| Title |
Playing God and the Intrinsic Value of Life: Moral Problems for Synthetic Biology?
|
|---|---|
| Published in |
Science and Engineering Ethics, March 2012
|
| DOI | 10.1007/s11948-012-9353-z |
| Pubmed ID | |
| Authors |
Hans-Jürgen Link |
| Abstract |
Most of the reports on synthetic biology include not only familiar topics like biosafety and biosecurity but also a chapter on 'ethical concerns'; a variety of diffuse topics that are interrelated in some way or another. This article deals with these 'ethical concerns'. In particular it addresses issues such as the intrinsic value of life and how to deal with 'artificial life', and the fear that synthetic biologists are tampering with nature or playing God. Its aim is to analyse what exactly is the nature of the concerns and what rationale may lie behind them. The analysis concludes that the above-mentioned worries do not give genuine cause for serious concern. In the best possible way they are interpreted as slippery slope arguments, yet arguments of this type need to be handled with care. It is argued that although we are urged to be especially vigilant we do not have sufficiently cogent reasons to assume that synthetic biology will cause such fundamental hazards as to warrant restricting or refraining from research in this field. |
X Demographics
The data shown below were collected from the profile of 1 X user who shared this research output. Click here to find out more about how the information was compiled.
Geographical breakdown
| Country | Count | As % |
|---|---|---|
| Unknown | 1 | 100% |
Demographic breakdown
| Type | Count | As % |
|---|---|---|
| Members of the public | 1 | 100% |
Mendeley readers
The data shown below were compiled from readership statistics for 78 Mendeley readers of this research output. Click here to see the associated Mendeley record.
Geographical breakdown
| Country | Count | As % |
|---|---|---|
| Iran, Islamic Republic of | 1 | 1% |
| United Kingdom | 1 | 1% |
| Ireland | 1 | 1% |
| Canada | 1 | 1% |
| Unknown | 74 | 95% |
Demographic breakdown
| Readers by professional status | Count | As % |
|---|---|---|
| Student > Bachelor | 25 | 32% |
| Researcher | 15 | 19% |
| Student > Ph. D. Student | 12 | 15% |
| Student > Master | 7 | 9% |
| Other | 4 | 5% |
| Other | 9 | 12% |
| Unknown | 6 | 8% |
| Readers by discipline | Count | As % |
|---|---|---|
| Agricultural and Biological Sciences | 16 | 21% |
| Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology | 13 | 17% |
| Social Sciences | 9 | 12% |
| Business, Management and Accounting | 7 | 9% |
| Philosophy | 5 | 6% |
| Other | 16 | 21% |
| Unknown | 12 | 15% |
Attention Score in Context
This research output has an Altmetric Attention Score of 1. This is our high-level measure of the quality and quantity of online attention that it has received. This Attention Score, as well as the ranking and number of research outputs shown below, was calculated when the research output was last mentioned on 16 March 2012.
All research outputs
#19,440,618
of 23,911,072 outputs
Outputs from Science and Engineering Ethics
#835
of 947 outputs
Outputs of similar age
#123,751
of 158,673 outputs
Outputs of similar age from Science and Engineering Ethics
#6
of 7 outputs
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