Reprogenetics and the "Parents Have Always Done It" Argument‪.‬

A common argument in favor of using reprogenetic technologies to enhance children goes like this: parents have always aimed at enhancing their children through upbringing and education, so why not use new tools to accomplish the same goal? But reprogenetics differs significantly from good childrearing and education, in its means, if not its ends. One way to begin making sense of new and often initially perplexing technologies is to see them as extensions of established technologies and practices. When we take this view of an emerging technology, we regard it primarily as a new way of doing something that we are already doing--a new means to an old end. This basic outlook matters for how we go about reflecting on and reasoning about the technology in question. Generally speaking, it supports a welcoming stance. If we are comfortable with familiar practices--which we often are--and if we see new technologies as mere extensions of these practices, we are quite likely to feel comfortable with the new technologies, too.