Genes and Future People: Philosophical Issues in Human Genetics

Advances in genetics will make it possible to intervene in human biological development in ways that will give us considerable control over the properties that make us persons and the length and quality of our lives. Genes and Future People explores two general philosophical questions presented by human genetics, one metaphysical, the other moral: (1) How do genes, and different forms of genetic intervention (gene therapy, genetic enhancement, presymptomatic genetic testing of adults, genetic testing of preimplantation embryos), affect the identities of the people who already exist and those we bring into existence? and (2) How do these interventions benefit or harm the people we cause to exist in the near future as well as those who will exist in the distant future by satisfying or defeating their interest in having reasonably long and disease-free lives?