Gene Therapy

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Genome sequencing is plummeting, raising all sorts of issues about who owns the genes and identity theft. The issue will then be how can we ensure that this technology is equitably distributed? And I think more deeply in terms of curing genetic diseases in the body. That is going to become far more prevalent. We'll find clever ways of delivering these payloads of molecular scissors or whatever you're scalpels,.Whatever you want to use, to precisely the right tissue.

Shermer and Cobb discuss: objections to genetic engineering (political, religious, cultural) • selective breeding • recombinant DNA • the ethics of genetics • patenting life • gene therapy • gene editing • CRISPR • literature and films on the dangers of genetic engineering • bioweapons • 3 Laws of Behavior Genetics and what people fear about it.

Matthew Cobb is a professor in the School of Biological Sciences at the University of Manchester. He is the author of six books: The Idea of the Brain: A History; Life’s Greatest Secret: The Race to Crack the Genetic Code; Generation; The Resistance: The French Fight Against the Nazis; Eleven Days in August: The Liberation of Paris in 1944; and Smell: A Very Short Introduction. He lives in England.