appendix q 
MAY RESEARCH BE SlOEl'ED’ — COHEN 
rcquiremcius arc not germane here. One seeks to dis- 
cover reasons that may serve to deny approval. What- 
ever the decision-making machinery, the individu- 
al users of that machinery need grounds for conclud- 
ing yea or nay. These grounds — not the system^ of 
their application — are what I am. concerned with 
here. 
Finally, I note that the six alternative principles are 
not mutually exclusive; one could rationally hold 
(say) both (3) [on killing], and some variant of (6) 
[risks over benefits]. They may overlap, relying upon 
the same feature of a given inquiry — for example, 
what is objectionable under (4) [openness] may also 
be objectionable under (5) [unfairness]. 
It remains to determine which (if any) of these prin- 
ciples should be adopted, and which (if any) apply to 
the sphere of recombinant DNA research, and to iden- 
tify the restrictions (if any) that properly follow there- 
from. 
The Six Principles Reconsidered 
What follows is a critical appraisal of the six al- 
ternative principles listed above. The conclusions 
reached unavoidably rely upon some personal judg- 
ments, but a.f'e put forward for general agreement. 
Principles Based upon the Product of Research (^1-#3) 
(1) “Research should not be permitted w'hen it 
aims at (or likely to result in) the discovery of knowl- 
edge that is w'l'ong for human beings to possess.” 
This principle should be rejected utterly. There is 
no body of knowledge, or item of knowledge, that is 
intri.nsically wrong to possess. The conviction that 
theie are forbidden precincts, that there is an intel- 
lectual sanctum sanctorum into which all entry is sin- 
ful, must rely upon some claim of special revelation, or 
some other nonrational restriction that has no right- 
ful authority to limit inquiry in a university or re- 
search institution. 
Principles of privacy, it is true, may render certain 
sorts of knowledge about individuals not suitable for 
public scrutiny. But there is a vast difference between 
the claim that some knowledge is not properly public 
and the claim that some knowledge is intrinsically 
unfit for human acquisition. Individuals are free, of 
course, to limit themselves if they honestly hold be- 
liefs of the latter sort. The search here, however, is not 
for principles that some persons may cling to but for 
the principles research institutions ought to defend. 
Note that this principle, (1), is widely attractive. 
Much of the anxiety that attends DNA re.^earch, I 
submit, flows from vague, unformulated doubts about 
whether this probe into “the code of life itself” might 
not be a form of human presumption, a playing of 
God. One is understandably awed by the cumulative 
powers of human intelligence; those powers can be 
(and often have been) misused. But fear of that mis- 
use does not give rational warrant for closing the ave- 
nues of exploration. If one did believe that there are 
domains in which human knowing is taboo, molecu- 
lar genetics might indeed be one of them. Inquiry in- 
to nucie.nr fusion or celestial exploration mn'ght then 
be equally taboo, as m'ght be the study of theories of 
relativity, or the development of contraceptive tech- 
nics. The penetration of every intellectual frontier 
threatens deeply held convictions. Every striking ad- 
vance in human prowess .Tightens many, horrifies 
some and appears to a few as the profane invasion of 
the holy of holies. The difficulty lies not in discrimi- 
nating between the real holy of holies and those only 
mistakenly supposed; it lies in the unwarranted as- 
sumption that there are any spheres of knowledge to 
which ingress is forbidden. This first principle is whol- 
ly untenable; a fortiori it is not tenable as applied to 
the biochemistry of genetics. 
(2) “Research should not be permitted when it 
aims at (or is likely to result in) the discovery of 
knowledge that is not wise to place in luunan hands.” 
Of this principle I distinguish three varieties, de- 
pending on the degree of probability with which great 
injury may be anticipated as a result of the possession 
of that knowledge. Of course, there will be argument 
about what constitutes great injury, about how such 
probabilities are to be calculated or estimated, and 
about what the probabilities are in a par'icular case. 
But supposing rough agreement is reached on these 
matters, the rightness (or wrongnes.sJ of the principle 
here formulated remains to be dciermincd, and is of 
profound importance. 
Principle (2a) [that prohibition of research is justi- 
fied when there is any probability of very injurious 
consequences] may be rejected categorically: it verges 
on the absurd. On that principle one ought not rise 
from bed. 
Principle (2b) [that prohibition of research is justi- 
fied when there is moderate probability of very injuri- 
ous consequences] must be more seriously considered 
— but it too desen’es rejection in the end. It is true, of 
course, that the results of inquiiy will often be such 
that there is some moderate likelihood that iheir use 
will prove very injurious, even disastrous. But the 
ubiquity of such possibilities renders (2b) [as it does 
(2a)] so sweeping as to entail the cessation of a great 
deal of the research — both in biologic and in physi- 
cal sciences — best calculated to improve the human 
condition. 
Nevertheless, serious thinkers have urged the adop- 
tion of somie such principle. Two especially — one a 
historian, and the other a biophysicist — deserve re- 
sponse. 
Shaw Livermore, professor of history at the Uni- 
versity of Michigan, in concluding that his university 
should not proceed with the development of recombi- 
nant DNA technology, argues as follows^ 
(i) Research on recombinant DNA promises the de- 
velopment of a special, elemental capability; that of 
overcoming the natural genetic barriers that separate 
the species, and (ultimately) of uniting genetic com- 
ponents of different species to produce new forms of 
life. 
(ii) This capability wmuld be so great, so over- 
Appendix Q--3 
