From: Ramez Naam (mez@apexnano.com)
Date: Wed Apr 30 2003 - 01:01:40 MDT
From: Reason [mailto:reason@exratio.com]
> ...in this article on Bill McKibben's book.
>
> http://www.salon.com/tech/books/2003/04/30/enough/index_np.html
>
I submitted the following letter to the editor in response to the
review of Enough. The letter is probably too long to be printed, but
we'll see.
------------
Enough is Long on Style, Short on Substance
I read Katharine Mieszkowski's review of Bill McKibben's new book
Enough with some interest.
The review does a good job of summarizing Enough. At the same time,
it fails to point out some of the serious flaws of the book.
As Mieszkowski reports, one of McKibben's core concerns is that
parents will use genetic engineering techniques to turn their children
into robots. McKibben believes that genetic engineering will give
parents "infinitely more power" to mold their children than they
currently possess.
This is a complete fallacy. While studies of identical twins and
adopted siblings have shown without a doubt that genes affect human
behavior, they've also shown that the impact of environment is just as
large, if not larger, than the impact of genetics.
Even on the most general tests of personality - tests so removed from
reality that they summarize a whole human in just 5 numbers - genes
account for only about half the variation in scores.
Genes play a much smaller role in hundreds of real world personality
traits like smoking, religious beliefs and practices, political party
affiliation, sense of humor, and so on. These details of our identity
are sculpted mostly by random chance and our environment - including
our parents.
McKibben's other major arguments are similarly flawed. Genetically
enhanced children won't live meaningless lives lacking in challenges.
They'll find /new/ challenges and obstacles to overcome.
Nor will genetic engineering take choice away from parents any more
than literacy and modern schooling do. Parents have the choice of
raising their kids without sending them to school or teaching them to
read, but only a parent who didn't care about their children would
ever act in such a way. If the situation becomes the same with
genetic engineering, it will be only because we've found some genetic
tweaks to our children which virtually everyone agrees are a benefit.
In the end, McKibben's book is long on style but short on both
scientific accuracy and thoroughly considered arguments.
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