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Genetics
Film
Our Genes, Our Choices:
Who Gets to Know?
Moderator Arthur Miller, professor at Harvard Law School, leads an intense, provocative and often humorous discussion that reveals the far-reaching implications of genetic testing.
To a group of 13 distinguished panelists, he presents a myriad of questions concerning genetic testing, the right to privacy, and the implications of test results in all areas of one's life. Panelists include Supreme Court Justice Stephen G. Breyer, ABC News correspondent Cynthia McFadden, Mark A. Rothstein, director of the Institute for Bioethics, Health Policy and Law at the University of Louisville, Nancy C. Wexler, professor of Neuropsychology at Columbia University and president of the Hereditary Disease Foundation, and other participants from the fields of adoption, law, genetics, employment and medicine...
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| Video Clips |
• What’s all the fuss about with genetic tests? Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer and commissioner of the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission Paul Miller debate whether genetic tests are different from other medical tests. [DSL/cable] [modem]
• ABC senior legal correspondent Cynthia McFadden interviews Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer, in the role of a likely nominee to the Supreme Court, on the impact his genetic history will have on his prospects for nomination. [DSL/cable] [modem]
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Essay
Could We?
When Austrian monk Gregor Mendel's mid-19th century experiments led to the discovery of the basic mechanisms of heredity, the science of genetics was born. Since then, the focus of scientific inquiry has moved from Mendel to molecules and from genetics—the study of individual genes and the way traits pass between generations—to genomics, the study of an organism's entire complement of DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid). Today the landscape is dominated by the Human Genome Project whose end product—the complete sequence of all 3.1 billion base pairs of DNA contained in almost every human cell—is an encrypted blueprint for human life. No one could have predicted that only a century after Mendel, scientists would begin to master the DNA molecule itself. How did we reach this point? The story is one of persistence, intuition, and just plain luck...
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Suggested Reading
The Cloning Sourcebook. Ed. Klotzko, Arlene J. Oxford Univ. Jul. 2001. c.368 pages. permanent paper. ISBN 0-19-512882-6. $45. (more academic). Cracking the Genome: Inside the Race To Unlock Human DNA. Davies, Kevin. Free Pr. c.288 pages. ISBN 0-7432-0479-4. (Jan. 2001). $25. Encyclopedia of Bioethics. Reich, Warren T. 5 volumes. Macmillan. (1995). More suggested reading ››
Recommended Films
Breaking the Code: Applying Genetic Techniques to Human Disease (1997) 38 min. Human Relations Media$149
Australian program reviews DNA composition and then examines two genetic diseases, hemophilia and Parkinson's. The Human Cloning Race (2002) 50 min. A&E Home Video. ISBN: 0-7670-4664-1. $19.95
An A&E Investigative Reports episode that discusses reasons for support of cloning and the reasons against human cloning. Brave New World: Why Not Clone a Human? Ethical Challenges of Biotechnology (1999) 44 min. Films for the Humanities & Sciences. ISBN: 0-7365-2185-2. $89.95
Originally an ABC Nightline program, discusses the ethical issue of human cloning. http://www.films.com/Films_Home/item.cfm?s=1&bin=10907 More Films ››
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