Editable Future – The Technical, Ethical, Legal and Artistic Perspectives of Gene Editing

Organizers

Chinese Academy of Fine Arts, CAFA Art Museum, Berggruen Research Center, Peking University

Much controversy has grown in the public with the development of gene editing methods. The society looks confused in front of this cutting age technology which has the power to change people’s lives or rather the whole world, for good or bad. What is gene editing? What can go wrong? What are the ethical and legal controversies in the current debates? Where are we heading as a species? Two top gene editing scientists, two policy researchers, an artist and a curator sit together to share their thoughts with the public.

Topics and speakers

A Brief Introduction of Genome Editing Technology
Yangming WANG
Berggruen Fellow, Principal Investigator of the Institute of Molecular Medicine, Peking University.

Gene Edited Babies: What went wrong and what could go wrong
Haoyi WANG
Principle Investigator of the State Key Laboratory of Stem Cell and Reproductive Biology, Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Sciences

Ethical and Legal Controversies concerning Human Germline Genome Editing
Yaojin PENG
Associate professor at the Institute of Zoology, Innovation Academy for Stem Cell and Regeneration (IASCR), Chinese Academy of Sciences

The Governance of Biotechnology: the Wisdom of the History and the Challenge of the Emerging Gene Editing
Lu GAO
Associate professor in Institute for the History of Natural Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences

Gene as Artistic Media
Jo WEI
Researcher of Art, Science and Technology at the Central Academy of Fine Arts, Curator

Identity issues: Where do we come from? What are we? Where are we going?
Marta de Menezes
Artist

Summary

Gene editing is the high-profile forefront in the biotech field. On November 12, a seminar themed with “Editable Future” was held in Central Academy of Fine Arts and six researchers engaged in gene editing were invited to attend the seminar. Their studies cover molecular biology, policy of science and technology, technology law and biological art. The discussion started from the science and technology, gradually extended to the social ethics and philosophical discussions and finally focused on how to express the confusions and expectations with art. The six lecturers in different fields have respectively given the lectures with different topics and such multi-field dialogues have boosted the in-depth considerations on gene editing.

The first lecturer was Wang Yangming, researcher of Institute of Molecular Medicine, Peking University and scholar of Berggruen Institute. He introduced what the gene editing was in a simple way. The basis of gene editing lied in that DNA determined the genetic characteristics of
human beings and the slight difference of gene character encoding would lead to great disparities. Gene editing was driven by the application needs in gene function analysis, agriculture development, disease treatment, etc. At present, with the development of CRISPR technology, gene editing has become more precise with the gradually decreased costs. At last, he simply discussed the typical applications of gene editing and their advantages and disadvantages and expressed that there were still some applications whose effects were difficult to judge, such as trans-humanity.

Thereafter, Wang Haoyi, researcher of State Key Laboratory of Stem Cell and Reproductive Biology and Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Sciences shared his thoughts and considerations on baby gene editing and emphasized that the discussions on gene editing should based on the specific facts instead of general talking. In particular, it was necessary to distinguish whether the discussed objects were heritable or not, and whether the gene editing shall be used for disease treatment or human enhancement. At last, he reaffirmed that the scientific problems
needed to be talked specifically by taking consideration of the possible risks and the yield ratio.

As for the scientific problems that may exert huge social influence, the scientists should develop their research with accountability and the common people should be engaged in discussion and participation with liabilities.

Having listened to the two scientists’ considerations on the scientific dimension of gene editing, Peng Yaojin, associate researcher from Institute of Zoology, Chinese Academy of Sciences and Stem Cells and Regenerative Medicine Institute introduced “Ethics and Legal
Disputes on Gene Editing of Human Reproductive System” in the dimension of law analysis. He discussed the typical arguments on the application of gene editing of human reproductive system, made the horizontal comparisons on the regulation mechanism on gene editing in the international community, and comprehensively analyzed the differences of the United States, Germany, France and the UK in law regulation. Thereafter, he introduced the recent legislative developments in our country and pointed out that the primary issue in our country was lower law level and light punishment. Therefore, he looked ahead to the future legal regulations and expressed the necessity to intensify the international cooperation. Each country should actively assume their liabilities and responsibilities in international science governance. As for the current status in China, he said that it was necessary to set up the powerful regime framework to improve the governance effectiveness, learn from the UK on some regime construction in the future, and strengthen the discussions between the scientific community and the public.

From the legal discussions to the social ethics, Gao Lu, associate researcher of the Institute for the History of Natural Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, introduced the history developments and current status of biological treatment. Tracing back to the history, she introduced Asilomar Conference, which was the start of current biological treatment, and reviewed the scientists warming model marked by this conference. Thereafter, deeply affected by Asilomar model, United States National Research Council released Risks Assessment in the Federal Government which laid the keynote of current risk treatment model—a linear risk control and management only based on the scientific facts. Such model overlooked the systematization and complexity and only relied on the self regulation and control of the scientific circle. Looking at the abuse of the gene editing technology nowadays from this perspective also demonstrated the inappropriateness of the current risk management from another perspective. Gao Lu pointed out that it was necessary to seek for setting up the new risk management model and shape the
scientific possibilities based on the social needs with the more open and self-reflective spirit, rather than only limiting the risk management to the “risks” and “securities” that have been distinguished by the scientists themselves. Such new model called for the participation of more disciplines and more social groups as well as the profound reflections on technologies and human relations.

Back to the art field, Wei Ying, curator and technical art researcher of Central Academy of Fine Arts, made a speech themed with “Taking Gene as the Artistic Medium”. She firstly introduced the school of bioart and then put forward the concept of pan-bioart, i.e. realizing the cross of art and biology from more dimensions. Biology, as a technology, could be used in art. For example, biology may participate in the art creation as a kind of material, data or image; or by regarding the biology as the concept generator, the artistic work may be created by taking the gene
in digital world as the symbol mark; or focusing on the gene in physical world, the gene may be transformed to the practical substance through central dogma. She analyzed the connotations of several art works including Genesis, Green Fluorescent Protein Bunny and The Eighth Day one by one by taking the Genesis Trilogy created by Kac as the typical gene art. At last, she said that the center of the bioart had shifted from Europe to Asia, which had given us the opportunity to deeply think about the life and technology from our own cultural context.

The famous biological artist Marta de Menezes from Portugal started the discussion themed with “Identity: Where Do We Go?” On the relation of art and biology, she pointed out that the human beings had affected the surrounding creatures from the ancient times whereas the biology
development had promoted our world renovation to be more precise and highly effective. The form of art intervention enabled us to reflect the change of technology and knowledge from the metaphysical perspective of philosophy, and in art world it had become increasingly popular to
understand biology as a means of art creation. At the same time, Marta introduced her methodology in art creation and expressed that the methods she used constituted her identity as an artist. In addition, she displayed several bioart works created by her cooperation with the researchers in laboratories worldwide and shared her creation process, thoughts and artistic ideology on such works.