Follow North East Theatre Guide on Twitter at https://twitter.com/NETheatreGuide and on Facebook at www.facebook.com/NETheatreGuide.
Professor Robert
Winston
'Modifying Humans: Where does genetics stop?'
Whitley Bay Playhouse
Monday 26th September 2016 at 7 pm
History
shows that humans are obsessed with their genes. Does the sequencing of the
human genome really herald a new opportunity for medicine or is there a darker
side that we ignore? Moreover, humans have continuously attempted to favour
certain characteristics that have been regarded as ‘desirable’. The history of
eugenics, from the Supreme Court in the US to the camps
in Nazi-occupied Europe, is a prominent stain on
the scientific record. IVF treatments now mean we can treat apparently hopeless
sterility, help 65 year-olds to conceive, store eggs and embryos in the deep
freeze for several hundred years, and screen embryos for serious genetic
disorders before a pregnancy has even really begun.
And
advances in gene technology mean that we can not only select embryos for
‘desirable’ characteristics but we can now modify genes of animals with
remarkable ease; so possibly very soon we may be able to enhance humans by
genetic modification. Will ethical considerations prevent us from the next step
- manufacturing stronger, more gifted and very intelligent children? Or will our imperfect knowledge of how our
abilities are inherited mean that they there are some major surprises in store?
Tickets
Tickets costing £16 are available now from the Box Office open Monday – Friday 10am – 4pm, Saturday 10.30am – 2.30pm plus until show start
on event days. Tickets can also be purchased on the booking hotline 0844 248
1588* or online at www.playhousewhitleybay.co.uk.
*Calls cost 7p per minute plus your phone company’s access charge.
*Calls cost 7p per minute plus your phone company’s access charge.
No comments:
Post a Comment