Abstract
There is good evidence that height is socially and economically beneficial to males. Consider two parents with otherwise healthy sons. One wants to obtain medical treatment to change her son’s ultimate projected height from 150 (4′11′) to 160 cm (5′3″). The other would give similar medication to increase her son’s projected final height from 190 (6′3′) to 200 cm (6′7″). This chapter explores some of the theoretical and practical considerations in (1) using biomedical technology to change a characteristic of a child from socially disfavored to typical; or (2) to change a characteristic from excellent to outstanding (in terms of societal norms). Prospects are poor for changing norms themselves with regard to important features of interpersonal competition such as mating desirability or markers of social dominance. It is necessary to directly confront the question of when (if ever) it should be permissible to change the child’s body, or even the child’s genotype, to allow him to better succeed within his culture. This leads to interesting ways to frame problems that do not necessary lend themselves to definitive recommendations.
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Notes
- 1.
The effect of height on non-cis-heterosexual attraction has not been well-studied.
- 2.
Mating success does not necessarily translate into greater reproduction, due to conscious desires to limit childbearing both by men and by women.
- 3.
For purposes of disclosure, I am a man whose height is 178 cm.
- 4.
In females, there may a trade-off between occupational and social success, at least at taller height ranges. For girls, there is the dilemma that adult height may have opposite effects on occupational and mating success.
- 5.
The multiauthor Parens volume presents diverse points of view, most of which are skeptical towards parental authority in this area, and some of which would reject treatment of children who cannot consent.
- 6.
How is it possible to explain preservation of genes that seem maladaptive, such as genes that determine Tay-Sachs disease, or that enhance the odds for schizophrenia? Evolution results in group, or kin, adaptation, and not individual adaptation (Del Giudice and Ellis 2016). Keller and Miller propose three reasons for persistence of deleterious genes. First, a changed environment may remove the adaptiveness of the allele. Second, the heterozygous state may have survival advantage, though the homozygous state is deleterious. Third, the characteristic or disease in question may be polygenetic. Some allelic combinations of relevant genes may be beneficial, and others deleterious. In addition, epigenetic factors may determine whether a genetic allele is beneficial or harmful (Del Giudice and Ellis 2016).
- 7.
Some features of attractiveness are cultural, while others are innate.
- 8.
Macdonald’s (1963) triad of enuresis, animal cruelty and fire-setting in children as a predictor of violent crime (Hellman and Blackman 2006) is widely accepted, but the importance of the presence of all elements of the triad is controversial. It is not far-fetched to speculate that highly predictive future discovery of childhood behavioral markers (or even biological markers) highly sensitive for subsequent serial violent behavior could transpire, and invite intervention.
- 9.
The prevalence of ADHD is somewhat lower in Europe (2–7%), perhaps because of underdiagnosis (Sayal et al. 2018). Unlike in North America, medicine is used as second-line treatment, after behavioral therapy, but the use of stimulants is increasing.
- 10.
The possibility of genetic surgery makes this hypothetical even more powerful.
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Jacobs, A.J. (2022). Enhancement of Function. In: Assigning Responsibility for Children’s Health When Parents and Authorities Disagree: Whose Child?. The International Library of Bioethics, vol 90. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-87698-2_10
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