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I remember this was literally the question posed to us by an ethics professor 20 years ago. Now it's a reality.
A person with Down's can live a happy fulfilling life, but most parents would never choose to have a child with Down's if it could be born 'normal' instead. So we're essentially removing them from the gene pool and human race.
It's eugenics for sure. I'm not sure if it's unethical though. It's pretty complex.
I don't think Downs works like that.
It's already being removed, since people choose abortion over downs and since people with Downs don't have children (normally).
It is not hereditary. It's an error or mutation that can occur for anyone. The chances are higher the older the parents are.
There's hereditary factors but it's because the genes in charge of replication are flawed.
My understanding is that women with down syndrome only have a 30-50% chance of fertility, and men are generally infertile. Additionally there are laws in place to prevent those with mental disabilities from being taken advantage of sexually, which lessens the chance of children even more. It's a spontaneous mutation, so they wouldn't be removed from the gene pool.
https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC6603116/
If 99℅ of pregnancies are screened and the gene's edited then, yeah, you're effectively eliminating people with Down's from our world.
Unless society collapses and the Quirk returns naturally.
Realistically, gene editing will never be affordable for the vast majority of the world's population. But today, abortion is chosen up to 93% of the time instead. If the alternative is a live, healthy birth, I can't see any ethical issues.
https://obgyn.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/pd.2910
The one thing you can guarantee of the human race though is we will do it before we really put the thought in to "if" we should do it.
I have ADHD and have 2 boys on the spectrum. Despite the challenges with my younger and higher needs son I don't know if given the opportunity to play God if I would. As you said it's an extremely complex question I don't know if anyone is truly equipped to answer and I'd argue we definitely aren't mature enough to start playing God.
Here be dragons.
Personally, I'd much rather have never been born than be as neurodivergent as I am. We all exist without our consent, and I think preventing disabilities and neurodivergence in our children is no more unethical than having children in the first place. I'd never make the decision for people who already exist, I know some people consider it a part of who they are and I wouldn't want to change that. However, with hypothetical offspring, they aren't anybody yet. You can't take away part of a identity that doesn't exist.
What scares me is the idea that having neurodivergent children could be outlawed. I think neurodivergence does bring a lot of value to humanity as a whole, and while I don't think there's anything egreiously unethical about an individual preventing it in their child, the idea that a government could have that much power over how we have children is absolutely fucking terrifying.
This is something I've thought a lot about. I hope you appreciate my rambling or at least don't find me inconvenient to ignore
I do appreciate it and stresses why it's such a nuanced topic and why I feel we (collective) are not mature enough to make the decision about if we should be playing God.
My 12 year old who is high needs is also the happiest and gentlest boy despite the challenges and when asked he feels he is not different and more importantly, he feels normal.
He also has T1D. I'd much rather we focus CRISPR on solving the problems we currently have than erasing the "inconvenience" of a neurotypical having a kid with autism, ADD or Autism.
Stopping fetuses from developing Down's Syndrome in my opinion isn't unethical because it will genuinely improved their quality of life. They will live longer lives, have fewer health problems, etc. The slippery slope however was pretty well covered in the film Gattica in which people not only start requesting designer children but the world becomes a dystopian utopia where the genetically perfected are unfairly favored as the ruling class while the genetically unmodified become relegated to the worker/slave class.
Reminds me of Cyprus with Thalassemia,
they were mostly against termination, but when they introduced screenings, and optional termination. the disease mysteriously disappeared. even though publicly they were against it
(it's a story I read about it a long time ago, so take it with a grain of sand)
Well, it looks like your memory is somewhat correct.
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/17486509/
i personally call it "soft-eugenics".
not too give it moral traits, it just is