Biomedical Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
Endnote
One potential endpoint of creating search capabilities that dynamically and completely integrate
databases in medicine, law, the genome, individual IQ and education test scores, and personal
employment records is revealed in Aldus Huxley's
Brave New World
, in which everything is known
about every citizen before their birth. In this novel, embryos are immunized in vitro in a central
hatchery against all known infectious diseases; old age itself is a disease. Furthermore, citizens are
indoctrinated at birth to the social order, based on their made-to-order genetic profile that
determines whether they are leaders or obedient followers.
Another possibility is that, like other disruptive technologies—the electric light, antibiotics, the PC,
and the automobile, for example—our ability to manipulate nucleotide and amino acid sequences will
simply become an invisible part of the social fabric. Thanks to bioinformatics, new, more powerful
drugs will be available to treat HIV and similar acquired diseases, as well as correct for genetic errors
that would otherwise result in lifelong suffering for individuals and a cost burden for the healthcare
system.
