Genetic Engineering: Dream or Nightmare, Mae-Wan Ho (Continuum, revised edition 1999)

Mae-Wan Ho, a molecular biologist by training and previous experience, has written a thorough critique of genetic engineering from a perspective that is fully conversant with the scientific issues but also challenges its basic assumptions and its alliance with big business. The result is an authoritative treatise on what she considers a major threat to the survival of the earth.

Ho’s thesis is that reductionist science is inadequate to address the problems we face today and indeed is one of the key factors intensifying them. The attempt through reductionist science, or as Ho calls it "bad science," to understand and manipulate the resources of the earth as if they were separate entities operating in cause and effect relationships is not in accord with the reality that good science reveals. One manifestation of reductionist science, genetic determinism, or the understanding that individual genes ultimately determine the makeup of an organism, is a misguided and destructive ideology according to Ho. Genes are fluid and freely adapt themselves to their environment. She offers numerous examples to illustrate the adaptability of genes to any situation and their ability to cross species lines. The development of specialized vectors for cross-species transfer of genes, a basic technique of biotechnology, provides new highways for the transfer of pathogens and the development of new threats to life. Indeed Ho believes that many of the outbreaks of disease in the world today are the result of a reductionist understanding of medicine that applies drugs or other remedies to attack specific causes of a disease and does not consider the effect of an organism’s environment or the interaction of many different causes in the creation of the disease. Bacteria thrive by creatively developing resistance to the application of antibiotics, hence the unending cycle of increased doses and the introduction of new antibiotics with less effectiveness. Ho believes that unless the paradigm changes from reductionist science to an organic understanding of the earth, the perils we face will intensify as a direct result of a reigning paradigm that is not in accord with reality.

In a similar way the attempt to identify particular genes as the key to particular diseases or conditions does not recognize the role of an organism functioning as a whole with a constant communication among its genes. Such an effort is misguided and results in a massive displacement of resources away from addressing the true causes of disease like poverty, malnutrition and unhealthy environmental conditions. Hence, the lack of reliable scientific assumptions at the base of biotechnology places doubt on the entire enterprise. "The notion of an isolatable, constant gene that can be patented as an invention for all the marvelous things it can do is the greatest reductionist myth ever perpetuated." (p. 108)

Ho enumerates a number of ethical implications of the pursuit of biotechnology and also a number of threats to human and animal health. Taken together these points illustrate her thesis that biotechnology is a dangerous threat not only to those without power but to the very life support system of the earth:

Ethical Implications

1) Genetic discrimination from diagnostic tests.

2) Negative eugenic practices in ‘therapeutic’ abortions.

3) Positive and negative eugenic practices in in vitro fertilization and diagnostic techniques.

4) The marginalization of women in the commercialization of reproductive technologies.

5) The possibility of the immoral use of human embryos in ‘pharming’ and in providing tissues and organs for transplantation.

6) The immoral use of humans and human embryos for experimentation.

7) Negative impacts on animal welfare in ‘pharming’ practices.

Hazards to human and animal health

1) The risk of cross-species epidemics as a result of facilitated recombination between animal and human viruses in xenotransplantation.

2) The risk of cross-species epidemics as a result of facilitated recombination between animal viruses and resident viruses in the human genome in ‘pharm’ animals such as transgenic sheep.

3) The risk of severe immune reactions from vectors in gene replacement therapy.

4) The risk of cancer from facilitated recombination between gene replacement vectors and resident viruses.

5) The risk of superviruses arising from facilitated recombination between viruses and cells in culture.

6) The risk of cross-species superviruses arising from facilitated recombination between viral vaccines and resident viruses in plants, animals and humans.

7) The risk of harmful mutations from cross-species transfer of transposable elements.

8) The risk of new iatrogenic diseases from new generations of genetically engineered drugs and vaccines. (pp. 267-268)

In the face of the threat of biotechnology Ho believes that a holistic approach to science and life is necessary if the world is to survive.

The key to genetic health is precisely the same as the key to physiological health: an unpolluted environment, wholesome organic foods free from agrochemicals and sanitary, socially acceptable and aesthetically satisfying living conditions. (p. 243)

Genetic Engineering is a skillful critique of an operating scientific paradigm that fuels the engine of corporate economic power. The book might be faulted by those attempting to discredit it as a polemical attack on the ideological combination of reductionist science and global corporate capitalism. Ho’s treatise does move beyond the science to a critique of how a particular kind of science operates to transform the world for the benefit of those it serves. It further shows how that view of science is inadequate and serves to discount the science present in indigenous cultures or ignore the results of different scientific methodologies.

The times today are similar to the times several centuries ago when many would deny that the earth was round or rotated around the sun. Eventually those perceptions became the perspective of the majority. Today those who hold perspectives supported by reductionist science are in the majority, yet the flaws of that perspective will become evident as it exacerbates the destruction of the web of life that holistic or organic scientific views seek to understand and support. Ho’s work provides a valuable contribution to the quest for a new culture seeking to create living economies that sustain the web of life.

J. Andy Smith III
January 4, 2002

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