Sign up to save your podcasts
Or
Share Ethics, Gene Editing, CRISPR & Moral Courage with Françoise Baylis #371
Share to email
Share to Facebook
Share to X
Share to email
Share to Facebook
Share to X
Or
Ethics, Gene Editing, CRISPR & Moral Courage with Françoise Baylis #371
Ethics, Gene Editing, CRISPR & Moral Courage with Françoise Baylis
#371
What happens when scientific innovation moves faster than our moral imagination?
In this episode of the SuperCreativity Podcast, James Taylor speaks with world-leading bioethicist Françoise Baylis about CRISPR, gene editing, embryo research, relational autonomy, and the future of human identity.
From the controversial 14-day embryo rule to the difference between needs and wants in reproductive technologies, Baylis challenges techno-solutionism and genetic determinism. Together, they explore how ethical collaboration can shape better science, why consensus building still matters, and why the most important question in innovation is not “Can we?” but “What kind of world are we building?”
This is a wide-ranging, deeply human conversation about creativity, power, responsibility, and moral courage in the age of AI and biotechnology.
Notable Quotes
- “We all have ethics. We learned them sitting on our parents’ knee.”
- “Biology will never give you the answer. You’re just looking for something to hang your hat on.”
- “Being really cool science isn’t good enough.”
- “We have a moral obligation to respond to needs. We do not have a moral obligation to respond to wants.”
- “We are not just rational atoms bouncing around in the world.”
- “In ethics, there’s only one question worth answering: What kind of world do you want to live in?”
- “Are we witnessing the end of an era, or the birth pangs of a new world?”
Resources and Links
Françoise Baylis’ book: Altered Inheritance
Her public-facing website: francoisebaylis.ca
Buy your copy of ‘SuperCreativity – Accelerating Innovation in the Age of Artificial Intelligence’ at https://www.jamestaylor.me/supercreativity/
Apple Podcast
Spotify Podcast
Takeaways
What bioethics actually is and why it matters now more than ever
The real meaning behind CRISPR and gene editing
Why the 14-day embryo rule exists and why it’s under pressure
The ethical difference between human needs and human wants
Why genetic enhancement raises profound social justice questions
Why consensus building is not naïve but necessary
The one question Baylis believes every innovator must answer
In his upcoming book, James Taylor delves into the transformative concept of SuperCreativity™—the art of amplifying your creative potential through collaboration with both humans and machines. Drawing from his experiences speaking in over 30 countries, James combines compelling stories, case studies, and practical strategies to help readers unlock innovation and harness the power of AI-driven tools. This book is a must-read for anyone looking to elevate their creativity and thrive in the modern age of human-machine collaboration.
James Taylor is a highly sought-after keynote speaker, often booked months or even years in advance due to his exceptional expertise. Given his limited availability, it’s crucial to contact him early if you’re interested in securing a date or learning how he can enhance your event. Reach out to James Taylor now for an opportunity to bring his unique insights to your conference or team.
Enquire Now
The Creativity Blueprint
Free 3-Part Video Training Series On How To Unlock Your Creative Potential, Break Down Creative Blocks, and Unleash Your Creative Genius
FREE training video shows you how to unlock your creative potential in 5 simple steps. The world’s top creative individuals and organizations use these exact strategies.
The 7-Figure Speaker Blueprint
FREE training video shows you the ten ways to make $1,000,000 from your speaking. The world’s top professional speakers use these exact strategies.
In this first FREE video series, award-winning keynote speaker James Taylor reveals how to become a 7-figure speaker.
CHAPTERS
00:08 – Introduction to Françoise Baylis and her work at the intersection of science, ethics, and public policy
supercreativity-podcast-with-ja…
01:32 – Her origin story: an unexpected philosophy class that changed everything
03:48 – Why ethics must move from the ivory tower into hospitals, labs, and boardrooms
05:42 – Ethics as collaboration: how research teams can innovate beyond competition
09:51 – The 14-day embryo rule explained
Why 14 days? Neural development, twinning, and value-laden decisions
supercreativity-podcast-with-ja…
12:01 – What happens when scientists want to go beyond 14 days?
Embryo models, stem cells, and artificial womb research
16:54 – Needs vs Wants: should we use gene editing to create genetically related healthy children?
22:42 – Editing non-human animals: are we appropriating everything for our own interests?
25:28 – Relational autonomy: why we are not isolated individuals but deeply interconnected beings
29:40 – Genetic determinism, tech elites, and the future of human enhancement
32:41 – Radical hospitality and collaborative ambition in science
34:00 – The most important question in ethics:
“What kind of world do you want to live in?”
36:44 – Dystopian futures vs birth pangs of a better world
40:19 – Moral courage and what Baylis is working on next
Pre-order your copy of the SuperCreativity book today at https://geni.us/QiDBu
TRANSCRIPT
James Taylor (00:08)
Today's guest is Dr. Francois Baylis, a Canadian philosopher and world-leading bioethicist whose work sits squarely at the intersection of science, ethics, and public policy. For decades, Baylis has challenged conventional bioethics, insisting it must be practical, accountable, and focused on impact, especially when science moves faster than our moral language. She has helped shape global debate on CRISPR and gene editing, reproductive technologies,
research involving women and pregnant people and how we understand autonomy and identity in the age of innovation. Her work, Altered Inheritance, pushed the world to grapple with what it means to edit human DNA responsibly. She's been awarded Canada's Top Humanities Prizes, is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada and serves on the Governing Board of the International Science Council. Dr. Bayliss brings philosophy into the public square, not as an abstract thought, but as a force that guides policy
and the future of science itself. Dr. Beyes, welcome to the Super Creativity Podcast.
Francoise Baylis (01:08)
Thank you for having me on the show.
James Taylor (01:11)
Now Francois, we met for the very first time, but quite recently in Auckland, in beautiful Auckland, and I was learning a little bit about the work you've been doing. You've spent your career really at this intersection of philosophy, science, and public policy. But where did it all begin for you? What sparked your curiosity to explore how ethics can shape scientific innovation?
Francoise Baylis (01:32)
I I was one of those people who was very fortunate to have gone to university without a plan. And so I think in a certain sense, you're open-minded as to where you're going to go, what you're going to learn. And at least when I went to school, at grade school, there was nothing similar to philosophy. And so this was a new topic. And I'm not sure I even knew what it meant. It could have been psychology for anything I thought at the time.
But I think what happened for me there was I happened to take a course with a professor who was very engaging and actually provided an opportunity for people to think for themselves.
So you may not be able to tell from my accent, but I actually started my university career in French. So I was born in Montreal, the French part of Canada. And having done all of my education in French, I wasn't at all confident that I would succeed at university if I had to work in English. So I went off to a bilingual university. And so my course was in French. And the professor, the very first day, asks us what we thought about masturbation.
and I'm in shock. I'm a little kid, I'm 18. It's not 2025 where we talk about sexuality at the dinner table.
And I think the thing to appreciate at the moment is that this was very shortly after the birth of the world's first test tube baby. And so the question was actually quite pointed and about ethics because that was the only way to get access to sperm. And at the time, the Catholic Church's position was that this was morally wrong and therefore the activity of creating in vitro fertilization babies was also wrong.
But for me the important thing was this was an invitation to think for myself. I was brought up a Catholic and here I am in a classroom, first year university and somebody's basically saying you don't have to just defer to some external authority. And for me that was just wonderful, wonderful.
James Taylor (03:28)
Now, your work, you help people navigate really complex, often painful decisions, often when we're talking about children here as well. What shaped your belief that ethics had to move from the ivory tower really into the real world, in hospitals, labs, courtrooms, and also boardrooms?
Francoise Baylis (03:48)
Well, I think what's really important to appreciate is that we all have ethics. At the very least, we learn that sitting on our parents' knee. But we also learn that when we go out to schools and we're exposed to teachers, for example, who may have different ethical views, different values, we may find ourselves in religious communities. We may find ourselves in a book club.
⁓ When we move through these various circles, we get exposed to different ideas. And sometimes those ideas entrench our intuitions, and sometimes those ideas challenge our intuitions. And so I think of my work as trying to help people understand a contemporary problem.
then help them to understand how the views and values they have align with certain options or certain resolutions or certain ways of going forward. And then asking them to see if they can understand somebody else's perspective in terms of responding to that very same challenge. And then opening up the possibility that we need to challenge our intuitions, our gut beliefs, that we don't have to have that as anything more than a starting point. Now it may mean that we return to those beliefs and we re-entrench them, but we might
also call them into question. And I think that's where I see my work is actually opening up a space for people to think about what they currently believe and whether they might believe something else.
So I guess in a way it kind of mirrors my own life experience of being invited to think for myself, understanding I'm doing that against a backdrop of beliefs. It isn't tabula rasa. I'm not starting with no beliefs. I have some, I bring them into the public square, but I should be open to being challenged there. And I think that's what it means to be human, to actually use our imagination, our creativity, to think about who we are, how we've come to believe what we believe, and maybe.
Just maybe we're wrong.
James Taylor (05:42)
One thing I really like about your work is you also position ethics as a collaborative endeavor, as a way of together imagining a better future. What does this kind of ethical ⁓ way of collaborating look like in practice? So for example, you've written a lot in terms of the number of days that research can happen on embryos. So give us an example from instead of just the theory side, actually.
with a research lab, they're thinking about doing research on embryos, there's different rules, I know in different places, and they're talking about extending some of these days as well. What does that collaborative way of innovating look like? And how do you ensure that there is enough challenge and grit in the system to push back as well?
Francoise Baylis (06:27)
I think that's a really important question because I think that really underlies a lot of my current work where I'm actually trying to get research teams to think about ways that they could contribute to knowledge production based on this idea of collaborative ambition rather than competition.
And we live at a time where most people think that the only way we can make progress is if we've set up something that's competitive and we're both looking to get there first. And I think that's a sad way of thinking about how we would move society forward. So let's take that concrete example about research involving human embryos. There was a time when I started working in the area of bioethics that this was absolutely forbidden.
The human embryo was perceived by many as the most vulnerable member of our community and therefore deserving of respect. And so the claim was made that the human embryo has moral status. It has a right to life and we ought not to destroy the human embryo.
People then start weighing in in the 60s, 70s, 80s. But really it comes to the fore in the context of making the world's first test tube baby. This science of in vitro fertilization because for the first time we actually have the embryo outside of the human body. Now that research is aimed very narrowly at the time in trying to address the wishes of persons, couples who are infertile and want to have a children and who can't because of blocked fallopian tubes.
So the science there is really, let's get the sperm and the egg outside of the body, put them together in a lab and put them back into a uterus so that we can have a pregnancy. But now we have the human embryo outside of the body and we continue to learn about how we can keep that embryo alive outside of the human body in order to learn more about human development. The hope and the idea there is we will learn technologies not only to help with reproduction, but perhaps to help with basic things like cancer science.
can understand how these cells proliferate, maybe we can better understand what happens with cancer and its development. Maybe we can develop therapies. So all of a sudden you have a new research subject.
Some people argue these are just cells in a dish. In fact, famously, one philosopher said they're no different than lettuce. That caused quite an uproar amongst those who really believe genuinely that this is developing human life. What happens, and this is in the late 70s, early 80s, a decision is made which some describe as a compromise. And the compromise, and I'm saying that in quotation marks because really you can't compromise when somebody believes this is killing and somebody believes it's not. But in any case, the literature
describes this as a compromise and the compromise is 14 days. I could go into the science of why 14 days but suffice it to say that different jurisdictions agree on 14 days and in a couple of places it gets entrenched in legislation.
the United Kingdom, for example, but in many countries it just becomes practice and the professional organizations also adopt this as practice. And so most people today, 2026 would say we have an international consensus that you can do research up until 14 days and then you must stop. That's the point at which you have protectable human life. Now, and for the past.
James Taylor (09:51)
But that number
of days, though, why was it 14? Is it some type of central nervous system or does this embryo start to look, you know, obviously pictures and things that, know, it starts to look something that is kind of, well, this could be something. Why 14 days?
Francoise Baylis (10:12)
Right, so it's actually not based on morphology because you're still basically looking at a ball of cells. But the reason 14 days is deemed important is in one space. It is actually what you said. What you have is the precursor to the brain appears on day 15. And so in order to be cautious, right, the claim is we will stop on day 14. Because what we think is really critical about the human is our brain, our capacity to think. And so if we have evidence that we're going to get that
of that neural tube development on day 15 will be cautious and stop on day 14. That's kind of the perspective that's taken out of the UK. But if you actually look in the United States, it's a different idea. The idea is that's when twinning and recombination is no longer possible. So recombination means two embryos join and we have what's called a phetus in phetu. And the idea there is, well, humans can't do that. I can't just saddle up to some human and join them. So then this maybe isn't
a protectable human life. And then the other part, the twinning, that's the last point at which an embryo could divide in two and you could get identical twins. And the idea there is, well, humans can't do that. So if this thing can do that, then it's not human. Because again, I just can't divide myself into two. So you have these biological phenomena that people point to. Now, let me say really clearly, those of us who work in ethics will say, that's still a value laden decision. And you're just trying to hang it on something that looks
objective, but you're really trying to pursue something that has to do with different goals and objectives. And my view is biology will never give you the answer. You're just looking for something to hang your hat on. Two different approaches, two different ways of getting to 14 days, and then that's how we find ourselves there today.
James Taylor (12:01)
So let's imagine I'm a research scientist, my team and I, believe that there is something that we can really find out, something that's gonna push science, gonna help perhaps people, future people as well, but I need 21 days in order to figure that out. At the moment, the laws in these countries say, no, that's not gonna be possible, but you're suggesting something, kind of, talking about collaborative approach, something slightly different in terms of how that...
discussion progresses.
Francoise Baylis (12:34)
Right, so currently when people agreed to 14 days, they did not have the scientific capacity to take the embryo to 14 days. So what I think is really important to appreciate is that when the scientific community agrees to this limit, it would be the equivalent of saying to me today, Francoise Bailesh, you cannot go to Mars. sure, yeah, where's the paper? I can sign that. I'm not going to Mars.
There's nothing for me to lose in signing on to that and now I can do whatever I want. So maybe this agreement was can I go to the moon? Yes, you can go to the moon, but you can't go to Mars. Yep, sure, I'm good with that because that's all I know how to do. So when the scientific community embraced 14 days, it didn't have the capacity to even take the embryo up until 14 days. It can do that now. And so now it's saying exactly what you've said, which is you're stopping us from contributing to that overall project of knowledge production.
You are stopping us from finding the cure to cancer. We need to go beyond that. And lots of things are happening. So one thing that's happening is we have now what are called embryo models. These are human embryos which are not created through fertilization. So it's not egg and sperm coming together. But it's actually working with stem cells and creating these entities that we believe function just like embryos. And so now the claim is we can use those. We can use embryo models.
They would come from our skin for cells for example and so people are saying well
James Taylor (14:01)
Yeah, I remember
last year there was something with Oregon, they kind of figured out a way of doing this with the skin cells and so it kind of got over that thing, that ick factor of like, you there's this really human children potentially, but it's not, it's our skin cells.
Francoise Baylis (14:16)
Exactly, that's what happens when we take somatic cells and we have the ability to basically push them back to become what we call pluripotent cells, meaning cells that could become anything. And then in the simplest terms, then we push them forward to become what we want them to be. So we take a skin cell, we push it backwards to become a pluripotent cell, and then we push it forward to become a gamete or to become an embryo. And so one of the things that becomes important in that space is scientists are now saying, I have a different
subject, you might think it's an embryo but it's really not an embryo and I want to do the research with that. And I think the thing to appreciate here is some people are buying into that language, some people are saying we don't even have to go down that path, we think even with a fertilized embryo we should be able to go beyond 14 days and then the argument becomes how long? 21 days, 28 days?
And just before I answer that, you have to remember other scientists are working on how can we push our ability to save early newborns in the opposite direction. And so there we're looking to build an artificial uterus. And some people think if you're working from both ends of that spectrum, eventually you'll have human development completely outside of the body. So if we think about what's happening now, my contribution to the debate is to say, look,
Maybe what we ought to do is instead of thinking of some new arbitrary number, which is going to come under pressure again once the scientific community is able to reach that number, why don't we actually think about goals and objectives of the research? And why don't we actually map the time limit?
to the individual research project. And what that means is sometimes, depending on what your goals or objectives are, you might only be allowed to work with the human embryo until day two. Maybe, depending on your goals and objectives, you can work with the human embryo until day 14. Maybe, depending on your goals and objectives, you can work until day 21. But basically, saying let's look at the intent, let's look at the anticipated benefits, then let's look at the real harms and look at the
ways in which we're going to understand how those harms will or won't be worth embracing relative to the anticipated gains. Now I want to be really clear I'm not trying to collapse this into a really simple harm-benefit ratio but I am saying we need to move away from something that's completely arbitrary to something that we can actually ground in a value-based discussion.
James Taylor (16:54)
I heard some in previous interviews, I've heard you also talk and kind of push back on needs and wants and the difference between those two things. ⁓ So two parents who want to have a biological child, perhaps one of them, they can't have that for whatever reason. They want to use these technologies to be able to have that child that has some of the one, some of the other. And you talk about, is at this point, it's quite useful to just take a step back and differentiate between needs and wants.
Can you explain what you mean by that? Because I actually think this is actually an interesting one if you pull this back just from talking about embryos to actually innovation more generally as it relates to kind of working on the edges of something.
Francoise Baylis (17:36)
Yes, so I think one of the things that I think happens to all of us is it's so easy to get excited about frontier science.
and to think, wow, that's really cool. And I guess what I'm trying to say is, yes, it might be really cool, but maybe it's not worth doing. And it may not be worth doing partly because of opportunity costs, partly because it doesn't fit in some kind of priority setting. All I'm saying is being really cool science isn't good enough. And I think that one of the ways in which I try to do that is to say, what are the justifications offered for expending time, talent, and treasure to pursue a particular science?
scientific goal or objective. Because that's what you're investing, right? There's only so much money, there's only so much time, there's only so many humans with the capacity to do some of this truly novel frontier work. And so in that space I'm asking us to pull back and say, okay, what are we going to invest in? And I use this language of needs and wants because too often I think we just keep articulating all these wants as if that's sufficient justification. And I am asking people to step back
and think about needs. So if we go back to some of this conversation around the human embryo, reproduction, etc. What we've had recently is the development of CRISPR technology which allows the scientists to modify the DNA of humans. That can happen in a somatic context, meaning taking people's somatic cells, any of their body cells, trying to manipulate them to offer therapeutic intervention. We've been successful with that recently with
cell disease for example. But we also have the capacity to modify our reproductive cells and those are different from our somatic cells, our body cells. And if we look at our reproductive cells, our gametes, so the egg, the sperm, or the very early human embryo, what we're looking to do there is to create a new human without traits that we don't like or with traits that we do like. Now that's the space in which I've started this conversation about the difference between needs and
wants because we have prospective parents coming forward saying I want to use that kind of technology in order to have a child with these traits. Right now because the science is new we're looking at eliminating traits that are thought to be associated with disease or disability. In that context what happens is
People come forward, an example would be cystic fibrosis, and they say, my partner and I would like to have a child. If we use our own gametes, our own sperm and egg, this child will have cystic fibrosis. We don't want a child with cystic fibrosis, so we'll give you our embryos. You'll genetically modify them so they won't have cystic fibrosis. That's a space in which I start saying, ⁓ why do we need the technology for this?
And that's a space in which I then take up the argument and try to suggest you actually don't need this technology for this. Now the response is going to be, but of course we need this. That's the only way we can have healthy, genetically related children. And I come back and I say, well, you can actually have healthy children using all kinds of other technologies that we already have and that aren't costly and that aren't risky. They involve other things like
social responses in terms of adoption or they may involve using donor gametes and the person says that no no no no that's not what I want I want a genetically related healthy child and so then what you realize is what they really want is this genetic link that that's what's most important to them and that's when I say well now we're in the realm of what you want versus what you need if what you really want is to be a parent
there are many ways that we can respond to that want. When you articulate it as a need, it's actually something different. And the reason society needs to pay attention to that distinction is I'm going to argue we have a moral obligation to respond to needs.
we do not have a moral obligation to respond to wants. And the simplest example I give of that is that if I see a human who's hungry, starving, in need of food, I should respond. I have a moral obligation to respond. If I respond and I provide that person with bread and they say back to me, well, actually I'd like a croissant.
I'm sorry, I don't have a moral obligation to find you a croissant. I do have a moral obligation to respond to your need for food. And so I'm trying to get people to understand what is the claim that you're making on humanity, and it is a claim on humanity because it's time, talent, and treasure which are limited resources.
James Taylor (22:42)
And you're already seeing, I guess, an early version of this in non-human animals, let's say animals that use pigs, cows, sheep. I know there's a lot of discussion here in the UK, just in Scotland just now around gene editing of getting rid of certain traits within farm animals in order that they can be used better. They're going to get less diseases, other things as well. So you're kind of seeing a little bit of a...
We've seen like the old version of this, which was all the dogs with the noses where they can't breathe because they've been bred multiple times, have very short snouts and everything, and it causes them lots and lots of problems. But as humans, we like the look of that particular type of dog with that particular face. does your work ever kind of link into the, we've been talking about humans, but what about non-human animals? Does your work ever kind of link into that and what our responsibility is to them?
Francoise Baylis (23:35)
So in this space, I have said quite forcefully, why is it that we humans think we can take everything?
and just appropriate it for our own needs, our own use, our own interests. And this is the space in which I have made that claim. you you gave an example of the ways in which we modify non-human animals, and in part, that's all motivated by ourselves. It's not motivated by doing something that's good for that non-human animal. So, for example, you know, we want to modify cats so that we don't have an allergic reaction to them. We want to modify cows and bulls so they don't have horns that hurt.
us. We want to modify mosquitoes so that they don't give us some kind of disease that we don't want. And the list goes on and on and on. And in that space I keep thinking why is it that we don't think that this is about finding ways for us to live together as opposed to us thinking that it's up to us to manage everything in our interest.
I think that's a fundamental mistake and I think that we will bear the consequences of that kind of thinking, especially as we are now starting to explore ideas about not only appropriating and exploiting everything on this planet but perhaps going to other planets where we don't know what kind of life there might be on those planets and if we think it's okay to just go and you know appropriate everything when we visit these other places might we be on the receiving end of that kind of thinking and so I really
do think it's really important for us to think about where we should be appropriating resources and where we should be thinking of other things on this planet not as resources for us. And I think that's a classic example where we do think it's for us as opposed to finding ways of living together.
James Taylor (25:28)
The final thing I wanted to touch on was I always love having guests like yourself who come on introducing me to new ideas, new concepts. And one of the ones which I hadn't really heard before and I kind of trying to get my head around a little bit is you've done work on relational autonomy. So this idea of relational, so in a world where AI can help us make decisions about traits, it can help us think about embryos and we're seeing a lot of fantastic stuff around protein folding, for example, using AI to think about that, neurotech and
or that side, how do we need to rethink the idea of a free will, of a selfhood? Because I know if I guess on here before, I've talked a lot about this link between identity and our creativity. So how do you challenge this assumption of us being completely self-sufficient? And can you explain to me as a lay person, this idea of relational autonomy, what it is, and how does it kind of link into the work that you do?
around bioethics.
Francoise Baylis (26:30)
So I think one of the things that's core to this idea of relational autonomy is challenging mainstream views about autonomy.
So especially in high income countries and what we would describe as the global north, in recent years, and it is relatively recent, we've kind of embraced this idea that when we think about what it means to engage respectfully with others, that we should respect their autonomy. This grounds, for example, a lot of our thinking around informed consent, whether that's in the context of therapeutic interventions, research interventions, even just in the context of democracy, right? We should consent to be governed. ⁓
is to recognize that in this space we've kind of been bought into this assumption that we're all individual atoms just bouncing around in the world doing whatever it is we want to do and I'm saying well if you actually stop and think that's not really how we work we are not just these rational beings doing whatever we think is rational in the abstract in fact when we do our decision-making we very often stop and think how will this affect my children how will this affect my partner how will this affect my
parents, my community, my workplace, my space in the world. And so I'm saying rational beings actually really do understand they're relational and they actually don't make these decisions as if they're just these autonomous self-interested individuals. And so we really need to question all the philosophies around the world that are grounded in that belief and we need to reimagine the human not as this independent rational autonomous being but as this being that
embodied, this being that is relational and understand better the ways in which we engage with others, whether it's respectful or not, remains to be seen. But it is to say that's the quality of engagement. And so in this space I've tried to embrace a lot of things. That's why I constantly talk about consensus building and I have all kinds of people saying, how Pollyanna should view, isn't that lovely that there are people who still think we can build consensus. ⁓ I do think that.
I have to think that in a hopeful world because otherwise we are just embracing conflict. And so if we're committed to consensus building, I believe even if we never reach consensus on a particular challenge, we'll all be better off for having tried. So I believe in that kind of consensus building. I believe in collaborative ambition. I believe in respectful engagement where we can disagree, but we can actually understand why we hold different views and values and still be committed to finding
a space where we can interact respectfully. So I think the important
James Taylor (29:12)
So it sounds like
it kind of pushes against almost a little bit the kind of Richard Dawkins say position, that kind of selfish gene, that we are purely expressions of our genes and our genetics and whether we don't know unless we're doing these things, but it's because our gene wants to procreate and continue. You're kind of basically pushing against that side. You're saying, no, no, I think it's a little bit more complicated than that.
Francoise Baylis (29:40)
I do think we're more complicated than that, but I do need to acknowledge that many people do in fact embrace that kind of thinking from Richard Dawkins, and I think that's why we're seeing, and I'll use the term tech bros, ⁓ invest heavily in this technology. And some of it's in the context of, you know, longevity and themselves wanting to live forever. But another set of research that they're funding quite heavily is the genetic modification of humans with the idea that somehow they're going to take this
technology and be able to entrench their privilege in their DNA. So they will not only be the rich people, the powerful people, ultimately they'll be the only people because their genes are thought from their perspective to be the best ones and they're going to ensure that they improve them so they'll commit themselves to enhancement but they're going to be the clay that needs to be you know molded and shaped. So I think there is absolutely a lot of people who buy into this genetic determinism in effect and
who really do see that happening and they're now trying to just, if you will, contest Darwin as well and layer on top of that technology that will allow them to survive. So they're thinking that there's still the capacity to kind of control the gene. I think they're mistaken, but I do think we also need to push back against that kind of genetic determinism.
James Taylor (31:03)
Fascinating. So as we start to finish up here, some final questions for you. In your own work, often when we have people on the show, one of the questions I'll often ask is, we were talking about collaboration earlier, who is that creative pair that you have? Who is that person you go to maybe with the kernel of an idea who pushes back, maybe thinks slightly differently to you? I think about like Marion Pierre Curie or the husband and wife couple that gave us the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine. Who is that Yin-Tio Yang? Who is that other person that you often go to?
Francoise Baylis (31:35)
I guess I would almost want to say it's the collectivity of those who work in the science space who I think are still blinkered.
And so for me the challenge is to engage them in conversation and to get them to see that there might be reasons to sort of open up their field of vision and to basically see things from a perspective other than their sort of enthusiastic pursuit of their science. Now I give all scientists the benefit of the doubt in so far as I truly believe they're kind of one or two ends of the spectrum. So in one sense I just love science, I just love knowledge and I'm just doing my thing.
in my little corner. ⁓ And at the other end, I'm really deeply committed to using my science to achieve this goal, which I think is good for humanity. So do I know there are bad actors in the world? Yes, I do. But I really want to focus on the people who might find themselves at either of those extremes. And I believe in what others would recognize as radical hospitality. I want to invite you in. Let's have a conversation.
James Taylor (32:41)
That's a very ⁓
Canadian tone. ⁓
Francoise Baylis (32:47)
Well, you know,
we're kind of open-minded and we like to have conversations, or at least I do. But I think, you know, think about all the kinds of words I'm throwing out there. Those are actually hooks. They're handles for people to hold onto. What does it mean to think about collaborative ambition? What does it mean to think about relational autonomy? What does it mean to think about radical hospitality? What does it mean to commit to consensus building? All of this...
at end of the day is my life's work. And why do I say that? Because in my book and most recently just constantly repeating in ethics, there's only one question worth answering and all other questions come off of that. And we have lost sight of that first and most fundamental question. And that question is, what kind of world do you want to live in? And it's only when you've answered that question that you can then turn to the second question, which is, and how will this text
Technology helped me build that world and I worry that we've lost sight of the first question and we're just thinking about how will this technology help me and we forget what kind of a world did you think you were building and this is so critically important
even if you're just thinking about it from a science techno point of view. And the easiest way for me to underline that is if we're talking about genome editing technology, which is the space I'm working in now, and we're talking about it in the context of reproduction, so we're looking to modify the next generation of humans, you have to know.
What kind of world are you building? Because at the very basic level you need to know, are you making modifications for that new human to live on this planet? Are you making modifications of that new human to live in outer space, a spaceship, Mars? What are you doing? You have to understand the world you want to build. And I'm taking it beyond the sort of biological environment to the social environment. What kind of relationships do you want to foster? What kinds of things do you need?
Will you have, again, bad actors? People that ultimately are just interested in power? Yes.
And part of my job is to find those individuals and to try to encourage them to reflect on some of their core values and commitments. And that's a huge project and I will fail. I will fail in my lifetime. But my work is about leaving breadcrumbs for others. And so it's seeding these ideas that I have and hoping that the next generation, someone will pick them up and continue this project.
James Taylor (35:19)
think on that first question you asked us to reflect on about what you want that future to look like, what that future will look like, it's one the things I feel saddest about just now in terms of fiction, where so much of the things that are on films, TV are dystopian visions of the future. ⁓ It's very rare that you get a film that there was a film a few years ago, Contact, which is beautiful film about space and...
And was a more optimistic view and some of the things you kind of spoke about, about that radical hospitality kind of linked to that as well. But my worry is that ⁓ a lot of the fiction we're seeing today and lot of the creativity is going into creating great films and movies and books are painting a picture towards a future that is slightly on that dystopian side, that darker side as well. And I kind of worry about that.
Is there a book, I was always told that you should always go through a year, the end of the year and change something that you fundamentally believed in at the start of the year. So your view is completely changed on an idea. Is there a book, maybe not your own, that really changed the way you thought about something, completely changed your view, your perspective on something that could be related to ethics or the future, really kind of, really under, change your assumptions about how you think about the world.
Francoise Baylis (36:44)
of books that I could put in that space, but I think one of the ones that I found quite interesting is called Shantamaran. And it actually tells the story of a young man who's in prison and who escapes. I don't even know if that could happen in this day and age, but anyhow, he manages to escape from the prison, makes his way to India. And the book is basically autobiographical. ⁓ And it talks about his sense of self and
the shifting and I think part of the reason that particular book struck me is because I don't intersect very much with people who find themselves in prison. I certainly don't intersect in my life with people who are escapees from prison. I don't intersect with people who are in circles of violence, ⁓ which is what he finds himself in, ⁓ in the drug trade, et cetera. And so for me, it was an interesting window into a world that I am not familiar with.
But I also see a moral trajectory in there. ⁓ Eventually, after years, he actually turns himself in, goes back to Australia, finishes his time, ⁓ becomes a public speaker and has a new life. And so I think for me, it's just fascinating, just the narrative of that kind of a life, which I'm not exposed to, but the capacity for lived experience to shift the way you see and understand yourself in the world. ⁓
hand it just to offer a comment about you know your other remark around dystopias. I think it's much easier and this is not my work this is other people who have said very loudly and clearly it's much easier to imagine the end of the world partly because we have all these representations than it is to imagine something else ⁓ that's positive and utopian and I guess
One thing I would offer up almost, I guess, as a closing remark for me is maybe we need to think about where we find ourselves right now. There's a way in which we can think about the current time we're living with all of its chaos and disruption ⁓ as the end of an era, the end of an empire, whatever you want to describe. But there's a sense in which I think many people are feeling vulnerable and anxious. We're seeing an increase of all the things I don't believe in, in terms of posturing and
and violence, etc. ⁓ There's another way that we could be thinking about this as birth pangs for a new world, a better world, and that maybe we need to go through this. I don't know, ⁓ but that says something if you choose an orientation and there is a choice to be made there. If you think we are going through birthing pangs, then maybe you respond differently to the world in this moment, this very difficult moment. So there's a way in which you can be a realist. You can say, yeah, this is not a great place right now and these are all the reasons.
But is it because we're witnessing the demise or is it because we're witnessing a rebirth? And we may not know in our lifetime, right? Because these kinds of things take, history tells us, hundreds of years. But for every new civilization to appear, an old one has to disappear. And they are times of turbulence. So I think we're living through one of those times. I think history will tell us we're living through one of those times.
James Taylor (39:57)
birth
I like that.
I like that. Birth pangs, I like that idea. If people want to go deeper into your work to learn more about your writing, your research that you're doing just now as well, I know you travel around the world speaking, you're giving talks and being parts of different conferences, where is the best place for to go and find out about that information?
Francoise Baylis (40:19)
Well, I try to curate my public facing work on my own website, which is just my name as one word, françoisbales.ca for Canada. But if you put my name into something, you will easily get to my university website, which would be sort of more academic. But I'm actually mostly committed to the work that I'm doing that's public facing, because I think that's the one that that's the community I really want to speak with. ⁓ I really want to share ideas with people who are interested in
themselves being brought into a space where they can explore their own ideas. And so I think if I put enough of them out there, people are going to want to engage with at least one little facet ⁓ of my work. What I'm working on right now is courage. What does it mean to be courageous? And so that work's not out yet. I'm going to probably play with that. It takes me a long time to actually solidify certain kinds of ideas, but I'm asking us to think about what's moral courage? What's intellectual courage? What is it that we need at this moment in time?
we know it if we saw it? ⁓ We think we know courage when we see it. My thesis is often we don't because what might get perceived as courage actually wasn't courageous from the point of view of the individual. So that will take me into questions around power and position. ⁓ So I'm excited about my new work but I do want to say that
If you want a really big picture view about who I am and what I believe in and the kinds of themes we've talked about, they are all in my book, Altered Inheritance, and it's an old book by Today's Standards, 2019, but I think it's...
It's the same book I would write today, but with a different technology. So if we wanted to say, we were talking today about AI, which is sort of the frontier science, I'd write the exact same book. I would just have different illustrations because the book is about what kind of world do we want to live in. And that's the invitation for people to think about that.
James Taylor (42:14)
Well, Francoise Baylis, thank you for sharing your wisdom, your clarity, your courage, and your fierce commitment to a more thoughtful human future. It's been a real pleasure having you on the Super Creativity Podcast. Thank you.
Francoise Baylis (42:26)
Well, thank you for great questions that allowed me to expand on a lot of ideas. I really appreciate that.
The post Ethics, Gene Editing, CRISPR & Moral Courage with Françoise Baylis #371 appeared first on James Taylor.
View all episodes
By James Taylor - Keynote Speaker on Creativity, Innovation and Artificial Intelligence
4.8
4545 ratings
Ethics, Gene Editing, CRISPR & Moral Courage with Françoise Baylis
#371
What happens when scientific innovation moves faster than our moral imagination?
In this episode of the SuperCreativity Podcast, James Taylor speaks with world-leading bioethicist Françoise Baylis about CRISPR, gene editing, embryo research, relational autonomy, and the future of human identity.
From the controversial 14-day embryo rule to the difference between needs and wants in reproductive technologies, Baylis challenges techno-solutionism and genetic determinism. Together, they explore how ethical collaboration can shape better science, why consensus building still matters, and why the most important question in innovation is not “Can we?” but “What kind of world are we building?”
This is a wide-ranging, deeply human conversation about creativity, power, responsibility, and moral courage in the age of AI and biotechnology.
Notable Quotes
- “We all have ethics. We learned them sitting on our parents’ knee.”
- “Biology will never give you the answer. You’re just looking for something to hang your hat on.”
- “Being really cool science isn’t good enough.”
- “We have a moral obligation to respond to needs. We do not have a moral obligation to respond to wants.”
- “We are not just rational atoms bouncing around in the world.”
- “In ethics, there’s only one question worth answering: What kind of world do you want to live in?”
- “Are we witnessing the end of an era, or the birth pangs of a new world?”
Resources and Links
Françoise Baylis’ book: Altered Inheritance
Her public-facing website: francoisebaylis.ca
Buy your copy of ‘SuperCreativity – Accelerating Innovation in the Age of Artificial Intelligence’ at https://www.jamestaylor.me/supercreativity/
Apple Podcast
Spotify Podcast
Takeaways
What bioethics actually is and why it matters now more than ever
The real meaning behind CRISPR and gene editing
Why the 14-day embryo rule exists and why it’s under pressure
The ethical difference between human needs and human wants
Why genetic enhancement raises profound social justice questions
Why consensus building is not naïve but necessary
The one question Baylis believes every innovator must answer
In his upcoming book, James Taylor delves into the transformative concept of SuperCreativity™—the art of amplifying your creative potential through collaboration with both humans and machines. Drawing from his experiences speaking in over 30 countries, James combines compelling stories, case studies, and practical strategies to help readers unlock innovation and harness the power of AI-driven tools. This book is a must-read for anyone looking to elevate their creativity and thrive in the modern age of human-machine collaboration.
James Taylor is a highly sought-after keynote speaker, often booked months or even years in advance due to his exceptional expertise. Given his limited availability, it’s crucial to contact him early if you’re interested in securing a date or learning how he can enhance your event. Reach out to James Taylor now for an opportunity to bring his unique insights to your conference or team.
Enquire Now
The Creativity Blueprint
Free 3-Part Video Training Series On How To Unlock Your Creative Potential, Break Down Creative Blocks, and Unleash Your Creative Genius
FREE training video shows you how to unlock your creative potential in 5 simple steps. The world’s top creative individuals and organizations use these exact strategies.
The 7-Figure Speaker Blueprint
FREE training video shows you the ten ways to make $1,000,000 from your speaking. The world’s top professional speakers use these exact strategies.
In this first FREE video series, award-winning keynote speaker James Taylor reveals how to become a 7-figure speaker.
CHAPTERS
00:08 – Introduction to Françoise Baylis and her work at the intersection of science, ethics, and public policy
supercreativity-podcast-with-ja…
01:32 – Her origin story: an unexpected philosophy class that changed everything
03:48 – Why ethics must move from the ivory tower into hospitals, labs, and boardrooms
05:42 – Ethics as collaboration: how research teams can innovate beyond competition
09:51 – The 14-day embryo rule explained
Why 14 days? Neural development, twinning, and value-laden decisions
supercreativity-podcast-with-ja…
12:01 – What happens when scientists want to go beyond 14 days?
Embryo models, stem cells, and artificial womb research
16:54 – Needs vs Wants: should we use gene editing to create genetically related healthy children?
22:42 – Editing non-human animals: are we appropriating everything for our own interests?
25:28 – Relational autonomy: why we are not isolated individuals but deeply interconnected beings
29:40 – Genetic determinism, tech elites, and the future of human enhancement
32:41 – Radical hospitality and collaborative ambition in science
34:00 – The most important question in ethics:
“What kind of world do you want to live in?”
36:44 – Dystopian futures vs birth pangs of a better world
40:19 – Moral courage and what Baylis is working on next
Pre-order your copy of the SuperCreativity book today at https://geni.us/QiDBu
TRANSCRIPT
James Taylor (00:08)
Today's guest is Dr. Francois Baylis, a Canadian philosopher and world-leading bioethicist whose work sits squarely at the intersection of science, ethics, and public policy. For decades, Baylis has challenged conventional bioethics, insisting it must be practical, accountable, and focused on impact, especially when science moves faster than our moral language. She has helped shape global debate on CRISPR and gene editing, reproductive technologies,
research involving women and pregnant people and how we understand autonomy and identity in the age of innovation. Her work, Altered Inheritance, pushed the world to grapple with what it means to edit human DNA responsibly. She's been awarded Canada's Top Humanities Prizes, is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada and serves on the Governing Board of the International Science Council. Dr. Bayliss brings philosophy into the public square, not as an abstract thought, but as a force that guides policy
and the future of science itself. Dr. Beyes, welcome to the Super Creativity Podcast.
Francoise Baylis (01:08)
Thank you for having me on the show.
James Taylor (01:11)
Now Francois, we met for the very first time, but quite recently in Auckland, in beautiful Auckland, and I was learning a little bit about the work you've been doing. You've spent your career really at this intersection of philosophy, science, and public policy. But where did it all begin for you? What sparked your curiosity to explore how ethics can shape scientific innovation?
Francoise Baylis (01:32)
I I was one of those people who was very fortunate to have gone to university without a plan. And so I think in a certain sense, you're open-minded as to where you're going to go, what you're going to learn. And at least when I went to school, at grade school, there was nothing similar to philosophy. And so this was a new topic. And I'm not sure I even knew what it meant. It could have been psychology for anything I thought at the time.
But I think what happened for me there was I happened to take a course with a professor who was very engaging and actually provided an opportunity for people to think for themselves.
So you may not be able to tell from my accent, but I actually started my university career in French. So I was born in Montreal, the French part of Canada. And having done all of my education in French, I wasn't at all confident that I would succeed at university if I had to work in English. So I went off to a bilingual university. And so my course was in French. And the professor, the very first day, asks us what we thought about masturbation.
and I'm in shock. I'm a little kid, I'm 18. It's not 2025 where we talk about sexuality at the dinner table.
And I think the thing to appreciate at the moment is that this was very shortly after the birth of the world's first test tube baby. And so the question was actually quite pointed and about ethics because that was the only way to get access to sperm. And at the time, the Catholic Church's position was that this was morally wrong and therefore the activity of creating in vitro fertilization babies was also wrong.
But for me the important thing was this was an invitation to think for myself. I was brought up a Catholic and here I am in a classroom, first year university and somebody's basically saying you don't have to just defer to some external authority. And for me that was just wonderful, wonderful.
James Taylor (03:28)
Now, your work, you help people navigate really complex, often painful decisions, often when we're talking about children here as well. What shaped your belief that ethics had to move from the ivory tower really into the real world, in hospitals, labs, courtrooms, and also boardrooms?
Francoise Baylis (03:48)
Well, I think what's really important to appreciate is that we all have ethics. At the very least, we learn that sitting on our parents' knee. But we also learn that when we go out to schools and we're exposed to teachers, for example, who may have different ethical views, different values, we may find ourselves in religious communities. We may find ourselves in a book club.
⁓ When we move through these various circles, we get exposed to different ideas. And sometimes those ideas entrench our intuitions, and sometimes those ideas challenge our intuitions. And so I think of my work as trying to help people understand a contemporary problem.
then help them to understand how the views and values they have align with certain options or certain resolutions or certain ways of going forward. And then asking them to see if they can understand somebody else's perspective in terms of responding to that very same challenge. And then opening up the possibility that we need to challenge our intuitions, our gut beliefs, that we don't have to have that as anything more than a starting point. Now it may mean that we return to those beliefs and we re-entrench them, but we might
also call them into question. And I think that's where I see my work is actually opening up a space for people to think about what they currently believe and whether they might believe something else.
So I guess in a way it kind of mirrors my own life experience of being invited to think for myself, understanding I'm doing that against a backdrop of beliefs. It isn't tabula rasa. I'm not starting with no beliefs. I have some, I bring them into the public square, but I should be open to being challenged there. And I think that's what it means to be human, to actually use our imagination, our creativity, to think about who we are, how we've come to believe what we believe, and maybe.
Just maybe we're wrong.
James Taylor (05:42)
One thing I really like about your work is you also position ethics as a collaborative endeavor, as a way of together imagining a better future. What does this kind of ethical ⁓ way of collaborating look like in practice? So for example, you've written a lot in terms of the number of days that research can happen on embryos. So give us an example from instead of just the theory side, actually.
with a research lab, they're thinking about doing research on embryos, there's different rules, I know in different places, and they're talking about extending some of these days as well. What does that collaborative way of innovating look like? And how do you ensure that there is enough challenge and grit in the system to push back as well?
Francoise Baylis (06:27)
I think that's a really important question because I think that really underlies a lot of my current work where I'm actually trying to get research teams to think about ways that they could contribute to knowledge production based on this idea of collaborative ambition rather than competition.
And we live at a time where most people think that the only way we can make progress is if we've set up something that's competitive and we're both looking to get there first. And I think that's a sad way of thinking about how we would move society forward. So let's take that concrete example about research involving human embryos. There was a time when I started working in the area of bioethics that this was absolutely forbidden.
The human embryo was perceived by many as the most vulnerable member of our community and therefore deserving of respect. And so the claim was made that the human embryo has moral status. It has a right to life and we ought not to destroy the human embryo.
People then start weighing in in the 60s, 70s, 80s. But really it comes to the fore in the context of making the world's first test tube baby. This science of in vitro fertilization because for the first time we actually have the embryo outside of the human body. Now that research is aimed very narrowly at the time in trying to address the wishes of persons, couples who are infertile and want to have a children and who can't because of blocked fallopian tubes.
So the science there is really, let's get the sperm and the egg outside of the body, put them together in a lab and put them back into a uterus so that we can have a pregnancy. But now we have the human embryo outside of the body and we continue to learn about how we can keep that embryo alive outside of the human body in order to learn more about human development. The hope and the idea there is we will learn technologies not only to help with reproduction, but perhaps to help with basic things like cancer science.
can understand how these cells proliferate, maybe we can better understand what happens with cancer and its development. Maybe we can develop therapies. So all of a sudden you have a new research subject.
Some people argue these are just cells in a dish. In fact, famously, one philosopher said they're no different than lettuce. That caused quite an uproar amongst those who really believe genuinely that this is developing human life. What happens, and this is in the late 70s, early 80s, a decision is made which some describe as a compromise. And the compromise, and I'm saying that in quotation marks because really you can't compromise when somebody believes this is killing and somebody believes it's not. But in any case, the literature
describes this as a compromise and the compromise is 14 days. I could go into the science of why 14 days but suffice it to say that different jurisdictions agree on 14 days and in a couple of places it gets entrenched in legislation.
the United Kingdom, for example, but in many countries it just becomes practice and the professional organizations also adopt this as practice. And so most people today, 2026 would say we have an international consensus that you can do research up until 14 days and then you must stop. That's the point at which you have protectable human life. Now, and for the past.
James Taylor (09:51)
But that number
of days, though, why was it 14? Is it some type of central nervous system or does this embryo start to look, you know, obviously pictures and things that, know, it starts to look something that is kind of, well, this could be something. Why 14 days?
Francoise Baylis (10:12)
Right, so it's actually not based on morphology because you're still basically looking at a ball of cells. But the reason 14 days is deemed important is in one space. It is actually what you said. What you have is the precursor to the brain appears on day 15. And so in order to be cautious, right, the claim is we will stop on day 14. Because what we think is really critical about the human is our brain, our capacity to think. And so if we have evidence that we're going to get that
of that neural tube development on day 15 will be cautious and stop on day 14. That's kind of the perspective that's taken out of the UK. But if you actually look in the United States, it's a different idea. The idea is that's when twinning and recombination is no longer possible. So recombination means two embryos join and we have what's called a phetus in phetu. And the idea there is, well, humans can't do that. I can't just saddle up to some human and join them. So then this maybe isn't
a protectable human life. And then the other part, the twinning, that's the last point at which an embryo could divide in two and you could get identical twins. And the idea there is, well, humans can't do that. So if this thing can do that, then it's not human. Because again, I just can't divide myself into two. So you have these biological phenomena that people point to. Now, let me say really clearly, those of us who work in ethics will say, that's still a value laden decision. And you're just trying to hang it on something that looks
objective, but you're really trying to pursue something that has to do with different goals and objectives. And my view is biology will never give you the answer. You're just looking for something to hang your hat on. Two different approaches, two different ways of getting to 14 days, and then that's how we find ourselves there today.
James Taylor (12:01)
So let's imagine I'm a research scientist, my team and I, believe that there is something that we can really find out, something that's gonna push science, gonna help perhaps people, future people as well, but I need 21 days in order to figure that out. At the moment, the laws in these countries say, no, that's not gonna be possible, but you're suggesting something, kind of, talking about collaborative approach, something slightly different in terms of how that...
discussion progresses.
Francoise Baylis (12:34)
Right, so currently when people agreed to 14 days, they did not have the scientific capacity to take the embryo to 14 days. So what I think is really important to appreciate is that when the scientific community agrees to this limit, it would be the equivalent of saying to me today, Francoise Bailesh, you cannot go to Mars. sure, yeah, where's the paper? I can sign that. I'm not going to Mars.
There's nothing for me to lose in signing on to that and now I can do whatever I want. So maybe this agreement was can I go to the moon? Yes, you can go to the moon, but you can't go to Mars. Yep, sure, I'm good with that because that's all I know how to do. So when the scientific community embraced 14 days, it didn't have the capacity to even take the embryo up until 14 days. It can do that now. And so now it's saying exactly what you've said, which is you're stopping us from contributing to that overall project of knowledge production.
You are stopping us from finding the cure to cancer. We need to go beyond that. And lots of things are happening. So one thing that's happening is we have now what are called embryo models. These are human embryos which are not created through fertilization. So it's not egg and sperm coming together. But it's actually working with stem cells and creating these entities that we believe function just like embryos. And so now the claim is we can use those. We can use embryo models.
They would come from our skin for cells for example and so people are saying well
James Taylor (14:01)
Yeah, I remember
last year there was something with Oregon, they kind of figured out a way of doing this with the skin cells and so it kind of got over that thing, that ick factor of like, you there's this really human children potentially, but it's not, it's our skin cells.
Francoise Baylis (14:16)
Exactly, that's what happens when we take somatic cells and we have the ability to basically push them back to become what we call pluripotent cells, meaning cells that could become anything. And then in the simplest terms, then we push them forward to become what we want them to be. So we take a skin cell, we push it backwards to become a pluripotent cell, and then we push it forward to become a gamete or to become an embryo. And so one of the things that becomes important in that space is scientists are now saying, I have a different
subject, you might think it's an embryo but it's really not an embryo and I want to do the research with that. And I think the thing to appreciate here is some people are buying into that language, some people are saying we don't even have to go down that path, we think even with a fertilized embryo we should be able to go beyond 14 days and then the argument becomes how long? 21 days, 28 days?
And just before I answer that, you have to remember other scientists are working on how can we push our ability to save early newborns in the opposite direction. And so there we're looking to build an artificial uterus. And some people think if you're working from both ends of that spectrum, eventually you'll have human development completely outside of the body. So if we think about what's happening now, my contribution to the debate is to say, look,
Maybe what we ought to do is instead of thinking of some new arbitrary number, which is going to come under pressure again once the scientific community is able to reach that number, why don't we actually think about goals and objectives of the research? And why don't we actually map the time limit?
to the individual research project. And what that means is sometimes, depending on what your goals or objectives are, you might only be allowed to work with the human embryo until day two. Maybe, depending on your goals and objectives, you can work with the human embryo until day 14. Maybe, depending on your goals and objectives, you can work until day 21. But basically, saying let's look at the intent, let's look at the anticipated benefits, then let's look at the real harms and look at the
ways in which we're going to understand how those harms will or won't be worth embracing relative to the anticipated gains. Now I want to be really clear I'm not trying to collapse this into a really simple harm-benefit ratio but I am saying we need to move away from something that's completely arbitrary to something that we can actually ground in a value-based discussion.
James Taylor (16:54)
I heard some in previous interviews, I've heard you also talk and kind of push back on needs and wants and the difference between those two things. ⁓ So two parents who want to have a biological child, perhaps one of them, they can't have that for whatever reason. They want to use these technologies to be able to have that child that has some of the one, some of the other. And you talk about, is at this point, it's quite useful to just take a step back and differentiate between needs and wants.
Can you explain what you mean by that? Because I actually think this is actually an interesting one if you pull this back just from talking about embryos to actually innovation more generally as it relates to kind of working on the edges of something.
Francoise Baylis (17:36)
Yes, so I think one of the things that I think happens to all of us is it's so easy to get excited about frontier science.
and to think, wow, that's really cool. And I guess what I'm trying to say is, yes, it might be really cool, but maybe it's not worth doing. And it may not be worth doing partly because of opportunity costs, partly because it doesn't fit in some kind of priority setting. All I'm saying is being really cool science isn't good enough. And I think that one of the ways in which I try to do that is to say, what are the justifications offered for expending time, talent, and treasure to pursue a particular science?
scientific goal or objective. Because that's what you're investing, right? There's only so much money, there's only so much time, there's only so many humans with the capacity to do some of this truly novel frontier work. And so in that space I'm asking us to pull back and say, okay, what are we going to invest in? And I use this language of needs and wants because too often I think we just keep articulating all these wants as if that's sufficient justification. And I am asking people to step back
and think about needs. So if we go back to some of this conversation around the human embryo, reproduction, etc. What we've had recently is the development of CRISPR technology which allows the scientists to modify the DNA of humans. That can happen in a somatic context, meaning taking people's somatic cells, any of their body cells, trying to manipulate them to offer therapeutic intervention. We've been successful with that recently with
cell disease for example. But we also have the capacity to modify our reproductive cells and those are different from our somatic cells, our body cells. And if we look at our reproductive cells, our gametes, so the egg, the sperm, or the very early human embryo, what we're looking to do there is to create a new human without traits that we don't like or with traits that we do like. Now that's the space in which I've started this conversation about the difference between needs and
wants because we have prospective parents coming forward saying I want to use that kind of technology in order to have a child with these traits. Right now because the science is new we're looking at eliminating traits that are thought to be associated with disease or disability. In that context what happens is
People come forward, an example would be cystic fibrosis, and they say, my partner and I would like to have a child. If we use our own gametes, our own sperm and egg, this child will have cystic fibrosis. We don't want a child with cystic fibrosis, so we'll give you our embryos. You'll genetically modify them so they won't have cystic fibrosis. That's a space in which I start saying, ⁓ why do we need the technology for this?
And that's a space in which I then take up the argument and try to suggest you actually don't need this technology for this. Now the response is going to be, but of course we need this. That's the only way we can have healthy, genetically related children. And I come back and I say, well, you can actually have healthy children using all kinds of other technologies that we already have and that aren't costly and that aren't risky. They involve other things like
social responses in terms of adoption or they may involve using donor gametes and the person says that no no no no that's not what I want I want a genetically related healthy child and so then what you realize is what they really want is this genetic link that that's what's most important to them and that's when I say well now we're in the realm of what you want versus what you need if what you really want is to be a parent
there are many ways that we can respond to that want. When you articulate it as a need, it's actually something different. And the reason society needs to pay attention to that distinction is I'm going to argue we have a moral obligation to respond to needs.
we do not have a moral obligation to respond to wants. And the simplest example I give of that is that if I see a human who's hungry, starving, in need of food, I should respond. I have a moral obligation to respond. If I respond and I provide that person with bread and they say back to me, well, actually I'd like a croissant.
I'm sorry, I don't have a moral obligation to find you a croissant. I do have a moral obligation to respond to your need for food. And so I'm trying to get people to understand what is the claim that you're making on humanity, and it is a claim on humanity because it's time, talent, and treasure which are limited resources.
James Taylor (22:42)
And you're already seeing, I guess, an early version of this in non-human animals, let's say animals that use pigs, cows, sheep. I know there's a lot of discussion here in the UK, just in Scotland just now around gene editing of getting rid of certain traits within farm animals in order that they can be used better. They're going to get less diseases, other things as well. So you're kind of seeing a little bit of a...
We've seen like the old version of this, which was all the dogs with the noses where they can't breathe because they've been bred multiple times, have very short snouts and everything, and it causes them lots and lots of problems. But as humans, we like the look of that particular type of dog with that particular face. does your work ever kind of link into the, we've been talking about humans, but what about non-human animals? Does your work ever kind of link into that and what our responsibility is to them?
Francoise Baylis (23:35)
So in this space, I have said quite forcefully, why is it that we humans think we can take everything?
and just appropriate it for our own needs, our own use, our own interests. And this is the space in which I have made that claim. you you gave an example of the ways in which we modify non-human animals, and in part, that's all motivated by ourselves. It's not motivated by doing something that's good for that non-human animal. So, for example, you know, we want to modify cats so that we don't have an allergic reaction to them. We want to modify cows and bulls so they don't have horns that hurt.
us. We want to modify mosquitoes so that they don't give us some kind of disease that we don't want. And the list goes on and on and on. And in that space I keep thinking why is it that we don't think that this is about finding ways for us to live together as opposed to us thinking that it's up to us to manage everything in our interest.
I think that's a fundamental mistake and I think that we will bear the consequences of that kind of thinking, especially as we are now starting to explore ideas about not only appropriating and exploiting everything on this planet but perhaps going to other planets where we don't know what kind of life there might be on those planets and if we think it's okay to just go and you know appropriate everything when we visit these other places might we be on the receiving end of that kind of thinking and so I really
do think it's really important for us to think about where we should be appropriating resources and where we should be thinking of other things on this planet not as resources for us. And I think that's a classic example where we do think it's for us as opposed to finding ways of living together.
James Taylor (25:28)
The final thing I wanted to touch on was I always love having guests like yourself who come on introducing me to new ideas, new concepts. And one of the ones which I hadn't really heard before and I kind of trying to get my head around a little bit is you've done work on relational autonomy. So this idea of relational, so in a world where AI can help us make decisions about traits, it can help us think about embryos and we're seeing a lot of fantastic stuff around protein folding, for example, using AI to think about that, neurotech and
or that side, how do we need to rethink the idea of a free will, of a selfhood? Because I know if I guess on here before, I've talked a lot about this link between identity and our creativity. So how do you challenge this assumption of us being completely self-sufficient? And can you explain to me as a lay person, this idea of relational autonomy, what it is, and how does it kind of link into the work that you do?
around bioethics.
Francoise Baylis (26:30)
So I think one of the things that's core to this idea of relational autonomy is challenging mainstream views about autonomy.
So especially in high income countries and what we would describe as the global north, in recent years, and it is relatively recent, we've kind of embraced this idea that when we think about what it means to engage respectfully with others, that we should respect their autonomy. This grounds, for example, a lot of our thinking around informed consent, whether that's in the context of therapeutic interventions, research interventions, even just in the context of democracy, right? We should consent to be governed. ⁓
is to recognize that in this space we've kind of been bought into this assumption that we're all individual atoms just bouncing around in the world doing whatever it is we want to do and I'm saying well if you actually stop and think that's not really how we work we are not just these rational beings doing whatever we think is rational in the abstract in fact when we do our decision-making we very often stop and think how will this affect my children how will this affect my partner how will this affect my
parents, my community, my workplace, my space in the world. And so I'm saying rational beings actually really do understand they're relational and they actually don't make these decisions as if they're just these autonomous self-interested individuals. And so we really need to question all the philosophies around the world that are grounded in that belief and we need to reimagine the human not as this independent rational autonomous being but as this being that
embodied, this being that is relational and understand better the ways in which we engage with others, whether it's respectful or not, remains to be seen. But it is to say that's the quality of engagement. And so in this space I've tried to embrace a lot of things. That's why I constantly talk about consensus building and I have all kinds of people saying, how Pollyanna should view, isn't that lovely that there are people who still think we can build consensus. ⁓ I do think that.
I have to think that in a hopeful world because otherwise we are just embracing conflict. And so if we're committed to consensus building, I believe even if we never reach consensus on a particular challenge, we'll all be better off for having tried. So I believe in that kind of consensus building. I believe in collaborative ambition. I believe in respectful engagement where we can disagree, but we can actually understand why we hold different views and values and still be committed to finding
a space where we can interact respectfully. So I think the important
James Taylor (29:12)
So it sounds like
it kind of pushes against almost a little bit the kind of Richard Dawkins say position, that kind of selfish gene, that we are purely expressions of our genes and our genetics and whether we don't know unless we're doing these things, but it's because our gene wants to procreate and continue. You're kind of basically pushing against that side. You're saying, no, no, I think it's a little bit more complicated than that.
Francoise Baylis (29:40)
I do think we're more complicated than that, but I do need to acknowledge that many people do in fact embrace that kind of thinking from Richard Dawkins, and I think that's why we're seeing, and I'll use the term tech bros, ⁓ invest heavily in this technology. And some of it's in the context of, you know, longevity and themselves wanting to live forever. But another set of research that they're funding quite heavily is the genetic modification of humans with the idea that somehow they're going to take this
technology and be able to entrench their privilege in their DNA. So they will not only be the rich people, the powerful people, ultimately they'll be the only people because their genes are thought from their perspective to be the best ones and they're going to ensure that they improve them so they'll commit themselves to enhancement but they're going to be the clay that needs to be you know molded and shaped. So I think there is absolutely a lot of people who buy into this genetic determinism in effect and
who really do see that happening and they're now trying to just, if you will, contest Darwin as well and layer on top of that technology that will allow them to survive. So they're thinking that there's still the capacity to kind of control the gene. I think they're mistaken, but I do think we also need to push back against that kind of genetic determinism.
James Taylor (31:03)
Fascinating. So as we start to finish up here, some final questions for you. In your own work, often when we have people on the show, one of the questions I'll often ask is, we were talking about collaboration earlier, who is that creative pair that you have? Who is that person you go to maybe with the kernel of an idea who pushes back, maybe thinks slightly differently to you? I think about like Marion Pierre Curie or the husband and wife couple that gave us the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine. Who is that Yin-Tio Yang? Who is that other person that you often go to?
Francoise Baylis (31:35)
I guess I would almost want to say it's the collectivity of those who work in the science space who I think are still blinkered.
And so for me the challenge is to engage them in conversation and to get them to see that there might be reasons to sort of open up their field of vision and to basically see things from a perspective other than their sort of enthusiastic pursuit of their science. Now I give all scientists the benefit of the doubt in so far as I truly believe they're kind of one or two ends of the spectrum. So in one sense I just love science, I just love knowledge and I'm just doing my thing.
in my little corner. ⁓ And at the other end, I'm really deeply committed to using my science to achieve this goal, which I think is good for humanity. So do I know there are bad actors in the world? Yes, I do. But I really want to focus on the people who might find themselves at either of those extremes. And I believe in what others would recognize as radical hospitality. I want to invite you in. Let's have a conversation.
James Taylor (32:41)
That's a very ⁓
Canadian tone. ⁓
Francoise Baylis (32:47)
Well, you know,
we're kind of open-minded and we like to have conversations, or at least I do. But I think, you know, think about all the kinds of words I'm throwing out there. Those are actually hooks. They're handles for people to hold onto. What does it mean to think about collaborative ambition? What does it mean to think about relational autonomy? What does it mean to think about radical hospitality? What does it mean to commit to consensus building? All of this...
at end of the day is my life's work. And why do I say that? Because in my book and most recently just constantly repeating in ethics, there's only one question worth answering and all other questions come off of that. And we have lost sight of that first and most fundamental question. And that question is, what kind of world do you want to live in? And it's only when you've answered that question that you can then turn to the second question, which is, and how will this text
Technology helped me build that world and I worry that we've lost sight of the first question and we're just thinking about how will this technology help me and we forget what kind of a world did you think you were building and this is so critically important
even if you're just thinking about it from a science techno point of view. And the easiest way for me to underline that is if we're talking about genome editing technology, which is the space I'm working in now, and we're talking about it in the context of reproduction, so we're looking to modify the next generation of humans, you have to know.
What kind of world are you building? Because at the very basic level you need to know, are you making modifications for that new human to live on this planet? Are you making modifications of that new human to live in outer space, a spaceship, Mars? What are you doing? You have to understand the world you want to build. And I'm taking it beyond the sort of biological environment to the social environment. What kind of relationships do you want to foster? What kinds of things do you need?
Will you have, again, bad actors? People that ultimately are just interested in power? Yes.
And part of my job is to find those individuals and to try to encourage them to reflect on some of their core values and commitments. And that's a huge project and I will fail. I will fail in my lifetime. But my work is about leaving breadcrumbs for others. And so it's seeding these ideas that I have and hoping that the next generation, someone will pick them up and continue this project.
James Taylor (35:19)
think on that first question you asked us to reflect on about what you want that future to look like, what that future will look like, it's one the things I feel saddest about just now in terms of fiction, where so much of the things that are on films, TV are dystopian visions of the future. ⁓ It's very rare that you get a film that there was a film a few years ago, Contact, which is beautiful film about space and...
And was a more optimistic view and some of the things you kind of spoke about, about that radical hospitality kind of linked to that as well. But my worry is that ⁓ a lot of the fiction we're seeing today and lot of the creativity is going into creating great films and movies and books are painting a picture towards a future that is slightly on that dystopian side, that darker side as well. And I kind of worry about that.
Is there a book, I was always told that you should always go through a year, the end of the year and change something that you fundamentally believed in at the start of the year. So your view is completely changed on an idea. Is there a book, maybe not your own, that really changed the way you thought about something, completely changed your view, your perspective on something that could be related to ethics or the future, really kind of, really under, change your assumptions about how you think about the world.
Francoise Baylis (36:44)
of books that I could put in that space, but I think one of the ones that I found quite interesting is called Shantamaran. And it actually tells the story of a young man who's in prison and who escapes. I don't even know if that could happen in this day and age, but anyhow, he manages to escape from the prison, makes his way to India. And the book is basically autobiographical. ⁓ And it talks about his sense of self and
the shifting and I think part of the reason that particular book struck me is because I don't intersect very much with people who find themselves in prison. I certainly don't intersect in my life with people who are escapees from prison. I don't intersect with people who are in circles of violence, ⁓ which is what he finds himself in, ⁓ in the drug trade, et cetera. And so for me, it was an interesting window into a world that I am not familiar with.
But I also see a moral trajectory in there. ⁓ Eventually, after years, he actually turns himself in, goes back to Australia, finishes his time, ⁓ becomes a public speaker and has a new life. And so I think for me, it's just fascinating, just the narrative of that kind of a life, which I'm not exposed to, but the capacity for lived experience to shift the way you see and understand yourself in the world. ⁓
hand it just to offer a comment about you know your other remark around dystopias. I think it's much easier and this is not my work this is other people who have said very loudly and clearly it's much easier to imagine the end of the world partly because we have all these representations than it is to imagine something else ⁓ that's positive and utopian and I guess
One thing I would offer up almost, I guess, as a closing remark for me is maybe we need to think about where we find ourselves right now. There's a way in which we can think about the current time we're living with all of its chaos and disruption ⁓ as the end of an era, the end of an empire, whatever you want to describe. But there's a sense in which I think many people are feeling vulnerable and anxious. We're seeing an increase of all the things I don't believe in, in terms of posturing and
and violence, etc. ⁓ There's another way that we could be thinking about this as birth pangs for a new world, a better world, and that maybe we need to go through this. I don't know, ⁓ but that says something if you choose an orientation and there is a choice to be made there. If you think we are going through birthing pangs, then maybe you respond differently to the world in this moment, this very difficult moment. So there's a way in which you can be a realist. You can say, yeah, this is not a great place right now and these are all the reasons.
But is it because we're witnessing the demise or is it because we're witnessing a rebirth? And we may not know in our lifetime, right? Because these kinds of things take, history tells us, hundreds of years. But for every new civilization to appear, an old one has to disappear. And they are times of turbulence. So I think we're living through one of those times. I think history will tell us we're living through one of those times.
James Taylor (39:57)
birth
I like that.
I like that. Birth pangs, I like that idea. If people want to go deeper into your work to learn more about your writing, your research that you're doing just now as well, I know you travel around the world speaking, you're giving talks and being parts of different conferences, where is the best place for to go and find out about that information?
Francoise Baylis (40:19)
Well, I try to curate my public facing work on my own website, which is just my name as one word, françoisbales.ca for Canada. But if you put my name into something, you will easily get to my university website, which would be sort of more academic. But I'm actually mostly committed to the work that I'm doing that's public facing, because I think that's the one that that's the community I really want to speak with. ⁓ I really want to share ideas with people who are interested in
themselves being brought into a space where they can explore their own ideas. And so I think if I put enough of them out there, people are going to want to engage with at least one little facet ⁓ of my work. What I'm working on right now is courage. What does it mean to be courageous? And so that work's not out yet. I'm going to probably play with that. It takes me a long time to actually solidify certain kinds of ideas, but I'm asking us to think about what's moral courage? What's intellectual courage? What is it that we need at this moment in time?
we know it if we saw it? ⁓ We think we know courage when we see it. My thesis is often we don't because what might get perceived as courage actually wasn't courageous from the point of view of the individual. So that will take me into questions around power and position. ⁓ So I'm excited about my new work but I do want to say that
If you want a really big picture view about who I am and what I believe in and the kinds of themes we've talked about, they are all in my book, Altered Inheritance, and it's an old book by Today's Standards, 2019, but I think it's...
It's the same book I would write today, but with a different technology. So if we wanted to say, we were talking today about AI, which is sort of the frontier science, I'd write the exact same book. I would just have different illustrations because the book is about what kind of world do we want to live in. And that's the invitation for people to think about that.
James Taylor (42:14)
Well, Francoise Baylis, thank you for sharing your wisdom, your clarity, your courage, and your fierce commitment to a more thoughtful human future. It's been a real pleasure having you on the Super Creativity Podcast. Thank you.
Francoise Baylis (42:26)
Well, thank you for great questions that allowed me to expand on a lot of ideas. I really appreciate that.
The post Ethics, Gene Editing, CRISPR & Moral Courage with Françoise Baylis #371 appeared first on James Taylor.
More shows like SuperCreativity Podcast with James Taylor | Creativity, Innovation and Inspiring Ideas
View all
BBC Inside Science
413 Listeners
The Rest Is Politics
3,727 Listeners
Empire: World History
2,493 Listeners
The Rest Is Politics: US
2,464 Listeners