Genetic Barriers

            What the future holds for the human race is something that is incredibly difficult to predict and is constantly changing. One concept that is often looked into is what would happen if life turned for the worse. This is a concept that has been explored by scientists and several authors and movie producers, with dozens of books, movies, television shows, and even video games showing different possibilities these have been. These range from exploring space, nuclear war, technological uprisings or just the death of the human race for nature to thrive. The book Oryx and Crake, written by Margaret Atwood, and the movie Gattaca, directed by Andrew Niccol, both predict futures where gene splicing and genetics dominated the planet.

            Gattaca takes place in the not too distant future, where genetics has become so large, up to the point where genetic modification is quite common and used to get the ‘best’ human beings possible. However, along with gene splicing, the society has changed with it, where jobs and education are all based around a person’s genes. In this future world, how far you go in life depends on how good your genes are, as the main character in the movie, Vincent Freeman, is unable to achieve his goal of going into space, as he has a heart problem, is myopic, has an expected life span of 30 years, and has the possibility of obtaining a mental illness. Due to this, he is unable to get the job he desires and must go through illegal methods to achieve his goal.

            The world of Oryx and Crake isn’t far off, as their society is ruled by corporations and seems to lack a government. In this possible future, genetic modification is widely used and big among the different corporations. Gene splicing in particular is especially big, and is even done as a pastime, as several animals were created for no better purpose than to pass their time, these often resulted in very dangerous animals that had to be destroyed. Along with animals, gene splicing created many dangerous viruses that are much more lethal than today’s viruses, capable of reducing a human into a puddle of goo. Splicing isn’t where it stops though, as cloning is a possibility in this universe, as Jimmy’s father tells him once while explaining the roll of pigoons in society.

            In short, both stories show futures that are very different from our own, where gene splicing and dicing has become very large and ends up dominating our life style. According to Atwood and Niccol, the future of human beings will remove anything natural from us, making us more and more reliant, and created, from genetic splicing. One must wonder, after seeing a world controlled by genes and another which freely manipulates them; how far will we go before we realize how much we are over dependent on splicing.