GENETIC ENGINEERING AND REPRODUCTION

Abstract

The field of genetic engineering encompasses the seemingly insurmountable gap between technological progress and the inability of the ethics dictionary to respond to issues that arise in the wake of these developments in technology. The immense implications of genetic engineering on our moral thinking is so intense that according to Jurgen Habermas, it “changes the overall structure of our moral experience.”1 Habermas cites Ronald Dworkin’s explanation for this change, as “the change of perspective which genetic engineering has brought about for conditions of moral judgment and actions that we had previously considered unalterable.”2 The quotation he brings from Ronald Dworkin stresses the dramatic implications that genetic engineering has for our traditional moral thinking.