I guess picking whether or not your child has a genetic disease or not is alright. Taking the option of choosing what gender your child is has it’s benefits. But choosing specific hair or eye colour your child will have is taking it way too far. There is a genetic way of modifying your children’s genes for desirable characteristics that’s called “Designer Babies.” This may have it’s positive side, like ensuring you’re children free from genetic diseases, and gender but the negative side outweighs the positive side by a mile. If people are given the option to choose cosmetic traits like hair and eye colour, don’t you think everyone will only be choosing traits that appeal to them? There will be very little diversity in the world since everyone will start looking like each other. If you think about it, it’s kind of like making a character on the Wii. You get to choose your hair style and colour, eyebrow shape, eye shape and colour, nose shape, lip shape and colour, skin complexion and so forth.
Cystic Fibrosis and Down syndrome are two examples of screening embryos for genetic diseases that scientists have come up with. There is a process that is called InVitro Fertilization that must be gone through where the eggs are combined with sperms in test tubes outside of the mother’s body. This is monitored and checked to insure that no distinguishable genetic disorders are present in the embryo. The other process called Pre-implantation Genetic Diagnosis where they select the only disease free cells and implant them back into the mother’s womb. We can relate this to taking a Barbie doll and throwing away all the parts that you don’t like and keeping only the parts that you like. Germ Line Therapy is a process where damaged DNA is replaced with healthy DNA in the embryos.
It is said that the New InVitro Fertilization has a 100% success rate. In the near future, the specialist will be able to sustain technology that is capable of yielding steady results on increasing the likeliness of certain hair and eye colour. Obviously, this would come with a outrageous price of $20 000. This would segregate social class farther than it is today. By giving the wealthy people the option to get a designer baby, that would mean our future is full of perfect designer babies and babies with numerous flaws.
I do not think that these new technologies that are coming out to make
designer babies should only be used to insure children will not have any genetic disorders. Everyone is different and may think that even by choosing the gender of your baby is going too far, since it should be God’s choice. InVitro Fertilization and Pre-implantation Genetic Diagnostics should be a decision that has been thought long and hard. In my opinion, I think that since technology is evolving everyday, it should be used to benefit the future generation. There is a YouTube Video that I found on Designer Babies. Enjoy!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TN9ep4B9Hw0&feature=player_embedded
Article:
http://www.bionetonline.org/english/content/db_cont1.htm
Cystic Fibrosis and Down syndrome are two examples of screening embryos for genetic diseases that scientists have come up with. There is a process that is called InVitro Fertilization that must be gone through where the eggs are combined with sperms in test tubes outside of the mother’s body. This is monitored and checked to insure that no distinguishable genetic disorders are present in the embryo. The other process called Pre-implantation Genetic Diagnosis where they select the only disease free cells and implant them back into the mother’s womb. We can relate this to taking a Barbie doll and throwing away all the parts that you don’t like and keeping only the parts that you like. Germ Line Therapy is a process where damaged DNA is replaced with healthy DNA in the embryos.
It is said that the New InVitro Fertilization has a 100% success rate. In the near future, the specialist will be able to sustain technology that is capable of yielding steady results on increasing the likeliness of certain hair and eye colour. Obviously, this would come with a outrageous price of $20 000. This would segregate social class farther than it is today. By giving the wealthy people the option to get a designer baby, that would mean our future is full of perfect designer babies and babies with numerous flaws.
I do not think that these new technologies that are coming out to make
designer babies should only be used to insure children will not have any genetic disorders. Everyone is different and may think that even by choosing the gender of your baby is going too far, since it should be God’s choice. InVitro Fertilization and Pre-implantation Genetic Diagnostics should be a decision that has been thought long and hard. In my opinion, I think that since technology is evolving everyday, it should be used to benefit the future generation. There is a YouTube Video that I found on Designer Babies. Enjoy!http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TN9ep4B9Hw0&feature=player_embedded
Article:
http://www.bionetonline.org/english/content/db_cont1.htm
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