genetic engineering

I assume we are debating HUMAN genetic engineering. It's important to note that we are NOT debating human cloning. We are debating Human genetic engineering. Those two things are VERY DIFFERENT. Human genetic engineering is the genetic engineering of humans by modifying the genotype of the unborn individual to control what traits it will possess when born. There are two types of HGE, Negative and Positive. Negative HGE is when treating problems that arise from genetic disorder. The idea of gene therapy is that a non-pathogenic virus or other delivery system can be used to insert a piece of DNA a good copy of the gene into cells of the living individual. The modified cells would divide as normal and each division would produce cells that express the desired trait. The result would be that he/she would then have the ability to express the trait that was previously absent at least partially. This form of genetic engineering could help alleviate many problems, such as diabetes, cystic fibrosis, or other genetic diseases. ALLOW ME TO STRESS THE POINT: THAT MEANS WE CAN CURE: Heart disease: coronary arteriosclerosis, high blood pressure, hyperlipidemia Cancer: retinoblastomas, colon, stomach, endometrium, lung, bladder, breast, skin (melanoma) Neurological illnesses and disorders: Alzheimer's disease, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (Lou Gehrig's disease), Gaucher's disease, Huntington's disease, multiple sclerosis, neurofibromatosis, Parkinson's disease, Tay-Sachs disease, Tourette's syndrome Mental illnesses and behavioral conditions: alcoholism, anxiety disorders, attention deficit disorder, eating disorders, manic depression, schizophrenia Other genetic diseases: cleft lip and cleft palate, clubfoot, cystic fibrosis, Duchenne muscular dystrophy, galactosemia, hemophilia, Hurler's syndrome, Marfan's syndrome, phenylketonuria, sickle cell disease, Thalassemia And of course, as mentioned before, Diabetes will also be a thing of the past. Get the point? The second type of HGE is Positive HGE, which is in the realm of enhancement, rather than cure. Theoretically genetic engineering could be used to drastically change people's genomes, which could enable people to regrow limbs and other organs, perhaps even extremely complex ones such as the spine. It could also be used to make people stronger, faster, smarter, or to increase the capacity of the lungs, among other things. If a gene exists in nature, it could be brought over to a human cell. Although we are not at the level of technology YET to do POSITIVE HGE without unethical human experiments. But with the increase of technology, someday we will. If not positive, than negative HGE should be done with the hope that with the increase of technology, Positive HGE will be done. You said: "why should we let people go around creating other people??" "why should we let people take lives into their own hands and play God??? This is always an amusing argument from the anti HGE side. If the Human race wasn't allowed to make more people, you wouldn't exist. In this sense, the homo-sapient race has been playing God for the past hundred thousand years. (Or the past six thousand years if you believe in Genesis literally) My opponent may argue that the process that we use is to create humans is "natural" while what I am advocating is "unnatural". However, we have legalized many forms of "unnatural" methods of creating other people "unnaturally". One fine example of this would be in vitro fertilization. IVF is a process in which egg cells are fertilized outside the woman's womb. The process also involves hormonally controlling the ovulatory process, removing the ova (eggs) from the woman's ovaries and letting sperm fertilize them in a fluid medium. The fertilized egg (zygote) is then transferred to the patient's uterus with the intent to establish a successful pregnancy. According to that argument, we should ban IVF also, since we are using unnatural methods to create people. Also, one should note that Testing for (negative) HGE is usually done with nothing more than an embryo, (sperm and egg fused) the embryo is unshaped, and has yet to form a single human organ. Sources: http://en.wikipedia.org... http://en.wikipedia.org... http://www.familytreemagazine.com...