How to Prepare for a Future of Gene-Edited Babies–Because It’s Coming
April 26, 2019
(Smithsonian) – It really feels to me like the world of science fiction and science fact are, in many ways, converging,” says Jamie Metzl. The polymath would know—he’s an expert on Asian foreign relations who served in the State Department, a futurist who was recently named to the World Health Organization’s advisory committee on human genome editing governance, and yes, the author of two biotech-fueled science-fiction novels. But his newest project, Hacking Darwin, is pure nonfiction. In the book, Metzl sketches out how real-world trends in genetics, technology and policy will lead us to a swiftly approaching future that seems plucked from science fiction but, Metzl argues, is not just plausible but inevitable: a globe where humans have taken charge of our species’ evolution through altering our DNA.