Pros And Cons Of Eugenics

Genetic testing and editing isn't a new-found technology, it has been used on plants and animals for decades. Consequences of these are beginning to arise, particularly in genome editing within species. Pure bred dogs are the closest comparison we have to what we would be doing if liberal eugenics was legalised. Darwinism is at the heart of this argument, that natural selection will be central for the improvement of mankind. Cross-breeding has been evident to inherently increasing survival within species, due to genetic diversity. Whereas, inbreeding is highly frowned upon due to the genetic problems associated with it. Yet, it isn't uncommon to inbreed certain species of dogs that are desirable. Eugenics applies a similar concept, breeding …show more content…
An ideal world is one without disease and disabilities, without the fundamental 'flaws' we are always facing as a society. However, it is very rare you find someone addressing mental attributes. Habermas discusses how liberal eugenics provokes the question of how to value morality and Betta extrapolates on this, describing this as 'pushing the line of 'globalised neoliberalisim' as an explosive alliance between Darwinism and free trade ideology'' (p. 10). It is this that brings about a very draconian side to eugenics. The idea that one day, the ability to code for something such as intelligence, happiness, or the deletion of a so-called 'criminal' gene is where people who are positive eugenics become torn. How can someone believe in eugenics only partially, these pro-eugenics activists only want one side of the coin, because admitting to wanting a mentally altered society would be far too comparable to the old eugenics we are all so familiar with. These sorts of characteristics are highly dependent on the nature vs nurture argument, for your genes will only get you so far, but your upbringing will highly affect the development of a person regarding their personality. Pro- eugenicists seem to think that the way to solve the world's problems wouldn't be through education and support, but rather to simply remove the gene. For instance, get rid of criminals by getting rid of the 'criminal' gene, solving poverty by getting rid of genes that may lead to a low-income situation. Buchanan discusses the problem with this argument, 'there is already some evidence of genes associated with dispositions to criminal behaviour … these interventions would not be make for the benefit of the subject, but for the benefit of the broader society.' (Buchanan 2000, p.173). Liberal eugenics is a selfish design, and genes for personality traits haven't been fully discovered, so to begin wiping them out would be an oversight on