Prometheus

Should we try to make ourselves better physically, mentally, morally? Should we try a eugenics program? We could alleviate so much suffering - of the "thousand natural shocks that flesh is heir to" we could get rid of maybe 900.

We have always been able to alter human nature, but recent discoveries have considerably enhanced our abilities. We could make people more intelligent, more creative, more athletic. We could make people better suited to monogamy. No one would have to be born with a propensity for addiction or excessive weight gain. We could make people who are more altruistic - who wouldn't commit crimes, who wouldn't allow anyone to go hungry, wouldn't permit war, wouldn't tolerate cruelty of any kind, or even indifference. We could banish inherited disease of all kinds. Why wouldn't we bestow these benefits on our children? Do we like suffering? Should we get busy sticking pins in each other?

Of course playing about with human nature can be dangerous. Here are some objections:

Objection - What if the program fell into the wrong hands - some sinister cabal? Would they manufacture a race of soldiers, obedient and deadly? Or make a herd of pig-people, self-satisfied and pleasure-oriented? Or build a monster like Frankenstein's? Or, conversely, will their creation be so tepid, so dull, so unable to give offense as to drown us all in a (luke-warm) sea of blandness. We'll all perish of insipidity.Response - These mistakes are not inherent in a eugenics program and can be avoided.
Objection - It is impious to alter our nature.Response - (Just as it was impious to rise above our station or invent the airplane.) We were made by our Creator to aspire and improving our nature is one of our grandest aspirations.
Objection - A eugenics program requires coercion.Response - Coercion is not unknown at present. Have they stopped writing regulations? Making arrests? Dropping bombs? At present all the manipulation, all the force only brings about the apotheosis of certain unworthy individuals.
Objection - A eugenics program favors aristocracy.Response - A eugenics program and democracy can coexist. The program should be entirely meritocratic, and everyone, regardless of their genetic endowment, should be cared for and respected.
Objection - A eugenics program is racist.Response - There is no necessary connection between eugenics and racism. Personally I look forward to a time when everyone is kind of tan.
Objection - In the wake of eugenics life will be boring.Response - Is it really necessary for so many children to die of leukemia or war (for instance) to provide us with entertainment? A desperate, never-resting search for drama does not find happiness. If some thinkers hold that a dearth of evil or suffering exists they can always (with the best motives) drive nails into their friend's eyes.
Objection to a eugenics program that aims at improving our morals - We are already pretty good, or at least capable of becoming pretty good. If only the political or economic system was fixed, we would approach Utopia, which is just around the corner.Response - Both the French and Russian Revolutions descended into terror and despotism, destroying the hopes of naive humanists. Even the most successful countries are plagued with suicide, divorce, addiction and other social ills. Many nations still suffer war, police oppression, ethnic conflict, etc.
Objections to a eugenics program that aims at improving our morals - If the conflict of man vs. man vanishes, if the conflict of man vs. himself disappears as well, we will be diminished. If soldiers are no longer required to charge the foe, nor ascetics to trek into the desert, the necessary result will be mere lassitude.Response - Life will still be worth living even if we neglect to torment our neighbors or ourselves. The conflict of man vs. the physical world will remain, and this struggle will be enough (sometimes too much). We will not run short of obstacles: To create we will have to contend with physical objects that are not always plastic. We will have to contend with the law of gravity also. To explore we will have to battle mountains, ocean currents, steaming jungles, frozen continents. I do not know which will challenge our understanding more - infinitely large distances of space or infinitely small particles. Accidents and finally death will frustrate our deepest desire for permanence. Obstacles will remain, only now we will go out to meet them with an undivided heart.

Why does science always have to serve such ridiculous ends? Thanks to the genius of our scientists we can now build amazingly destructive bombs. Thanks to remarkable improvements in microprocessors and materials we can now buy products that will never benefit us at all in any way.
In the wealthy countries many are alive only because of massive medical intervention. If these people reproduce defective genes could be passed on to the children. We are faced with a long-term problem: succeeding generations will be less and less healthy.
The religious hope God's grace will help us become better. Humanists think we already have become better. Conservatives favor vigorous punishments (stoning?, the rack?) to force us to become better. So why would any of them object when we actually become better? Is it really so necessary to maintain our precise current levels of rottenness?
Once, tens of thousands of years ago, we shared the earth with other hominid species. we helped exterminate them, however, and gained dominion over the world. Someday the more advanced humans created by eugenics will succeed us. What could be more fitting?