Seminar on Ethical and Policy Issues Arising From the Project to Map and Sequence the Human Genome

加州理工学院的Daniel Kevles教授和Leroy Hood教授为1989/1990学年组织了一次研讨会，讨论与人类基因组计划有关的伦理和政策问题。该研讨会将汇集与新的生物技术科学技术中心（STC）有关的教职员工、研究人员和学生，以及位于人文学部的加州理工学院科学、伦理和公共政策项目的成员和附属机构。在洛杉矶地区，从事基因组计划的专家和人文主义者，或关注围绕该计划的伦理问题的专家和人文主义者也将参加。在这笔资金的支持下，凯夫尔斯教授和胡德教授将邀请加州理工学院的外部演讲者参加本次研讨会的八次会议。这些研讨会将审查的问题集中在与完成基因组的绘制和排序以及基因组计划将产生的信息有关的伦理和政策问题上。关于基因组绘制和测序的问题，发言者将研究基因组计划对生物学的一般影响，包括项目的速度和战略、对研发资源分配的影响、国际合作的前景以及对生物学行为的可能影响等问题。关于以项目所产生的信息为中心的问题，发言者将讨论诸如信息的“所有权”和如何使用信息等问题。科学家和人文主义者将在人类基因组计划的发展中发挥核心作用，解决这些问题至关重要。他们携手合作，避免可能困扰这项计划的道德困境，从而增加公众对这项计划的信心和支持。作为生物技术STC的所在地，几乎没有一个更好的地方来进行这样的讨论。

Professors Daniel Kevles and Leroy Hood of the California Institute of Technology have organized a seminar for the 1989/1990 academic year to address issues of ethics and policy related to the human genome project. The seminar will bring together faculty, research staff, and students associated with the new Science and Technology Center (STC) for Biotechnology with members and affiliates of the Caltech Program on Science, Ethics, and Public Policy, which is situated in the Humanities Division. Specialists and humanists working on the genome project or concerned with the ethical issues surrounding it in the Los Angeles area will also participate. With support from this grant, Professors Kevles and Hood will bring to Caltech outside speakers for eight sessions of this seminar. The issues to be examined at these seminars center on the ethical and policy issues concerned with accomplishing the mapping and sequencing of the genome and with the information that the genome project will produce. With respect to the issues surrounding the mapping and sequencing of the genome, speakers will examine the implications of the genome project for biology in general, including questions of the pace and strategy of the project, its implications for the allocation of R&D resources, prospects for international cooperation, and likely impact upon the conduct of biology. With respect to issues centering on the information produced by the project, speakers will address such concerns as "ownership" of the information and how the information is to be used. It is vitally important that these kinds of issues be addressed by scientists and humanists who will play central roles in the development of the human genome project. Working together to avoid the ethical quagmires which could beset this project, they may increase public confidence in and support of the project. As the site of the STC for biotechnology, there is hardly a better place for such discussions to take place.