Although biotechnology has produced many benefits for humanity, its applications have also had some undesirable consequences, such as the decline in the biodiversity of species and the reduction of agrobiodiversity, environmental pollution and the exploitation of intellectual property rights and patents in. When he coined the term in 1919, farmer Karl Ereky described “biotechnology” as “all lines of work through which products are produced from raw materials with the help of living beings. In modern biotechnology, researchers modify DNA and proteins to transform the capabilities of living cells, plants and animals into something useful for humans. Biotechnologists do this by sequencing or reading DNA found in nature and then manipulating it in a test tube or, more recently, inside living cells.
Advances in biotechnology are intensifying the debate, from questions about how to alter life to creating it from scratch. For example, a recently announced initiative called GP-Write aims to synthesize an entire human genome from chemical components within the next 10 years. The organizers of the project have many applications in mind, from recovering woolly mammoths to growing human organs in pigs. However, as critics pointed out, the technology could make it possible to produce children without biological parents or to recreate the genome of another human being, such as making cellular replicas of Einstein.
In response, the organizers of GP-Write insist that they welcome a vigorous ethical debate and have no intention of converting synthetic cells into living humans. However, this does not guarantee that rapidly advancing technology will not be applied in the future in ways that we cannot yet predict. Biotechnologically improved crops absorb many nutrients from the soil. A high intake of nutrients can adversely affect soil fertility, so future crops may not be able to grow or be harvested.
