Re:Scientists Edit a Dangerous Mutation in Human Embryos
by tambgbtanla on Thursday August 03, 2017 @12:46AM
(#14917015)
the arguments may be good in some rhetorical sense, but their inapplicability to modern biology means they aren't very good in the only sense that counts for this discussion. the fear is amusing, though
There is in them a perfectly sincere hope and enthusiasm; but it is not for us, but for what they might learn from us, if they could rule us as they can rabbits. They cannot tell us anything about heredity, because they do not know anything about it. But they do quite honestly believe that they would know something about it, when they had married and mismarried us for a few hundred years. They cannot tell us who is fit to wield such authority, for they know that nobody is; but they do quite honestly believe that when that authority has been abused for a very long time, somebody somehow will be evolved who is fit for the job. I am no Puritan, and no one who knows my opinions will consider it a mere criminal charge if I say that they are simply gambling. The reckless gambler has no money in his pockets; he has only the ideas in his head. These gamblers have no ideas in their heads; they have only the money in their pockets. But they think that if they could use the money to buy a big society to experiment on, something like an idea might come to them at last. That is Eugenics."
G.K. Chesterton, Eugenics and other Evils.
I recommend reading this book, as Chesterton was one of the few voices against Eugenics in its prime, and the arguments still are good.