CHAPTER VII
THE QUEST FOR DESIGNER CHILDREN The Jewish Tradition and Genetic Engineering Lewis D. Solomon
F rom conception through birth it is hard to find an area where technology has not had an impact. Beginning in the 1960s, physicians began to use ultrasound to observe prenatal development and diagnose abnormalities. With the 1970s came more technological gymnastics, notably IVF, letting infertile couples conceive. The intervening decades have witnessed numerous other tests and treatments for the unborn, most recently embryonic genetic tests and fetal surgeries. Someday, physicians will diagnose genetic predispositions to disease, treat ailments before they occur, and correct those occurring at the genetic level. We may also witness non therapeutical enhancement.
Yet technology can leave couples facing difficult decisions they are emotionally unprepared for. Increasingly, couples expect perfect babies all the time, leading to a desire for designer-made-tospecification-“perfect”-children.
From the perspective of the Jewish tradition, technological advances force us to ask: when do humans become Godlike? Modern technologies represent a new power to control human destiny. As the late Lord Immanuel Jakobovits warned:
Genetic engineering may open a wonderful chapter in the history of healing. But without prior agreement on restraints and the strictest limitations, such mechanization of human life may also herald irretrievable disaster resulting from man’s encroachment upon nature's preserves, from assessing human beings by their potential value as tool-parts, sperm-donors or living incubators, and from replacing