Editing the gene editing debate: Reassessing the normative discussions on emerging genetic technologies

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dc.check.date2020-11-27
dc.check.infoAccess to this article is restricted until 12 months after publication by request of the publisher.en
dc.contributor.authorFeeney, Oliver
dc.contributor.funderEuropean Cooperation in Science and Technologyen
dc.date.accessioned2020-01-09T10:01:15Z
dc.date.available2020-01-09T10:01:15Z
dc.date.issued2019-11-27
dc.date.updated2020-01-09T09:49:07Z
dc.description.abstractThe revolutionary potential of the CRISPR-Cas9 gene editing technique has created a resurgence in enthusiasm and concern in genetic research perhaps not seen since the mapping of the human genome at the turn of the century. Some such concerns and anxieties revolve around crossing lines between somatic and germline interventions as well as treatment and enhancement applications. Underpinning these concerns, there are familiar concepts of safety, unintended consequences and damage to genetic identity and the creation of designer children through pursuing human enhancement and eugenics. In the policy realm, these morally laden distinctions and anxieties are emerging as the basis for making important and applied measures to respond to the fast-evolving scientific developments. This paper argues that the dominant normative framing for such responses is insufficient for this task. This paper illustrates this insufficiency as arising from a continued reliance on misleading genetic essentialist assumptions that generate groundless speculation and over-reactionary normative responses. This phenomenon is explicit with regard to prospective human (germ line) genetic enhancements. While many normative theorists and state-of-the-art reports continue to gesture toward the influence of environmental and social influences on a person and their traits and capacities, this recognition does not extend to the substance of the arguments themselves which tend to revert to the debunked genetic determinist framework. Given the above, this paper argues that there is a pressing need for a more central role for sociological input into particular aspects of this “enhancement myth” in order to give added weight, detail and substance to these environmental influences and influence from social structures.en
dc.description.sponsorshipEuropean Cooperation in Science and Technology (COST Action IS1303 - Citizen's Health through public-private Initiatives: Public health, Market and Ethical perspectives (CHIP ME))en
dc.description.statusPeer revieweden
dc.description.versionAccepted Versionen
dc.format.mimetypeapplication/pdfen
dc.identifier.citationFeeney, O. (2019) 'Editing the gene editing debate: Reassessing the normative discussions on emerging genetic technologies', Nanoethics, 13(3), pp. 233-243. doi: 10.1007/s11569-019-00352-5en
dc.identifier.doi10.1007/s11569-019-00352-5en
dc.identifier.eissn1871-4765
dc.identifier.endpage243en
dc.identifier.issn1871-4757
dc.identifier.issued3en
dc.identifier.journaltitleNanoethicsen
dc.identifier.startpage233en
dc.identifier.urihttps://hdl.handle.net/10468/9467
dc.identifier.volume13en
dc.language.isoenen
dc.publisherSpringer Nature Switzerland AGen
dc.rights© 2019, Springer Nature B.V. This is a post-peer-review, pre-copyedit version of a paper published as Feeney, O. (2019) 'Editing the gene editing debate: Reassessing the normative discussions on emerging genetic technologies', Nanoethics, 13(3), pp. 233-243, doi: 10.1007/s11569-019-00352-5. The final authenticated version is available online at: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11569-019-00352-5en
dc.subjectCRISPRen
dc.subjectGene-editingen
dc.subjectGenetic determinismen
dc.subjectELSIen
dc.subjectEthicsen
dc.subjectPhilosophyen
dc.subjectSociologyen
dc.subjectHuman enhancementen
dc.titleEditing the gene editing debate: Reassessing the normative discussions on emerging genetic technologiesen
dc.typeArticle (peer-reviewed)en
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