Brain Implants, Gene Editing and Synthetic Blood: Why Some Fear the Future of Medicine

Would you allow a microchip to be planted in your brain if it would allow you to always recall where you put your keys, remember your entire grocery list without writing it down, and improve your work output by a factor of three? Would you accept transfusions of synthetic blood if they could improve your speed, endurance, and recovery times? Would you consider drastically altering your potential children’s DNA to make them resistant to most known diseases?

The Pew Research Center recently released the results of a national poll of Americans and found widespread resistance toward these ideas. More than 60 percent of people said they were worried about genetic enhancement, brain chips, and synthetic blood. While the survey also found some enthusiasm for theses ideas, with 49 percent of people enthusiastic for genetic enhancements and only 34 percent looking forward to brain implants, such deep interventions in human capabilities appear to strike a majority as a bridge too far into the future.

And while these kinds of technologies may still be a long way off, signs of creeping scientific progress are all around. Researchers recently announced that cloning technology has been much more successful than many previously thought. Peter Thiel, a prominent venture capitalist, has publicly discussed using the blood transfusions to maintain his youth. Synthetic blood and human genetic engineering might not be far behind.

Do we have good reason to fear significant advancements in the human abilities? Or is the majority of Americans right to be wary of the unintended consequences such unprecedented human “enhancements” could bring?

Meddling with nature

Mark Frankel, the director of the Scientific Freedom, Responsibility and Law Program at the American Association for the Advancement of Science, pointed out that one of the most striking findings in the Pew survey was that over 70 percent of respondents thought the technologies discussed, including gene editing to prevent disease, brain implants to improve cognition, and blood transfusions to improve physical abilities, would become available before they were fully tested or understood.

"It says a lot about the relationship between the people and technology," he said.

As a researcher in science, ethics, and law, he found these responses indicated a lack of trust in the established methods of vetting new technologies, such as the Food and Drug Administration’s approval process for novel medications and medical procedures.

But while the safety and unforeseen consequences of new technologies are clearly a vitally important topic, Pew’s results also suggest that many people are nervous about the implications of new forms of human enhancement, even if they are generally safe.

Around 50 percent of respondents said that each of the medical advancements they were asked about would “cross a line” and be “meddling in nature.” Without necessarily agreeing with this evaluation, Frankel acknowledged the appeal of the idea.

“It really can change the way we think of people, and maybe even the human race at some point in time,” he said. “These technologies can really change the nature of who we are.”

And while Frankel thinks this kind of research is valuable for starting a conversation, he also argued that it’s hard to know how reliable these surveys are, particularly if respondents haven’t thought much about the questions.

“It has a lot to do with their comfort level, and what they’re hearing about it,” he said.

Were any of these technologies to actually come on the market, it’s hard to know how people would actually respond. Telling a researcher that you oppose genetic enhancement of embryos is one thing. But would these same people refuse a procedure from their doctor if they were promised it could drastically reduce their future child’s risk of cancer, heart disease and diabetes?

For the children

Julian Savulescu, a professor of philosophy and bioethics at the University of Oxford, has written extensively in support of innovative means of human enhancement. He believes that as these technologies emerge, and people see the effects all around them, resistance will fade.

“As science further progresses and offers real treatments or enhancements that really do benefit people, they will vote with their feet,” he said in an interview the International Journal of Applied Ethics.

Savulescu takes an especially strong line in favor of enhancement techniques, particularly on those that could greatly improve the lives of our offspring and future generations. He argues that, if we have the option, we should choose to have a child with the best life prospects possible — though he argues against restrictions on individual reproductive choices.

He was also critical of those who are overly risk-averse regarding new technologies.

“It is crazy to give up the extraordinary benefits of genetic modification for the tiny risks of some harm,” he said. “We need to do a rational cost-benefit analysis.”

Michael Sandel, a philosopher at Harvard University, is much more critical of potential human enhancement technologies. He worries, for instance, that genetic engineering could worsen the urge to have the “perfect” child and could corrupt the parenting relationship.

“I think part of being a parent, to love one’s child, is to accept them as they come—not to see them as instruments of our ambition or as creatures to be molded, as if they were themselves commodities,” he told PBS. “I think too often in our society parents, who may have good impulses, overreach and try to mold and shape and direct their child.”

Sandel doesn’t object to genetic enhancement wholesale, because he believes this technology could have a role fighting diseases and other health issues. But once we start to use technology to improve human abilities beyond normal parameters, many more moral issues are raised.

And Sandel notes that once we begin heading down the road of accepting the road of genetically altering our offspring, it’s not clear where it will end. Will parents end up choosing their child’s sex, eye color, personality traits? Will the competition to be the most skilled and talented begin with parents in a genetics lab before a child is even born — perhaps exacerbating social inequalities?

These concerns may account for some of the public’s wariness towards new technologies that Pew found.

An old question

But as Frankel, the researcher from the American Association for the Advancement of Science, noted, new technologies are often met with public reticence.

"These debates have been going on for perhaps centuries," he said. "Historians of science and religion have written about how people reacted to the introduction of automobiles, electricity, some of the things that you and I, and most of us, take for very much for granted, and just don't seem to see [as] very much of an issue."

While we readily enjoy the benefits of these advancements, as well as others such laser eye surgery and synthetic limbs that look more like human enhancement, they were initially greeted with ample reluctance.

“Overall, science and technology has changed our life for the better,” Frankel continued. “But at the same time, they have created the bomb, they have created, to a certain extent, pollution, et cetera, et cetera.”

As much as some people might prefer it genetic engineering and brain enhancements just weren’t invented at all, don’t count on it. Frankel, like Sandel, argues that the treatment of illness, physical and mental, is a powerful reason to develop technologies of human enhancement, and it’s unlikely that the public or policymakers would stifle this progress.

But any treatment methods that can fight illnesses and impairment may also have the potential to greatly improve upon normal human abilities — so society will be forced to grapple with tough ethical questions.

If these powerful human enhancements arise, they will change the world in unforeseeable ways. Potentially, they could cure countless diseases and alleviate untold generations of pain and suffering.

But would the society they create be one we want to live in? Should we look forward to the rest of the changes human enhancement could bring?

“I would say I’m on the side of optimism,” said Frankel, before quickly adding: “Cautious optimism.”

Photo credit: John Sherwell via Wikimedia Commons