A look at genetic engineering that provides valuable background for rethinking the appropriate uses for these technologies.
A sober reflection on the promises and perils of genetic engineering.
A professor of zoology at the University of Manchester and the author of Life's Greatest Secret: The Race To Crack the Genetic Code, among other books, Cobb investigates three areas of molecular biology that raise enormous safety and ethical concerns: heritable human gene editing, gene drives, and viral gain-of-function research. In order to fairly assess the current state of these fields, he recounts the history of recombinant DNA research as well as the initial steps toward its commercial exploitation in medicine and agriculture. Readers without a solid understanding of biology will likely find that the scientific complexity of the history robs it of some of its drama. Cobb’s focus, however, is not on the science itself but on the social and political context of these discoveries. In particular, he examines the few moments in which scientists themselves sought to organize public debate about the potential consequences of their work. Most interestingly, Cobb contends that the famous 1975 Asilomar conference, while well intentioned, was limited by its focus on laboratory safety and lacked sufficient discussion of the broader ethical issues surrounding genetic manipulation. This view informs the main conclusion the author aims at the funders, scientists, and policymakers who are his primary audience. He believes the excitement surrounding “inevitable technical solutions,” such as CRISPR gene editing, often distracts from posing a more fundamental question, one that encompasses a wider variety of disciplines other than molecular biology: To which pressing problems are these techniques the safest and simplest solutions? While Cobb is careful to note that there are important potential applications in the three areas that concern him, he concludes that a great deal of research remains a risky solution in search of a problem.
A look at genetic engineering that provides valuable background for rethinking the appropriate uses for these technologies.Pub Date: Nov. 15, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-5416-0285-4
Page Count: 464
Publisher: N/A
Review Posted Online: Sept. 13, 2022
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 1, 2022
Some of Avant’s mantras are overstated, but her book is magnanimous, inspiring, and relentlessly optimistic.
Memories and life lessons inspired by the author’s mother, who was murdered in 2021.
“Neither my mother nor I knew that her last text to me would be the words ‘Think you’ll be happy,’ ” Avant writes, "but it is fitting that she left me with a mantra for resiliency.” The author, a filmmaker and former U.S. Ambassador to the Bahamas, begins her first book on the night she learned her mother, Jacqueline Avant, had been fatally shot during a home invasion. “One of my first thoughts,” she writes, “was, ‘Oh God, please don’t let me hate this man. Give me the strength not to hate him.’ ” Daughter of Clarence Avant, known as the “Black Godfather” due to his work as a pioneering music executive, the author describes growing up “in a house that had a revolving door of famous people,” from Ella Fitzgerald to Muhammad Ali. “I don’t take for granted anything I have achieved in my life as a Black American woman,” writes Avant. “And I recognize my unique upbringing…..I was taught to honor our past and pay forward our fruits.” The book, which is occasionally repetitive, includes tributes to her mother from figures like Oprah Winfrey and Bill Clinton, but the narrative core is the author’s direct, faith-based, unwaveringly positive messages to readers—e.g., “I don’t want to carry the sadness and anger I have toward the man who did this to my mother…so I’m worshiping God amid the worst storm imaginable”; "Success and feeling good are contagious. I’m all about positive contagious vibrations!” Avant frequently quotes Bible verses, and the bulk of the text reflects the spirit of her daily prayer “that everything is in divine order.” Imploring readers to practice proactive behavior, she writes, “We have to always find the blessing, to be the blessing.”
Some of Avant’s mantras are overstated, but her book is magnanimous, inspiring, and relentlessly optimistic.Pub Date: Oct. 17, 2023
ISBN: 9780063304413
Page Count: 288
Publisher: HarperOne
Review Posted Online: Aug. 17, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 2023
Alternately admiring and critical, unvarnished, and a closely detailed account of a troubled innovator.
A warts-and-all portrait of the famed techno-entrepreneur—and the warts are nearly beyond counting.
To call Elon Musk (b. 1971) “mercurial” is to undervalue the term; to call him a genius is incorrect. Instead, Musk has a gift for leveraging the genius of others in order to make things work. When they don’t, writes eminent biographer Isaacson, it’s because the notoriously headstrong Musk is so sure of himself that he charges ahead against the advice of others: “He does not like to share power.” In this sharp-edged biography, the author likens Musk to an earlier biographical subject, Steve Jobs. Given Musk’s recent political turn, born of the me-first libertarianism of the very rich, however, Henry Ford also comes to mind. What emerges clearly is that Musk, who may or may not have Asperger’s syndrome (“Empathy did not come naturally”), has nurtured several obsessions for years, apart from a passion for the letter X as both a brand and personal name. He firmly believes that “all requirements should be treated as recommendations”; that it is his destiny to make humankind a multi-planetary civilization through innovations in space travel; that government is generally an impediment and that “the thought police are gaining power”; and that “a maniacal sense of urgency” should guide his businesses. That need for speed has led to undeniable successes in beating schedules and competitors, but it has also wrought disaster: One of the most telling anecdotes in the book concerns Musk’s “demon mode” order to relocate thousands of Twitter servers from Sacramento to Portland at breakneck speed, which trashed big parts of the system for months. To judge by Isaacson’s account, that may have been by design, for Musk’s idea of creative destruction seems to mean mostly chaos.
Alternately admiring and critical, unvarnished, and a closely detailed account of a troubled innovator.Pub Date: Sept. 12, 2023
ISBN: 9781982181284
Page Count: 688
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Review Posted Online: Sept. 12, 2023
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Oct. 15, 2023
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