Runaway Biology: A Call for Conscientious Genome Editing with CRISPR
By Søren Hough,
SFTP
| 01. 28. 2021
By 2018, it was clear that CRISPR had spun out of control. In the United States, one biotech company managed to bypass the Food and Drug Administration to get CRISPR-modified food onto people’s dinner plates. Not long after, a world-shaking report revealed that CRISPR had also been used without formal approval in China to edit the DNA of two baby girls, Lulu and Nana. As scientists and governments methodically deliberate on the best way to regulate CRISPR’s use in society, those seeking fame and fortune plow ahead heedless of the consequences. CRISPR, now a Nobel Prize-winning technology, is a permanent fixture in biological research and clinical medicine. We must take its dire ethical implications, from changing the food we eat to altering human evolution, more seriously.
Genetic Reductionism and CRISPR: Dire Bedfellows
When Drs. Jennifer Doudna and Emanuelle Charpentier were awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for their work on CRISPR, the Nobel committee framed their discovery as a tool for rewriting the “code of life” DNA.https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/chemistry/2020/press-release/." title>1 Describing DNA as the “code of life” is a common trope, and...
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Following a long-standing CGS tradition, we present a selection of our favorite Biopolitical Times posts of the past year.
In 2025, we published up to four posts every month, written by 12 authors (staff, consultants and allies), some in collaboration and one simply credited to CGS.
These titles are presented in chronological order, except for three In Memoriam notices, which follow. Many more posts that are worth your time can be found in the archive. Scroll down and “VIEW...
