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The American Journal of Bioethics 3.3 (2003) Web Only (2003)



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The Bioethics of Fiction:
The Chimera in Film and Print

Sarah K. Brem
Arizona State University

Karen Z. Anijar
Arizona State University

We live in difficult times, in times of monstrous chimeras and evil dreams and criminal follies.

Joseph Conrad, Under Western Eyes

"The Natives are restless tonight!"

Dr. Moreau, Island of Lost Souls

As Jason Scott Robert and Françoise Baylis (2003) note, the creations of biotechnology would be right at home in science fiction. The similarity of science and science fiction can make science fiction an analogy for science. Such analogies shape our representation of the world (Lakoff and Johnson 1980). Thus, examining the chimeras of science fiction might illuminate the ethical queasiness of laypeople—and scientists and ethicists, too, because it is doubtful they are immune to popular culture (witness NASA's embrace of Star Trek; Anijar 2000). We confine ourselves to three long-lived exemplars.

The Fly (1958; 1986). An arrogant and ambitious scientist uses himself as an subject in teleportation experiments. His DNA merges with that of a fly trapped in the teleport with him. He gradually loses his human form, values, rationality, and, in the end, his life.

The Island of Dr. Moreau (1933; 1969; 1997; Wells 1896). Dr. Moreau, an exiled scientist, splices nonhuman animals with human beings, exploring the "plasticity" of life. The experiments fail to erase their "true" animal nature, and Moreau's hybrids eventually regress and rebel, destroying Moreau and his laboratories.

Frankenstein (1931; 1993; Shelley 1831). Defying the boundary between life and death, Dr. Frankenstein creates a human-to-human chimera, filling all who encounter him with fear and dread. We draw upon three versions (there are more than 50). Whale's 1931 "monster" is a mute, mentally underdeveloped giant who does harm through ignorance. Branagh's 1993 monster is closer to Shelley's, articulate and reflective but filled with wrath.

Playing God or Playing the Devil?

Robert and Baylis present the "playing God" argument against chimera research. But in science fiction scientists are nothing we would want in a god: they are driven by arrogance, greed, and impetuous, self-absorbed creativity. Following the categories Rollin (2003) introduces, these are scientists who create "rampaging monsters" and pitiful creatures. Moreau is truly a scientist gone mad, taking research to pathological extremes:

"You see, I went on with this research just the way it led me. That is the only way I ever heard of true research going. I asked a question, devised some method of obtaining an answer, and got a fresh question. Was this possible or that possible? You cannot imagine what this means to an investigator, what an intellectual passion grows upon him! You cannot imagine the strange, colorless delight of these intellectual desires! The thing before you is no longer an animal, a fellow-creature, but a problem! Sympathetic pain,—all I know of it I remember as a thing I used to suffer from years ago. I wanted—it was the one thing I wanted—to find out the extreme limit of plasticity in a living shape."

"But," said I, "the thing is an abomination—"

"To this day I have never troubled about the ethics of the matter," he continued. "The study of Nature makes a man at last as remorseless as Nature." (Wells 1896)

In the 1997 version the fear of eugenics is particularly strong. Moreau strives to create a morally and intellectually perfect species, perfection being the purification of European culture. His "best" creatures dress well, play music, and possess manners to rival Martha Stewart's. They are "well-bred" (pun intended). But in all versions the creatures revert to nonhuman form. They are inferior to their evil creator, who at least does not have fangs, snout, and a preference for all fours. The science fiction anxiety touches upon centuries of inhuman treatment of non-Anglos, racist science (Guthrie 1976), and current projects to quantify human variation (National Human Genome Research Institute 2002).

Frankenstein is...

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