According to a team of British scientists and ethicists, experiments to “humanize” apes should be carefully regulated and certain experiments banned. In its report, Animals Containing Human Material, the working group begins with the obvious claim that “animals are not humans.” They then worry about three types of animal-human research. The first would be the insertion of human brain tissue into apes to research Parkinson’s:
The key question, which cannot at present be answered with any certainty, is whether populating an animal’s brain with human cells could result in that animal developing some elements of human consciousness, or ‘human-like’ behaviour and awareness.
This is the Planet of the Apes scenario. What if, in monkeying around with ape brains, they become human, or human-like? What then?
The second area of worrisome research involves the reproductive system:
. . . some work does result in the presence of functional human sperm and/or egg cells in animals – which raises the remote possibility that fertilisation between human and animal germ cells might inadvertently occur.
What do we do with a viable human-ape embryo? We dare not transfer it to a surrogate mother and deliver the baby, but, for those of us who think human embryonic life is sacred, we also wouldn’t want scientists to kill the embryo.
Finally, the working group is troubled by research “involving human appearance or behavioural traits.” Humanizing ape limbs and faces could blur the visual species distinctions that have been so important in preventing us from confusing Koko the chimp with grandma. God did not make species distinctions for nothing. He made the animals reproduce “according to their kinds” (Genesis 1:24). And we all know that when animals are bred outside their “kind” either the offspring die or we get hybrids, like mules, the infertile combination of a donkey and a horse.
Why would scientists want to do these things? To see if they can, of course. That’s often how science works and that’s what scientists do.
Wisdom, especially biblical wisdom, is in relatively short supply these days, not least in the biological sciences. That’s not to say that every scientist is a Dr. Frankenstein who can’t wait to get his hands on the next corpse to see if he can bring it to life, but the virtue of scientific innovation has to be balanced with the virtue of restraint. Compassion must be balanced with the virtue of justice. It takes nothing less than the wisdom of Solomon to know where to draw the lines around human-animal research.
Alert Christians must pay attention to these things. We need to help shepherd science in ethically appropriate directions. We can’t do that if we put our heads in the sand—a metaphor of human-animal hybridization! Think about it.