Limits of Responsibility: Genome Editing, Asilomar, and the Politics of Deliberation

On April 3, 2015, a group of prominent biologists and ethicists called for a worldwide moratorium on human genetic engineering in which the genetic modifications would be passed on to future generations. Describing themselves as “interested stakeholders,” the group held a retreat in Napa, California, in January to “initiate an informed discussion” of CRISPR/Cas9 genome engineering technology, which could enable high-precision insertion, deletion, and recoding of genes in human eggs, sperm, and embryos. Such modifications could affect every cell in a resulting child, including germ cells, and could therefore be passed down through subsequent generations. The group was responding to rumors, now confirmed, of experimental attempts in China to apply the CRISPR/Cas9 technology to human embryos. Although the Chinese efforts to modify human embryos were inefficient, the Napa group declared that the advent of a technology that makes human germ-line genetic engineering plausible makes a corollary discussion of its ethical implications urgent. Echoing this sentiment, the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) and the National Academy of Medicine have announced plans to convene an international summit in fall 2015...