Pete Shanks

Pete Shanks, MA, attended Oxford University, where he studied Philosophy, Politics and Economics, and moved to California in the mid-1970s. He has been active in a range of local and international political movements, while mostly making his living in the publishing industry, especially on the production side; he enjoys the craft of bookmaking. Appalled by the eugenic possibilities of biotechnology, he has consulted with the Center for Genetics and Society since its earliest days. He is the author of Human Genetic Engineering: A Guide for Activists, Skeptics, and the Very Perplexed (Nation Books) and a regular contributor to Biopolitical Times.

Publications

Assisted Reproduction at 30

By Pete Shanks, Cutting Edge News | 08.25.2008

Thirty years ago the assisted reproduction industry was born. From tiny but noisy beginnings, it grew through an occasionally troubled...

Assisted Reproduction

Food from Cloned Animals

By Osagie K. Obasogie and Pete Shanks, San Francisco Chronicle | 10.05.2007

Californians should be allowed to know what they're eating. That's the simple reason why Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger should sign SB63...

Biotech & Pharma

Unmasking the FDA’s Policy on Cloned Food

By Osagie K. Obasogie and Pete Shanks, The Cutting Edge | 08.12.2007

The FDA is still considering whether to allow meat and milk from cloned animals into America's food chain, without so...

Animal Biotechnologies

In the News

A Troublesome Controversy

By Pete Shanks, The Huffington Post | 06.09.2014

Nicholas Wade's book A Troublesome Inheritance: Genes, Race and Human History has been out for a month, and the fuss...

Racial Justice

Advocating Eugenics in the UK Department of Education

By Pete Shanks, Huffington Post | 10.28.2013

Dominic Cummings, a senior adviser to the UK Secretary of State for Education, recently provoked a flurry of complaints by...

Bioethics

Google vs. Death? Really?

By Pete Shanks, Huffington Post | 10.03.2013

Has Google gone right off the deep end? It's common for techies to be infatuated with transhumanism and other far-out...

Media Coverage

Biopolitical Times

The Emperors’ New Clothes

By Pete Shanks | 05.29.2025

A review of More Everything Forever: AI Overlords, Space Empires, and Silicon Valley’s Crusade to Control the Fate of Humanity...

A "Post-Human" Future?

A Deeper Dive Into the Colossal Furor

By Pete Shanks | 04.23.2025

^{Gray wolf by Jessica Eirich via Unsplash}

“I’m not a scarcity guy, I’m an abundance guy”
– Colossal co-founder and CEO...

Animal Biotechnologies

Stumbling Toward the End of an Era

By Pete Shanks | 03.25.2025

After almost 20 years of publicity stunts and dubious claims, we may not have 23andMe to kick around anymore. The...

Patents & Other IP