March 21, 2007

Decoding Our Destinies

I told a friend over dinner recently that the two most transformative forces that will substantially reshape human civilization over the next couple decades are:

• universal access to information
  
• the decoding and manipulation of the human genome
  

If you want to see an example of how our growing understanding of genetics affects everyday people, read the excellent Sunday feature on Katharine Moser that recently ran in the NY Times. Genetic testing revealed to Ms. Moser that she carries the gene for Huntington's disease. The article goes on to describe how Ms. Moser--still in her mid-twenties--has chosen to live her life after learning that the onset of her symptoms may begin in as little as twelve years.

Our grasp of human genetics allows us to do little more than take a peek into our individualized biological futures. That will change eventually, but in the meantime, people like Katherine Moser are leading us into in era that will offer many of us stark choices between living in blissful ignorance or taking a more deliberate path in the shadow of a terrible certainty.

Posted by wintermute2_0 at March 21, 2007 10:08 PM

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