We Might Not Want to Know the Dark Secrets Lurking in Our Genes
By Kevin Loria,
Tech Insider
| 08. 17. 2015
Untitled Document
Genetics has advanced to the point that we can sequence a person's genome, outlining their entire genetic blueprint, for a couple thousand dollars — perhaps even less — in approximately a day (provided you already have the million-dollar machine on hand).
That's far less than than the $3 billion it cost to first sequence a human genome, and many researchers agree that we're heading towards a time where we'll all have our genomes sequenced.
"That's certainly the vision of the future," says George Annas, a bioethicist at Boston University.
But there's one big problem with that: Once we're good enough at reading a DNA sequence to really interpret all the results — rather than just glean a few hints here and there — we may not want to know the answers.
The problem is that knowing the answers doesn't mean we'll know how to solve anything. There would be a high likelihood of identifying many ticking time-bombs or risks that we would still have no way of addressing. That could mean living an entire life knowing that you are, in a...
Related Articles
By Annika Inampudi, Science | 07.10.2025
Before a baby in the United States reaches a few days old, doctors will run biochemical tests on a few drops of their blood to catch certain genetic diseases that need immediate care to prevent brain damage or other serious...
By Geoffrey A. Fowler, The Washington Post | 07.17.2025
Nearly 2 million people protected their privacy by deleting their DNA from 23andMe after it declared bankruptcy in March. Now it’s back with the same person in charge — and I still don’t trust it.
Nor do the attorneys general...
By Elizabeth Dwoskin and Yeganeh Torbati, The Washington Post | 07.16.2025
A group of well-heeled, 30-something women sat down to dinner last spring at a table set with pregnancy-friendly mocktails and orchids, ready to hear a talk about how to optimize their offspring.
Noor Siddiqui, the founder of an embryo-screening start-up...
By Suzanne O'Sullivan, New Scientist | 07.09.2025
Rare diseases are often hard to spot. They can evade detection until irreversible organ damage or disability has already set in. Last month, in the hope of preventing just this type of harm, the UK’s health secretary, Wes Streeting, announced...