“Genetic Manipulation in Humans As a Matter of Rawlsian Justice”, 2001 (; similar):
Theories of justice traditionally have regarded people’s natural endowments as being fixed facts of the genetic lottery.1 Some theorists, such as Robert Nozick, believe that we own our traits, talents, abilities, and genes even though they were endowed to us by chance.2 Other theorists argue that the inequalities inherent in the natural distribution of talents and abilities place a moral obligation on us to compensate the less fortunate for their genetic disadvantages.3
The important point is that until now, theories of justice have regarded one’s genetic endowment as a fixed fact of nature rather than as a matter of justice. The ability to control the genetic endowment of future generations calls for a rethinking of the traditional theories of justice. This paper aims to investigate how one such theory—John Rawls’s—might be modified to help us respond to this new moral problem in ways that reflect more completely our considered convictions about fairness and justice.
I argue that Rawls’s theory as it stands does not give us satisfactory answers to questions about how to regulate genetic manipulation.4 Rawls’s failure to take natural primary goods into account in identifying the least advantaged leads him to counterintuitive conclusions about who in society is worst off. Similarly, worries about the inflexibility of social primary goods and the consequences these worries have for the instantiation of conditions of fair equality of opportunity are serious weaknesses in Rawls’s theory of justice.
I explain how we can modify Rawls’s theory into a framework that allows us to govern genetic manipulation in humans in ways that more fully accommodate the fixed points of our considered judgments about justice.51 go on to show how such a modified theory would instruct us to use technologies for genetic correction and enhancement. Assuming a safe, effective, and inexpensive means of genetic manipulation, the modified Rawlsian theory mandates certain kinds of genetic intervention while permitting or prohibiting others.