EDITORIAL:
Darwin in the Age of Biotechnology

GEORGE S. ROBINSON

Ours is truly an age of dazzling scientific and technological breakthroughs. One has little hope of keeping abreast of the latest labor-saving gadgets that enhance our ability to communicate and our quality of life, let alone figure out how to use all the bells and whistles. The real mind-boggling developments, however, are the discoveries about the human body, life on Earth, and the very origins of the universe. New, credulity-stretching discoveries are announced by scientists almost on a daily basis.

Biotechnology, in particular, is now unlocking countless secrets about the plant and animal kingdoms, and about the human body. Only recently, for example, have we learned that humans differ in genetic coding by only one-tenth of one percent. The science of nanotechnology is in its infancy, but is expected to provide medically corrective intervention even at the sub-cellular level. Almost science fiction!

In many ways, biotechnology is an extraordinarily disruptive technology—in both the good and bad senses of the word. Life-extending biomedical breakthroughs will expose new causes of death that were concealed in the past by shorter lifespans and earlier deaths. Genetic weaknesses that would have been selected out of the localized, regionalized, and global gene pools by what we accept as Darwinian principles of natural selection are now being retained and specific characteristics passed on to succeeding generations where they otherwise would not have.

Close at hand, we are told, are diagnostic gene chips, or miniaturized DNA probes on silicon chips allowing for near-immediate patient or individual profiling, predisposition, and prognosis. Having this capability also will change what a person might otherwise do, or not do, during his or her lifetime, in turn affecting the course of natural selection in human evolution. Who will control this “doctor-patient” gene chip? Physicians? Insurance com-panies? Drug companies and cartels? Government law enforcement agencies? The potential for beneficial uses is enormous, but so is the potential for serious abuse.

The biggest question, though, may be whether all these new scientific and technological breakthroughs will change forever the concept of “natural” selection. We are developing with almost unprecedented alacrity the knowledge and technological capability that could allow us to direct and even diversify our own evolution consciously, by direct internal genetic intervention, and not just through eugenics counseling or by changing the external environment in a way that impacts on isolated and broad human gene pools. But of critical importance to the survival and quality of survival of humans and our “altered” human descendants is why and how we use that knowledge and technology, and for what purposes. Underlying community values reflecting broad, informed public consent to the biotechnological innovations have not really kept pace with these innovations and the uses of the underlying technology.

Planet Earth has undergone six major species extinctions, the seventh being the present one orchestrated by humans. If our species is indeed a part of the planet’s web of life, what is the reason for the current demise of so many species of plants and animals? Is it a part of natural evolution? Will we always need this web of naturally evolved life to survive biotechnologically, on or off Earth?

“Grow or die” and “seed dispersal” are two basic principles of biology. If technology for survival in our own ecosphere is a natural component of human biological evolution, is it possible that the primary reason for stabilizing Earth’s web of life, of slowing and stopping the environmental destruction of the planet, is to provide a stable platform for human seed dispersal into the oceans, space, or even cyberspace? Biotechnology, perhaps, is quietly supplanting the current, human-engineered diminishment of the web of life that evolved in accordance with Darwin’s principles of natural selection.

Few may stop to ponder these issues, but more of us should. Those at the forefront of the scientific breakthroughs may be reluctant to discuss these matters, except in the context, perhaps, of tightly construed scientific questions, moral and community safety issues, or the real need for a particular technique to be used, say, on a hospital patient. But these inquiries must incorporate, I think, broader philosophical questions about why we are developing these capabilities, and where we are going with them. The current terms of reference for bioethi-cists may be inadequate for addressing the broader issue inherent in biotechnology and any directed human evolution, i.e., “whither humans and their altered descendants.”

In many aspects, of course, the issues addressed and the questions raised are not altogether unique. We have been undertaking for some time various “anti-evolutionary” practices, at least in terms of traditional Darwinian principles of natural selection. Eugenics screening, for example, and assisted reproduction technologies give doctors and patients increasing power to decide which human embryos survive and, more or less, with what characteristics.

Indeed, a genuinely effective infrastructure for these inquiries must be established to accommodate global involvement in the “informed consent” process with the issues related to why and whether we should pursue human evolution through biotechnological intervention. Some of the fascinating questions flowing from a broad inquiry might include whether conscious technology is a component of natural human biological evolution. Would subspeciation of Homo sapiens sapiens through the use of technology be a part of natural evolution? Is conscious or free-will use of human technology to diversify or redirect human evolution a necessary part of natural evolution? Does the broad global gene pool become redefined and less important as reproduction becomes more technological and predictable than the random genetic pairings based on human “emotion?” What impact might this have in a small and discrete biological society, such as one that might inhabit the International Space Station and its successor habitats over a long period of time? Could there ultimately be a human descen dant who satisfies criteria imposed by the taxonomists sufficient to be referred to one day as, perhaps (if I might be allowed to play a little havoc with that discipline), Homo sapiens alterios? Homo alterios oceanus? Homo alterios spatialis?

Evolution is now more than just a grand idea. It is awesomely big business and generates products, services, and almost obscene amounts of money. Even now, we patent new chemical complexes without having the faintest clue about the future potential uses for these for-mulations. But the new twists and turns in evolution also mean that modern humans are very likely to face a directed change in the very essence of what it is to be human...of what characterizes a “humanness” that distinguishes our species from the multitude of “experimental” protohominids.

Almost inevitably, Natural Law Theory and attendant implementing positive laws that institutionalize prevail-ing values formulated by different cultures and societies are about to suffer a wrenching paradigm shift during the next century as those cultures struggle to accommo-date the multitude of biotechnology innovations. And the constructs of jurisprudence likely will face some fairly disruptive “moments of truth!”

Where are the interpreters and direction givers for the next millennium? And where are the poets, the thespians, and the artists in all of this? Still to be determined, too, are the roles of theology and spirituality in the midst of these astonishing, unfolding capabilities. Does our current technology now place the human evolutionary process, or its failure, directly in our own hands? Until now, frightening as it may be, have we culturally, theologically, raised ourselves much too far above our bio-logical origins to accept the possibility or likelihood that our current ability to create and patent new life forms excludes our own species? It is an extraordinarily unique point at which we find ourselves in the natural and cultural history of the hominid evolutionary bush...where we, ourselves, may one day consciously change the very nature or essence of being human.

George S. Robinson, Editor

Return to COSMOS 2000 Table of Contents
Return to COSMOS Journals
Return to COSMOS Home Page