THE FRANKENSTEIN SYNDROME
Two tales of uncontrolled science frame the moral issues of genetic engineering.
by Bob Calverley
Internationally known gene therapy researcher W. French Anderson, M.D., has been called Frankenstein more than a few times. And he was an uncompensated scientific consultant for Gattaca, a science fiction movie about a society with unrestrained genetic science.
So it should surprise no one that Anderson, a professor of biochemistry, molecular biology and pediatrics at the Keck School of Medicine of USC, believes Frankenstein and Gattaca have something important to tell us about science.
"The message of Frankenstein that attracted people in 1818 and still energizes us today is: How much is too much in science? Just because you can do something, does that mean you should do it? Are there experiments that should never be done?" he asks. "Gattaca is an example of what our society will be 100 years from now if we continue without any controls. It would be a horrible society."
Is human genetic engineering one of those areas where scientists have already gone too far, or are in danger of soon doing so?
Anderson raised those questions in a lecture prepared last year for the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.
Anderson notes that when 18-year-old Mary Shelley conceived of Frankenstein in the summer of 1816, people truly believed that alchemists and scientists were on the verge of turning base metals into gold and of creating life or bringing the dead back to life. Shelley cited Erasmus Darwin, Charles Darwin’s grandfather and a noted scientist of the early 19th century, in the beginning of Frankenstein.
"They were doing some extraordinary experiments," says Anderson. In one, scientists arranged to acquire the body of a convict, Matthew Clydesdale, immediately following his execution. The fresh corpse was connected to a galvanic battery and shocked with electricity, a recent discovery.
"He thrashed around so that people thought he was alive. It so terrified them that he was ‘rekilled’ by cutting his jugular," Anderson says.
In Shelley’s novel, it is the monster, or "daemon," who is eloquent and rational in the bitter relationship with its creator, Dr. Victor Frankenstein. In the 1931 Boris Karloff movie classic, censors removed a key scene where the monster accidentally kills a little girl. Without the scene, the killing seemed intentional, and the monster became scarier—so scary in fact, that theaters kept stretchers in the lobby to carry out those overcome with fear. From then on, all of the myriad Frankenstein movies featured a terrifying monster. The point in all was the same, according to Anderson: "If we do research we shouldn’t be doing, we will be punished."
The 1997 movie Gattaca, written and directed by Andrew Niccol, concerns a future society in which it is possible to engineer all defects out of newborn children. Defects included not only debilitating diseases, but also things such as a tendency toward depression or violence and “suffering” from homosexuality. A clever marketing campaign featured large newspaper advertisements for “designer babies” in which you had to read the small print to learn the ad was for a movie.
Anderson related that in 1997 he was attending a meeting of the Recombinant Advisory Committee (RAC), which reviews research proposals for ethical considerations, when the first ads for Gattaca appeared. The ads invited people to order a baby much like they would order a car and RAC committee members, thinking Gattaca was a real company that was actually doing this, were shocked.
"In Gattaca, you are your DNA. Its point was that there is no gene for the human spirit," says Anderson. "Unless there is a clear stopping point, we will slide down the slippery slope to Gattaca."
Calling himself "a presumptuous scientist," Anderson poses three questions to aid society in stopping that slide.
First, is there a need to do the research? In the case of gene therapy, the answer is yes, says Anderson. "Some babies are born with lethal defects and it is immoral not to go forward with research that can alleviate human suffering."
Second, is there a moral standard by which to judge the research? Anderson, who met with the Vatican Council in the early 1980s, says that in 1983 the Pope issued what Anderson has come to believe is an appropriate moral standard. The Pope’s standard for scientific research is that it must increase human dignity.
"Cloning one’s self doesn’t meet that standard," says Anderson. "But treating human disease increases human dignity."
Anderson says that the last question, whether there is a process to ensure that the moral standard is followed, has no clear answer. Entities like RAC are a start, and committees currently review human genetic engineering experiments in advance.
The problem, notes Anderson, is not the maverick scientist who is going to South America to clone a human being. The problem is the gradual erosion of moral standards.
“That’s what Gattaca says. If you let the standards gradually erode, good people can do evil things,” Anderson says.
Powerful new technologies like nuclear power or gene therapy seduce scientists and society alike.
“The downside only comes after the real disasters, after the topsoil is gone and the ozone layer is destroyed,” says Anderson. So, he says, it becomes easy to set aside moral standards in the positive glow of seemingly innocuous scientific advances such as gene therapy for hair growth, which is coming to fruition.
"If we can choose to have hair growth, why not choose hair color? If we can do hair color, why not skin color? What about other racial characteristics?” he asks. He points out that with human growth hormone, it is already possible to “cure” shortness. “Short people are very adamant in insisting that they don’t have a disease, thank you very much. The deaf community feels similarly, and I agree,” he says.
Determining what is normal, what is better or what is an improvement is often determined by cultural bias. Anderson believes that the only protection is an educated and informed public. When the information comes in a form that people see as entertainment, that is even better.
“Frankenstein said, ‘here is the danger.’ Gattaca said, ‘here is where we could end up,’” says Anderson. “These stories help frame the moral issues of human genetic engineering." ?
Matthew Blakeslee contributed to this article.
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