By Andrew Joseph
STAT
Originally posted on June 4, 2016
Here is an excerpt:
Church said the core science of assembling a human genome from basic molecular ingredients dates back to at least 2009. And he noted that scientists have been grappling with related ethical questions for more than a decade, since the early days of synthetic biology opened the door to the idea of someone being able to build a pathogen from basic genetic components.
He said that although the project has no intention of spawning actual humans, the project’s leaders would not ignore the “ethical, social, legal” issues that inherently materialize given where the project could lead.
The article is here.
