59 REVIEW ESSAY J Med Ethics: first published as 10.1136/jme.29.1.59 on 1 February 2003. Downloaded from American biofutures: ideology and utopia in the Fukuyama/Stock debate R E Ashcroft ............................................................................................................................. J Med Ethics 2003;29:59–62 Francis Fukuyama, in his Our Posthuman Future, and theological accounts, angels lack the capacity for Gregory Stock, in his Redesigning Humans, present free choice that is the human burden and blessing, they nevertheless are powerful, redemp- competing versions of the biomedical future of human tive figures, agents of God’s transformation of the beings, and debate the merits of more or less stringent world. Yet this angel seems to be moving too fast regimes of regulation for biomedical innovation. In this to transform anything, still less redeem anything. To restore the redemptive power to this angel, we article, these positions are shown to depend on a could assume that it redeems the past through its shared discourse of market liberalism, which limits both gaze over the expanding field of the past, by tak- the range of ends for such innovation discussed by the ing it in as a whole (rather than as, say, a ruptured field of ruins, failures, and lost causes)—thus the authors, and the scope of their policy analyses and angel of history is actually Hegel’s owl of proposals. A proper evaluation of the human Minerva. significance and policy imperatives for biomedical When philosophy paints its grey in grey, a innovation needs to be both more utopian in its shape of life has become old, and it cannot imagination, and more sophisticated in its political be rejuvenated, but only recognized, by the grey in grey of philosophy; the owl of economy. In essence, the Fukuyama/Stock debate tells Minerva begins its flight only with the onset us more about current US political ideology than it does of dusk.2 about the morality of human genetic and That is, we can only grasp what is happening biopsychological engineering. when it is almost over, and when it is too late to .......................................................................... change it (or to understand it). (The Owl is the symbolic animal of Minerva, the Roman goddess http://jme.bmj.com/ n his Illuminations, in his Theses on the philos- of wisdom, corresponding to the Greek goddess ophy of history,the German Jewish philosopher Athena). Alternatively, we could assume that the and modernist mystic Walter Benjamin draws angel, far from being the subject of the wind, is I 1 actually the wind itself. On this assumption, the the reader’s attention to a drawing by Paul Klee. The drawing is of the Angel of History. Benjamin redemption is the process of historical change; points out that this angel is being blown forward every moment of that change is redeemed in vir- by the wind of history while facing backwards. tue of being part of that process, and faith Thus, the angel’s interpretation of what is demands recognition that redemption is achieved on September 28, 2021 by guest. Protected copyright. happening is only ever an account of what has through that process. But it is precisely faith, happened; and the angel’s speculations about because the end of redemption is unknowable; what is to come are shaped by the perceived regu- the wings of the angel shield it from our gaze. larities and contingencies of the past, and by the Francis Fukuyama, noted historiological pun- prospect that the wind will continue to bear him dit and advisor to presidents, and Gregory Stock, or her aloft and onward. director of the medicine, technology, and society This is a troubling image in at least two ways. programme at University of California Los Ange- First, the usual sense we have that we may have les, have been debating biotechnological futures some control over at least the immediate future is across Europe and the United States for some denied; our agency, our power to make things months now, promoting their new books, Our happen, does not appear to figure in this image. Posthuman Future and Redesigning Humans ....................... The familiar idea we have that we can know the respectively.3–7 They recently “performed” at a past, but not the future, is wrenched free of its meeting in London, courtesy of the radical think Correspondence to: tank, the Institute of Ideas, with support from the Dr R E Ashcroft, Imperial accompanying thought, that the unpredictability College of Science, of the future has to do not with the problem of Wellcome Trust, Novartis, and Prospect magazine. Technology and Medicine, induction (according to which the future would This meeting had been energetically promoted in Department of Primary be predictable if only our knowledge of the laws of the press and other media, and the tickets sold Health Care and General nature and the “initial conditions” which could out weeks in advance. In the event more the 950 Practice, ICSTM Charing Cross Campus, Reynolds completely specify the world’s state at a particular people attended this debate, which was chaired Building, St Dunstan’s moment), but with our human power of inten- by a very well known journalist, Jonathan Road, London W6 8RP, tional change. In this sense, the image denies the Dimbleby, and featured commentaries from Pro- UK; [email protected] Marxist postulate, that “man makes history, but fessor Robin Lovell-Badge, one of the leading Accepted 8 August 2002 not under conditions of his own choosing”. British animal stem cell researchers, Professor ....................... Second, the image is of an angel. On at least some Raanan Gillon (formerly editor of the Journal of www.jmedethics.com 60 Ashcroft Medical Ethics), and Brian Appleyard, journalist and science and encouraging research and investment into improving J Med Ethics: first published as 10.1136/jme.29.1.59 on 1 February 2003. Downloaded from commentator. All the contributions were fluent and engaging, collective welfare and the welfare of the weakest and most and the debate was wide ranging.8 vulnerable. Yet both Stock and Fukuyama subscribe to the The theme of the debate was the potential for new mainstream view in US politics, which is that there are limits biomedical technologies radically to transform human exist- on the capacity of the state to improve human welfare; limits ence, the probable social consequences of such transforma- which are set by human, biological, and psychological tion, and the moral evaluation of the possible worlds implied nature.10 The irony of Stock’s position is particularly acute and of the steps we might take towards them. Fukuyama’s here; his attitude to social engineering implies a commitment position was that while new biomedical technologies, (he to the view that human biology can be utterly transformed, devoted particular attention to psychopharmacological but not our desires and interests. Fukuyama fears these manipulation of mood, techniques for extending human life desires and interests: they will selfishly shape our technolo- span, and germline genetic engineering), offered great poten- gies and the uses to which they are put, while at the same tial for relieving suffering, they posed major risks. The risks time undermining their basis in biological and psychological described fell into two broad categories: a challenge to the very human nature. The vision he portrays of the Stockian future idea of a common human nature which would found human is one in which we are hopelessly adrift, without even a com- dignity and human rights, and a threat to political economic mon humanity to bind us. stability with potential for promoting violent conflict. If we Stock and Fukuyama share a good deal, then, in their change the genetic and psychological constitution of humans vision of political society, and in their unquestioned commit- significantly, we risk destroying the idea of human unity, ment to the free market, subject to “appropriate” regulation. undermining the ideal of personal autonomy, and erasing the They differ in the style and extent of regulation they propose, basis of moral equality. In addition, by extending the life span but they share a common discourse of economic and of those able to afford such technologies we pose various dan- quasieconomic interests as the drivers of technological, gers: intergenerational struggles, and geopolitical imbalance social, and species change. They further naturalise these between the aging, rich “North” and the young, poor “South”. interests as essential constituents of “human nature”. This is Fukuyama acknowledges that to some extent these problems most apparent in the second element of their common already exist; his prediction is that things will get worse. His discourse: the set of ends to which new biomedical technolo- solution is improved national and international regulation, to gies will be put. Both Stock and Fukuyama, as good liberals, focus efforts on technologies which will permit treatment of do not believe that it is the role of the state to prescribe the illness, while barring applications which would weaken or Good at which its citizens should aim. Moreover, they allow breach human rights or respect for human dignity. Not coinci- that citizens will often be committed to diverse and plural dentally, Fukuyama is a member of the recently established versions of the Good, and that these versions may compete or United States President’s Council on Bioethics.9 Stock, on the conflict, such that the state’s preferential commitment to other hand, presents a vision of unlimited human improve- some or other version of the Good could be seen as tyrannical ment in the free market, with decidedly sceptical views on the or illegitimate. They do allow that a commitment to certain power of national or international regulation to control inno- basic liberal values of liberty, equality before the law, and due vation.