately harmed or benefitted by their creation. Their obligations as prospective parents bear on the motivations behind their reproductive choices, including the choice to select for some genetic trait in their offspring. Even when procreators’ motivations aren’t malicious, or purely selfish, they can still fail to recognize and act for the end of the parental role. Procreators can wrong their offspring by selecting for some genetic trait, then, when doing so would violate their obligations as prospective parents, or when their motivation for doing so is antithetical to the end of the parental role. (shrink)

With the advance of CRISPR technology, parents will be tempted to create superior offspring who are healthier, smarter, and stronger. In addition to the fact that many of these procedures are considered immoral for Catholics, they could change human nature in radical and possibly disastrous ways. This article focuses on the question of human perfectionism. First, by considering the relationship between human nature and technology, it analyzes whether such advances can improve human nature in addition to curing diseases. Next, it (...) looks at the moral and spiritual dimensions of perfection by analyzing the cardinal virtues. It argues that seeking perfection in the physical sense alone may not be prudent or wise and may produce greater injustices and weaken the human spirit in the long run. Understanding our true calling to perfection can help us resist the temptation of hubris to enhance the human race through technology. (shrink)

Eugenics is often referred to in debates on the ethics of reproductive technologies and practices, in relation to the creation of moral boundaries between acceptable and unacceptable technologies, and acceptable and unacceptable uses of these technologies. Historians have argued that twentieth century eugenics cannot be reduced to a uniform set of practices, and that no simple lessons can be drawn from this complex history. Some authors stress the similarities between past eugenics and present reproductive technologies and practices (what I define (...) throughout the paper as ‘the continuity view’) in order to condemn the latter. Others focus on the differences between past and present practices (what I define throughout the paper as ‘the discontinuity view’) in order to defend contemporary reproductive technologies. In this paper, I explore the meanings of the word ‘eugenics’ and the relationship between its past and present uses in terms of contemporary debates on reproductive technologies and practices. I argue that moral disagreement about present technologies originate in divergent views of condemnable and justifiable features of the past. (shrink)

As eugenics is defined, it is very difficult to make a clear distinction between science (medicine, genetic engineering) and eugenics as a included field. And to set a line over which genetic engineering should not go further, according to moral, legal and religious norms. If we accept the help of genetics in finding ways to fight cancer, diabetes, or HIV, we also accept positive eugenics as they are defined now. And if we accept genetic screening, and interventions on the unborn (...) baby, or abortion, we also implicitly accept negative eugenics. In addition, at government level, although eugenics are officially denied, it has been legalized in many countries until recently, and is still accepted and legalized, albeit in subtle forms, even these days. The section Introduction defines the term and classification modes. The section History of Eugenics follows eugenics from the ancient period, the introduction of eugenics by Francis Galton, the practice of eugenics as a state policy in various countries, and the present eugenics (liberal eugenics). I then analyze various issues raised by the Ethics of Liberal Eugenics, and I have developed a special section for the Future of Eugenics, focusing on the human genome project. Finally, in the Conclusions, I express my personal views on the current practice of eugenics. -/- CONTENTS: -/- Abstract Introduction New Eugenics The Future of Eugenics Conclusions Bibliography -/- DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.2.28662.45120. (shrink)

Termenul eugenie, ca practică și domeniu de studiu, a fost inventat către Francis Galton în 1883, bazându-se pe opera vărului său, Charles Darwin, genetica mendeliană și teoriile lui August Weismann (teoria plasmei germenilor, conform căreia informația ereditară este transmisă numai de celulele germinale din gonade (ovare și testicule), nu de celule somatice) . Galton a definit eugenismul drept "studiul tuturor agenților aflați sub control uman care pot îmbunătăți sau afecta calitatea rasială a generațiilor viitoare". Eugenia a fost descrisă ulterior ca (...) o mișcare socială de îmbunătățire a speciei umane prin utilizarea tehnologiei. Termenul are o puternică valență negativă datorită conotațiilor sale istorice legate de programele selective de reproducere, taberele de concentrare, și experimentele medicale și exterminările în masă promovate de regimul nazist al Germaniei în al doilea război mondial. DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.2.34224.40962. (shrink)

A "free-market" approach to the genetic development of children may result in a homogenising. Parents may be inclined to choose according to models accepted by society. In this case, improving technologies will "will grant racism and homophobia an unprecedented efficacy." One concern about the obligation to produce the best child in a particular society is that social norms may be discriminatory, so that in the end, for example, most children will be boys, extremists and heterosexuals. The sequencing of the human (...) genome can help us in human evolution, to understand diseases for direct appropriate treatment, identify mutations that cause disease, and correct them. -/- DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.2.23389.67044. (shrink)

Despite the Nazi horrors, in 1953 the new eugenics was founded, when Watson and Crick postulated the double helix of DNA as the basis of chemical heredity. In 1961, scientists have deciphered the genetic code of DNA, laying the groundwork for code manipulation and the potential building of new life forms. After thirty years from the discovery of the DNA structure, the experimenters began to carry out the first clinical studies of human somatic cell therapy. The practice of prenatal genetic (...) tests identifies genes or unwanted genetic markers. Parents can choose to continue pregnancy or give up the fetus. Once the preimplantation genetic diagnosis occurs, potential parents can choose to use in vitro fertilization and then test early embryonic cells to identify embryos with genes they prefer or avoid. Because of concerns about eugenics, genetic counseling is based on a "non-directive" policy to ensure respect for reproductive autonomy. The argument for this counseling service is that we should balance parental autonomy with child's autonomy in the future. Specialists have not yet given a clear answer to the question of whether these practices should be considered eugenic practices, or if they are moral practices. DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.2.28777.95849. (shrink)

Dans la définition de l'eugénisme, il est très difficile d'établir une distinction claire entre la science (médecine, génie génétique) et l'eugénisme. Et de définir une ligne de conduite sur laquelle l'ingénierie génétique ne devrait pas aller, conformément aux normes morales, juridiques et religieuses. Tant que nous acceptons l'aide de la génétique pour trouver des moyens de lutter contre le cancer, le diabète ou le VIH, nous acceptons également l'eugénisme positif tel qu'il est actuellement. Et tant que nous acceptons le dépistage (...) génétique et les interventions sur le fœtus, ou l'avortement, nous acceptons implicitement l'eugénisme négatif. En outre, au niveau gouvernemental, bien que l'eugénisme soit officiellement démenti, il a été légalisé dans de nombreux pays jusqu'à récemment et est toujours accepté et légalisé, même sous des formes subtiles, y compris aujourd'hui. DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.2.31335.50088. (shrink)

Robert Wilson’s The Eugenic Mind Project is a major achievement of engaged scholarship and socially relevant philosophy and history of science. It exemplifies the virtues of interdisciplinarity. As principal investigator of the Living Archives on Eugenics in Western Canada project, while employed in the Department of Philosophy at the University of Alberta, Wilson encountered a proverbial big ball of mud with questions and issues that involved local individuals living through a painful set of memories and implicated his institutional home in (...) outstanding moral obligations. It is engaged scholarship because it required building relationships with affected persons and taking responsibility for his institution’s legacy, as well as transforming Wilson’s own outlook along the way. It is socially relevant philosophy and history of science because it brings to light issues that remain salient today, especially how eugenic themes are ubiquitous in societal discourse and evinced in everyday decisions. It is interdisciplinary because to accomplish this type of analysis requires intellectual gymnastics that range over diverse domains of research: from standpoint theory and disability studies to oral history and governmental policy; from the evolutionary biology of prosociality and variation to conceptual questions about the categorization of human traits and types. (shrink)

The main concern of the first eugenists, such as Karl Pearson and Walter Weldon of University College London , were the perceived intelligence factors considered to be correlated with the social class. In his speech "Darwinism, Medical Progress and Eugenics", Karl Pearson equates eugenics with a field of medicine. Some areas of medicine that are not commonly recognized as eugenic affect the human genes background. These include sterilization and surgical techniques that allow the functioning of reproductive organs. Even medicines that (...) do not directly involve reproductive organs can alter the gene pool. Genetic abnormalities in such individuals are thus duplicated, modifying the genetic background. On this basis, such practices are widely accepted as more radical eugenic processes. (shrink)

As scientific progress approaches the point where significant human enhancements could become reality, debates arise whether such technologies should be made available. This paper evaluates the widespread concern that human enhancements will inevitably accentuate existing inequality and analyzes whether prohibition is the optimal public policy to avoid this outcome. Beyond these empirical questions, this paper considers whether the inequality objection is a sound argument against the set of enhancements most threatening to equality, i.e., cognitive enhancements. In doing so, I shall (...) argue that cognitive enhancements can be embraced wholeheartedly, for three separate reasons. However, though the inequality objection does not sufficiently support the conclusion that cognitive enhancements should be prohibited, it raises several concerns for optimal policy design that shall be addressed here. (shrink)

Annotated bibliography on eugenics and philosophy.

This chapter steps back from the important psychological work on collaborative remembering at the heart of the present volume to take up some broader questions about the place of memory in Western cultural thought, both historically and in contemporary society, offering the kind of integrative and reflective perspective for which philosophy is often known. In particular, the text aims to shed some light on the relationship between collaborative memory and the other two topics in this title—group-level cognizing and individuals—beginning with (...) the relationship between collective intentionality and collaborative remembering, and concluding with some brief comments on the politics of collaborative remembering by drawing on recent work that has been undertaken with eugenics survivors in Canada. (shrink)

[The Ethics of Human Enhancement and Liberal Eugenics] The paper deals with the ethics of biotechnological enhancement of human qualities such as intelligence, health and lifespan. In contemporary bioethics three views have emerged concerning the moral permissibility of such a biotechnological enhancement of humans. While bioconservatives reject it as morally impermissible and dangerous, bioradicals welcome it as permissible and desirable. Between these two extremes we find bioliberals who admit some types of enhancement, under certain conditions. These debates are still overshadowed (...) by fear of eugenics, but this discredited term needs to be rehabilitated because it turns out that there are both desirable and undesirable forms of eugenics. (shrink)

Selection against embryos that are predisposed to develop disabilities is one of the less controversial uses of embryo selection technologies. Many bio-conservatives argue that while the use of ESTs to select for non-disease-related traits, such as height and eye-colour, should be banned, their use to avoid disease and disability should be permitted. Nevertheless, there remains significant opposition, particularly from the disability rights movement, to the use of ESTs to select against disability. In this article we examine whether and why the (...) state could be justified in restricting the use of ESTs to select against disability. We first outline the challenge posed by proponents of ‘liberal eugenics’. Liberal eugenicists challenge those who defend restrictions on the use of ESTs to show why the use of these technologies would create a harm of the type and magnitude required to justify coercive measures. We argue that this challenge could be met by adverting to the risk of harms to future persons that would result from a loss of certain forms of cognitive diversity. We suggest that this risk establishes a pro tanto case for restricting selection against some disabilities, including dyslexia and Asperger's syndrome. (shrink)

În acest articol încerc să argumentez opinia că, așa cum este definită eugenia, este foarte dificil de făcut o diferențiere clară între știință (medicină, ingineria genetică) și eugenie. Și de stabilit o linie peste care ingineria genetică nu ar trebui să treacă, conform unor norme morale, juridice și religioase. Atâta timp cât acceptăm ajutorul geneticii în găsirea unor modalități de combatere a cancerului, diabetului sau HIV, acceptăm în mod implicit și eugenia pozitivă, conform definiției actuale. Și atâta timp cât acceptăm (...) screening-ul genetic, și intervenții asupra fătului nenăscut, sau avortul, acceptăm în mod implicit și eugenia negativă. În plus, la nivel de guverne, deși oficial eugenia este repudiată, ea a fost legalizată în foarte multe țări până de curând, și încă mai este acceptată și legalizată, chiar dacă în forme mai subtile, și în prezent. În Introducere definesc termenul și modurile de clasificare. Urmează Istoria eugeniei pornind din perioada antică, introducerea eugeniei de Francis Galton, practica eugeniei ca politică de stat în diverse țări, și eugenia actuală (eugenia liberală). Analizez apoi diverse probleme ridicate de Etica eugeniei liberale, și am dezvoltat o secțiune aparte pentru Viitorul eugeniei, cu accent pe proiectul genomului uman. În final, în secțiunea Concluzii expun opiniile personale cu privire la practica actuală a eugeniei. Am folosit ca surse principale de investigație articolele lui Kenneth M. Ludmerer, ”American Geneticists and the Eugenics Movement: 1905-1935”, Kathy J. Cooke, ”Duty or Dream? Edwin G. Conklin's Critique of Eugenics and Support for American Individualism”, Jonathan Anomaly, ”Defending Eugenics”, John R. Harding Jr. ”Beyond Abortion: Human Genetics and the New Eugenics”, Michael Boulter, ”Bloomsbury Scientists”, Chapter Title: The rise of eugenics, 1901–14, Michael Ruse and Edward O. Wilson, ”Moral Philosophy as Applied Science” și Goering, Sara, "Eugenics". (shrink)

Imagine a world where everyone is healthy, intelligent, long living and happy. Intuitively this seems wonderful albeit unrealistic. However, recent scienti c breakthroughs in genetic engineering, namely CRISPR/Cas bring the question into public discourse, how the genetic enhancement of humans should be evaluated morally. In 2001, when preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD) and in vitro fertilisation (IVF), enabled parents to select between multiple embryos, Julian Savulescu introduced the principle of procreative bene cence (PPB), stating that parents have the obligations to choose (...) the child that is expected to have the best life. In this paper I argue that accepting the PPB and the consequentialist principle (CP) that two acts with the same consequences are morally on par, commits one to accepting the parental obligation of genetically enhancing one's children. (shrink)

My focus in this paper is the question of the moral acceptability of attempts to modify the human genome. Much of the debate in this area has revolved around the distinction between supposedly therapeutic modification on the one hand, and eugenic modification on the other. In the first part of the paper I reject some recent arguments against genetic engineering. In the second part I seek to distinguish between permissible and impermissible forms of intervention in such a way that does (...) not appeal to the therapeutic/eugenic distinction. If I am right much of what we would intuitively call eugenic intervention will be morally acceptable. Central to my argument is an asymmetry in the way genetic engineers can influence a person's capacities on the one hand and life‐goals on the other. Forms of genetic intervention that have a high probability of producing a mismatch of life‐goals and capacities will be ruled out. (shrink)

The present article dwells on the idea of the empowerment of women as it was used by the Communist regime. Eugenics, a field much discussed in inter-war Romania, was the main tool in controlling women. The principles of this science, related to the idea of biology as destiny, were adopted and applied so that the private sphere became public. My thesis is that even if these principles were used in the communist strategy in order to strengthen the nation, in fact, (...) their core aspect – reproduction – became only a means for increasing work force and in the end weakened the family and implicitly the nation. (shrink)

The CRISPR system for gene editing can break, repair, and replace targeted sections of DNA. Although CRISPR gene editing has important therapeutic potential, it raises several ethical concerns. Some bioethicists worry CRISPR is a prelude to a dystopian future, while others maintain it should not be feared because it is analogous to past biotechnologies. In the scientific literature, CRISPR is often discussed as a revolutionary technology. In this paper we unpack the framing of CRISPR as a revolutionary technology and contrast (...) it with framing it as a value-threatening biotechnology or business-as-usual. By drawing on a comparison between CRISPR and the Ford Model T, we argue CRISPR is revolutionary as a product, process, and as a force for social change. This characterization of CRISPR offers important conceptual clarity to the existing debates surrounding CRISPR. In particular, conceptualizing CRISPR as a revolutionary technology structures regulatory goals with respect to this new technology. Revolutionary technologies have characteristic patterns of implementation, entrenchment, and social impact. As such, early identification of technologies as revolutionary may help construct more nuanced and effective ethical frameworks for public policy. (shrink)

Japanese bioethics has created a variety of important ideas that have not yet been reflected on mainstream bioethics discourses in the English-speaking world, which include “the swaying of the confused self” in the field of feminism, “inner eugenic thought” concerning disability, and “human relationship-oriented approaches to brain death.” In this paper, I will examine them more closely, and consider what bioethics in Japan can contribute to the development of an international discussion on philosophy of life.

In this new post-genomic age of medicine and biomedical technology, there will be novel approaches to understanding disease, and to finding drugs and cures for diseases. Hundreds of new “disease genes” thought to be the causative agents of various genetic maladies will be identified and added to the list of hundreds of such genes already identified. Based on this knowledge, many new genetic tests will be developed and used in genetic screening programs. Genetic screening is the foundation upon which reproductive (...) technologies such as pre-natal diagnosis (PND) and preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD) are based. Genetic information arising from the human genome may also be used in attempts to redesign the human genetic inheritance by engineering the human germline (germline engineering). In each of these technologies—PND, PGD, and germline engineering—there are serious ethical and social concerns. Moreover, all three are eugenic in nature because they strive to control which genes are passed down to future generations. The goals of this article are threefold: 1) to introduce the science behind the three technologies; 2) to give a brief overview of eugenics in the past century and show how these genetic technologies are eugenic; and 3) to present a vision of social justice that rejects the genetic determinism upon which eugenics is based and embraces a holistic, ecological view of nature and humanity. (shrink)

Celem artykułu jest krytyka kilku popularnych argumentów przeciwko wykorzystywaniu współczesnych osiągnięć biomedycznych do poprawiania ludzkiej kondycji fizycznej lub umysłowej. Na przykładzie prac Habermasa, Sandela, Fukuyamy omówię trzy argumenty tego typu odwołujące się do: 1) autonomii; 2) życia jako daru; 3) naturalnej równowagi. Na koniec pokażę, że sprzeciw względem niektórych propozycji biomedycznego polepszenia kondycji ludzkiej może być wynikiem swoistego błędu poznawczego, który psychologowie określają jako efekt status quo.

In my previous paper I argued that if in vitro fertilization (IVF) is legal and practiced there is no moral ground to object to legalization of preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD). My opponent raises an objection that my paper “fails to address the ethical argumentation of one key opponent of IVF – the Catholic Church”. In this reply I show that her/his thesis that embryos created during IVF are in ‘ethical limbo’ and “fall outside the moral universe of Christian ethics” does (...) not undermine my argumentation and masks the serious problem Catholics have with the moral status of early embryos. (shrink)

The eugenics movement was not the anomaly of just one country. In its day, it enamoured industrialized nations throughout the Western world. In the end, the eugenics movement ultimately did not recover from the stigma it sustained as a result of the Second World War. However, with the advancement of genetic engineering and the researches into embryonic stem cells, discussions about eugenics are becoming relevant once more, and it will be the responsibility of the informed (and not merely reactionary) to (...) cultivate reasoned argument about eugenics based on a sound knowledge of biology and ethics. The potential to rid humanity of so many hereditary ailments may rest on such a rational dialogue and, as such, we should hope to heed the lessons of history more carefully than perhaps we have. (shrink)

Eugenics is an overused, and often mis-used phrase, when applied to the handicap ground for abortion, argues Ruth McNally. Instead, we should be aware of the power of eubionics – the quest for individual, bodily perfection.

Ethical debates about liberal eugenics frequently focus on the supposed unnaturalness of its means and its supposed harm to autonomy, an emphasis that leads into irresolvable disputes about human nature, free will, and identity. In this paper I draw on Nietzsche’s work to critique eugenics’ ends rather than its means, as harm to abilities, rather than to autonomy. I first critique subjective eugenics, the selection of extrinsically valuable traits, using Nietzsche’s notion of ‘slavish’ forms of evaluation: values reducible to the (...) negation of another’s good. Subjective eugenics slavishly evaluates traits in comparison to a negatively evaluated norm, disguising an intention to diminish the norm – for example, increasing one child’s intelligence by relatively decreasing everyone else’s. Even seemingly non-comparative selection of traits like eye color depend on negative comparison. Valued either for rarity or group identity, they devalue norm in its commonness or difference. Next, I argue there is no objective form of eugenics on the Nietzschean grounds that abilities are not valuable intrinsically, but only given the power to exercise them. Abilities frustrated by conflict with other abilities or one’s environment are harmful, while disabilities that empower one’s other abilities are beneficial. Consequently, all supposedly objective forms of eugenics are subject to the previous ethical critique of subjective eugenics. Because, like evolutionary fitness, the complementary fit of traits and environment that produces power is accidental and unpredictable, human wellbeing is maximized through the conservation of a diversity of types, rather than through active improvement. (shrink)

The argument of Julian Savulescu’s 2001 paper, “Procreative Beneficence: Why We Should Select the Best Children” is flawed in a number of respects. Savulescu confuses reasons with obligations and equivocates between the claim that parents have some reason to want the best for their children and the more radical claim that they are morally obligated to attempt to produce the best child possible. Savulescu offers a prima facie implausible account of parental obligation, as even the best parents typically fail to (...) do everything they think would be best for their children let alone everything that is in fact best for their children. The profound philosophical difficulties which beset the attempt to formulate a plausible account of the best human life constitute a further independent reason to resile from Savulescu’s conclusion. Savulescu’s argument also requires parents to become complicit with racist and homophobic oppression, which is yet another reason to reject it. Removing the equivocation from Savulescu’s argument allows us to see that the assertion of an obligation to choose the “best child” has much more in common with the “old” eugenics than Savulescu acknowledges. (shrink)