Synthetic biology is the promising and controversial technology platform that combines biology
and artificial intelligence opening up the potential to program biological systems much as we
program computers. Synthetic biology enables us not just to read and edit DNA - the technique
of CRISPR - but also write it. Rather than life being a beautiful game of chance synthetic
biology creates the potential to control our genetic destiny to say no to bad genes and build
a veritable genetic app store for downloading and adding new capabilities into any cell
microbe plant or animal. Amy Webb and Andrew Hessel's riveting stories include: the work of
scientists to develop plants that can be grown in sprawling indoor farms capable of feeding
millions with a fraction of the usual resources required a synthetic self-regulating insulin
that doesn't require injections or a pump life-altering regenerative personalized medicine
and novel durable solutions to climate change. There is also whimsy such as the dream of some
geneticists to unextinct the wooly mammoth. By examining both the science and the ethical
moral and religious issues surrounding synthetic biology Webb and Hessel provide the
background for preventing its misuse by some to re-engineer their bodies and that of their
children further increasing the disturbing division and polarization of societies into the
haves (the enhanced) and the have nots. They provide the background for making wise decisions
about issues such as: whether to program novel viruses to fight diseases what genetic privacy
will look like who will own living organisms how companies should earn revenue from
engineered cells and how to contain a synthetic organism in a lab. Whether we approve or
disapprove of synthetic biology it is coming. Now we need to understand its promise and
peril. Webb and Hessel help us understand the science as well as the political and societal
issues involved--
