Centre for Biological Signalling Studies and Department of Medical Ethics and the History of Medicine, Freiburg University, Stefan-Meier-Strasse 26, 79104 Freiburg, Germany.
Bioethics. 2013 Oct;27(8):411-8. doi: 10.1111/bioe.12051.
Synthetic biology can be understood as expanding the abilities and aspirations of genetic engineering. Nonetheless, whereas genetic engineering has been subject to criticism due to its endangering biodiversity, synthetic biology may actually appear to prove advantageous for biodiversity. After all, one might claim, synthesizing novel forms of life increases the numbers of species present in nature and thus ought to be ethically recommended. Two perspectives on how to spell out the conception of intrinsic value of biodiversity are examined in order to assess this line of thought. At the cost of introducing two separate capacities of human knowledge acquisition, the 'admiration stance' turns out to reject outright the assumption of a synthetic species' intrinsic value and of an imperative to create novel species. The 'kinship stance' by contrast does ascribe value to both synthetic and natural species and organisms. Nonetheless, while from this perspective creating novel species may become an ethical demand under certain conditions, it favours changing organisms by getting in contact with them rather than synthesizing them. It is concluded that neither the admiration nor the kinship stance warrants a supposed general moral obligation to create novel species to increase biodiversity.
合成生物学可以被理解为扩展了基因工程的能力和愿望。尽管基因工程因其危及生物多样性而受到批评，但合成生物学实际上可能对生物多样性有利。毕竟，人们可能会声称，合成新形式的生命会增加自然界中存在的物种数量，因此应该在道德上得到推荐。为了评估这一思路，本文探讨了如何阐述生物多样性内在价值的概念。通过引入人类知识获取的两种不同能力，“赞赏立场”断然拒绝了合成物种内在价值的假设以及创造新物种的强制性。相比之下，“亲缘关系立场”赋予了合成物种和自然物种以及生物的价值。尽管如此，从这个角度来看，在某些条件下，创造新物种可能成为一种道德要求，但它更倾向于通过与生物接触而不是合成来改变生物。结论是，赞赏立场和亲缘关系立场都没有证明存在创造新物种以增加生物多样性的一般道德义务。
