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The Mutant Project: Inside the Global Race to Genetically Modify Humans Kindle Edition

by Eben Kirksey (Author) Format: Kindle Edition
4.3 out of 5 stars 82 ratings

An anthropologist visits the frontiers of genetics, medicine, and technology to ask: Whose values are guiding gene editing experiments? And what does this new era of scientific inquiry mean for the future of the human species?

"That rare kind of scholarship that is also a page-turner."
—Britt Wray, author of Rise of the Necrofauna

At a conference in Hong Kong in November 2018, Dr. He Jiankui announced that he had created the first genetically modified babies—twin girls named Lulu and Nana—sending shockwaves around the world. A year later, a Chinese court sentenced Dr. He to three years in prison for "illegal medical practice."

As scientists elsewhere start to catch up with China’s vast genetic research program, gene editing is fueling an innovation economy that threatens to widen racial and economic inequality. Fundamental questions about science, health, and social justice are at stake: Who gets access to gene editing technologies? As countries loosen regulations around the globe, from the U.S. to Indonesia, can we shape research agendas to promote an ethical and fair society?

Eben Kirksey takes us on a groundbreaking journey to meet the key scientists, lobbyists, and entrepreneurs who are bringing cutting-edge genetic engineering tools like CRISPR—created by Nobel Prize-winning biochemists Jennifer Doudna and Emmanuelle Charpentier—to your local clinic. He also ventures beyond the scientific echo chamber, talking to disabled scholars, doctors, hackers, chronically-ill patients, and activists who have alternative visions of a genetically modified future for humanity.

The Mutant Project empowers us to ask the right questions, uncover the truth, and navigate this brave new world.

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  1. Print length
    298 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Publisher
    St. Martin's Press
  4. Publication date
    November 10, 2020
  5. File size
    1.2 MB
  6. Page Flip
    Enabled
  7. Word Wise
    Enabled
  8. Enhanced typesetting
    Enabled
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Editorial Reviews

Review

"The Mutant Project takes us on an eye-opening global adventure tracking the scientists racing to genetically engineer human beings and the activists who are pushing back. Eben Kirksey asks crucial questions at the heart of science and social justice—not only who will have access to new genetic technologies, but also who decides how and why they are developed? Power and profit, not human health and wellbeing, steer the answers. The Mutant Project exposes the urgency of democratically deliberating the ethics of gene editing before the science hurtles us into a future even more resistant to social change."
 —Dorothy Roberts, author of Fatal Invention: How Science, Politics, and Big Business Re-create Race in the Twenty-first Century

"This book is a beautiful mutant, part mystery, part horror story, part genetic science and totally engaging. Kirksey takes us adventuring—whirling through an exciting and informative journey we encounter genes, CRISPR, technology, scientists, people, hopes, dreams and land smack dab in the mess of 'human nature.' If you only read one book about genomic technologies and human futures, this should be it."
—Agustin Fuentes, Professor of Anthropology, Princeton University

"Would you like to meet the first genetically modified people? From high-tech biology labs in Shenzhen to ACT UP activists in Berkeley, Eben Kirksey brings to life a ragtag crew of scientists and bio-hackers trying to mutate the human family, and maybe even cure cancer along the way. At turns terrifying and liberating, this infectiously readable book probes the limits of life itself, how we live it now and how it might be lived in the future."
—Alexander R. Galloway, author of The Interface Effect

"A riveting jaunt to the cliff-edge of the future, where scientists, engineers, patients and biohackers struggle over the power, function and meaning of human gene editing. Will gene editing save us or destroy us? Some of us or all of us? With rare access to key players, Kirksey is the perfect guide to this unsettling new ethical and political terrain. This engrossing book deftly integrates science, ethnography, and social fiction through the lens of the author’s peerless analytic imagination. Empathetic, provocative and probing, it is a must read."
—Alondra Nelson, Harold F. Linder Professor, Institute for Advanced Study and author of The Social Life of DNA

"Written with the gumption of an ethnographer, historian, and investigative journalist all in one, The Mutant Project is a fascinating record of close-up encounters at the vanguard of human genetic engineering. That rare kind of scholarship that is also a page-turner."
—Britt Wray, PhD, author of Rise of the Necrofauna: The Science, Ethics, and Risks of De-Extinction

"The Mutant Project is an engaging, lively and well-written account of recent advances in gene editing technologies in humans. Eben Kirksey provides a fascinating tour of the world behind the headlines, illuminating the science, politics, personalities, money and moral challenges involved."
—Robert Klitzman, MD, Director of Masters of Bioethics Program, Columbia University, and author of Designing Babies: How Technology is Changing the Ways We Create Children

"Kirksey is not afraid to venture into the unknown. Whether it is the microscopic realm of CRISPR or the fast-mutating milieu that is Shenzhen, China, he plunges into it with courage, care, and most importantly, a sense of wonder. The biological, financial, legal, and ethical entanglements that bind scientists, entrepreneurs, investors, governments, hackers, artists, journalists, patients, and parents together are as unsettling as they are generative. Taking us through this deeply moving journey filled with unexpected twists and turns, Kirksey shows us that it is possible to imagine, even create, a world more livable than the one we inhabit. Such an inspiring book!"
—Fan Yang, author of Faked in China

“The issues currently raised by CRISPR and the potential genetic engineering of humans may seem incredibly new, but in fact they are the oldest of all - what it means to be human, and what our relationship is with technology. From the domestication of fire to the smartphone, humans as a species cannot exist without our technologies. In this thought-provoking and well-researched book, Eben Kirksey wrestles anew with this oldest of questions - there are no easy answers, but the journey could change your life.”
—Mark Lynas, author of Seeds of Science: We Got it So Wrong on GMOs

"Kirksey provides a front row seat to the riveting series of events that led to the world’s first genetically-edited humans. It’s an absorbing tale of reckless ambition and breakneck technological advances that raises disturbing questions about the future of the human race."
—Steven Heine, author of DNA Is Not Destiny: The Remarkable, Completely Misunderstood Relationship between You and Your Genes

"The Mutant Project provides insightful and balanced coverage of the history, science, culture, business, and ethics of genetic engineering of humans since the birth of the first three-person IVF baby in 1997. Most importantly, Kirksey's landmark book uncovers new information about the health and treatment of the families and children affected directly by the fast-moving, ethically murky, and risky reproductive experiments with CRISPR-Cas9 in China. He boldly forecasts a near political future in which all societies will need to become more attentive to the rights and needs of genetically modified human beings."
—Eileen Hunt Botting, author of Artificial Life After Frankenstein

"Should the technology be reserved for addressing disease and correcting serious physical abnormalities? Or is human enhancement (bigger muscles, extra height) fair game too?... Kirksey tackles many of these complex issues, including ethics, social justice, inequality, threats of eugenics, and the influence of money on science...Science fiction is increasingly becoming science reality."
—Booklist

"Lucid study of recent efforts to alter the human gene to end hereditary diseases, a project fraught with ethical and medical implications... A readable, provocative look at biological tinkering that will doubtless shape the future, whether we like it or not."
—Kirkus Review

"The Mutant Project might provoke and disturb as it raises unsettling questions about the nature of human life, technology and corporate and personal greed, but Kirksey’s entertaining and fascinating combination of detective story, medical history and ethics is a must-read."
—Book Page

"A fascinating albeit chilling account of how human embryo engineering moved from the realm of sf to scientific fact. Recommended for anyone interested in the brave new world of genetic engineering technologies."
—Library Journal

"Kirksey’s exploration of the debates over genetic modification eventually takes him around the world....Dr. Kirksey paints a detailed and nuanced portrait of Dr. He without condoning his actions...In examining Crispr, it becomes clear, we are called upon to examine ourselves too."
—The Wall Street Journal

"Out of this rich tapestry of stories, some central themes emerge, including the question of how profit-driven medicine and dreams of personal and national glory shape the complex landscape of modern genetic medicine. Kirksey shows how these are global phenomena that unfold their power in the West and the East, in mainstream academia, and at the fringes of DIY biology. He is also concerned about how cultural ideas about race, beauty, and health become intertwined with new genetic technologies and with the global financial network."
—Science



About the Author

EBEN KIRKSEY is an American anthropologist and Member of the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, New Jersey. He has been published in Wired, The Atlantic, The Guardian and The Sunday Times. He is sought out as an expert on science in society by the Associated Press, The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Democracy Now, Time and the BBC, among other media outlets. He speaks widely at the world’s leading academic institutions including Oxford, Yale, Columbia, UCLA, and the International Summit of Human Genome Editing, plus music festivals, art exhibits, and community events. Professor Kirksey holds a long-term position at Deakin University in Melbourne, Australia.

Product details

  • ASIN ‏ : ‎ B084M1TQPZ
  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ St. Martin's Press (November 10, 2020)
  • Publication date ‏ : ‎ November 10, 2020
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • File size ‏ : ‎ 1.2 MB
  • Text-to-Speech ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
  • Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Print length ‏ : ‎ 298 pages
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.3 out of 5 stars 82 ratings

About the author

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Eben Kirksey

Eben Kirksey

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Eben Kirksey attended the University of Oxford as a British Marshall Scholar and earned his Ph.D. from the University of California at Santa Cruz. Often on the road, he lives between Australia and the United States.

Eben has an insatiable curiosity about nature and culture. Investigating some of the most important stories of our time—related to biotechnology, the environment, and social justice—led him to Asia, the Pacific, and the Americas.

In academic settings, Eben is perhaps best known for his work on multispecies ethnography—a field that uses innovative approaches to study human interactions with animals, microbes, fungi, and plants.

Hope is a central theme that runs through Eben’s books. The Mutant Project explores how the fragile hopes of patients—people who dream of curing chronic illnesses with gene editing—have inspired scientists and biotechnology companies to do better research.

When controversy broke about the world’s first genetically modified babies, Eben spoke about ethics from the main stage of the International Summit on Human Genome Editing in Hong Kong. Over 1.8 million people watched news unfold from the Summit in real time, as Dr. Jiankui He revealed the details of his CRISPR experiment. After the dust settled, Eben traveled to mainland China where he secured insider access to Dr. He’s laboratory. Profit-driven medical enterprises continue to push CRISPR into reproductive clinics.

In an era of widespread environmental destruction and pandemic disease, it has become difficult to hold onto hope. While researching Emergent Ecologies, Eben found lively communities that are flourishing in unexpected places.

Eben has found hope in difficult situations too. At the age of twenty-two he witnessed a massacre in West Papua, a remote Pacific island. His first book, Freedom in Entangled Worlds, explores dreams of Indigenous peoples who are trying to liberate themselves from a situation of genocide.

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Top reviews from the United States

  • J. Morley
    5.0 out of 5 stars A riveting read about a timely and compelling subject
    Reviewed in the United States on January 22, 2021
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    Rarely does a book of serious scholarship read like an entertaining thriller. Renowned anthropologist and environmental humanities scholar Eben Kirksey has managed just that! Kirksey has the gift of storytelling, as he unfolds a fascinating and timely tale about our complex past, present and possible futures in genetics. Kirksey delves into the heart of the issues, having put himself into the heart of the cutting edge world of biotech—where the motto, as Kirksey puts it, might be similar to the silicon valley adage “move fast and break things.” The cautionary tale of the dark side of medicine has always been that breaking eggs to make omelets is great if you or your loved ones are not the sacrificial eggs. He carries the reader through this tumultuous story, full of storms and silver linings, twists, turns, and precipices, that engage and keep the reader at the edge of their seat. It felt rather like an amusement park ride, in which scary things pop up here and there, just when you least expect it.

    Kirksey confesses in the beginning that his literary companions on his journey were the likes of Shelley’s “Frankenstein” and other notable Romantic Era and modern science and speculative fictions. That “speculative fiction” helped him understand “the perils and potential of experiments that are remaking the human species.” However, my very favorite quote, one that describes the general thesis of this important work lies roughly in the midway point, after his thoroughly educational introduction of the history and current issues. Kirksey provokes us into difficult reflection by asking rhetorical questions that draw starkly lucid attention to the critical turning point of this moment: “Whose lives are worth living? What kinds of people should be edited out of existence? What traits should be added to future generations of genetically modified humans?” He asks these questions to help us understand what exactly is a stake; the dystopian tropes of eugenics and mutants are not fantasy, but a complicated reality in which many lives are already and will be affected—perhaps damaged, perhaps transformed, and perhaps many lives will never even come to pass.

    Kirksey’s form of scholarship asks difficult questions, rather than seeking simple answers. When issues are deeply complex, with so much at stake for so many, questions about access, ethics and equity must be first and foremost. Kirksey does not argue against this turn in the biological sciences, but rather argues that it is a “warp speed” turn, and there is still much to learn about the human genome. His courageous book has been an invaluable lesson for me about so much I wanted to know, and what perhaps I did not want to know. One cannot easily unknow what one now knows. So be prepared to be engaged, to be provoked, and to come away with a rich reflection on the complexities of our rapidly mutating present.
    One person found this helpful
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  • Tony
    5.0 out of 5 stars A complex topic but an easy read
    Reviewed in the United States on March 25, 2021
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    Great book! Easy to read and understand.
    2 people found this helpful
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  • Jessica Higgins
    4.0 out of 5 stars Interesting history on gene mutation and what the path forward looks like for the future.
    Reviewed in the United States on January 27, 2021
    Amazon Vine Customer Review of Free Product( What's this? )
    In November 2018, Dr. He Jiankui shocked the world when he announced the first genetically edited babies, twins to be exact. He further shocked everyone when he announced there was another pregnancy. With great power comes great responsibility and the discussion has shifted from when will it happen to how do we oversee the morality of this ability. China has long dominated genetic research by recruiting top talent to the country to make breakthroughs before other countries. But when it becomes available wide stream, who will decide who gets access? These are just some of the questions that plague the future of this field.

    Eben Kirksey takes readers on a bumpy ride as he kicks off his book with the unveiling of the genetically modified twins, Lulu and Nana. However, this probably did not occur the way that readers think. It was planned to be documented in a research journal, but another researcher got wind of it and leaked it out, which caused prerecorded YouTube videos to be released to the public, therefore causing all kids of chaos at this genetic convention. It’s a mess to be sure.

    I really enjoyed the history portion of this book and how we got to where we are today. Kirksey did a great job explaining why China is further along in this field than the United States. I also enjoyed getting to understand the background story of clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats, commonly known as CRISPR, which is the backbone of this book. Much of the book focuses on finding a cure for HIV through genetic modification, which is where much of the current research is focused. It is a higher-level book, so just reading for enjoyment likely won’t be what keeps readers engrossed.
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  • Jijnasu Forever
    3.0 out of 5 stars though repetitious, good framing of key issues of next-gen tech in genetics engineering
    Reviewed in the United States on November 15, 2020
    Kirksey provides a very unique perspective on the opportunities and challenges of gene editing technologies by focusing not merely on the science but also on the potential inequalities, challenges to access, and ethical issues.
    The frame for most of the book is set by the recent announcement of HIV-resistant, gene-edited babies born in China. As the book progresses, the discussion centers on IVF and HIV/AIDS. In both scenarios, Kirksey is able to weave in science, politics, business and social equity as key discussion points. The discussion on whether the hoopla around Chinese scientists is more motivated by politics and competition was an interesting one.

    The book, however, could have been more compact - the discussions and observations tend to repeat and there is no clear narrative arc - there is no central hypothesis or set of premises that the author wants the reader to explore.. By sometimes focusing too much on a travelouge/journal type narration, the author inadvertendly dilutes the focus on the topic. Kudos to the author to frame ethical, political, scientific, and health policy/access issues.
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Top reviews from other countries

  • Spiny Norman
    5.0 out of 5 stars Fabulouus! Very readable..
    Reviewed in Australia on September 9, 2022
    Verified Purchase
    Want to know what we may be facing... this will tell you.
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  • Jose Lourenço Claudio Junior
    5.0 out of 5 stars Questioning what values are driving gene editing experiments.
    Reviewed in Brazil on August 17, 2023
    Verified Purchase
    Basic definition/Main idea:
    The book "The Mutant Project" tackles the frontiers of genetics, medicine and technology, questioning what values are driving gene editing experiments and what are the implications for humanity.

    Real-life example or analogy:
    Imagine you are at a scientific conference and a researcher announces that he has created the first genetically modified babies.
    This would have a huge impact and spark debates about the ethical and social limits of gene editing.

    The book explores ethical and social issues related to gene editing, investigating who has access to these technologies and how we can shape research agendas to promote an ethical and just society.
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  • Placeholder
    3.0 out of 5 stars Not good
    Reviewed in India on October 19, 2024
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