Synthetic Biology and Morality

Synthetic biology, which aims to design and build organisms that serve human needs,has potential applications that range from producing biofuels to programming human behavior. Theemergence of this new form of biotechnology, however, raises a variety of ethical questions -- firstand foremost, whether synthetic biology is intrinsically troubling in moral terms. Is it anegregious example of scientists "playing God"? Synthetic Biology andMorality takes on this threshold ethical...
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Synthetic biology, which aims to design and build organisms that serve human needs,has potential applications that range from producing biofuels to programming human behavior. Theemergence of this new form of biotechnology, however, raises a variety of ethical questions -- firstand foremost, whether synthetic biology is intrinsically troubling in moral terms. Is it anegregious example of scientists "playing God"? Synthetic Biology andMorality takes on this threshold ethical question, as well as others that follow, offeringa range of philosophical and political perspectives on the power of syntheticbiology.

The contributors consider the basic question of the ethics of making neworganisms, with essays that lay out the conceptual terrain and offer opposing views of the intrinsicmoral concerns; discuss the possibility that synthetic organisms are inherently valuable; andaddress whether, and how, moral objections to synthetic biology could be relevant to policy makingand political discourse. Variations of these questions have been raised before, in debates overother biotechnologies, but, as this book shows, they take on novel and illuminating form whenconsidered in the context of syntheticbiology.

ContributorsJohn Basl, Mark A. Bedau, Joachim Boldt,John H. Evans, Bruce Jennings, Gregory E. Kaebnick, Ben Larson, Andrew Lustig, Jon Mandle, Thomas H.Murray, Christopher J. Preston, Ronald Sandler