In 1898, Felix Hoffman, a young chemist working for Bayer, succeeded in creating a pain killer to treat headaches that is still marketed to this day. He discovered aspirin. With the success of this wonder drug, Hoffman continued his work and, eleven days later, manufactured a cough syrup that Bayer felt ecstatic to mass market. People purchased the cough medicine in powerful numbers and felt the euphoric sense of goodness. It’s too bad that Mr. Hoffman’s second discovery was heroin. Bayer sold the drug for nineteen years before realizing that it contained more problems than it solved. It was too late for many; the junkie had been born. If the company had just waited longer, tested the product more (instead of counting on his earlier success) the lives of so many souls could have been altered.
It seems absurd now in the twenty-first century that something as disastrous and vile as the heroin fiasco could ever occur, but even today, it happens. People have this unhealthy habit of being overzealous with new technology. Take, for example, the exciting new world of genetic technology. Through years of research, scientists have uncovered a vast variety of options available, but at what cost? For instance, a whole forest of insect repellant trees has been created. If insects are not prone to be near those trees, they will leave to find food or simply stay and starve. The same goes for the snakes or other animals that feast on insects and continues all the way up to the human. Either the species will flee or they will suffer local extinction. Either way, there will be a random lot of trees thanks to the eagerness of using genetic technology. This foreign phenomenon is not limited to foliage though. Because they are incapable of withholding new technology, humans, much like insect repellant trees, will one day prove too exotic for the natural universe.
The Essay on Technology In Our Day To Day Life
We live in the age of modern science. Digital technology is the most blessed invention of modern science. We can’t even think of a single day without technology because we always use various technologies to accomplish specific tasks in our daily life. Technology is connected to almost every part of our lives as well as in business. Life without Technology is like a ship without a rudder because ...
People are always looking for an advantage. Be it intellectual, physical, or aesthetic, they crave the best of themselves; even if that means fundamental genetic alterations. Athletes strive to be stronger, so steroids are used; the obese yearn to be thinner, so they undergo surgery; girls long to be prettier, so they get nose jobs. Vanity and arrogance grow too deeply in the hearts of all men. Therefore, if given the option, people surely would change themselves if the appropriate technology was available.
Furthermore, due to man’s inner arrogance and pride, many inventions and new technology go without proper examination before marketing. Besides heroin, other products including Dichloro-Diphenyl-Trichloroethane (DDT) and cocaine were used before a real grasp of consequences existed. Pesticides with DDT permeated fish bodies; American bald eagles swept down to eat the fish; infected food caused eagle eggs to have weaker shells, which forbade the babies to hatch causing a near extinction. Finally, cocaine was used in the original Coca-Cola for taste (before people realized the dangers of the addictive and deadly drug).
Now, all of these substances no longer find their way into these products because the risks and implications are better understood.
However, much of that same disregard happens today and shall continue to occur for as long as man inhabits this frail and finite universe. Insect repellant trees make a mockery of the natural environment currently in existence, destroy (or at least contribute to the destruction of) the food chain, and build a false sense of reality. What will happen when nature no longer desires to live with those trees? Science will continue masterminding, while completely ignoring the earth it works upon. For instance, when these trees repel insects and most other life away, will science counterattack and attempt to balance the environment it already corrupted? Perhaps man will construct insect attractive trees, which would not be normal bug intensive plants, but more powerful “insect cologne” trees. In all actuality, it seems, to the science community anyway, that fully investigating consequences before using new technology is illogical, if the implied problems can just be fixed later.
The Essay on Revolutions in Genetic Technology-an Abstract
REVOLUTIONS IN GENETIC TECHNOLOGY-AN ABSTRACT INTRODUCTION Throughout evolution one of the most primary aims of man has been to find the cure for all diseases. This pursuit led to the discovery of such groundbreaking drugs such as penicillin and vaccines for rabies and anthrax. And medical processes such as chemotherapy to treat cancer. But as humans have evolved so have the disease causing micro ...
That standing, the very same overcompensation could occur with some other form of genetic technology. Take, for instance, cloning. The purposefulness of cloning remains just as vague as that of insect repellant trees, but once again, if man possesses the technology to do, he shall use it. However, the information actually known about cloning is so minute; the complexity of the human genome confounds too many minds. One day though, as seen already with sheep, dogs, and horses, man will clone himself. There may indeed be no real purpose besides the experience of doing it, but it will occur. It may work well too. Cloning may swell into an international passion and trend before any long term repercussions are noticed. Thousands of extra “humans” may already be walking on this small, blue planet before something goes awry. The disaster may not even be genetic; perhaps the extra bodies will consume all of the natural resources. Can science cure that? Perhaps it can, but not before a plague or other natural disaster strikes the earth seeking to clean up the genetic mess.
Nothing happens without consequence. As a matter of fact, Newton’s Third Law states, “For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.” Therefore, no matter how simple, how unimportant something may seem, it has value. Even if cloning humans never proves possible, other aspects of genetic alterations, such as plastic surgery and enhancement drugs, will lead to a downfall as great as the energy that created the change. At first, these changes may seem minor and inconsequential, but they will contribute to a blob of blunders that mankind will one day pay for. There may be nothing he can do to stop it too—whether it is now when the problem is small, or later when it needs to be fixed. All he can do is sit back, let his inquisitive nature control him, and wait for himself to cause his own extinction.
The Essay on Is Cloning Of Humans Just
... of their own rather than using sperm of another man. Cloning humans would also mean that organs could be cloned, so it ... and the duplicate tested for the disease or disorder.If the clone was free of genetic ... be at risk of passing a genetic defect to a child could make use of cloning. A fertilized ovum could be cloned, ...
