Question I'm against Designer Babies. Is there any rule in ethics that makes it wrong? We can think of many problems with it, like kids who have better genes will bully others, and the parents get to choose talents that might not be enjoyable to the kid later in life. Any other problems that you can think of? Thank You for your time! Sincerely, Bailey

Accepted:
March 21, 2013

Comments

I don't see what is wrong with designer babies, anymore than with the ways that parents try to shape their children as they grow up. Why should someone with better genes, whatever they are, bully someone else? If it were possible for example to exclude certain illnesses, or make them less likely, by using technology what is wrong with it? Or if you want a boy, or a girl, to balance the rest of the family, as parents sometimes say, it is not obviously wrong to take measures to make it more likely, if it can be done.

Designing babies could be identified more with preventative healthcare, while the ordinary way of producing babies with taking medical efforts to change what nature has provided us with, perhaps. We are often told that prevention is better than cure, and it is difficult to see why this principle should not be applied to the production of children.