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It sets the entire field back by creating a lot of fear and bad press that discourages further research. This example is from institutional research rather tha
by bonniemuffin 7y ago
It sets the entire field back by creating a lot of fear and bad press that discourages further research.
This example is from institutional research rather than an indie biohacker, but Jesse Gelsinger's death may have set back the field of gene therapy by many years due to fear (some realistic and some unrealistic). https://www.sciencehistory.org/distillations/the-death-of-jesse-gelsinger-20-years-later https://www.sciencehistory.org/distillations/the-death-of-je...
- wetpaws 7y agoHe is not responsible for fears of other people. People were afraid of everything throughout the whole history of human science.
- oarabbus_ 7y agoNo, but he can definitely be responsible for the technology being highly regulated or restricted if his experimentation goes awry .
- pmarreck 7y agoI think we have to weigh the risks vs. the potential rewards, and accept "premature death" as a possible cost. The lack of ability to process out ammonia seems pretty debilitating, so that seems like it was a good candidate. Jesse Gelsinger is a hero, and should be remembered as such. That all said, we should glean as much science as possible from the postmortem to understand and prevent whatever misunderstandings resulted in the death, going forward.