You can design your home, outfit a new car with customized features, put a new spin on an old recipe for dinner, pick out what you wear, choose what colors with which to color, design a cell phone plan tailored for you, and even build a computer with the exact specs you're looking for. So why not be able to design your baby?
Sound crazy? Well, the owner of a fertility clinic in Los Angeles vows in 6 months picky parents will have the ability to choose their newborn's features - everything from hair and eye color to skin tone.
Known as pre-implantation genetic diagnosis, this technology was originally designed to pinpoint and treat diseases.
Ethics, though are now being called into question.
"What we need here is to put some regulation and oversight on this multi-billion dollar business," says Marcy Darnovsky with the Center of Genetics and Society. "We have to do this carefully. This is not about policing women's reproductive rights. This is about bringing in some responsible regulation oversight to this multi-billion dollar business that happens to be involved with making new people."
Having complete power over what you produce is a good feeling, no question. However, what does this mean for the future of reproduction? The owner of the Institute is the first to admit the technology isn't perfect. And for those of Scandinavian descent, you're going to most likely get the results you desire as the gene pool is less diluted.
As we become an increasing technology and almost-futuristic-based society, new breakthroughs like this are going to become more common. But is it for better or worse?
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