Why should anyone be making genetically engineered animals anyway? Ask FDA and its new draft about this.Most of the concerns raised about these critters are ethical. Some argue that it is inherently wrong for us to try and manipulate the heredity of animals. It is not our place to change the essential characteristics of a horse or a chicken. Nor can we be sure, critics worry, that genetically engineered animals will produce milk or meat that is absolutely safe to eat. And some critics worry that mixing genes from different species is not only unnatural but may wind up creating animals who wind up interbreeding with others and making offspring with traits that no one ever intended or anticipated.
These ethical worries are not all legitimate. In a world in which there are thousands of varieties of pigs, chickens, sheep, cows, dogs, cats and mice all made by humans using selective breeding, it is hard to argue that it is inherently wrong to change "the essence" of any animal. We have changed our domestic animals so much that their wild relatives can no longer recognize them. Genetic engineering speeds the process and allows more drastic changes to be undertaken, but it is not fundamentally different than what it took our ancestors a few thousand years to do to get to the Chihuahua, Collie or Great Dane.
