Introduction to Designers babies

Welcome to the 'Design you own babies' blog

We are hereby very glad to provide you with useful and accurate information on designing your babies. Whether you are a parent- to-be or just an interested passer-by, we would be very pleased if you could leave us some comments and your point of view. Every week, we will share with you letters from our loyal readers and comments they left. We hope that you will enjoy visiting this blog and spread the word so that more people will be aware of this new technology which will bring both advantages and disadvantages.

How it all started

Well basically, if it were 20 years ago, it would actually pretty much be a hit-or-miss affair on having a baby boy or a baby girl . It was not controllable, and you can say that it all depends on god. But hey! Not anymore, ever since the beginning of 2000. Parents who accessed to certain genetic testing techniques can now predetermine their baby's sex with great accuracy and we would like to share with you a successful case :

On August 13th 1996, Ms.Monique and her husband Scott Collins's wish came true when their long-wished-for daughter, named Jessica, was born, after a genetic prescreening at a fertility clinic in Virginia.


But this is all just the beginning.

Do you know that scientists and doctors predict that it may even be possible to find out an enormous range of characteristics ? Such as, a child's future body shape, their hair and eye color, their level of resilience to certain diseases and illnesses, and more shockingly, their IQ
and personality type.

Insights into the future

In fact, some even suggested that parents can someday be able to go beyond..., to elimilate undesirable traits and could start selecting genes that they want, like musical-inclined talents. Just like how pizza buyers ordering which type of cheese and toppings they want.

Here are some quotes from biotechnology critic Jeremy Rifkin-----

"It's the ultimate shopping experience: designing your baby," he said.

''Probably due to the fact that we already having people who desire for prefection through steps like going through cosmetic surgery and psychopharmacology. This is not a big step."

From what he say, we can see that a group in our community has already accepted designers babies.

What advantages does it bring?

Indeed, from what we know at the beginning, designing babies only permitted families to pick the sex of their child due to health concerns. (This is because that having a male child might not be good news to certain familes as a deadly X-linked diseases such as hydrocephalus, or water on the brain will mostly affect boys)

Some more quotes...

Dr. Zev Rosenwaks, director of the Center for Reproductive Medicine and Infertility at Cornell Medical Center in New York City-----------

"Our view at the moment," says , "is that these techniques should be used for medical indications, not family balancing."

Princeton University biologist Lee Silver, whose book 'Remaking Eden' addresses issues like designers babies------------

"When the world first learned about IVF two decades ago," suggests . "it was horrifying to most people, and most said that they wouldn't use it even if they were infertile. But growing demand makes it socially acceptable, and now anybody who's infertile demands IVF."

Ethical problems

Ethical problems about these technologies including debates over fertilized embryos that were frozen but never used,as well as what to do with the embryos left over after a successful pregnancy, multiple births and the risks that it brings.

We all know that infertile couples might never stand for it. As some societies value boys more highly than girls, such as China and India, are already out of balance; this could complicate the problem even further.

Gender-role stereotypes

Surveys in America has shown that there is a equal numbers of parents want girls as boys. But at the same time, showed that Americans believe that an ideal family will have a boy as the
oldest child. Boys seems to be more popular as they are 'more dominant' than girls, and could protect and take care of the younger siblings.


Another ethical issues raised by the public includes the possibility of parents using this technolgy to avoid having kids with certain disorders, which is not life threathening or babies destinated to be short or retarded? The society might get more inhuman, using the name of doctors who are playing god.
Will those children be allowed to be born?
Will they be treated as second-class citizens?
Will they be discriminated?

The main question is, exactly what kinds of genes will parents select, to enhance their already healthy children? Genes for cancer resistance, a higher IQ, attractive face or even pleasant personality? These techonology helps achieve perfectionists' dreams, but on the other hand, made the human race itself more competitive.

Who knows?

Okay let's go back to the present.
You might think this is ridiculous. But who knows ?
No one is definately sure whether these techniques will be available. But never underestimate technologies nowadays.

"Yes, theoretically you could do such things," Baylor University human-reproduction specialist Larry Lipshultz said. "It's doable, but I don't know of anyone doing it."

Is it fair?

Also, it is believed that such technology will definately be expensive. And there will always be people with enough money to spend on this. So does it mean only the rich can have perfect ideal children? What about the poor? Do they have to depend only on good genes and luck?

"There may be problems," admits James Watson, whose co-discovery of the structure of DNA in 1953 made all this possible. "But I don't believe we can let the government start dictating the
decisions people make about what sorts of families they'll have."

So what is your stand? Tell us now!