Every life has value, right? What about those who don’t appear able to value their own lives? What about infants whose brief existence is filled with suffering? Can we say that God has a purpose even for them?

When we imagine that some people endure “special” kinds of suffering, we alienate one another. We leave people isolated when what we actually need is each other.

I wanted to explore something Mary shared in the last episode, about this lie that the lives of the disabled are “impossibly hard.” What is it like for families coping with disabilities? What are the solutions we offer them now? Is erasing the disability something they even want, or are they asking for something else?

Is it possible to talk about healing a genetic disability without in some way discounting the value of the people who live with these disorders? What will the world be like for people with disabilities as these populations continue to shrink? Is eliminating disability even a worthwhile goal?

In this episode, we explore the idea of using this technology to heal an existing condition. What would that mean for the patients involved? Is there something about our genetics that is intrinsic to us, that we wouldn’t want to change?

In this episode, we explore the research on genetic editing. Where are we now? Does what we might able to do with genetic editing justify what we need to do to get there? If not, where does that leave us?

This season on Brave New Us, we’re exploring the field of genetics, its human applications, and the ethical question that arise when we think about using this knowledge to alter the building blocks of who we are.

First up, we take a look at human enhancement. What are some of the ways this technology might be able to improve our capabilities or help us ensure that our children have particular characteristics, and why, just maybe, we ought to be cautious about doing so.