I always enjoy looking at the world through the Xian Right’s eyes, because they think the forces of progress have accomplished so much more. In this case, transhumanists have apparently taken control of the National Institutes of Health.
The Center for Bioethics and Human Dignity Denounces NIH Funding of Genetic Re-Engineering Project
CHICAGO, May 3 /U.S. Newswire/—The Center for Bioethics and Human Dignity strongly denounces the decision by the National Institute of Health (NIH) to fund a project to develop guidelines for the use of human subjects in genetic enhancement research. The grant, totaling almost three-quarters of a million dollars, is being given to Maxwell Mehlman and Case Law School to promote the genetic re-engineering of human beings for non-therapeutic purposes under the rubric of “enhancement.”
“This is a violation of the spirit of the NIH-sponsored Human Genome Project,” says CBHD Senior Fellow C. Ben Mitchell. “Providing this grant signals a fundamental and dangerous change in the policy of the NIH, resurrecting the mistaken goals of the eugenics programs in the United States and Europe in the early twentieth century.”
The project has been charged with “determining the conditions under which it would be ethical to conduct genetic enhancement research using human subjects,” implying that scientists, physicians, politicians, ethicists or the public at large, condones such research.
“The project presupposes that it is ethical to reengineer normal human beings,” says CBHD President Dr. Andrew Fergusson. “But in a society which correctly decries the use of artificial means, such as steroids to ‘enhance’ athletic abilities, the presumption of the NIH to pursue the re-engineering of human beings is the height of scientific and social arrogance.”
By choosing to pursue an agenda for re-engineering humankind, the NIH has clearly demonstrated an inadequate degree of oversight of its funding activities. The White House and Congress must investigate this blatant misuse of taxpayer funds. CBHD is a strong advocate of research for healing, and is deeply saddened that this incredibly important instrument of good is being used for a course of evil.
I think they see that the Bush administration’s implosion may mean that the influence of the Christian Right in Washington science policy are numbered. Time to return to the trenches and throw hand grenades. For the record, Max Mehlman is a thoughtful analyst of an enhanceed future, an advocate of judicious regulation. He is author of Wondergenes: Genetic Enhancement and the Future of Society Listen to my Changesurfer Radio interview with Mehlman here.
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