Charis Thompson

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Rereading Carolyn Merchant’s The Death of Nature a quarter century after its publication and from the perspective of its contribution to feminist theory is a rewarding process. Merchant’s book has garnered a sustained readership as a foundational text of ecofeminism. Simultaneously, however, ecofeminism itself has been sidelined within feminist theory because of critiques that it is marred by ethnocentrism and by an essentialist identification of women with nature. Rereading Merchant leads to three conclusions. First, Merchant explicitly repudiates ethnocentrism and essentialism, developing instead an archival methodology that grounds the universalizing claims of modern science in time and place, text and ideology. Second, the central claim of ecofeminism—that the domination of women and of nature have shared roots in the logic of science and capitalism—remains a powerful thesis. Third, ecofeminism brought together antimilitarist feminists and others whose voices are underrepresented in contemporary academic feminism. Combining the critiques of recent third‐wave feminisms with a reevaluation of ecofeminism would greatly strengthen the field.

Asian Biotech: Ethics and Communities of Fate

Providing the first overview of Asia’s emerging biosciences landscape, this timely and important collection brings together ethnographic case studies on biotech endeavors such as genetically modified foods in China, clinical trials in India, blood collection in Singapore and China, and stem-cell research in Singapore, South Korea, and Taiwan. While biotech policies and projects vary by country, the contributors identify a significant trend toward state entrepreneurialism in biotechnology, and they highlight the ways that political thinking and ethical reasoning are converging around the biosciences. As ascendant nations in a region of postcolonial emergence, with an “uncanny surplus” in population and pandemics, Asian countries treat their populations as sources of opportunity and risk. Biotech enterprises are allied to efforts to overcome past humiliations and restore national identity and political ambition, and they are legitimized as solutions to national anxieties about food supplies, diseases, epidemics, and unknown biological crises in the future. Biotechnological responses to perceived risks stir deep feelings about shared fate, and they crystallize new ethical configurations, often re-inscribing traditional beliefs about ethnicity, nation, and race. As many of the essays in this collection illustrate, state involvement in biotech initiatives is driving the emergence of “biosovereignty,” an increasing pressure for state control over biological resources, commercial health products, corporate behavior, and genetic based-identities. Asian Biotech offers much-needed analysis of the interplay among biotechnologies, economic growth, biosecurity, and ethical practices in Asia. Contributors Vincanne Adams Nancy N. Chen Stefan Ecks Kathleen Erwin Phuoc V. Le Jennifer Liu Aihwa Ong Margaret Sleeboom-Faulkner Kaushik Sunder Rajan Wen-Ching Sung Charis Thompson Ara Wilson

Why we should, in fact, pay for egg donation

In this perspective, I shall argue that women who donate eggs solely for human embryonic stem cell research ought to be compensated. My argument rests on three inter-related principles. First, it is important to recruit the healthiest possible egg donors to minimize the risks of donation. This would relieve pressure to donate on those suffering from diseases that might be treatable with stem cell-based therapies, who are likely to be at greater risk from donation. Second, I believe that it is crucial to be pro-active in building representative stem cell banks, especially in stem cell initiatives paid for, in part, by the public/government. The right of all groups to participate in and benefit from equitable and safe research must be developed for egg donors as for other kinds of research participants. Particular attention should be paid to the opinions and desires of women from historically underserved populations as to how to conduct donations and guide research so as to serve all members of society. Third, reasonable payment would undermine tendencies for domestic and international black and grey egg markets for stem cell research to develop. I then suggest replacing the question of compensation with the question of harm mitigation as the central donor protection issue.

Medical Migrations Afterword: Science as a Vacation?

Why do 21st-century medical migrations seem so important politically and theoretically? Seneca’s quote reminds the reader that medical travel is nothing new. Practitioners, patients, purveyors, and researchers of the medical arts and sciences have always traveled, and continue, vigorously, to do so. Likewise, the sick have long embarked on quests for salves and salvation for the body and mind. This volume suggests, however, that medical migrations are increasingly part of the very fabric of the transnational world order. The contemporary period has been characterized as one where we are witnessing the globally differentiated but nonetheless widely diffused rise of ‘biological citizenship’, ‘biosociality’, ‘the biomedicalization of society’, and a transnational ‘biomedical mode of (re)production’. Although there are several versions of these theses, the general idea is that more and more aspects of transnational relations, finance, social organization, human relations, moral and experiential life, and commerce are conducted under the guise of biomedicine, including the weaponization and industrialization of, and promissory speculation in, human life itself. Biomedicalization’s swathe is wide: in the affective realm, hope and desperation structure demand and morally regulate conduct; in the biomedical ‘bench to bedside’ research process, the life sciences are commercialized through the synonymization of research with innovation; bodies become more

Before it is too late: professional responsibilities in late-onset Alzheimer’s research and pre-symptomatic prediction

The development of a wide array of molecular and neuroscientific biomarkers can provide the possibility to visualize the course of Alzheimer’s disease (AD) at early stages. Many of these biomarkers are aimed at detecting not only a preclinical, but also a pre-symptomatic state. They are supposed to facilitate clinical trials aiming at treatments that attack the disease at its earliest stage or even prevent it. The increasing number of such biomarkers currently tested and now partly proposed for clinical implementation calls for critical reflection on their aims, social benefits, and risks. This position paper summarizes major challenges and responsibilities. Its focus is on the ethical and social problems involved in the organization and application of dementia research, as well as in healthcare provision from a cross-national point of view. The paper is based on a discussion of leading dementia experts from neuroscience, neurology, social sciences, and bioethics in the United States and Europe. It thus reflects a notable consensus across various disciplines and national backgrounds. We intend to initiate a debate on the need for actions within the researchers’ national and international communities.

IVF global histories, USA: between Rock and a marketplace

The USA has played, and continues to play, a distinctive and significant part in the history of IVF and assisted reproductive technology worldwide. American IVF emerged in the scientific context of contraceptive and fertility research, in the social context of a wealthy nation without universal healthcare, and in the political context of the abortion debate and its impact on federal versus state funding and regulation. IVF had its first clinical success in the USA in 1981. Since then, IVF in the USA has become known for procedures involving third, fourth and fifth parties as gamete donors and surrogates. The USA has also been one of the pioneers in domestic and transnational deployment of IVF for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender (LGBT) parenthood, and a pioneer of the social egg-freezing revolution. US IVF has been marked by professional and patient advocacy for such things as the honest reporting of success rates, recognition of the risks of postponed childbearing, and the need for insurance coverage. Certain landmark legal custody disputes over IVF embryos and offspring, as well as media attention to gendered, racialized, and class-based access to and pricing of assisted reproductive technology, have also driven the development of IVF in the USA.

CRISPR-Cas9 System: Opportunities and Concerns

Currently, a new revolutionary genome-editing tool is opening new avenues for gene engineering. It is known as the clustered regularly interspaced short palindromic repeats (CRISPR)11 and the CRISPR-associated (Cas) 9 system. In general, the CRISPR-Cas system has been evolved in archaea and bacteria as part of their adaptive immune mechanisms. Mechanistic aspects of the system can be found in the literature. Among the 3 CRISPR-Cas system types that were found in these organisms, the type II system in Streptococcus pyogenes is the most widely applied. The type II (CRISPR-Cas9) system includes the RNA-guided Cas9 nuclease, which binds to specific DNA sequences (complementary to the RNA-guide sequence) and creates double-stranded breaks on the DNA. The dsDNA breaks can be repaired via homology-directed repair (HDR) or nonhomologous end-joining (NHEJ). Based on this principle, the Cas9 and the guide-RNA were modified in various ways to improve the efficiency and specificity of this system, to expand its potential for different applications. This system can be used for altering specific genetic loci through insertions, deletions, point mutations, and sequence inversions. More recently, the system was modified to act as a genome regulator, by tethering effector domains to the Cas9 or guide-RNA, and as a visualization tool by fusing with marker molecules. This multiplex capacity of engineering CRISPR-Cas9 enabled scientists to apply this system for genome modifications in a variety of organisms, like Arabidopsis, Drosophila, Caenorhabditis elegans, zebrafish, mosquitoes, mice, primates, and humans. Lately, the CRISPR-Cas9 gene editing has been used in human embryos and generated several ethical questions and concerns. In this Q&A, 5 experts from around the world discuss the capabilities of the CRISPR-Cas9 system in editing genomes and discuss the associated ethical concerns. The interest for using the CRISPR-Cas9 system to targeted genome editing is rapidly emerging. The efficiency …

Reproductions Through Technology

Franklin explores how the development of in vitro fertilization into a routine procedure has changed our understanding of technology and biology. Franklin explores how the development of in vitro fertilization into a routine procedure has changed our understanding of technology and biology.

Situated Knowledge, Feminist and Science and Technology Studies Perspectives

In this article, the feminist and science and technology studies roots of situated epistemology are discussed. The idea of combining a commitment to a real world, albeit a constructivist one, with attention to practice and embodiment is assessed. The controversial conferral of agency on nonhuman objects is similarly explicated. Finally, uptake and critique of the notion of situated knowledges is addressed.